Tragic

Villains who although acting for evil, selfish or unethical goals have understandable and traumatic reasons that serve as a Freudian excuse, mitigating factor and/or redeeming quality for their motives and purposes; hence audiences can sympathize and connect with them on a human level. Most are not in full control of themselves due to being evil not by choice but instead being victims of forces beyond their control. This also applies toOrganizations and/orHostile Species whose members are driven by tragedies.

Villains who are tragic or sympathetic often suffer fromposttraumatic stress disorder or PTSD, becomeDelusional,Insecure and/orEgotists because their experiences twist them towards insanity; many of them can also beFallen Heroes and/orVengeful, if not both. Some may even becomeAddicts because of their traumatic experiences.

There are three ways to deem a villain as tragic:

• Villains with painful backstories giving them negative emotions and shaping them into destructive and hateful beings. However, their broken hearts cause their actions since they were forced into darkness and their unfortunate pasts made them distrustful and misled. This can happen if they were rejected/loners, bullied, scarred, became addicts and/or suicidal, lost loved ones, had an abusive family/creator and so on (e.g.Atrocitus,Andrew Detmer,Baldur,Spinel,Tyrion Lannister, theJoker,Darth Vader andTai Lung).
• Protective villains committing crimes to save those they care about. They are only looking out for whoever they love or care for the most but useextreme measures to do so and are confronted by heroes or even the ones they are protecting making it more difficult to save them (e.g. most versions ofMr. Freeze,Two-Face,Johnny Klebitz,The Puppet,Cersei Lannister,Walter White,Harley Quinn,Joseph Seed andYokai). However, not every protective villain is automatically tragic.
• ThePossessed and/or Brainwashed controlled, corrupted or indoctrinated by an evil presence. Therefore they are not willingly evil but manipulated by the higher powers controlling them (e.g.Cujo,Gollum,Lizard,Arthas Menethil,Kazuya Mishima,Ice King andVaas Montenegro). To these villains frequently death without regaining their memories or their original personalities is considered blessing, should they ever recover only to realize what they have done during their state of being brainwashed/possessed would often shatter their minds and souls. Some who are indoctrinated (likeStrelnikov) start off with honorable intentions but start to let power go to their heads.

Tragedies are sympathetic and mitigating factors and Freudian excuses for many villains’ villainies and most of the time, some of these villains have a chance/choice toredeem themselves at the end of a story. Often times, sympathetic factors including tragedies can involve a villain beingmentally unstable,in love, suffering fromimmense psychosis on a daily basis ordissociative identity disorders (DID) and beingaddicts,sympathetic nihilists orsuicidal are among examples of being tragic villains as well. Having a very sympatheticbackstory or beingprotective and/orpossessed/brainwashedpawns are most common ways a villain can be tragic. Suffering from a horrific and cruelmutilation andhad done absolutely nothing to deserve their fates can also make the villain tragic. Beingexiled or shunned unjustly is also another factor, but that rarely ever happens.

Tragic villains can cross as many lines as they can and still be tragic if they retain their sympathetic background/nature, empathy and/or their feelings (i.e.: beingFaux Affably Evil,having racial or xenophobic views,destroying their own innocence or even having amisanthropic nature and/or beinggenocidal orcataclysmic). Anantisocial villain is hard to qualify as tragic as they lack empathy and feelings, but if they suffered such horrific events in their lives that is so sympathetic to the point it twisted their moral center make them become such a violent person, they may qualify, as long as their legit tragedy doesn't contradict their otherwise ruthless nature (e.g.Prince Hans,Dabi,Penguin andPetyr Baelish). Some of these villains can even beanti-villains and/orremorseful, or evenVillains by Proxy. Some tragic villains can even be fueled withhatred and pain from their experiences or they can even becomecompletely dominant with fear if their tragedies scarred them for life with no recovery whatsoever.

Note: Just because a villain redeemed themselves in the end, is an anti-villain, an extremist, a fallen hero, is insecure, has honor, are on & off and has remorse doesn't automatically mean they're tragic if they never had a tragic past to begin with (e.g.Janja,Rattlesnake Jake,Lord Business,Beavis and Butt-head,Bebop and Rocksteady,Zangief andZaheer).

/!\Pure Evil villainsCAN NEVER be Tragic. Either their so-called “tragedies” would have to be extremely and outrageously logic-defying to even be realistic, or they would simply use it to justify their evil actions and nothing more. Through their actions and lack of feelings, they manage todestroy their own innocence and as a result are no longer sympathetic. Their excuses may be what they deserved (e.g.Mason Verger) and some have faked at least one tragedy (e.g.Jagi,Joker,Zhan Tiri,Chairman Drek,Commodus,SCP-5045-1). They may also try to present their excuses as tragedies, but end up beingLESS sympathetic if their excuses amount to pure jealousy or pettiness (e.g.Ahmanet,Tom Cooper,Scar,Syndrome,Professor Zündapp,Sir Miles Axlerod,Piella Bakewell,Ernst Stavro Blofeld,Mysterio,Henry Evans,General Lunaris,Andross,Richard III,Howard Payne andJill Roberts).

Even if a Pure Evil villain was given reasons for what they were doing that could genuinely be considered a tragedy, their actionsFAR OUTWEIGH their tragedies (e.g.Muzan Kibutsuji,Lord Voldemort,Donquixote Doflamingo,Dio Brando,Lady Van Tassel,Lots-o'-Huggin' Bear andKilgrave). They should go under theEnvious and/orVengeful categories instead.

Being a tragic villain is a sympathetic quality and any character or even a hero are allowed to sympathize with those types of villains, no matter the lines they cross. A Pure Evil villain is not meant to be sympathized with for anything and even if they had an experience that might actually be a genuine tragedy, their villainies are so egregious to the point that whatever tragedies they may have suffered in the past are no longer relevant and they do not match up with their crimes or motives even if in the rare case some Pure Evils are written to be seen as tragic (e.g.Judge Claude Frollo,Lots-o'-Huggin' Bear,Miss Gribben,Commander Rourke,Ahmanet,Captain Vidal andGriffith). Should a tragic villain get the help they deserve, they can finallystop their evil ways, have others accept them and move on from the experiences they suffered in their past.

Also,DO NOT add characters like these even if they are not Pure Evil:

• Villains crossing the Moral Event Horizon due toMERE EXCUSES FAR TOO PETTY to count (e.g.Ernesto de la Cruz,Rumpelstiltskin,Maleficent,Balthazar Bratt,Doctor Psycho,Plankton andEric Cartman).
• Villains faking tragedies and/or bringing it on themselves whilst blaming others for the consequences (e.g.King Stefan,Dr. Wily,Twinbraid,Lord Shen,Jervis Tetch,Seojin Cheon andRose the Hat).
• Villains with defeats like beingBetrayed and/or an excessiveDeath but no tragedies to begin with (e.g.Naria,Zhao,Lord Farquaad,Jabba the Hutt,Chantel DuBois,Dr. Zara,Gregory andRené Belloq).
• Villains who have had unpleasant experiences in the past, but said circumstances have nothing to do with their villainy (e.g.Dr. Robotnik,Tamatoa,Stormfront,Randall,Dr. Nefarious,Hervnick Z. Snerz,Commander Tartar,Merle Dixon,Hopper andOrin Scrivello).
• Villains who felt unloved or unappreciated, but ended upLESS sympathetic due to the horrible nature of their actions and how heinous and petty they are (e.g.Lex Luthor,Daisuke Hiyama,Lord Dominator,Annie Wilkes,Kaigaku andHiro Shishigami).
• Villains who were evil creations from the start with a lack of moral agency, but were in circumstances that only increased their villainy even more (e.g.Kid Buu,Mechagodzilla,Doomsday, theOmnidroids andCalamity Ganon).
• Villains who are only speculated to have a tragic past, but aren’t confirmed to have one (e.g.Shego,Ra's al Ghul,Todd Alquist, theJoker andthe Look-See).

This is for characters whose tragedies are not onlyTRUE AND LEGITIMATE butSTILL hold up after crossing the Moral Event Horizon.