It's that time again! It's time for me to get back on my BS and tell you why The Parent Trap's Meredith Blake was not the villain of the piece, not by any stretch of the imagination.
Can you imagine being her? Forced to deal with two bratty children and a fiance who couldn't even communicate with his ex (who is equally vindictive because they agreed to split their own children apart)?! Meredith deserved better. Those children certainly deserved therapy... and better parents, too. Leave it to Disney to punish her for being the only honest person in the film! Soulless corporation!
After Redditor hurtfocker asked the online community, "Who's a 'bad guy' from fiction who was actually right?" people shared their opinions. Careful, readers, because here there be spoilers.
"On the way there..."
The engineer Mace from the movie Sunshine. He's less of the explicit bad guy but is functionally an antagonist to the main character for much of the movie.
For those who haven't seen it, it's a movie about the crew of a spaceship who is on a mission to drop a payload into the sun, to give it a jumpstart as it's dying and that makes things obviously very bad on Earth. The ship has a large dome of solar shields to protect it as it gets closer and closer to the sun, with the ship itself hiding in the shade of the shield. The main group in the movie is actually the second attempt to do this, as the first ship failed on its mission.
On the way there, they receive an emergency signal from the first ship, which is still mostly intact and seems to still have its mission payload but was unable to contact Earth directly. One of the ship's experts, and the main character of the movie, suggests that the mission has a better chance of success if they can take that extra payload and bring it along, in case theirs fails. The ship's engineer, Mace, pretty assertively argues that their best chance is to stay on mission and not deviate from the plan. In fact, for the first half of the movie, he's framed as the antagonist to the main guy because he comes across as the "other guy", whose argument is naturally wrong because it goes against the main character.
Basically, everything that goes wrong in the movie is a direct or indirect result of the decision to deviate from the plan. And from that point forward, Mace is working tirelessly to correct massive f*ck-up after massive f*ck-up. But because he's gruff in demeanor and makes coldly calculated decisions, he's the primary antagonist... for a while.
"He was trying to rid the house..."
Tom the Cat.
He was trying to rid the house of a mouse that not only chewed a hole in the wall but also frequently contaminated and stole food. Tom was just doing his job as the cat of the house.
"He always thought humans..."
Magneto.
He always thought humans would try to destroy mutants and he was right because they tried. He might have not been completely right, but man it's hard not to feel some sympathy for him after the shitty hand that life dealt him early on.
"The mom and the boyfriend..."
The mom and boyfriend from The Santa Clause and the mom and boyfriend from Mrs. Doubtfire.
In both cases, they're trying to protect the children from an unreliable, possibly sociopathic father who is going to bizarre lengths to violate custody agreements (Doubtfire) or get the kid all twisted up in a bizarre, unhealthy fantasy (Santa Clause), and also interfere in the mom's personal life.
THANK YOU.
Something was seriously wrong with both those men. Watching Mrs. Doubtfire these days, it's no wonder why Miranda divorced Daniel's lazy @ss.
"To an extent."
Poison Ivy. To an extent. She's just fed up with the way humans treat the environment.
She's pretty much an anti-hero now.
Proof that rehabilitation works!
"Dude bulldozed his cornfield..."
The bank in Field of Dreams. Dude bulldozed his cornfield to build a baseball field so he could play catch with his dad's ghost. Then they threatened to foreclose because he wasn't paying his bills because he destroyed his source of income.
"He has some very valid anti-dictator points..."
Zaheer from Legend of Korra is my favorite villain of all time. He has some very valid anti-dictator points and fascinating perspectives on detaching one's self from life but ended up taking his vision too far. He is the perfect storm of an air nomad monk gone rogue.
"Poor guy."
Benjamin (Rob Lowe's character) from Wayne's World.
I love the movie, but upon some pondering, I have concluded that if Benjamin indeed were an ice cream flavor, he might not be pralines and d*ck after all. I mean, he picked up a show created by a couple of fast-food employees on the suggestion of a fan and really put some investment into it. He kept most aspects the same ("That looks like Wayne's basement. Only that's not Wayne's basement. Isn't that weird?") except for the theme song, but I bet they could have worked something out on that if they'd discussed it. Sure they had to be censored a little more than when they were at Wayne's mom's house, but those are FCC rules, not Benjamin's.
Wayne and Garth were also pissed about the Vanderhoff spot at the end of each episode, but how did they think the show would make money without a sponsor? And don't say they didn't care about money because they snatched up their advance as fast as they could and booked it outside singing: "We got five thousand dollars! We got five thousand dollars!" Additionally, they got a pretty cool sponsor, all things considered. Was it Rogaine, or Tampax, or Charmin? No! It was an arcade with the latest video games, and the owner just wanted to update everyone on his newest machines! Hell, that could have just been a neat additional segment since the show was primarily about music and youth culture anyway.
Finally, I know Wayne hated Benjamin for stealing Cassandra away from him, but I don't think he really stole her. She was 100% into Wayne until he started being mean and rude to her. She doesn't have to put up with that! She's a rock goddess! How long had they been dating anyway, a week? Benjamin was a gentleman. Yeah, anyway, I guess it was obvious from the start that the movie was about a couple of idiots, but I want Benjamin to get a little respect. He was trying to give an indie project a little mainstream exposure but the history books have recorded him as an ogre. Poor guy.
These make you think twice, don't they?
In the words of the great Meredith Blake, "Here's what's going on, buddy: the day we get married is the day I ship those brats off to Switzerland, get the picture? It's me, or them. Take your pick."
She really deserved to have that chance.
Have some villains you'd like us to (re)consider? Feel free to tell us all about them in the comments below!
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