Basic Trope: Two or more Big Bads work together.
- Straight: Admiral Alex Annihilation and Baron Bruce Bonecrusher work together to Take Over the World.
- Exaggerated:
- Alex and Bruce are so powerful that not even Bob Badass and Alice Awesome can stop them.
- Admiral Alex Annihilation and Baron Bruce Bonecrusher also have Colonel Charles Cruel, Duke Dan Destruction, Emperor Elliot Evulz, Führer Franz Foul, Generalissimo Grant Gore, Impirator Ivan Iron, King Keith Killbride, Lord Larry Lawless, Dr. David Destructo, etc. on their team.
- The aforementioned villains all form an Omniscient Council of Vagueness.
- Downplayed:
- Alex and Bruce team up to rob a convenience store.
- Alex and Bruce have a loose alliance.
- Alex and Bruce are Co-Dragons, but collectively serve as the de facto main antagonists on behalf of the distant Emperor Evulz.
- Justified:
- Alone, Alex and Bruce aren't very good Big Bads, but they're nigh-unstoppable when they work together.
- Alex and Bruce are have a close connection, being friends, siblings, or even lovers. Despite being selfish they really do care about each other, so they decide to help each other and team up.
- Alex is a Non-Action Big Bad and Bruce is a Dragon-in-Chief, and they have the same ambition.
- Inverted:
- Alex and Bruce are two Big Goods working together to save the world.
- Alex and Bruce are a Big Bad Ensemble competing to conquer the world.
- Subverted:
- Alex and Bruce commit similar crimes at the same places and appear to be working together, but are really working independently of each other.
- Alex and Bruce turn out to be Co-Dragons to Emperor Evulz.
- Double Subverted:
- Until they meet and decide to work together.
- Alex and Bruce overthrow Emperor Evulz.
- Evulz decides to get off his throne and directly join in on the crimes, making it a tri-umvirate.
- Parodied: Alex and Bruce are idiots who can't work without each other.
- Zig Zagged: Alex and Bruce are thought to be the Big Bads of the story, but they're really working for Emperor Evulz. We later see them trying to overthrow him. However Alex and Bruce fail miserably without Emperor Evulz even noticing, only for it to become a Running Gag.
- Averted:
- Alex is the Big Bad while Bruce is actually The Dragon.
- All bad guys work alone and never team up.
- Enforced: "Fans like Alex, but they also like Bruce. Wouldn't they like them more if they worked together?"
- Lampshaded: “Oh great, now we gotta fight two big bosses?!”
- Invoked: Alex puts out an ad in the newspaper for a villain to team up with.
- Exploited:
- When Bob Badass and Alice Awesome find out that Alex and Bruce work in the same HQ, they formulate a plan to eliminate them at the same time.
- Alice and Bob decide to turn the villains against each other.
- Defied: Alex and Bruce refuse to work together at any point.
- Discussed: "Hey, we should team up. We'd be twice as powerful then."
- Conversed: "I should've known those two would be working together."
- Deconstructed: Alex and Bruce work together, but there's a great deal of friction between them, and their alliance ultimately falls apart.
- Reconstructed: However, when Bob Badass and Alice Awesome show up to Alex's fortress of doom, Bruce rushes there to destroy his two worst enemies and save his former friend in one fell swoop.
- Played For Drama: Alex and Bruce are the villains and are nigh-unstoppable together, so much of the story's tension is derived from trying to figure out if the villains will win.
Join me comrade! Only together, we can become the Big Bad Duumvirate and conquer TV Tropes!
