#i think this is the first proper character analyses ive ever done so :p

[justapitcherofwater]

oh boy oh boy analyses time :DDD

So I think I’m just gonna start with this; I think c!Badboyhalo may just be the most interesting villain I’ve ever encountered.

And he is definitely a villain, they make it abundantly clear that he is some sort of villain on the dream smp (at the very least he is a local menace with generally selfish intentions). He hardly ever gives anything without gaining something in return, he has all the aspirations for power and control and chaos, heck, that was the reason for the badlands in the first place, that was probably the reason why he originally followed the egg (before the thing with skeppy), because it promised all those things to him! A lot of his actions and motivations could actually be compared to c!Dream if it wasn’t for one small yet incredibly significant detail.

c!Badboyhalo is very very empathetic and compassionate.

Empathy is not a common villain trait. At all. In the slightest. It's actually usually associated with the hero, and seen as a weakness by the villain, and the only times you ever really see empathy in a villain is when the villain is using their empathy to manipulate and generally hurt the people around them, and you practically never see a villain who is in any way compassionate. “You care too much!” In many narratives is used as an insult and is framed by the villain as a fatal flaw, until our main character and all the friends they made along the way come together to defeat the bad guy using teamwork and determination, and it turns out it wasn’t a fatal flaw at all, it was their greatest strength. 

I think this is what makes c!bbh such a weird character. He wants power, he wants to create chaos and discord among others for his own benefit and he would probably succeed if he didnt keep fucking himself over with his own empathy. He is literally the definition of “you care too much”, because he does, he cares way too much for his own good and it keeps getting him hurt. He knew that the egg was manipulating and brainwashing him, and yet he still went back to it off his own accord when it took Skeppy so that he could be with him. He knew that he would get in trouble if he let Dream escape from the prison, it was his job to keep him in the prison, but he also knew that Dream was getting tortured, that he was suffering and that there was little to nothing that he could do about it. So he let him go. He gave the blueprints to Ranboo for the same reason he let Dream escape. Because he felt bad for him. Because he wanted to help and not let Dream suffer but there was little else he could do (even saying outright in one stream “I thought it was the right thing to do,”).

And where did all of this get him? Did it further his goals of monopoly? Did it gain him more power, or followers, or allies? No. He pushed away and hurt all of his friends. He accidentally killed Skeppy. The Eggpire fell. The Badlands fell along with it. Dream got out, and now he’s going back to terrorizing the smp. Because of this, Sam threatened to kill Ranboo to try and make him come back, and subsequently went through with it when it didn’t work, which would, indirectly, be Bad’s fault. He lost his job. He lost everything. As of currently in the Dream smp, c!Badboyhalo is a complete wreck of paranoia and using unhealthy coping mechanisms in a poor attempt to deal with his extensive trauma. 

He really is a tragic character, because every single time he tried to do something for other people it blew up in his face.

It really puts that “You care too much” view that a lot of villains have in media into perspective, because as we can see through c!bbh, for them it would be a fatal flaw. You can’t be compassionate and still succeed as a villain, or, you can, but it’s damn near impossible. Most villains that even have any empathy or compassion either gain it over the course of the story, or they already have it and they end up being closer to anti-heros than villains. In either situation the villain usually ends up turning to good and joining the heroes. You can’t have empathy as a villain, it's not sustainable, it’s not productive, and it will lead to ruin. c!Badboyhalo’s intention in those moments was to help, but due to his goals and plenty of his actions being conflicting, it ended up with everybody getting hurt.

I mean, I’m sure it wasn’t all because of his empathy, he’s not exactly the brightest bulb in the box, and that factor certainly didn’t help, but my point still stands.