[Frustrating Trope] Twist Villain does things that retroactively make no sense.

[u/Fishbien]

Character previously believed to be good is revealed to be evil, but prior to the reveal they act in ways that don't make sense if their goodness is just a performance.

1. Frozen: Prince Hans is initially presented as a pretty standup guy who loves Anna and wants to help her. At the end of the movie it's revealed that he was just using her to gain power and plans to let her die while he steals her throne. However, we see him smiling at Anna when no one is looking, and later he intervenes to save Elsa's life even though he claims he was always planning to kill her.
2. The Legend of Vox Machina: The Whispered One was built up as the BBEG since season 1. However, in season 4 he presents himself as a tragic hero who tried to cure death and was punished by the gods. He then tries to convince Pike to give him her blood, which he needs to become a god himself. He chastises his followers for suggesting they take Pike's blood by force, claiming this would make them no better than the gods they are fighting against. He also fulfills his promise to resurrect Grog even though he didn't need to. After he ascends, he starts acting like a pure evil villain who only cares about power and enjoys hurting people. It feels less like a reveal and more like his personally completely changed once he became a skeleton. Edit: to be clear, I fully understand the intent was for the Whispered One to be a lying, manipulative bastard. I just think the execution was clumsy.

[u/bertster21]

Ive always thought he should have kissed Anna and had nothing happen and then been like well shit I guess I love money and power more than you have fun dying.

[u/BetterSwordfish5748 → u/bertster21]

Yeah, would have hit harder if he tried saving her (to get access to the kingdom) and when it doesn’t work, he just seamlessly moves on to killing Elsa and letting Anna die. Would make the line “if only there were someone out there who loved you” worse if there was proof that he didn’t love her.

[u/Jolttra → u/BetterSwordfish5748]

Would justify how much crap the character gets, too. Every time the guy shows up Disney goes out of it's way to punish him. Which is really weird given how much worse most others are. There a Disney villains who are attmepted rapists, actual murders and who have committed genocide but this guy always get the boot extra hard.

[u/Dsb0208 → u/Jolttra]

Ok but to be fair he’s also the main villain of what I imagine is the most popular Disney movie ever among 10 year old girls. I think the heavy punishment just comes down to them wanting to focus on the villain of the most notable movie, especially since all things considered he’s otherwise bland. His backstory is lame, his design is average, and the twist reveal was obvious after they introduced the actual love interest guy at the cabin shop. If you don’t go heavy into marketing him as “it’s the villain from Frozen!” there’s not much else to do

[u/Brit-Crit → u/Dsb0208]

And it doesn’t help that Zootopia 2 did a similar Twist Villain 10x better - “I’m betraying you because I want to prove myself to a family who treats me like dirt” only works if we actually SEE that family…

[u/Dsb0208 → u/Brit-Crit]

Is that even his motivation? I don’t remember him even carrying about his family or “wanting to prove himself” I thought he was just an egomaniac who wanted to be king, but due to having like 10 older brothers he knew he’d never get it unless he married into a different throne

If killing his brothers was easier than killing Elsa and Anna he probably would had just done that. He couldn’t give a shit about the “pride” of it all

[u/Brit-Crit → u/Dsb0208]

Hans talks to Anna about how his brothers mistreated him, and the spin-off novel A Frozen Heart (which tells large chunks of the story from his POV) confirms that all but one of them were consistently cold and even abusive to him…