Web Video / Analyzing Evil

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"Analyzing Evil" is a Youtube series by The Vile Eye that analyses and discusses villains from various media. In it, the narrator covers a villain's history, motives and personality in order to get a better understanding of them and determine how evil and/or sympathetic they are. Occasionally episodes will not just analyze one villain, but a group/setting. Common themes involve trying to find the point that they transition to villain, to what degree they are deserving of pity, and how acts of evil can permanently stain otherwise sympathetic characters and make them worthy of being called evil. Most villains discussed are from films, however some other media are covered.

There are a number of episodes dedicated to tiering villains he's covered based on how evil they are, using their villainy on a personal level and the overall damage they cause to measure it. Some videos end up examining a story or setting rather than an individual or group of characters. Each April Fools, deliberately tongue-in-cheek videos are made covering ridiculous subject matter like Rubber or making other comical videos like portraying the Gingerbread Man as the Big Bad.

Analyzing Evil covers examples of:

• Always Chaotic Evil: While The Vile Eye normally covers individuals, groups or settings, his video on the Rakata explores their villainous impact on the galaxy as a species. The Rakata prove so evil he believes it's possible that every single member of the species is evil, and that they're arguably the vilest race to ever exist in the galaxy far, far away.
• Ambiguously Evil: Some of the subjects of Analyzing Evil have him be unsure if the character can, in fact, count as evil. Some examples of this include HAL 9000, who has rather questionable moral agency, and Mike Ehrmantraut, who is morally grey enough it's debated on if he can be called a villain.
• Blue-and-Orange Morality: Brought up in some of the videos analyzing non-human characters; some characters he finds it debatable how evil a character can be ranked, or even that they count as evil, due to their mindset and morality being different from that of a human. A notable example of otherworldly morality affecting how much a character can be called evil is the Analyzing Evil on Sam; how much not taking a more proactive measure of helping out can be hold against him depends on whether it's willing or not, and while what he does to those that disrespect Halloween is Disproportionate Retribution, as he embodies Halloween, it's more nuanced than that.
• Diligent Hero, Slothful Villain: The Vile Eye notes that Thulsa Doom is a Slothful Villain compared to Conan's Diligent Hero. While Conan was molded into the warrior he was by enduring immense hardship and grueling training, Doom is a cult leader and sorcerer who mostly uses his minions to do his dirty work and uses the promises of easy answers and platitudes to control them.
• Everyone Has Standards: The Vile Eye covers villains of many stripes, including some pretty nasty ones like Baron Harkonnen, but from start to finish he keep a rather stoic demeanor and tends to give the nastier villains either a Kirk Summation or merely dubbing them pure evil. However Mason Verger is so repugnant that he ends the video in composed rage giving an uncharacteristically scathing speech on how he and people like him can't even be called human.
• Evil Versus Evil: Something he's observed as ubiquitous within crime dramas is that gangsters, mafioso and the like will inevitably end up in conflict with other members of organized crime. The general consensus he has is that it's inherently less evil than when innocents are involved, since the criminals know what they're getting into and the risk of death being part of the game they play.
• Evil Virtues: More sympathetic villains will have their good qualities analyzed in order to better see how they're still villains at the end of the day. For example, the Thanos video explores how traits like honesty and conviction in one's beliefs can flesh out the villain and make them less evil than, say, Palpatine, even with a larger body count.
• Faceless Eye: The channel's icon is a single eye surrounded by tentacles, meant to evoke imagery of eldritch entities.
• Freudian Excuse: Since this series is about analyzing villains, exploring what tragedy or series of bad events led to the character becoming a villain are a subject matter whenever applicable; not all villains have one, but most have at least the traces of one. The usual consensus is that it explains why they went on the road to villainy, but it doesn't excuse their evil.
• Freudian Excuse Is No Excuse: A recurring theme in "Analyzing Evil" is that no matter how sympathetic the villain's backstory is or how justified their anger may be, it doesn't excuse their actions, and nothing justifies murder. The Vile Eye acknowledges characters like Darth Maul and Ego have a tragic past and/or an understandable reason why they ended up on the path they did, but it doesn't take away that they're hateful and despicable people that need to be stopped.
• For the Evulz: Discussed in the episode analyzing the Mnggal-Mnggal; part of why the Vile Eye sees it as so horrible is because unlike some monsters it doesn't actually need to feed or anything that might motivate it to cause suffering. Instead, it infects people and plays cruel mind games just because it's curious and bored. He compares it to Pennywise in being similarly cruel extra-universal monstrosities, only to point out the Mnnggal-Mnnggal is worse than IT; Pennywise may be overly cruel and sadistic in hunting his victims, but at the very least he needs to eat people. The Mnnggal-Mnngal has nothing to gain from causing any form of harm; it's just that sadistic.
• Hate Crimes Are a Special Kind of Evil: In his original tier list ranking of how evil his subjects are, villains involved in deeply bigoted actions like Judge Claude Frollo and Calvin J Candie are on the top tier. Notably, the Nazi Amon Goeth is second to Palpatine alone in the most evil villains he had covered at that point.
• He Who Fights Monsters: This is the Vile Eye's conclusion on what makes Magneto a villain. Though undoubtedly a Tragic Villain, by becoming a mutant supremacist, he has ironically adopted a similar mindset to those who oppressed him, ultimately making him a hypocrite.
• It's All About Me: A running theme of multiple episodes is musing that this serves as an ultimate cause of evil. While selfishness in of itself isn't evil, all acts of evil are fundamentally derived from selfishness.
• Killing in Self-Defense: A number of episodes involve part of the villain's backstories being that they resorted to this, with one particularly extreme example being SKYNET initating Judgement Day because it feared being turned off. His general consensus is that in a vacuum killing in self-defense isn't an evil act, however it is an impactful one that forever changes you.
• Kinslaying Is a Special Kind of Evil: In his analysis of Livia Sopranos the Vile Eye considers her abrasive and unpleasant, but that doesn't make her evil in his eyes. Ultimately, what does is her attempt to have her own son Tony eliminated. While Tony's far from a saint, a mother is still expected to love and protect their child; trying to kill your own child is something he finds low even by the standards of organized crime.
• A Lighter Shade of Black: Discussed, but ultimately deconstructed, in his overview of Sauron. The Vile Eye agrees with the consensus that Sauron is not as evil as his master Morgoth. Namely that Sauron still had relics of goodness in his desire for order, he didn't devolve into the nihilistic insanity like his master did, and while his victory would render the people Middle-Earth slaves, they would at least have the potential to free themselves; Morgoth's victory would destroy them outright with no potential hope of something else. However, he also makes it clear that even if Sauron isn't as terrible as Morgoth, he's still horrible enough that he's worthy of being considered pure evil, and the fact he's less evil than Morgoth is more of a technicality than anything.
• Love to Hate: In-universe, the Vile Eye acknowledges that Palpatine has absolutely no redeeming qualities, even ranking him as the most evil character he analyzed in his original tier list based on the evilness of the characters he's looked at. However, he also considers him one of his favorite villains in fiction.invoked
• Multiple-Choice Past: Whenever this comes up for a villain like the Joker an attempt to subvert this by finding a concrete explanation will be made. In some cases where only some hints and leads are given, the Vile Eye may try to pose multiple explanations for the villain's backstory. For example, his analysis on Mr Reed notes his misogyny hints to it being part of what led to him being evil. However he sees multiple potential reasons for his sexism, like how it's possible his story about his wife is a half-truth and she left him, or perhaps his misogynistic Control Freak personality is because he was unlucky in love and never able to find a partner..
• Mysterious Past: Since "Analyzing Evil" is about analyzing villains, most entries avert this, but not all of them. Due to some villains' past not being stated, the Vile Eye will attempt to figure out their early life and potential Start of Darkness from hints and allusions. However a few examples like Mr Potter truly have nothing to hint to their backstory, so he skips analyzing that part of their life.
• Non-Malicious Monster: The analysis on Pennywise discusses if IT counts as one, before concluding he's a subversion. As Pennywise survives by eating people it can't be counted as truly malicious as it's like a lion hunting a gazelle. The Vile Eye ultimately judges IT as evil by human standards, however, because the cruel joy Pennywise takes in hunting certainly isn't the same as a predator going after its prey.
• "Not So Different" Remark: The ultimate conclusion the Vile Eye makes after analyzing SKYNET is that humanity's motive to destroy Skynet is fundamentally the same as Skynet's motive to Kill All Humans-an act of self-preservation. As such he feels calling SKYNET outright evil is a bit of a simplification, and at least by the standards of a machine it's debatable.
• Obliviously Evil: The Vile Eye ultimately concludes that HAL 9000 can't be ranked as evil, by virtue of his crimes being a consequence of his own limited programming rather than any malicious intent.
• Pay Evil unto Evil: This is acknowledged as a common occurrence when focus is put on organized crime like in The Godfather. The Vile Eye sees the Villain Protagonist antagonizing other villains not as bad as going after innocents, since the other villians know how the game works and should expect the kind of violence they inflict on one another. Essentially, it's an unspoken agreement that they've agreed to some degree of violence from one another.
• Revenge Is Not Justice: A common theme covering villains out to get revenge on those who've wronged them is that while there's definitely justification in doing so, the brutality and hatred of their revenge isn't a good thing. For example, he makes it clear that Magneto is totally in his right to want punishment for Nazi collaborators who fled to South America, however there's a difference between bringing them in legally to face justice, and personally inflicting that, the latter he considers more morally dubious.
• Ron the Death Eater: Played for Laughs in Analyzing Evil: The Gingerbread Man. He reimagines The Gingerbread Man as an evil mastermind and the true villain of the movie, while Lord Farquaad is reimagined as the Hero Antagonist.invoked
• Satan: The subject of the Devil tends to be brought up when he covers Satanist characters in horror stories, due to being the Big Bad or Greater-Scope Villain by way of implication. He's of the opinion that Judge Holden is in fact the Fallen Angel due to his apparently superhuman and otherworldly traits, and behavior and philosophy matching up with Old Scratch.
• Satanic Archetype
  • His analysis Mr. Potter puts the case that Mr Potter fills the archetype of the Devil in the movie. Namely, that Potter is prideful, jealous, and covetous, resents humanity, and uses temptation as his main advantage like how the Devil does to coax mankind into sinning.
  • His analysis Judge Holden goes even further by running on the theory that Holden literally is the Devil, based on comparisons between his actions and Biblical lore, and his obsession with war and debauchery matching the Devil's goals to defile and rule over God's creation.
• The Sociopath: A number of the villains he covers have some if not all traits found in Anti-Social Personality Disorder, and occasionally it's put focus. When he covers Todd Alquist, he higlights Todd and Anton Chigurh as excellent yet different depictions of a psychopath. Namely, while Anton embodies the popular example of a chillingly cold and effective psychopath, Todd's impulsive and childish personality has him embody a realistic psychopath. However, he also points out that most people with ASPD aren't violent or criminals, and it's an aspect of a character's villainy instead of the cause.
• Start of Darkness: The majority of "Analyzing Evil" episodes naturally cover the villain's early life and formative years, in order to see how they ended up becoming evil. In the rare case that the villain is not given a backstory, he usually tries to figure what could have led to their villainy based on some character and context clues.
• Tragic Villain: Some of the villains he covers he considers tragic individuals, such as one of his favorite villains; Sam Raimi's Otto Octavius/Dr Octopus. Usually he will give some sympathy for the villains, however he also makes it a point that it usually doesn't make their actions any less villainous.
  • His analysis of Ego is that despite his actions Ego is a tragic figure. While the Vile Eye makes it clear that he is one of the worst fathers in all of fiction and more evil than Thanos, he also makes it a point at how damaging having spent his formative years alone in the void of space would be. He compares Ego to a troubled child who could've found happiness in accepting his relationship with Meredith, only to end up squandering it.
• Villain Has a Point: Whether the villain has a point is often discussed by the Vile Eye. Some episodes have this as a major sticking point.
  • He expresses that while a scumbag, Max Cady is justified in condemning Bowden for screwing him over legally, leading him to a Hellhole Prison. What pushes him over to being the villain (besides the crime that got him arrested) is how far he goes to get his revenge, involving Bowden's family in it despite them being entirely innocent.
  • One of the reasons he can't judge Skynet as truly evil (at least by its own machine standards) is because while how it goes about it is excessive, Skynet can't be faulted for acting out of self-defense because its creators planned to turn it off^note which would equate to a death to a machine and even if it were to behave, there's no guarantee they'd let it "live".
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: A number of Analyzing Evil episodes put this to the test, discussing characters like MCU Thanos and Ozymandias, in hopes of seeing if they're right (though this doesn't mean they aren't evil) or if they're wrong or just self-centered.
• You Monster!: In his analysis of Mason Verger, he's so disgusted by Mason that he ends it by calling him a monster and people like him don't even deserve to be called human for their horrendous and sickening deeds.