Basic Trope: A scheming villain whose fatal flaw is overconfidence.
- Straight: Eugene the Snake has the skills and the potential, but his ego gets the better of him, ultimately leading to his downfall.
- Exaggerated: Eugene is a megalomaniac and considers himself a god, which leads him to grossly overestimate his abilities and fail spectacularly and miserably.
- Downplayed: Eugene is a quite cunning villain, but he would be a lot more effective one if he had a smaller ego.
- Justified:
- Eugene was mocked and teased viciously all throughout his youth, so he began to develop a big ego as a psychological defense mechanism.
- Eugene was subtly pushed into a place of power by several unseen masterminds. Not realizing their involvement, he assumes he got there by virtue of his own skill, and becomes arrogant as a result.
- Inverted:
- Eugene is a timid villain with no self-esteem.
- Eugene is a scheming villain that always assumes the best out of his opponents; therefore, he always plans accordingly to not be surprised by any of them. There is no little enemy, after all.
- Harry is a hero with a severe case of Heroic Self-Deprecation.
- Harry is a hero whose fatal flaw is overconfidence.
- Eugene is a villain who has lots of power, but no self-esteem.
- Eugene is a Dirty Coward who constantly seemingly over-estimates his foes and expects them to be holding back their capabilities even when it does not makes sense. Turns out he is always right and Fear Is the Appropriate Response.
- Subverted:
- Eugene ultimately decides that his objective is more important than his pride.
- Eugene learns from his mistakes and becomes less smug in the process.
- Eugene is an Insufferable Genius that proves to succeed despite his ego.
- Eugene can back up his ego and is completely justified in his self-confidence.
- Double Subverted: But then Eugene compulsively tries to defend his pride, which leads to his demise.
- Parodied: Eugene is a street criminal who sets a house on fire out of a dare from his friends, and he dies in the fire.
- Zig Zagged:
- Eugene outwardly appears to be a sleazy arrogant jerk...but then it turns out that he was just a nice guy all along. Then it turns out that that Eugene was just a robot...then the real Eugene reveals himself, and he's a sleazy arrogant jerk...but then the heroes fatally wound him in a fight, and he says that he was just pretending to be a sleazy arrogant jerk before dying. But then it's revealed that that Eugene was a stunt double, and the real Eugene comes out and has a Villainous Breakdown because you destroyed all his robots and stunt doubles, but refuses to back down because his pride is at stake. The heroes brutally slaughter him.
- Eugene’s wild mental state means that his level of competency varies. On a good day, he’s focused, cautious, very capable of pulling off the grand schemes that he envisions, and almost always keeps a cool head. On a bad day he’s an overconfident, emotionally unstable wreck capable of only a fraction of what he can usually muster and flipping his lid when something so much as inconveniences him.
- Eugene claims to have an incredibly complicated Xanatos Gambit planned that the heroes could never hope to thwart, and that several apparent errors were Just as Planned. By the end of the work, it's not clear how much really was part of his plan and how much was genuine blunders.In any case, Eugene is definitely smug, even in his apparent defeat.
- Averted:
- Eugene lacks the charm and grace of a Magnificent Bastard, but he has a normal-sized ego.
- Alternatively: Eugene completely lives up to his large-sized ego.
- Eugene is a
True Neutral character with an average ego.
- Enforced: "I'd like my villain to be a contemptible, unlikable bastard. Let's give him an inflated sense of self-worth so the audience will want him to be beaten."
- Lampshaded: "Man, Eugene, you've got some serious ego issues."
- Invoked: Eugene lacks the charisma of a Magnificent Bastard and hints that he might be arrogant, too.
- Exploited: Eugene's smugness keeps people guessing since he never shows any other personality traits in public. Half of his enemies dismiss him as a little fish in a big pond; the other half assumes he knows something they don't by default (whether or not he actually does).
- Defied: Eugene is a Knight Templar who has no sense of self-worth, devoting his cause to what he believes to be the greater good for the people, rather than himself.
- Discussed: "Well, of course, Eugene is an egotistical Jerkass."
- Conversed: "Is it really all that impossible for Eugene to do something for someone else rather than for himself?"
- Deconstructed: Eugene's ego and arrogance lead to him becoming a General Failure.
- Eugene used to be a nice person, but years of engaging in cutthroat politics and backstabbing have taken a toll on his moral compass. Thus, he adapts a Inferiority Superiority Complex, presenting himself with a big ego to hide the guilt of his shady deeds.
- Reconstructed:
- ...But then he masters his ego and becomes a successful Magnificent Bastard and President Evil.
- It turns out that his outrageous confidence in himself was why his best plans would work.
- Until his ego becomes genuine.
- Played For Drama and Horror: Eugene slowly becomes more and more demented as the heroes continue to try and break his ego, and is always too proud to beg, thinking that it's only going to hurt his ego even further, and goes all out. He tries to defy a Villainous Breakdown, but unknowingly, he is having one himself by becoming more insane.
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