Basic Trope: A character of evil alignment or a jerk still harbours feelings of sentiment for their parents, usually their mother.
- Straight: In the city of Troperia, Bob, head of the city's largest criminal organization, loves his mother, Alice. Even when ordering his mob to carry out less-than-legal actions, he still has time to do things like write her letters and treat her to dinner.
- Exaggerated: Bob almost has the entire city at his fingertips; but even when he's one press of a trigger away from taking over Troperia, he'll drop everything because Alice wants him to look after her cat for a few days.
- Downplayed:
- Bob is a jerk but always acts very polite to his mother.
- Bob is a brutal and ruthless Anti-Hero but is very fond of his mother.
- Justified:
- Alice, who's probably just as heinous, if not even more so than Bob, helped him get his criminal empire off the ground. Bob would be willing to do anything for the woman who gave him a hand in becoming the man he is today.
- Alice is family. The people he commits crimes against aren't.
- Alice busted her chops to give Bob a roof, an education, three meals a day and the occasional toy, and made clear she had Bob's back when he started to scam and rob people. This is loyalty that deserves to be rewarded in kind.
- Inverted:
- Even Bad Women Love Their Children: Alice runs a drug cartel and has no qualms about buying off the police, but doesn't mind stopping what she's doing to spend time with her son Bob.
- Bob holds nothing but contempt for Alice, and seems to take delight in making her life miserable.
- Bob is a Friend to All Living Things… except his mother.
- Bob is a Friend to All Living Things… his mother most of all.
- Even Bad Women Love Their Daddies: Diane runs a rival organization but loves her father Charles, and visits him while she has the chance.
- Even Bad Men Love Their Children: Bob would give his daughter Alice the world. In fact, he plans to do exactly that.
- Bob's mother loves him unconditionally, even knowing he's a Complete Monster who can never return the same affection.
- Bob saves the world from time to time, but completely hates his mother.
- Villainous Parental Instinct
- Gender-Inverted: Even Bad Girls Love Their Daddies: In the city of Troperia, Beatrice, a greedy CEO who's broken a lot of hearts and kicked a few puppies to get where she is, loves her father, Alan. Even when ordering her minions to carry out less-than-legal actions, she still has time to do things like talk to him on the phone and buy him something nice for Father's Day.
- Subverted:
- Bob runs a mob and seems to love Alice, but is in reality using her as a pawn to fulfill his own goals.
- Bob really can't stand his mother.
- Bob loves his mother, but it turns out he's not a bad guy at all; he's been framed by the true Big Bad.
- Double Subverted:
- Said goals, in one way or another, also help out his dear mother.
- That is, his biological mother, who was an asshole who abandoned him. But definitely loves his adoptive mother.
- Turns out, even being framed was all part of the plan, and Bob is a bad man after all.
- Parodied:
- Alice is an overprotective shrew of a mother who constantly nags at Bob for seemingly every little inconvenience, but he loves her all the same.
- Despite being a crazy psychopath, Bob is a childish momma's boy who still lives with his mother, and still depends on her for food, shelter, and emotional comfort.
- Bob is literally a malevolent deity who obliterates continents for fun, but he loves his mother very much and hates disappointing her even more than he loves obliterating continents.
- Zig Zagged: Bob's treatment towards Alice depends on her relevancy to whatever plot Bob has in mind and how it would affect Troperia.
- Averted: Bob keeps his personal life and his criminal life completely separate.
- Enforced: "Bob is a crime lord here, but he still needs to be shown as a human. Write in a few scenes that have him take time off from his activities to go visit Alice."
- Lampshaded: "You sure do love Alice, don't you, Bob?" "I feel sorry for any man/I pity the fool who doesn't care for their mother as much as I care for mine."
- Invoked: After a particularly gruesome hit that makes national news, Bob is advised by some of his henchmen to try being a bit less brutal in his actions. He thinks of where he could get inspiration from to help become less violent, thinks of his dear old mom, and starts getting ideas…
- Exploited: In order to entrap Bob, Anti-Hero Emily exploits Bob's love for Alice by putting an (empty) gun to her head and threatening to kill her unless Bob gives himself up.
- Defied:
- Bob orders Alice and her belongings moved elsewhere; not out of concern for her safety, but because she'd only get in the way of his plans.
- Bob is a Self-Made Orphan, and shows contempt at the idea of even respecting one's parents.
- Discussed: "First thing you should know about Bob: there's nothing he loves more than his mother." "That says a lot for an utter dick like him."
- Conversed: "It's a little funny, don't you think? These bad guys kill, bribe, and steal, but you just mention their mom and all of a sudden it's like they're greeting her after coming home from school." "Well, the show wants to give Bob a redeeming quality instead of making him pure evil." "Fair enough."
- Deconstructed:
- Diane, who commands a criminal outfit that rivals Bob's, finds out about how much he loves Alice and uses this information against him; she kidnaps Alice and threatens to kill her unless Bob gives in to demands that would leave her as the greatest crime lord in Troperia.
- Bob may love his mama...but Alice herself is torn between her love for Bob and her growing horror at his ever-escalating crimes, leaving their relationship strained.
- Reconstructed:
- Bob is emotionally strained at first, but has to remind himself that Alice's life on the line. Because Diane abducted the one person he cares about more than his mob itself, he's not afraid to go to levels he wouldn't normally go and make her punishment for kidnapping Alice much worse than usual.
- In revenge, Bob kidnaps Diane's father Charles, and tells her to release his mother or he'll kill her dad. Because Even Bad Women Love Their Daddies.
- Bob knows his behavior would break Alice's heart, and so he does his damned to hide it from her... While for her part, Alice knows about his real job and is rather distressed, but keeps it a secret because she knows how much their relationship means to Bob.
- Implied: Marsha, Bob's mother is the only one to survive the destruction of Bob's home town.
I'm gonna let you live today, because i've got a Mother's Day cake in the oven, and I need to check on it. Go back to Even Bad Men Love Their Mamas, and remember: you were never here.
