Dark Lord

From Wikinfo

Dark Lord (also known as an Evil Overlord) is a name often used in fiction to talk about a villain with evil henchmen, especially when the real name is thought to bring bad luck. Such a villain usually seeks to rule the world, galaxy, or universe.

In "religious orders" (as opposed to entertainment literature) contexts, it usually means Satan or other similar entities who hold power over lesser fiendish creatures and seek to disrupt the comfort and lives of people, sometimes tragically, and definitely maliciously.

Many of the clichés of a dark lord came from totalitarian states and fascist propaganda and ideology. They are sometimes depicted in outfits resembling Nazi troop uniforms, and the architecture is often in the geometric, modernist style common in the former Soviet Union. The frequency in which these cliches occur spawned the Evil Overlord List, a popular web site satirizing the mistakes Dark Lords make.

In fantasy novels Dark Lords have become something of a cliché following the success of J. R. R. Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings, in which the Dark Lord is Sauron. The case of Sauron also started the habit of characters being too afraid to mention a Dark Lord by name: the Gondorians of Middle-earth as a rule would never refer to Sauron by his name, because they are afraid it will bring Sauron there: they always called him either "The Enemy" or "The Nameless Enemy", even though they know he has a name. In the prequel "The Silmarillion", it is revealed that Sauron is the second Dark Lord; he was the lieutenant of the first Dark Lord, Morgoth, until the latter's defeat. Morgoth brought original evil to the world and created the Orcs by torturing and mutilating Elves.

Following the example of Sauron, Dark Lords in fantasy are always depicted as immensely powerful, implacably evil creatures with an insatiable lust for power, who cannot be reasoned or bargained with. Only by their ultimate destruction can peace be restored.

It is incredibly rare for a dark lord to actually engage in direct conflict with the heroes; often, they are dark gods, exist in other dimensions, and/or maintain a dark, inaccessible fortress. Rather than combat heroes directly, they usually rely on a vast, shadowy network of minions, often with an extremely hierarchical structure.

Among the Dark Lords in fantasy and science fiction are:

• Stephen Donaldson's Lord Foul, in The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant series, has physical form but is apparently immortal; he seeks the wild magic contained within Covenant's white gold wedding ring so that he can smash the Arch of Time and escape the Land.

• Darth Vader of the Star Wars movies is the Dark Lord of the Sith, but is merely the servant of Emperor Palpatine.

• The black-robed femme fatale Winnowill fulfils the role of a Dark Lord in the comic book series Elfquest.

• Shai'tan is the Dark Lord in Robert Jordan's The Wheel of Time. (See Characters in the Wheel of Time series)

• Lord Voldemort in Harry Potter books is a Dark Lord, and "Dark Lord" is also a name used for him.

• Evil Harry Dread in the Discworld mythos; Harry started out with just two henchmen and his Shed of Doom; he is now a well-known villain on the Disc. He does every steriotypical Dark Lord thing imaginable, from henchmen as dumb as possible to building in escape tunnels in his evil mountains so that when he escapes the 'heroes' will have 'something to fight tomorrow'.

• Torak in David Edding's Belgariad and its successive novels is the Dark God, or rather embodies this title, which is later passed on to someone else.

• The TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer has various characters fulfilling the role of Dark Lord, but the character that most closely resembled the archetype was the first season's The Master, an ancient vampire, and the only villain to have successfully killed Buffy. (She got better, of course).

• In its spin-off show, Angel, the Dark Lord role is taken by the largely invisible, but all-powerful Senior Partners at the law firm Wolfram and Hart.

• In the British childrens' series The Dreamstone, the Dark Lord is Zordrak, also called the Lord of Nightmares.

References

• Adapted from the Wikipedia article, "Dark_Lord" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Lord, used under the GNU Free Documentation License