December 28, 2011

Evil Overlord



The Top 100 Things I'd Do If I Ever Became An Evil Overlord
(copyrighted excerpts, from the List.)


- My Legions of Terror will have helmets with clear plexiglass visors, not face-concealing ones.

- My ventilation ducts will be too small to crawl through.

- My noble half-brother whose throne I usurped will be killed, not kept anonymously imprisoned in a forgotten cell of my dungeon.

- Shooting is not too good for my enemies.

- The artifact which is the source of my power will not be kept on the Mountain of Despair beyond the River of Fire guarded by the Dragons of Eternity. It will be in my safe-deposit box. The same applies to the object which is my one weakness.

- When I've captured my adversary and he says, "Look, before you kill me, will you at least tell me what this is all about?" I'll say, "No." and shoot him. No, on second thought I'll shoot him then say "No."

- After I kidnap the beautiful princess, we will be married immediately in a quiet civil ceremony, not a lavish spectacle in three weeks' time during which the final phase of my plan will be carried out.

- I will not include a self-destruct mechanism unless absolutely necessary. If it is necessary, it will not be a large red button labelled "Danger: Do Not Push". The big red button marked "Do Not Push" will instead trigger a spray of bullets on anyone stupid enough to disregard it. Similarly, the ON/OFF switch will not clearly be labelled as such.

- I will never employ any device with a digital countdown. If I find that such a device is absolutely unavoidable, I will set it to activate when the counter reaches 117 and the hero is just putting his plan into operation.

- Despite its proven stress-relieving effect, I will not indulge in maniacal laughter. When so occupied, it's too easy to miss unexpected developments that a more attentive individual could adjust to accordingly.

- I will maintain a realistic assessment of my strengths and weaknesses. Even though this takes some of the fun out of the job, at least I will never utter the line "No, this cannot be! I AM INVINCIBLE!!!" (After that, death is usually instantaneous.)

- I will dress in bright and cheery colors, and so throw my enemies into confusion.

- I will not fly into a rage and kill a messenger who brings me bad news just to illustrate how evil I really am. Good messengers are hard to come by.

- If I learn that a callow youth has begun a quest to destroy me, I will slay him while he is still a callow youth instead of waiting for him to mature.

- If it becomes necessary to escape, I will never stop to pose dramatically and toss off a one-liner.

- My five-year-old child advisor will also be asked to decipher any code I am thinking of using. If he breaks the code in under 30 seconds, it will not be used. Note: this also applies to passwords.

- If I must have computer systems with publically available terminals, the maps they display of my complex will have a room clearly marked as the Main Control Room. That room will be the Execution Chamber. The actual main control room will be marked as Sewage Overflow Containment.

- If I decide to test a lieutenant's loyalty and see if he/she should be made a trusted lieutenant, I will have a crack squad of marksmen standing by in case the answer is no.

- If I am fighting with the hero atop a moving platform, have disarmed him, and am about to finish him off and he glances behind me and drops flat, I too will drop flat instead of quizzically turning around to find out what he saw.

- I will not use any plan in which the final step is horribly complicated, e.g. "Align the 12 Stones of Power on the sacred altar then activate the medallion at the moment of total eclipse." Instead it will be more along the lines of "Push the button."

- I will not ignore the messenger that stumbles in exhausted and obviously agitated until my personal grooming or current entertainment is finished. It might actually be important.

~ ~ ~

Complete list is here. There's a coupla' iffy things in it, content-wise, but predominately clean and hilarious and oh-so-true.


chortling maliciously,
-whisper

7 comments:

T.D. said...

I can't get over the awesomeness. I was half-dead from laughing by like, number 8.

RED~Scribe said...

Oh my goodness. I just found my new favorite list. And, whaddya know? I've come up with several interesting story ideas from them. *sigh* To be a writer...

Jake said...

Excellent. ^_^ It exposes many cliches that need fixing in villainous writing.

Ninja Tim said...

Brilliant. I heard someone mention this list before, but haven't seen it until now. Thanks for sharing. =)

I wonder if they have a list like this for heroes. That'd be pretty interesting too. *ponders*

whisper said...

bwahaha.

and yes, Ninja Tim - a hero list would be splendid. o_O

Unknown said...

Awesome. So funny!

J.T.Z. Baner said...

But the one-liners are the best!

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