History Main / SociopathicSoldier

* ''Series/BandOfBrothers'' is rather ambiguous with this trope, but Speirs exhibits traits of a psychopathic killer more than once during the series. His men both fear him and tell stories of his brutality. Historians agree the real man was a brutal soldier but not a sadist.

* ''Fanfic/MythosEffect'': Jukek, from the Turian Hierarchy, used to be a regular soldier sent to fight against the New Earth Federation... Except that the NEF specializes in {{Lovecraftian Superpower}}s and stalking their victims like horror monsters. Juluk underwent a days-long TraumaCongaLine running in sheer terror for his life with little to no food, until in desperation he almost drown in a river trying to get away. The Hierarchy finds him, puts him in a hospital... And the moment he wakes up they tell him that the rest of his unit is dead and that he should be back for duty as soon as possible. That was the last straw for Julek's sanity, as the only way he could interpret the whole situation was as a giant cosmic joke, and the realization has him LaughingMad. Now he's known as the epitome of DissonantSerenity, casually challenging others to shoot him, making bets with his squad over how long the "new meat" gets eaten, wiping the rotting entrails of his dead allies on his armor, and more. And in his words? He's never been ''happier''.

* Sergeant Tony Meserve in ''Film/CasualtiesOfWar''. He kidnaps, rapes, and kills a young village girl, then tries to kill PFC Eriksson with a grenade in the latrine.

* Ewan [=McStarley=], Vinnie Jones' character in ''Film/TheCondemned2007''-- a SAS operative who became a CondemnedContestant after setting fire to a Rwandan village, executing 17 men, raping 9 women, and torturing various others.

* In the ''Film/{{Doom}}'' movie, Sarge shows himself to be this, at one point [[spoiler:killing the rookie member of his team for refusing his order to kill a room full of unarmed civilians]]. Small wonder, then, that he [[spoiler:mutates into the protagonist's final adversary after becoming infected]].
* Leone revisits the trope in ''Film/DuckYouSucker'' (aka ''Film/AFistfulOfDynamite'') in the form of the Mexican soldiers serving under [[ANaziByAnyOtherName Colonel Gunther Reza]]. The Mexican army as conceived by Leone seems intent on imprisoning or killing every single person they meet, and their look is modelled on that of the fascist stormtroopers and German soldiers that Leone saw in Italy when he was a child. Reza himself is a terrifying Psychopath and ImplacableMan to boot, despite [[SilentAntagonist never saying a word]].

* ''Film/LawrenceOfArabia'' grows closer and closer to this trope as the movie goes on, finally culminating in [[spoiler:the massacre at Tafas.]]

* Paul Lazzaro in ''Film/SlaughterhouseFive''. This is clearly defined when he recounts the story of killing a dog by putting some clock parts into a steak that he gives to the dog that bit him. Any time someone makes him angry, he threatens that person with violence, then [[spoiler:in the end of the movie, he kills Billy Pilgrim, just as he said he would.]]

* Andrew Scott from ''Film/UniversalSoldier''. He was a Sergeant in UsefulNotes/TheVietnamWar, where he goes renegade as he starts butchering civilians and kills his own squad when they try to stop him. He cuts off the ears of his victims and [[CreepySouvenir wears them in a necklace]]. He orders Private Luc Deveraux to kill the two remaining 'traitors', two Vietnamese children, [[WouldHurtAChild doing the job himself]] when Deveraux refuses. Both are reborn years later as memory-wiped {{Super Soldier}}s. As soon as Scott regains his memories he kills his controllers and goes on a blood-filled vendetta across the States to punish Deveraux for disobeying his illegal orders back in Vietnam, graphically killing anyone who gets in his way. At the end he takes Deveraux's elderly parents and his love interest hostage, awarding all of them the death penalty. Despite claims earlier in the film that he thinks he's still fighting the insurgents in Vietnam, Scott later plainly admits that he's fully aware of where he is and what he's doing, and his only motive is revenge for Deveraux refusing to partake in his atrocities.
* The unnamed Colonel in ''Film/WarForThePlanetOfTheApes''. Apart from slaving a race of sentient beings, crucify some of them and deprive them of food and water, he kills his own son and some of his men... and his men's families, to prevent the spread of a non-lethal virus. His sociopathy is probably motivated by his obsession with the survival of the human race.

* ''Film/WrathOfMan'': Two members of Jackson's crew show different forms of this. Brad has failed to adapt to civilian life and is itching for a new "mission" to end his boredom, with no care about who gets hurt. Jan seems generally unstable and has poor impulse control, leading him to [[spoiler:kill Jackson and Bullet to steal the money from their final heist]]. [[spoiler:Bullet]] only reveals this at the end when he guns down [[spoiler:Fortico guards he personally trained]] with no apparent emotion.

* ''Series/BandOfBrothers'' is rather ambiguous with this tropes, but Speirs exhibits traits of a psychopathic killer more than once during the series. His men both fear him and tell stories of his brutality. Historians agree the real man was a brutal soldier, but not a sadist.

* ''Series/{{Outlander}}: Captain Jonathan "Black Jack" Randall is a [[DepravedBisexual equal opportunity]] rapist and torture who uses his authority to sadistically torture the population of the Scottish Highlands. He particularly enjoys creating [[ScarpiaUltimatum scarpia ultimatums]] in which his victims have to decide between being raped and tortured themselves or having their loved one raped and tortured. And he doesn't care if his victims are men, women, or children.

* ''Series/TheTwilightZone1959'': In "[[Recap/TheTwilightZoneS3E80AQualityOfMercy A Quality of Mercy]]", a new replacement is ''very'' eager to kill some enemies (Japanese soldiers, in this case), to the disgust of his {{shell shocked veteran}}s (well, they ''have'' been fighting longer than he had). This being ''The Twilight Zone'', he gets his comeuppance when he somehow becomes a Japanese soldier and is forced to obey an EvilCounterpart who repeats [[NotSoDifferentRemark his own bloodthirsty words]] back at him. AllJustADream, maybe, but he gets the message.

* ''WesternAnimation/MyAdventuresWithSuperman'' features a [[AgeLift younger]] version of Characters/{{Deathstroke}} before he became a PsychoForHire mercenary, and he's very much this trope. He was a ruthless BloodKnight that cared nothing for potential civilian casualties when attacking his opponents under [[WellIntentionedExtremist Amanda Waller]]'s orders, and was a {{sadist}} who frequently partook in EvilGloating that he was [[TokenEvilTeammate one of "the good guys"]].