Tropescilloscope: Historical Villain Upgrade

A work's portrayal of a historical villain is heavily modified from the real-life figure the character is based on. (read more at tvtropes.org)

Film Frequency (%) Film Frequency (#)

More Tropes Rewatch Bonus Foreshadowing Big Bad Duumvirate Would Hit a Girl Karmic Death Spell My Name with an "S" For the Evulz Black and Gray Morality Retcon Married to the Job Parental Neglect The Bad Guy Wins Sinister Minister Male Gaze Dirty Old Man Sealed Evil in a Can Auto Erotica Dramatic Gun Cock Berserk Button No Name Given Pre-Mortem One-Liner Curb-Stomp Battle Distracted by the Sexy Accidental Murder No Celebrities Were Harmed Overprotective Dad Author Appeal Dirty Coward Ungrateful Bastard Reality Has No Subtitles You Have Got to Be Kidding Me! The Hero Dies Tap on the Head Casting Gag The X of Y An Aesop Hate Sink Only in It for the Money Ambiguously Gay Pyrrhic Victory Gender Flip The Quiet One Captain Ersatz A Father to His Men Didn't Think This Through Light Is Not Good Wicked Cultured The Oner Stealth Pun Implacable Man The Ghost Batman Gambit Those Wacky Nazis Horror Films One-Word Title Film Noir Index The Sociopath Naïve Newcomer Left the Background Music On Victoria's Secret Compartment Nice Job Breaking It, Hero! Hope Spot The Casanova Undying Loyalty Hong Kong Films Action Prologue Award-Bait Song Mad Scientist Brainless Beauty Meet Cute Happily Married All for Nothing Dramedy Idiot Ball Heroes Want Redheads Ragtag Bunch of Misfits Accidental Misnaming Damsel in Distress Moment Killer Insane Troll Logic Dogged Nice Guy Villainous Breakdown No-Sell Shirtless Scene Neck Lift Demonic Possession Red Shirt Truth in Television Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass Insult Backfire Scenery Gorn Public Domain Feature Films Boom, Headshot! The Load Broken Bird Not So Stoic Fanservice Extra Pretty in Mink Canon Foreigner Broken Pedestal Suspiciously Similar Substitute Why Did It Have to Be Snakes? Suddenly SHOUTING! More Dakka Leitmotif Made of Explodium Mind Screw Take That! Bavarian Fire Drill Manipulative Bastard "Awesome McCool" Name No Ending As You Know Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds Those Two Guys Redemption Equals Death Manly Tears Novelization The Un-Favourite aka: The Un Favorite Cowboy Cop Made of Iron Woman Scorned Agony of the Feet Slasher Smile Final Girl Horror Comedy Big Eater Celebrity Paradox Contrived Coincidence Adult Fear Actually Pretty Funny Artistic License – Biology Awesome, but Impractical Eldritch Abomination Colour-Coded for Your Convenience aka: Color Coded For Your Convenience Despair Event Horizon Kids Are Cruel Fate Worse than Death Punctuated! For! Emphasis! Love at First Sight Nice Hat Bond One-Liner Anachronism Stew Blatant Lies Amusing Injuries Male Frontal Nudity Rasputinian Death Aluminum Christmas Trees Character Development Non-Indicative Name Heroic Sacrifice MacGuffin Eureka Moment Disney Villain Death Up to Eleven Took a Level in Badass Dropped a Bridge on Him Four-Temperament Ensemble Pretty Little Headshots Jerk with a Heart of Gold Chekhov's Skill Let's Get Dangerous! Rule of Cool Does Not Like Shoes Sadistic Choice The Big Guy Sacrificial Lion Girl-on-Girl Is Hot Shown Their Work Cool Shades Wrong Genre Savvy Death of a Child Naked People Are Funny Together in Death Stalker with a Crush Adaptational Attractiveness Dull Surprise Dissonant Serenity Roaring Rampage of Revenge Improbable Aiming Skills Crazy-Prepared Driven to Suicide Deconstruction Badass Normal Really Gets Around Whole Plot Reference Dark Is Not Evil Five-Man Band Badass Bookworm Scenery Porn Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking Shut Up, Hannibal! Groin Attack Country Matters Foregone Conclusion What Happened to the Mouse? Reality Ensues Knife Nut Rated M for Manly Big Bad Everyone Has Standards Small Name, Big Ego Our Vampires Are Different And Starring Ship Tease Faux Affably Evil Black Best Friend folderlabel It's Personal Sequel Escalation Superhero Put on a Bus Hell Is That Noise An Arm and a Leg Crapsack World Continuity Nod Intergenerational Friendship Properly Paranoid Serious Business Hair of Gold, Heart of Gold Call-Back Early-Bird Cameo Toilet Humour aka: Toilet Humor Chase Scene Well-Intentioned Extremist Informed Ability Beauty Is Never Tarnished Evil Brit Dwindling Party Extremely Short Timespan Pay Evil unto Evil Gilligan Cut Reasonable Authority Figure Cool Car Domestic Abuse Depraved Bisexual Enemy Mine Plucky Comic Relief Better to Die than Be Killed Eye Scream Man on Fire Car Fu Australian Movies Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas There Is No Kill Like Overkill Badass Longcoat Face–Heel Turn Recycled IN SPACE! Amoral Attorney Handicapped Badass I Have Your Wife Big Applesauce Say My Name Manic Pixie Dream Girl Cat Fight Deadpan Snarker Beard of Evil The '60s The Power of Love Brother–Sister Incest Cloudcuckoolander Loads and Loads of Characters Action Girl Have a Gay Old Time It Will Never Catch On The Ditz Take a Third Option Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane Pun aka: Incredibly Lame Pun Red Oni, Blue Oni Disproportionate Retribution Oh, Crap! Word of God Gone Horribly Right Sliding Scale of Idealism vs. Cynicism Why Don't You Just Shoot Him? Large Ham Jerkass Has a Point Only Sane Man Ascended Extra From Bad to Worse Dies Wide Open You Have Failed Me Chiaroscuro Rousing Speech Break the Haughty Affably Evil Bare Your Midriff Shell-Shocked Veteran Shipper on Deck Mood Whiplash Romantic False Lead Spanner in the Works Same Language Dub Alpha Bitch Those Two Bad Guys What You Are in the Dark Camera Abuse Military and Warfare Films The Stoic Anti-Hero Bunny-Ears Lawyer Abhorrent Admirer Badass Boast Hollywood Law The Vamp Action Film, Quiet Drama Scene The End... Or Is It? Noodle Incident Mystery and Detective Films Self-Deprecation Unresolved Sexual Tension Fan Disservice Death Seeker Token Minority Brick Joke Beware the Nice Ones Frame-Up Irony Artistic License – Gun Safety Sequel Hook No OSHA Compliance Names to Run Away from Really Fast Red Eyes, Take Warning Hair-Trigger Temper Obviously Evil Dressing as the Enemy Cool Old Guy Fourth Date Marriage Yandere Psycho for Hire Bloodless Carnage Cain and Abel Big-Bad Ensemble Epic Movie Trailers Always Spoil Historical-Domain Character Only Known by Their Nickname Catapult Nightmare Disguised in Drag Friend to All Children A Date with Rosie Palms Room Full of Crazy Blood Knight Bald of Evil Determinator aka: The Determinator Deal with the Devil Worthy Opponent Mama Bear Cassandra Truth Screw the Rules, I'm Doing What's Right! All Girls Want Bad Boys Mooks Combat Pragmatist Big Damn Heroes B-Movie She Cleans Up Nicely Author Avatar Bound and Gagged Ghost Fiction The Place Impaled with Extreme Prejudice Ugly Guy, Hot Wife Manchild Dual Wielding Hooker with a Heart of Gold Cool Guns Needs Wiki Magic Love Deliberate Values Dissonance Suspiciously Specific Denial Fainting Intrepid Reporter Half the Man He Used to Be Arc Words Real Life Ass Shove Evil Plan Department of Redundancy Department Leave the Camera Running Throwing Your Sword Always Works Exactly What It Says on the Tin Make It Look Like an Accident Historical Villain Upgrade Retirony Unwitting Instigator of Doom Improvised Weapon Line-of-Sight Name Evil Counterpart Pre-Asskicking One-Liner Cluster F-Bomb Spiteful Spit Pragmatic Adaptation Humans Are Bastards Adults Are Useless May–December Romance Daddy's Girl Gainax Ending Alas, Poor Villain Femme Fatale Even Evil Has Standards Hoist by His Own Petard Lampshade Hanging Offscreen Teleportation Mighty Whitey Red Herring Babies Ever After Annoying Younger Sibling Stylistic Suck Expository Hairstyle Change You Killed My Father Every Car Is a Pinto Evil vs. Evil Bloody Hilarious Bring My Brown Pants Narrator Artistic License – History Captain Obvious Biopic Ambiguous Disorder Slashed Throat Evil-Detecting Dog Ms. Fanservice Aside Glance Shout-Out The Reveal Historical In-Joke All Just a Dream Grey and Gray Morality Politically Incorrect Villain Rule of Funny Exact Words Fish out of Water Not So Above It All Blackmail Bury Your Gays Double-Meaning Title The Voiceless Hidden Depths Laser-Guided Karma All There in the Script Death by Irony Running Gag The Mafia Villain Ball Kill It with Fire Breaking the Fourth Wall timeperiod From Nobody to Nightmare Fatal Flaw Stuff Blowing Up Police are Useless My God, What Have I Done? Bait-and-Switch You Have Outlived Your Usefulness Black Comedy Rape Brutal Honesty Comically Missing the Point Empathic Environment Training Montage One-Man Army Foil Drill Sergeant Nasty Motor Mouth As Long as It Sounds Foreign This Is Gonna Suck Fire-Forged Friends What the Hell, Hero? Horror Doesn't Settle for Simple Tuesday Sudden Sequel Death Syndrome The '90s "Shaggy Dog" Story Reckless Gun Usage Beta Couple The Bully Good Is Not Nice The Remake Animal Motifs Screw the Rules, I Have Money! Serial Killer Big Brother Instinct Jitter Cam Face Death with Dignity Wham Line War Is Hell Adaptation Expansion It Can Think The Dragon Twist Ending Offscreen Moment of Awesome The Dog Bites Back The Cavalry Double Entendre Peek-a-Boo Corpse Jerkass Heel–Face Turn Tagline Disney Death Evil Laugh Last-Name Basis In Medias Res Mexican Standoff The Atoner Bottomless Magazines Unusual Euphemism Central Theme Villain Opening Scene In the Back Never Trust a Trailer aka: Trailers Always Lie As Himself He Knows Too Much Abusive Parents Butt-Monkey Vacation Films Diabolus ex Machina Nothing Is Scarier Humiliation Conga Soft Glass The Stoner Artistic License – Physics Costume Porn Framing Device Toplessness from the Back Film Series Retired Badass Interrupted Suicide Anti-Villain Spiritual Successor Kick the Son of a Bitch Calling the Old Man Out Arch-Enemy Age Lift The Great Depression After the End Bitch in Sheep's Clothing Rule of Three Knight Templar Major Injury Underreaction NO INDOOR VOICE Defrosting Ice Queen O.O.C. Is Serious Business Red Right Hand Armor-Piercing Question Madness Mantra Recap / RiffTrax aka: Riff Trax Movies Developing Doomed Characters Nice Guy Nice Job Fixing It, Villain! Translation Convention Revenge Genre Shift Ambiguous Ending Corpsing Smug Snake Obfuscating Stupidity Creative Closing Credits Important Haircut Anyone Can Die I Did What I Had to Do "The Reason You Suck" Speech Mr. Fanservice Only a Flesh Wound Chekhov's Gun Freeze-Frame Bonus Skewed Priorities Your Cheating Heart Deus ex Machina True Companions Break the Cutie Homage Kill 'em All Maybe Ever After Only One Name Wham Shot Getting Crap Past the Radar The Chick Meaningful Background Event The Hero Product Placement Never My Fault Older Than They Look Overly Long Gag Bilingual Bonus Catch-Phrase Time Skip Apocalypse How Punch-Clock Villain Science Fiction Films Psychopathic Manchild Paper-Thin Disguise Adaptation Name Change Posthumous Character Monumental Damage Pragmatic Villainy Stock Footage Television Movie Index Bittersweet Ending Unusually Uninteresting Sight Your Head A-Splode Evil Is Hammy Tempting Fate Animal Title Index Dirty Cop The Faceless Blood from the Mouth No-Holds-Barred Beatdown Dark and Troubled Past Failed a Spot Check Determinator Black Comedy Fat Bastard No Good Deed Goes Unpunished Gory Discretion Shot Sanity Slippage Canadian Movies Taking the Bullet Roger Ebert: Great Movies List Alliterative Name Stepford Smiler Villain Song And I Must Scream Improbable Infant Survival aka: Infant Immortality Cruel and Unusual Death Heel Realization Creepy Child Took a Level in Jerkass Neck Snap Screw This, I'm Outta Here! Sci-Fi Horror "Where Are They Now?" Epilogue N-Word Privileges Faking the Dead Rape as Drama Becoming the Mask Artistic License – Geography Dying Moment of Awesome Playing Gertrude Lock and Load Montage Adaptation Dye-Job Arranged Marriage The Lost Lenore Mugging the Monster Papa Wolf Jump Scare Antagonist Title Freudian Excuse Early Installment Weirdness Death by Sex 20 Minutes into the Future Off with His Head! Insistent Terminology The Alleged Car The Ace "Well Done, Son!" Guy Gold Digger Conspicuous CG Riddle for the Ages A God Am I Immune to Bullets World of Ham Badass in a Nice Suit Romantic Comedy My Greatest Failure Hero of Another Story He Who Fights Monsters Martial Arts Movie Adaptational Heroism The Smurfette Principle Vitriolic Best Buds Henpecked Husband Ripped from the Headlines Almost Kiss Loophole Abuse Reality Is Unrealistic Cool Old Lady Bond Villain Stupidity Too Dumb to Live Visual Pun Downer Ending Big Fancy House Vampire Fiction Lighter and Softer Super Strength Rich Bitch Off-into-the-Distance Ending Crucified Hero Shot Meaningful Name Scary Black Man It's All About Me Refuge in Audacity Evil Sounds Deep Slap-Slap-Kiss A Minor Kidroduction Blonde, Brunette, Redhead Gorn Protagonist Title Call-Forward Imperial Stormtrooper Marksmanship Academy Music Stories Drugs Are Bad Our Zombies Are Different Affectionate Parody Hero Antagonist Thriller Heroic BSoD Bland-Name Product Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep" Asshole Victim Advertised Extra Tranquil Fury BFG Bullying a Dragon Ooh, Me Accent's Slipping I Want My Beloved to Be Happy Smoking Is Cool Based on a True Story All Men Are Perverts Ominous Latin Chanting Never Found the Body Works Set in World War II Deliberately Monochrome Greater-Scope Villain Shoot the Shaggy Dog Documentary Disappeared Dad Love Triangle Bolivian Army Ending All There in the Manual Adapted Out Mythology Gag Death by Adaptation Be Careful What You Wish For La Résistance Belligerent Sexual Tension Drives Like Crazy Match Cut Does This Remind You of Anything? Sir Swears-a-Lot Mercy Kill The '50s Hypocritical Humor Guns Akimbo Rule of Symbolism Bad "Bad Acting" Genre Throwback Would Hurt a Child Funny Background Event Re-Cut Sports Stories Historical Hero Upgrade Closed Circle Sexy Discretion Shot Action Survivor Vomit Discretion Shot Dutch Angle I Need a Freaking Drink Spared by the Adaptation Vomit Indiscretion Shot Setting Update The Alcoholic The Chessmaster Punny Name Fanservice Death Glare Expy Evil Cannot Comprehend Good The '70s One Steve Limit Villain with Good Publicity Big "NO!" Missing Mom Did Not Get the Girl Not So Different How We Got Here Grievous Bottley Harm Not What It Looks Like Screw the Money, I Have Rules! Artistic License – Law Fantasy Films Race Lift Camp Gay Dark Action Girl Parental Substitute Body Horror Darkest Hour Rape Is a Special Kind of Evil Facial Horror Badass Grandpa Precision F-Strike The Musical Kick the Dog Cat Scare Random Events Plot Instant Death Bullet Composite Character Epic Fail Silence Is Golden Covers Always Lie Get Out! Not Quite Dead Dramatic Irony Not Even Bothering with the Accent Establishing Character Moment Adaptation Distillation Soundtrack Dissonance Video Credits Villain Protagonist Stealth Hi/Bye Genre Savvy Title Drop Ax-Crazy British Films The Stinger Flipping the Bird Woman in White Corrupt Corporate Executive Meaningful Echo Jack Bauer Interrogation Technique Race Against the Clock Storming the Castle Fingore Scare Chord Fatal Family Photo Anachronic Order Real Life Writes the Plot Market-Based Title The Smart Guy Parental Abandonment Earn Your Happy Ending Improbable Weapon User Chewing the Scenery She's Got Legs Mundane Made Awesome Index of Film Westerns I'm a Humanitarian Card-Carrying Villain Book-Ends Wounded Gazelle Gambit Fun with Acronyms The Film of the Book Easily Forgiven Fantastic Racism Ironic Echo Film Noir Credits Gag Slasher Movie Straight Gay Coming-of-Age Story Destination Defenestration Creator Cameo Decoy Protagonist In Name Only Hypocrite Mr. Exposition Aww, Look! They Really Do Love Each Other Star-Crossed Lovers Artistic License – Military French Films Anguished Declaration of Love Attempted Rape Defiant to the End Shower Scene Adorkable Morality Pet Men Are the Expendable Gender Eiffel Tower Effect Hollywood Darkness Heterosexual Life-Partners Taking You with Me Pet the Dog Fake Shemp Leaning on the Fourth Wall Sassy Black Woman Sir Not-Appearing-in-This-Trailer Obstructive Bureaucrat Unspoken Plan Guarantee Cold-Blooded Torture Animated Credits Opening Black Dude Dies First Bar Brawl Green-Eyed Monster Police Brutality I Just Shot Marvin in the Face The Brute Due to the Dead No Antagonist Laughing Mad Totally Radical Redshirt Army Honor Before Reason The Lancer Mistaken for Gay Very Loosely Based on a True Story Chuck Cunningham Syndrome Show Within a Show Curse Cut Short The Starscream Fiery Redhead Darker and Edgier Eyepatch of Power German Films Dark Reprise Malevolent Masked Men Bad Boss Bloodier and Gorier Jerk Jock Authority Equals Asskicking Christmas Movies Index The '80s Imagine Spot My Beloved Smother Action Genre Demoted to Extra Poor Communication Kills For Want of a Nail Sole Survivor Parental Incest Psychological Thriller Extreme Doormat Dumb Blonde Guile Hero The Cameo Chekhov's Gunman Even Evil Has Loved Ones Killed Mid-Sentence Crazy Jealous Guy Danny Peary Cult Movies List '80s Hair Logo Joke Italian Films Silent Movie Bowdlerise Kubrick Stare Air-Vent Passageway Broken Aesop Unreliable Narrator The Mole An Axe to Grind Bi the Way A.I. Is a Crapshoot And the Adventure Continues Eagleland As the Good Book Says... Famous Last Words Actor Allusion Never Trust a Trailer Plot Hole Here We Go Again! Funny Foreigner Karma Houdini Russian Films Zombie Stories Once More, with Clarity! The Dreaded Adaptational Villainy The Un-Reveal Not Using the "Z" Word Gratuitous English Children Are Innocent Pimped-Out Dress Wretched Hive Betty and Veronica Back from the Dead Outrun the Fireball Adaptational Badass Flashback Daylight Horror Evil Is Petty Japanese Films Drowning My Sorrows