So for my first PE proposal in a while, I give you Paul Gilstrap from the hit detective show, Monk.
What is the Work?[]
The TV show Monk is a live action crime dramedy about a Private Detective named Adrian Monk (played by Tony Shaloub) who suffers from Obsessive compulsive disorder. However, his obsessive tendencies come in handy on his job seeing as to how he notices things the cops wouldn't normally see. He was a cop once but had his badge taken away when he had a nervous breakdown following his wife's, Trudy's, murder. The show started in 2002 and ended in 2009.
The show basically revolves around him solving murders the police can't figure out all the while facing his own fears along the way in an attempt to get his badge back. His assistants (Sharona Fleming in Seasons 1-3 and Natalie Teeger in Seasons 3-8) have to endure his crazy antics as they assist him in his personal needs as well as solving his cases.
Who is He? What does He Do?[]
Paul Gilstrap is a computer technician who works at a lab where they make tetrachlorodrine, an extremely deadly (and fictional mind you) poison that he plans to use to kill his wife with. So he steals some and intends to use to poison one of his wife's Neptune bars. However to cover his tracks, he poisons two other Neptune bars and puts them in a store on Halloween, so that way his wife would just look like another victim of a serial killing. Bare in mind he's doing this on the night of Halloween, knowing full well that children would most likely eat the bars and die from them.
His plan is however, foiled when he's caught putting the poison back, Although he was in the clear due to lack of evidence, he knows he won't be for long once someone dies from the poison and an autopsy is performed. He then buys several Neptune bars but misses two, one of which is going to house of Adrian Monk's brother, Ambrose, and one which was brought by an armed car driver. Knowing that their would be an autopsy on the drive once he dies, Paul intends to shoot the man to death to avoid this from happening. Therefore he follows the poor man to his truck and distracts him long enough for the poison to start taking it's course. As the man is dying from the poison, Paul takes his gun and shoots him to death just to cover his death up.
Once Paul tracks the other candy bar to Ambrose's house, he assaults Ambrose to get to it when the latter won't give him more than once piece of candy, and stalks any child who went to Ambrose's house and scares them so he can steal their candy. However he never gets the poison back and is arrested once Adrian Monk put's two and two together.
Heinous Standards?[]
Paul Gilstrap is one of the most heinous villains of the show whose standards I'd say are pretty high. While killing one's spouse is nothing new to the show, most of the reasons for doing so are all the same. Either they want their spouse's money or the spouse found out they were cheating on them, etc. Paul has absolutely no clear reason for wanting to kill her. There's no mention of money or an affair, and when we see her she is an extremely nice lady which leaves us to believe he wants to kill her just because he's plain sick. Now while Paul may only have one death on his hands compared to other villains who have way more (one of whom killed 12 people), he is the only villain on the show who openly plans to poison children just so he can get away with his wife's murder, which is extremely vile even by the show's standards cause none of them come close to attempted child murder.
There's also the fact that his means of killing the driver is pretty cruel considering he shoots him to death as he's already dying form the poison, just to save his own a--. The only other villain who may compete with is Thereasa Scott whose a Black Widow and I may propose her once I make a page for her. I can't speak for the show's novel villains seeing as to how I haven't read them but I'm pretty sure they're not canon anyways.
Miltigating Factors?[]
None. He has no tragedy or some mental illness to explain him wanting to kill his wife. He does have little screen time and hardly any lines at all (in fact his only line throughout the episode is asking the car driver if he has a light for his cigarette), but his actions in trying to poison his wife and willingness to poison children to cover up her murder are what stand out. He is also not shown to care for anyone other than himself.
As I said before, there is absolutely no reason to believe he has a bad relationship with his wife. When Adrian Monk goes trick-or-treating with Natalie's wife Julie, they arrive at her house and she's very sweet and welcoming. It's also her only scene and she never mentions what her relationship with Paul is like. So while we may not know if she was very loving to Paul, we don't know that she was bad to him in any way and we have good reason to not believe given how sweet she is to Monk and Julie. And even if their relationship is bad that does not in no way justify her murder or those of children to cover her death up.
Paul Gilstrap has proven that he knows what he does is wrong considering he is smart enough to try to cover up his wife's murder to make it look like she was a victim of a serial killing, and he lies about stealing the poison to avoid getting arrested. There's also the fact that he's competent enough to know that he must shoot the car driver to death to keep an autopsy from happening. He also wipes his finger prints off the gun before he leaves to avoid the driver's death being traced to him. Now while he may not have been very careful considering the cashier saw his face, he was more acting impulsively cause he knew the driver would die soon from eating the chocolate bar and he would have a worst chance of getting caught.
Final Verdict[]
Let's see, a guy who wants to kill his wife for no reason and is willing to murder children to cover up said murder of his wife, and who shoots a helpless man to death as he's slowly dying of poison. I say he qualifies.