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Post by Luke Danger on Mar 27, 2016 12:23:27 GMT -5
So, a thought. As we all know the Attitudinator can shift someone from hero to villain more or less at the press of a switch.
However, I'm wondering... HenchCo advertised it as a way to bolster villains who were lagging due to defeats. We know brain boosters exist - see "Naked Genius" - and everyone hit by the proper version became far more effective. Drakken was shown to be very good at a bunch of skills suddenly (though he was always capable), and Ron, while likewise capable in the past, was suddenly doing some pretty advanced trigonometry with his plans.
So... perhaps besides just being meant to emphasize someone's evilness, HenchCo also slipped brain boosters into the design? After all, your skill is not related to being good or evil, it's independent of that (since Shego seems to be just as effective as a villainess as she was a heroine), but if villains just got more prone to killing henchmen for failures due to being more evil someone is going to notice HenchCo's thing wasn't working. So throw in a brain booster, and they get more evil AND get some competence to boot.
Thoughts? Seems to nicely explain how Zorpox got so nasty in a short time when Ron usually was, while capable, nowhere near that capable by intention (he built The Mangler by accident), and would fit what HenchCo is trying to do with it.
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Post by christhecynic on Mar 27, 2016 15:35:13 GMT -5
My take on it is that Ron's major weakness is low self-esteem (Kim's is overconfidence but it only gets to play a role when she's actually in over her head.) For whatever reason evil Ron is confident Ron and as a result he can do truly impressive things.
Also Ron just seems to have a talent for evil. Note how he basically set up the Seniors' entire operation with a handful of offhand comments.
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Post by neosaiyanangel on Mar 27, 2016 15:51:16 GMT -5
Hm... I see your point. It would make better business sense to do that.
However, I think Hench and his company might not've thought that far ahead, or in that way. They clearly don't think highly of their villain clients, using kiddie-level manipulation to try and get them to react in certain ways and underselling them here and there (see Grande Size Me and Ron the Man). They probably never even thought that a villain could become super evil. The worst villain we see in the entire show (on Earth, anyway) just made his henchmen vanish down a hole with the assumption that they either A. died or B. were mindwiped. Fanon tends to favor the latter.
Even WITH the effects of the Attitudinator things weren't even all that villainous. Remember, Zorpox's demands with his doomsday threats was nacos.
Seriously, nacos.
So I think that yeah, there IS a chance that they're made smarter. Maybe. But I think it's more likely that Hench never considered it and that Ron just doesn't live up to his potential. If you take Ron out of the equation of flip-flopping from the Attitudinator and Reverse Polarizer, then there IS no jump in competence. All of Team Go were just as effective being good as they were evil. As to Hench not thinking about casual murder of his employees, the KP world doesn't HAVE that depraved depth that our world has. Hench would have to be pretty messed up in the head to even consider murder being someone's ultimate evil realization.
Ron... In the show, there's a plentitude of evidence that Ron could be awesome. His NICKNAME is 'Potential Boy'. The things that seem to defeat him, though, are his 'natural Ronness' (which, most of the time, is an excuse to be lazy) and Kim herself. Have you noticed in episodes before Kim and Ron started dating, whenever Ron's shown being good at something, even better than KIM, she gets negative and angry at him? She can't seem to handle the idea that Ron's good at stuff. In season 4, Ron was FINALLY starting to come into his own. Took a risk and joined the football team. Positive encouragement, helped to lead them to victory after victory. Taking charge with his sister? Encouraged. Fighting aliens? Encouraged.
So as far as Ron getting hit with the brainflipping machines, I think it's him stopping holding back and dealing damage because he WANTS to and he doesn't give a speck of care about what Kim thinks. It isn't a matter of becoming smarter. It's a matter of him not pushing himself to suppress his potential.
...I feel like this is just a pile of incoherent rambling. Does what I'm saying make sense?
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Post by Luke Danger on Mar 27, 2016 19:56:44 GMT -5
Nah, I think I get what you're saying.
But to be clear, when I said "just an uptick in killing henchmen", I more meant that being nastier is the only thing. That combined with actually being able to build doomsday devices that worked would likely be seen working as intended.
Mind I hesitate to treat the Reverse Polarizer as what Hench intended mostly because that was Electronique doing her tweaks (she outright says she had modified it, or at least Shego said it was modified), so saying that as it worked in STG is how Hench intended it to work is dubious (I based the assessment on Shego's effectiveness on the fact that she's outright stated to be why Team Go was able to stay functional mostly, rather than her combat skill in STG).
Of course, 'competence' doesn't mean 'go for taking over the world'; maybe if Ron was just evil he still would've gone for Nacos, he just would've resorted to a Trojan Mole Rat (that could fight, taking Ajax's suggestion from Age of Mythology) rather than having two doomsday devices ready in tandem quick enough that Shego thought Ron was wasting his time chuckling up a storm.
And true, HenchCo does seem to disrespect the villains a bit, but at the same time if HenchCo didn't provide something of quality no one would buy from them.
... and was Kim being overly negative to Ron in Seson 4? I recall that most of the time she went for positive encouragement and only really got negative when he was being particularly stupid (IE, kid's menu coupons at a fancy resteraunt or calling out his paranoia trying to get him to snap out of it in "Odds Man In"). I mean, she was able to look past Ron cheating on varsity sports pretty quickly despite nearly being killed by that. I mean she did hit him in the arm when he wasn't eager about Martin Smarty's award, but that's less 'negative' more 'hey, come on, it's actually something you could use'.
I mean Ron definitely had some self esteem issues, but even in Season One when Kim was all trying to fix him directly (IE, haircut) he showed he had his own skills and capabilities. I dunno, it seems to be just a bit too sharp of a jump from "bright but book dumb" to "able to make tons of superweapons without other people noticing until it is turned on"
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Post by shadowdancer01 on Mar 27, 2016 20:09:24 GMT -5
I always though of the attitudinator as changing ones moral compass and making them very single minded. Some one like Ron becomes much more effecting due to the forced focus on one thing. I think it made them evil (or good) mostly by removing distractions and doubts. Therefore, people under its effect weren't likely to commit atrocities and such unless they would have before the device was used. The Wego's idea of evil was stealing chicken and Ron's was taking the worlds supply of Nacos.
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Post by neosaiyanangel on Mar 27, 2016 20:10:19 GMT -5
Nah, I think I get what you're saying. But to be clear, when I said "just an uptick in killing henchmen", I more meant that being nastier is the only thing. That combined with actually being able to build doomsday devices that worked would likely be seen working as intended. Mind I hesitate to treat the Reverse Polarizer as what Hench intended mostly because that was Electronique doing her tweaks (she outright says she had modified it, or at least Shego said it was modified), so saying that as it worked in STG is how Hench intended it to work is dubious (I based the assessment on Shego's effectiveness on the fact that she's outright stated to be why Team Go was able to stay functional mostly, rather than her combat skill in STG). Of course, 'competence' doesn't mean 'go for taking over the world'; maybe if Ron was just evil he still would've gone for Nacos, he just would've resorted to a Trojan Mole Rat (that could fight, taking Ajax's suggestion from Age of Mythology) rather than having two doomsday devices ready in tandem quick enough that Shego thought Ron was wasting his time chuckling up a storm. And true, HenchCo does seem to disrespect the villains a bit, but at the same time if HenchCo didn't provide something of quality no one would buy from them. ... and was Kim being overly negative to Ron in Seson 4? I recall that most of the time she went for positive encouragement and only really got negative when he was being particularly stupid (IE, kid's menu coupons at a fancy resteraunt or calling out his paranoia trying to get him to snap out of it in "Odds Man In"). I mean, she was able to look past Ron cheating on varsity sports pretty quickly despite nearly being killed by that. I mean she did hit him in the arm when he wasn't eager about Martin Smarty's award, but that's less 'negative' more 'hey, come on, it's actually something you could use'. I mean Ron definitely had some self esteem issues, but even in Season One when Kim was all trying to fix him directly (IE, haircut) he showed he had his own skills and capabilities. I dunno, it seems to be just a bit too sharp of a jump from "bright but book dumb" to "able to make tons of superweapons without other people noticing until it is turned on" I think you misunderstood me in relation to how Kim treats Ron. I'm saying that in seasons 1-3 Kim was not the best friend. In season 4, however, she was VERY supportive of Ron growing and being competent. Also, I think you're underplaying Ron's potential to make doomsday weapons. Remember, he created The Mangler while haphazardly trying over what, an hour while panicking? I think he's smarter than he lets on (even more than he thinks he is), but is ultimately weighed down by his laziness and lack of support.
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Post by Luke Danger on Mar 27, 2016 20:21:17 GMT -5
Nah, I think I get what you're saying. But to be clear, when I said "just an uptick in killing henchmen", I more meant that being nastier is the only thing. That combined with actually being able to build doomsday devices that worked would likely be seen working as intended. Mind I hesitate to treat the Reverse Polarizer as what Hench intended mostly because that was Electronique doing her tweaks (she outright says she had modified it, or at least Shego said it was modified), so saying that as it worked in STG is how Hench intended it to work is dubious (I based the assessment on Shego's effectiveness on the fact that she's outright stated to be why Team Go was able to stay functional mostly, rather than her combat skill in STG). Of course, 'competence' doesn't mean 'go for taking over the world'; maybe if Ron was just evil he still would've gone for Nacos, he just would've resorted to a Trojan Mole Rat (that could fight, taking Ajax's suggestion from Age of Mythology) rather than having two doomsday devices ready in tandem quick enough that Shego thought Ron was wasting his time chuckling up a storm. And true, HenchCo does seem to disrespect the villains a bit, but at the same time if HenchCo didn't provide something of quality no one would buy from them. ... and was Kim being overly negative to Ron in Seson 4? I recall that most of the time she went for positive encouragement and only really got negative when he was being particularly stupid (IE, kid's menu coupons at a fancy resteraunt or calling out his paranoia trying to get him to snap out of it in "Odds Man In"). I mean, she was able to look past Ron cheating on varsity sports pretty quickly despite nearly being killed by that. I mean she did hit him in the arm when he wasn't eager about Martin Smarty's award, but that's less 'negative' more 'hey, come on, it's actually something you could use'. I mean Ron definitely had some self esteem issues, but even in Season One when Kim was all trying to fix him directly (IE, haircut) he showed he had his own skills and capabilities. I dunno, it seems to be just a bit too sharp of a jump from "bright but book dumb" to "able to make tons of superweapons without other people noticing until it is turned on" I think you misunderstood me in relation to how Kim treats Ron. I'm saying that in seasons 1-3 Kim was not the best friend. In season 4, however, she was VERY supportive of Ron growing and being competent. Also, I think you're underplaying Ron's potential to make doomsday weapons. Remember, he created The Mangler while haphazardly trying over what, an hour while panicking? I think he's smarter than he lets on (even more than he thinks he is), but is ultimately weighed down by his laziness and lack of support. Yeah, I somehow missed the "before" in "before they started dating", which is probably what confused me. And I definitely agree Ron had the potential, but we don't know how much time Ron took to make it and Drakken definitely noticed the time it took, which is a far cry from "whip up two world destroying superweapons so fast that Shego thought all Ron did was doing evil laughs". Probably doesn't help that we don't have the exact timetables, but that's getting into calcs and power levels and that's something that always gets messy. *shrugs* I guess it's a question of how much time did Ron have, and how much of a happy accident was it? I mean Ron obviously didn't expect it to work, considering he was shocked when it did, but I guess it's a matter of was it unconscious "okay here's a working one, hope the duct tape olds", or was it purely "oh I hope this fools Drakken long enough for KP to get here".
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Post by christhecynic on Mar 28, 2016 6:26:42 GMT -5
I kind of left out the biggest reason I doubt that it had unstated extra features:
If Hench knew it could do something, I think he'd advertise it. A lot.
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Post by neosaiyanangel on Mar 28, 2016 12:08:30 GMT -5
I kind of left out the biggest reason I doubt that it had unstated extra features: If Hench knew it could do something, I think he'd advertise it. A lot. ...wow. That's an amazing point. I wish I'd thought of that. XD
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Post by shadowdancer01 on Mar 28, 2016 18:16:21 GMT -5
I kind of left out the biggest reason I doubt that it had unstated extra features: If Hench knew it could do something, I think he'd advertise it. A lot. And charge more too, don't forget that.
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Post by Deleted on Mar 28, 2016 21:06:17 GMT -5
Jack hench is a business man first and foremost. He's all about the bottom line. If hes' making a buck, so be it. Now, as for advertising it, he probably kept it hush hush so Shego wouldn't steal it. Like she tends to do.
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Post by christhecynic on Mar 29, 2016 9:12:48 GMT -5
I kind of left out the biggest reason I doubt that it had unstated extra features: If Hench knew it could do something, I think he'd advertise it. A lot. And charge more too, don't forget that. Definitely. Why add extra functionality if there's no profit margin to be had?
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