Playing With / Omnicidal Maniac

Basic Trope: A villain whose main plan is to destroy the world, and has the means to do so.

• Straight: Doctor Destructo seeks to destroy Earth and all of its inhabitants with nuclear weapons, synthetic plagues, or both.
• Exaggerated:
  • Doctor Destructo plans on using his newly created Reality Bomb to destroy reality as we know it.
  • Doctor Destructo plans on using a triple-level fail-safed This Will Really Destroy Reality Bomb to destroy reality, then recreating a new universe with a big bang to sterilize away whatever might have survived in some corners the bomb missed, before collapsing the new universe onto itself and decaying all matter to a state where no planets, stars or any other celestial bodies will emerge, ensuring nothing will ever exist ever again, even existence and nonexistence.
  • Doctor Destructo wants to prevent reality from ever coming into being.
  • Doctor Destructo plans to send every living being in the world, including himself, into the Sun.
  • Doctor Destructo wants to destroy the entire omniverse, possibly even beyond.
  • Doctor Destructo plans to destroy the entirety of fiction itself.
  • All of the villains share this goal.
  • It's an everyday problem.
• Downplayed:
  • Doctor Destructo is a mundane Serial Killer who expresses a clear desire to destroy everything in his rants, but there isn't the slightest chance of him actually doing so.
  • Doctor Destructo doesn't want to kill everyone, but the vast majority of the planet, leaving only the people that follow him alive.
  • Ax-Crazy
• Justified:
  • Doctor Destructo is a Straw Nihilist who lives in a Crapsack World and suffered from a severe Freudian Excuse, and is using the Reality Bomb to subject the world to euthanasia or create a better one In His Own Image.
  • The plan is Doctor Destructo's ultimate philosophical experiment. He seeks to find out if there's an afterlife or the world is All Just a Dream. To make sure of the results, he'll kill himself as well.
  • Doctor Destructo is the absolute personification of nothingness, the avatar of hate, or some other Eldritch Abomination, and wants to wipe out reality because it's who he is.
  • Destructo is a being born from misanthropy who can only manifest in the physical world via Demonic Possession. Dr. D'Amico, a brilliant inventor, becomes its next host after finding out his inventions are being used to cause suffering and oppression around the world.
  • Doctor Destructo suffers from a god complex, and believes destroying it all will prove this.
  • Absolute Xenophobe taken to its logical extreme.
  • Doctor Destructo is fighting a powerful enemy that can only be stopped by the destruction of the universe.
  • Doctor Destructo used to be an aspiring world conqueror who sought to protect the world from itself. But too many people "selfishly" stopping him has led him to believe It Is Beyond Saving.
  • Doctor Destructo believes that everyone gets what they deserve in the afterlife. To end injustice, he decides to send everyone there by force.
  • It is such a Crapsack World that destroying and killing everything is the only way for Doctor Destructo to save everyone, perhaps to lay the groundwork for a new, better world to be born.
• Inverted:
  • Doctor Destructo's sole motivation is to keep the world from being destroyed.
  • The world's sole motivation is to absolutely destroy Doctor Destructo.
• Subverted: Doctor Destructo's plan to destroy reality is a Red Herring meant to obfuscate his real plan, or simply a blackmail attempt: He has no plan of following through whether he gets what he wants or no.
• Double Subverted: ...but once his last desire has been fulfilled, he throws the switch anyway.
• Parodied:
  • Doctor Destructo has no concept of the scale of destruction he is about to unleash. When Bob asks him, "Why would you want to destroy the world?" he gets flummoxed.
  • The method to destroy the world turns out to be either much less dangerous than initially thought, or just completely bizarre: Destructo's device turns out to drown the Earth in lukewarm custard.
  • Doctor Destructo wants to destroy the universe because a flying deer from space always kicks him in the face
• Zig-Zagged: Doctor Destructo is about to destroy the world, but suddenly realizes just what an awful thing that would be to do, and stops. After attempting to come to terms with his own horridness and failing, he realizes that the only way to keep people from trying to follow his example would be to destroy himself, and the sinful world that spawned him, with his Reality Bomb.
• Averted: Doctor Destructo doesn't want to destroy reality, or obviously has no way to do so.
• Enforced: "Enough with the Take Over the World plots. Can we have something else that's an adequate threat for our invokedGod-Mode Sue protagonist?"
• Lampshaded: "How does a plan involving killing all life everywhere make any sense?"
• Invoked: Doctor Destructo is out to get the attention of the really really powerful beings, and only presenting a genuine threat to the world will do.
• Defied: "Oh please, why would I ever want to destroy the world? That would be bad for business."
• Exploited: Bob quickly informs the other villains of Destructo's plans and lets them foil it in an Evil Versus Oblivion setup.
• Discussed: "In every story I've heard, the bad guys were content to rule. I think we're dealing with something bigger."
• Conversed: "You'd think Doctor Destructo could think of something to do with the world besides blow it up."
• Implied:
  • After Doctor Destructo leaves the room during one of his planning sessions, he places a shattered globe on his desk.
  • Doctor Destructo desires to conquer the multiverse, and based off of how the way he conquers his universe is through something like a genocidal takeover or mass murdering spree on everything he sees, it’s likely this is his way of conquering.
• Deconstructed:
  • Doctor Destructo finds killing just a single planet, let alone the entire universe, far too difficult for any one man to ever achieve.
  • Doctor Destructo is suffering from severe, untreated depression that clouds his better judgment and steers him away from his usual, less destructive schemes.
  • Doctor Destructo manages to get an Armor-Piercing Question involving his "destroy the world" plot in just a simple "What are you gonna do afterwards?" He is stumped trying to figure out what to do after he destroys the world, since that's his only goal.
• Reconstructed:
  • From the start, Doctor Destructo is an extreme negative utilitarian. He believes destroying a world gone to hell will relieve not just his own suffering, but everyone else's.
  • Doctor Destructo is aware of how much the audience suffers from watching the show. He decides to give them what they want by hatching a plan to end the universe (and the show) once and for all.
• Played for Laughs: Mike Nelson, Destroyer of Worlds
• Played for Drama: Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds

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