We finally are here, for this moment, the moment to propose more Spawn villains, now for the three candidates that the film has...and you will ask...why I'm proposing them all at once....that has a simple answer....I don't want to give this movie that much of my time... and the movie is not that long for me to need to do that many proposals...let's just get over with this, this wasn't that much of a good movie or adaptation of Spawn...although Violator was somewhat fun. Let's just end this.
What's The Work?[]
Spawn from 1997 is a movie based in the comic book Spawn made by Todd Mcfarlane. This movie will try to follow the begginings of the character, with him getting killed, coming back to earth as a hellspawn, and wanting to kill the one who pretty much arranged his murder, while a demonic clown tries to get him to do that. In this version, the demon that bringed Al Simmons back, wants him to lead the army of hell, while also wanting him to kill his killer, only to cause the apocalpyse by the use of a bio-weapon, with the clown being there to make sure that it happens, and you know, normal stuff. This proposal is obviously about the three main villains of the film, the demon that brought him back, the clown and Al Simmons's killer, and former boss, those are Malebolgia, Violator and Jason Wynn, the three most known vile villains from the comics.
The demon poorly rendered, the cheerleader clown demon and the guy that has scorpions as pets and has images of explosions on his room and expects no one to know that he is evil. The PE Trio.
Who Are Them? What Have They Done?[]
Let's start in order:
Malebolgia is the overarching antagonist of the film, being the one that pretty much manipulated everything for his plan to cause the apocalypse to happen. Malebolgia in itself, doesn't have that many appearences, although he is present around the film, appearing in some scenes (although when he talks his lips don't move well for some reason). So let's see, I don't that much to talk about him, he is presented as the actual ruler of hell, who have been claiming souls, such as Cogliostro's for a while now, just so he can make an army that could destroy heaven and win that war, for that, he allies himself with Jason Wynn, to cause a lot of deaths for his plans, and get the soul of Al Simmons, so he can make him the one that will lead his army. For this, Malebolgia gets Al killed by Wynn, and manipulates him, very easily, into leading his army if he wants to see Wanda again (Al's wife). Although, like in all adaptations, Malebolgia doesn't tell Al that he revived him 5 years later after his death, while in those 5 years he used Wynn to cause a lot more deaths. Malebolgia also appears to warn Violator, to get Spawn (the now revived Al), to kill Wynn, as Malebolgia got Violator to manipulate Wynn into getting a device in his heart, that if it senses that his heart stops, then all the bombs with the bio-weapon would go off, killing millions. Malebolgia also appears at the end, where he gets multiples other Spawns to try to kill our Spawn, after seeing that he betrayed them, although Spawn gets to escape with Cogliostro, with Spawn thinking on killing Malebolgia someday.
Violator is the main antagonist of the film, being pretty much the mentor of Spawn, who is send by Malebolgia to make sure that Spawn does what he needs to do. Violator, of course, has a lot more appearences in the film, being the one who makes the deal with Jason Wynn directly, about letting him take over the earth if he helps hell to destroy the heavens, by getting Al killed to use him as the leader of hell's army, showing a lot of sadism in what he does, enjoying every part of his work. Violator is generally with Spawn all the time, tormenting him at all moment (like showing him his own corpse and making fun of his new appearence), wanting to corrupt him, as usual, into killing people that will join to Hell's army. Violator is seen pleased, when Spawn tries to kill Wynn and gets to kill his right hand woman (Jessica Priest), just to later convince Wynn into getting a device in his heart that will get the Heat-16 bio-weapon to go off and kill millions of people on earth if Wynn dies, and of course, all of this in his plan of getting Spawn to kill him to cause that. After this events, Violator fights Spawn, revealing his true form, which makes him pretty much an animalistic giant thing, that beats Spawn up. Now at the end of the film, Violator tries to get Spawn to kill Wynn, by attacking Al's former family, and getting stabbed by Wynn while taking the shape of Wanda, so this would get Spawn in rage and kill Wynn, and with that, kickstarting the apocalypse. After seeing his plans fail, Violator reveals himself, very angry with Spawn, planning to kill Cogliostro and him, while also wanting to literally eat Wanda in front of Spawn, while also licking her in a perverted way. At the end, after a fight that ended up in hell and then in the mortal world once again, Spawn decapitates Violator, with his rests coming back to hell once again, ending with the clown once and for all.
Jason Wynn, is the seconday antagonist of the film, being the director of CIA, who uses the organization for his own selfish goals of obtaining power for himself, while also working for hell and being (in this movie) the direct responsible of Al's death. As it is seen in this film, Wynn has send Simmons in multiples missions, a lot of them having innocent people killed as collateral damage, not caring at all about those deaths. Wynn ends up having a deal with Violator, in his search of taking over the world, he will help Hell into defeating heaven, by getting a lot of people killed for that goal, and although he is unsure at the beggining, as Al was one of his best assassins, he ends up accepting the deal of killing him. Jason, with help of Jessica Priest, trick Al into going to a last mission, where they would end up killing him by burning him alive, while getting thousands killed by the explosion of the place, which as it is indicated later, caused multiples diseases in that place to thousands because of the bio-weapons there. So in those 5 years that Al was in hell, Wynn had thousands or maybe millions killed by his attacks, in guide of causing more kills for Hell to have soldiers. After seeing Al as the undead Spawn and almost getting killed by him, Jason asks explanations to the clown, just to later being convinced to linking his heart to the bio-weapon (that he was planning to use to kill half or more of the population of earth, so he can take everything) all of this so that no one would dare to kill him, not caring for all the innocents deaths that would ocur because of it. At the end, he takes Wanda, Terry and the little Cyan hostage, planning to kill them if Spawn doesn't join the army of hell, even trying to kill Wanda (seemingly not knowing that it was Violator in disguise). At the end, Spawn uses his powers to remove the device from Wynn's heart, and then he is detained by the police, with all of his shady deeds now being exposed to the public.
Mitigating Factors[]
Let's go in order:
Malebolgia has literally nothing, he is just the typical ruler of hell that wants to destroy the heavens and cause the apocalypse, nothing complex at all, and although he doesn't have that many appearences, he does show enough personality in those appearences, being a manipulator, showing rage, and being pretty tyranic, I don't have any issue here.
Violator as always doesn't show any mitigating factor exactly, I don't think I can call him loyal to Malebolgia, as he pretty much does what he does because he is a sadist that enjoys making people suffer and getting people killed, while also questioning Malebolgia's orders of getting Spawn to be the leader of the army, by saying that it should be him. His biggest issue probably would be that he is pretty funny and over the top, like when he disguised as a cheerleader and does a little musical number to motivate Spawn into killing more people, but these moments don't really detract from his heinouness, in my opinion, as these remark how much of a sadist and gross he is, while also showing how he doesn't take a lot of these things seriously, and well, these comedy moments are never about his crimes, and generally are just random moments that he has, with his actual crimes being pretty seriously, and he is treated as a threat by the narrative and the protagonists, so he is fine imo.
Jason Wynn is as much of evil as his other couterparts (although a little more stupid imo), the only thing I saw as a possible issue would be his relationship with Jessica Priest, as he seems somewhat sad by her death and planned to give her the vaccine so she wouldn't be affected by the virus used in his bio-weapon, but I think that moment about her death is too ambigous to say, as he doesn't really cry, or anything, he just...stands there looking at her corpse, and his reaction could maybe had to do that he could have been death just like her, and after that he never mentions her again, and the thing with the vaccine, I think it was because of how much she could use him to kill anyone he wants, but not for actual care for her as a person. Besides that, Jason Wynn is just an egostical, vile, greedy and horrible human, just like the other versions.
Heinous Standard[]
This one is easy, they are the most heinous villains from the film, while also working together for the same heinous goal. Malebolgia stands out for being the one who manipulated everything to happen, while also being the one who planned the thing about killing an inmense quantity of people with that bio-weapon so he can cause the apocalipsis. Violator is the one who directly does what Malebolgia wants, while showing an inmense quantity of sadism in those actions, while also being the one who is attempting to make sure that this all goes as planned, making him very important, while also having his own personal cruelty by the attack at Spawn's family and tormenting him. While Jason Wynn is the one who killed Al brutally by getting him to burn to death, while also getting multiple people killed in his attacks, even in the one that he got Al killed, he got thousands killed by the explosion, while also causing multiple diseases for the people there, and planning to take over the world after using his bio-weapon to kill a good amount of people on earth, not minding helping hell into causing all of this. At the end, all of them have an important role in causing the apocalypse and getting that bio-weapon to kill millions of people on earth, getting all of them to pass individually.
Final Verdict[]
Easy yes for the three of them, for trying to cause the apocalypse, causing thousands of deaths, getting Al killed, and trying to get the bio-weapon to affect nearly everyone (or everyone) on earth, getting a good amount of people killed by it.