Things I Don't Get

[forsyth]

Okay, so, The Incredibles. Really good movie. So, Syndrome, the villain. He's obviously a villain, what with the killing supers to perfect each generation of his bot he was gonna send to attack the city. Right, got that.

So, his secondary motivation, though, was to sell off his inventions after he used them, and then "when everyone is special, no one is."

That's quite frankly one of the stupidest lines I've ever heard. Okay, yeah, when everyone can fly, being able to fly isn't unique, but it's still special. And damn useful. That's not really a villain motivation. For all that it'd overthrow the current status-quo, something most heroes don't do. Or maybe I'm just weird and reading too much into it.

Comments

[evilcarp.livejournal.com]

You're a dumbass. That's fucking great motivation. Instead of being a villain who just wants money or power or to kill everybody else, it's a villian who's actually put some thought into why he hates superheroes. I like how different it is.

And it's fucking true. Once everybody can do the same thing, nobody thinks of it as special. How long ago was it that only certain people had cell phones, and everyone else was jealous and covering up their jealousy by pretending that cell phone users were all pretencious faggots? Now every fucking person has a cell phone. I see homeless people with those cell phones that come with a certain amount of minutes and then you toss them. They're all kinds of useful, and when you think of what has gone into making cell phones something every fucking person in the country can use, you should be impressed. But nobody thinks they're special.

If everybody had super powers, nobody would be more stupendous than anybody else.

Cock-knocker.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

Syndrome's a good villain, and it's a sensible motivation for him, but I don't see it as a villainous motivation. Which is part of what makes it a good motivation, I suppose. Because he's not just one-dimensional, and he's doing taking something that'd be a good idea but doing it in a bad way and for the wrong reasons. But giving everybody superpowers isn't a BAD thing, is my point. And if other people get raised up to the levels of supers, the supers don't lose anything, except the ability to lord it over the peons. And good for that.

[kail-panille.livejournal.com]

Giving everybody superpowers would definitely be a bad thing. Kliebold and Harris with superpowers? Bad. Granted if everybody's super they're arguably better able to defend themselves, but that only goes so far. Not everybody has the talent or inclination to battle evil, even if they've got the power.

But the point here that I haven't seen mentioned is that Syndrome wasn't giving away superpowers, and certainly wasn't giving them to everybody. He was planning to sell them.

In effect, he's talking about creating a new super-class, the wealthy. Whether that's just a side effect of his own greed or because he thinks that money is a good measure of a person's worth is, I think, open to question. But Syndrome probably does think that someone who worked hard and earned enough money to purchase powers has more right to them than someone who was just born with them by dumb cosmic chance.

[evilcarp.livejournal.com]

Everybody else is making good points that I won't repeat. Though, I do want to say that I frequently agree with the motivations of super villains. Not their villainy actions, but a lot of the time, I think they've got the right idea. So saying that Syndrome's motivation doesn't seem like supervillain motivation because it's doesn't seem like a bad thing doesn't make sense to me. Parly because I hate fucking superheroes.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

Part of it, I think, is the supervillains are easy to sympathize with, when done well. Because they're the guys who are going out and trying to change something, or actually DO something. The heroes are generally content to dink around and beat up muggers until something happens to make them act. Superheroes are fundamentally lazy and creatures of the status quo.

[the-s-guy.livejournal.com]

It's a supervillain motivation. It doesn't have to make logical sense, because Syndrome is not motivated by logic. He's motivated by emotion and thoughts of revenge for an imagined slight, and his reasoning is very emotional.

A superhero dissed him (from his perspective) because he had no native superpowers of his own. So he's going to coldly disassemble the very foundations of superheroism, so that no-one with 'powers' can ever do that to anyone ever again - and not just in a shortsighted way by, for example, killing off all the superheroes (although there's a bit of that as a side-effect), but making all current and future superheroes simply... unnecessary, regardless of what powers they might develop.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

And if Reed Richards did it, it'd be a superhero motivation. It's not a negative goal, like conquering the world, even if he's coming at it for the wrong reasons. Which makes it a kind of odd subtheme to an otherwise cheerful and modern movie.

[megpie71.livejournal.com]

The motivation isn't a new one (I can think of a previous version of it being used in "The Gondoliers" by Gilbert & Sullivan). I can see how it could be regarded as a villainous thing to do - in the same way that, for example, removing world poverty is regarded. When you remove the tools that other people have to make themselves feel superior to others, you deal a crushing blow to them personally.

How it makes sense as a motivation for Syndrome is through the individual psychology of the character, I think. Syndrome started as a kid who wanted to tag along with his favourite superhero, but wasn't allowed to because "he wasn't special enough" (his perception of the matter - a more realistic one would be that the superhero in question didn't want him getting injured or hurt). The kid who became Syndrome saw this as a rejection of who he was based on the "superiority" of the superhero in question, rather than as an effort to avoid harming him, so his eventual aim is to quash that perceived "superiority" one way or another. It's a way of getting back at the person who hurt him, and it's a very personal motivation - "you won't ever be able to tell someone else that they're not special enough, so there!"

[peterchayward.livejournal.com]

The line is actually "When everyone's super...no one is!" which makes total sense.

From memory, anyway.

[kalifla.livejournal.com]

"And when everybody's super...no one will be."
Which is true, even now. We're all individuals, all equally. We're all unique together.

And earlier in the movie during the argument about Dash going into sports he starts getting into "But when someone is TRULY exceptional -" and how people have to hide it. It's absolutely true and it's why superheroes would have to hide it - because even if the person with a different ability isn't trying to be snobby and all "noblesse oblige" about it, they will more than likely be perceived as such by everyone else. (There's a grain of first-hand experience in all of this, namely in high school.) We're slowly developing a super-race of humans in sports now, but since they are both entertainers and a collective, it's a lot easier to find their feats likeable. Their superior abilities don't make them less human to the public - at least not yet.

It's the perfect sub-theme for this movie. This movie is taking all the ideas in superhero comics and applying far more realism to the situations. Maybe the powers themselves aren't all that realistic in terms of physics, but the situation, to me, is handled with precision and seems entirely likely. My favorite moments in this thing were between Mr. Incredible and his lovely wife - her wondering about their marriage, his sudden happiness in being able to do the job he loves, his absolute deep grief when he thought he had lost everything.
"I'll break her in half."
"That sounds a little dark for you...!"
"It'll be easy. Like breaking a toothpick."
And then, at the end, when he says he's just not strong enough to lose her again and they kiss - that is one of the single most real, passionate kisses I have ever seen in cinema. They took the idea of superhuman and focused on the humanity of it rather than the super abilities. That's why the sub-theme, the villain's hate for the super abilities, works so well. He is hating what makes them "superior" to himself and ignoring completely what makes them people.

So yeah, you're thinking too hard about it.

[scltspider.livejournal.com]

I saw it as a way to fade out the last of the supers with an entire generation of technologically enhanced individuals, easily escalating the petty villains, as well as the police, to a point where people with "natural" superpowers couldn't make a difference. With no wisdom to temper the awesome power in the hands of the common individual, you might also see society itself tear apart at the seams.

A bit over dramatic? Yes, but it fits into the mindset of a supervillain.

And finally, in the end, who would have the upper hand? Syndrome, who most likely would build in a backdoor override that would allow him to halt anyone who would stand against him and he would be able to take absolute control with no real superheroes to stop him.


At least, that's how I would do it.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

See, maybe I'm just weird, or a supervillain at heart, but I think having the age of superheroes fade away to an age of everyone having the tech to be a superhero would be a good thing. Maybe that's my fundamental disagreement there.

[gwalla.livejournal.com]

There's a pervasive subtheme in The Incredibles very similar to The Trees by Rush.

[forsythferret.livejournal.com]

The Trees is kinda weird, because neither side's good guys and neither really wins.

Well, and because trees can't talk.