Thursday, October 27, 2011

Poisonous Villainy

  Poisonous Villainy
      I am not referring to when the wicked Queen poisons Snow White, although the Queen dressed as the old lady scares the hell out of me.  Poisonous villainy is the kind of poison which makes a normally good character act in ways which are unnatural.  Often the result is a good characters demise, although sometimes the good character can overcome the poison.  Poisonous villainy can be a real tragedy in various plays, movies and operas when it is used on innocent characters.  Poisonous villainy often comes from flat out hatred, or relying on passions such as lust for power, jealousy, envy and many more.
     The emperor in Star Wars (yes the Star Wars geek is back) uses villainous poison in Anakin Skywalker.  He plays with Anakin's mind and tells him various lies which Anakin is manipulated into believing.  The emperor manipulates Anakin into believing that the Jedi counsil does not trust him.  Also, he convinces Anakin that the powers of the dark side can save Padme.  This is of course common knowledge, but the poisonous villainy is the key focus of this post.  A good character is destroyed because of it.  Of course the emperor takes a nice tumble at the hands of Anakin when he tries to kill Luke.  Luke is close to being poisoned like his father in episode VI, but is able to overcome it.  The poison administered by a powerful villain brings out the worst in any good character because the purpose is to exploit their weaknesses.  Anakin totally gets nailed, because the emperor exploits his fear.
     Othello goes down hill really fast when Iago uses villainous poison on him in the play and the opera.  Scarpia also poisons Tosca in the same way in that both villains bring out jealousy in Othello and Tosca respectively.  Iago does it more than Scarpia.  Scarpia's main purpose is to possess Tosca.  Iago wants to destroy Othello because he was promised captain and it went to Cassio instead.  Cassio is the bait for the poison.  Tosca is tortured by Scarpia into believing that Cavaradossi is cheating on her.  Otello is tortured big time by Iago throughout the entire play.  Iago does such a good job of pretending to be Othello's best friend and confident, that he really exploits Othello's jealousy.  Iago survives, and Othello kills himself.  Scarpia certainly gets his in the end when Tosca murders him.  So does the Emperor when the redeemed Anakin kills him.  Why Iago survives is beyond me.  Othello stabs Iago at the end of the play, but he lives and is arrested.  A villain as bad as Iago should have to live with the guilt if he even feels it in the first place.  
   The queen in Snow White aims to kill snow white immediately with actual poison.  Hey, queen, snow white is prettier than you, get over it sweetheart.  My point is that it is the villainous poison that slowly tortures normally good characters that makes a villain powerful.  Twisting another person's mind with various deceptions is the ultimate way to torture them.    However, the villains better watch it, because it will come back like a boomerang in the end. Although my post is about fictional characters who engage in poisonous villainy, I will relate it to real life. In real life there is karma. Karma is the boomerang. If I treat people poor me in will come back to bite me in the ass. Here ends today's post.

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