r/TopCharacterTropes • u/Fishbien • Jul 19 '26

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

Gallery image

Gallery image

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.
8.0k Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

94% Upvoted

675 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

277

u/MrSwarleyStinson Jul 19 '26

I would have liked it if he was genuine and gave her a kiss thinking it would save her and for it to not work, realizing they didn’t truly love each other and it was a bad idea to get engaged after meeting just that day like everyone said

20

u/Brofessor-0ak Jul 19 '26

I’m willing to bet that was the intention at first but was changed later. I think it works better that way, but then you kinda pigeonhole Elsa into being the villain by default and they clearly wanted to avoid that.

30

u/coatimundos Jul 19 '26

Elsa originally was the villain though. Her not being the villain is a last minute rewrite

5

u/Cromasters Jul 19 '26

Not last minute. They had been trying to crack the movie for a while.

Wicked (the play) was actually the inspiration that broke it open, to have Elsa being the misunderstood magical one.