Smug Snake/Live-Action TV

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Examples of Smug Snakes in Live-Action TV include:

  • Lyn Peterson from Torchwood: Miracle Day is one hell of a Smug Snake. She's very sexy and seems pretty powerful at first, arresting Rex Matheson and the Torchwood team as soon as they arrive on US soil, but her incompetance soon becomes clear when her attempt to poison Jack Harkness is easily exposed and Gwen Cooper incapacitates her with a single punch. She proves herself a good fighter when she assaults Rex, but he still manages to defeat her by breaking her neck. Given that everyone on Earth has lost the ability to die, she remains alive but disturbingly yet strangely comically, now has her head on backwards.
  • This trope describes every single villain from 24, and surprisingly, a fair number of the good guys as well.
  • David Platt from Coronation Street beleives himself to be a Magnificent Bastard, with his wicked schemes of Disproportionate Retribution. However since he constantly makes the mistake of messing with people who easily wiped the floor with him, like Charlie Stubbs, Jason Grimshaw and Gary Windarss, it often blows up in his face. And the constant temper tantrums. Or the time he tried to blackmail Tracy Barlow (who is quite a qualified Smug Snake herself) into sleeping with him, she actually laughed it off.
  • Dakota Fred from the Discovery Channel seres Gold Rush easily qualifies, acting like a douchebag when working with the Hoffmans in the first season, then backstabbing them and buying the claim out from under them in season 2, forcing them to find another site to mine.
  • The Sheriff of Nottingham of the BBC series Robin Hood seems to count himself a great Magnificent Bastard, but in practice his evil works tend to be rather too easily foiled by Robin Hood's men to be considered the work of a true evil genius. Furthermore, his 'la-di-da-di-da!' Catch Phrase, often uttered as a sign of impatient indifference in response to threats concerning the meddling of Robin Hood and his men, is much too unctuous, awkward, and obnoxious to be a distinctive of a true Magnificent Bastard.
  • Captain Kevin Darling in Blackadder Goes Forth, a snotty little creep who, working safely behind the battlelines as General Melchett's adjutant officer, has made it his life's mission to make sure that Blackadder doesn't escape the trenches of World War I. He's loathed by Blackadder for obvious reasons; however, despite (or because of) all his sucking up, the General can't stand him either, at one point informing Darling that he regards him as a son - just not a particularly well-liked one.
  • Angel
    • Lilah Morgan was a true Magnificent Bastard, but eventually she had to die and be replaced, and that replacement was Eve. As the Poor Man's Substitute for Lilah, Eve inevitably came off as a Smug Snake, but the writers seemed to realize this, and put her through a series of events that had the effect of breaking the cutie. They were of the opinion that she would be more interesting if she got some Character Development that such that she would no longer be driven by slyness and cool disdain (as she started out), but by fear, anger, and a Minion Shipping romance with Lindsey.
    • Lilah herself only slowly evolved into a Magnificent Bitch; for most of her run on show (arguably until as late as the second half of Season 3) she was definitely a Smug Snake, even ending up with a promotion - and thus her life - solely because Lindsey contemptuously tossed it away.
    • The true Smug Snake in Angel was Gavin Park. Gavin believed himself to be the next Lindsey McDonald, a Magnificent Bastard who could arguably be called Angel's Arch Enemy (well, he would argue that he could), but he just wasn't the man, lawyer or villain that he'd replaced.
  • The Master of Doctor Who devolves from his usual Magnificent Bastard status unnervingly often, the most Egregious examples being in the Made for TV Movie, in which his grand evil scheme was to... not die, and in the episode "Logopolis" in which he wipes out a large part of the universe and octillions of people because he didn't do his homework.
    • In fact, a lot of serials with the Master as the main villain can be described less as "the Master is trying to take over the world" than as "the Master is up to yet another dumb scheme that's likely to get out of control and cause The End of the World as We Know It." Or indeed, as " the Master has a scheme to not die". Guys spends a lot of time cheating death even for a Time Lord, it's kind of his thing.
    • "Amy's Choice" features the unbelievably punchable Dream Lord.
  • Pick any villain from any episode of The A-Team, any villain.
  • The Vorta in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine are a Planet of Hats of Smug Snakes, with Weyoun as the smuggest. The Jem-Hadar despise all Vorta for this, despite remaining unquestioningly loyal.
    • Many Cardassians are also Smug Snakes. Dukat is one, through and through while fancying himself a Magnificent Bastard. Just listening to him talk about how he feels the Bajorans should have loved him like a father while he oversaw their enslavement and the strip-mining of their world, is disgusting to the series' protagonists and highly amusing to Weyoun. Dukat even has moments where he is on the side of the heroes until he takes an opportunity to serve himself to everyone else's detriment.
      • Dukat's right hand and successor Damar was also a pretty Smug Snake until he decided to rebel and fight back against the Dominion.
    • Kai Winn is the queen of Smug Snakes, especially in her first appearance. Five minutes of listening to Louise Fletcher cloak herself in "the-Prophets-forgive-you-for-being-a-filthy-unbeliever" self-righteousness, and you'll be itching to leap through the TV screen and punch the smug out of her.
      • She and Weyoun actually meet and have a Smug-off in late season five. Watching each of them get a taste of their own medicine should be deeply satisfying, but it's more likely to make you feel unclean...
  • Dave Hester from Storage Wars fits this, acting like a complete prick and having a near-permanent smirk on his face that makes one wonder why the other bidders don't knock his teeth out.
    • What's worse? He's, generally, WINNING...mostly because he 1. Has a good eye for the REALLY valuable stuff, and 2. Has a shitload more money, and more money to burn.
  • G'Kar during the first season of Babylon 5 and especially in the pilot movie.
    • Also, Mister Morden, with his ever annoying arrogant smile. J. Michael Straczynski points out in the commentary that he specifically loved the actor for how unlikeably smug he made the character come off: "Look at that guy! Don't you just want to hate him?"
      • The audience wasn't the only one who hated him.

'Vir: "I want to live just long enough to be there when they cut off your head and put it on a pike, as a warning to the next ten generations that some favors come with too high a price. I want to look up into your lifeless eyes and wave, like this.

    • Alfred Bester was like this in his first number of appearances as well, both smug and unsuccessful, but JMS noticed the threat of Villain Decay and averted it oh so hard with his later actions.
    • Most of the series' one-shot antagonists come under this trope.
    • No one can get through season 4 without wanting to punch Allison Higgins, ISN reporter and face of Clark's propaganda machine. One wonders if she's a Stepford Smiler.
  • Speaker of the House Haffley from The West Wing is an example of the "failed Magnificent Bastard" variety. He often tries to use the Republican majority in Congress to be irritatingly obstructionist to Democratic president Bartlet. However, often when he is most confident is when he fails terribly (such as when his attempt to cut the budget leads to the government going broke and Haffley look stupid, or when his pulling a vote on stem cell research to interfere with Democratic campaigning leads to Matt Santos tricking him into thinking the Democrats had left when they didn't).
    • The former example almost works; the government shutdown cripples the United States and the public blames Bartlet... until a Crowning Moment of Awesome where Bartlet walks to Congress to discuss the matter with Haffley - unfortunately for Haffley, he's unprepared for this, his Smug Snake instincts kick in, and he ends up leaving Bartlet sitting in a corridor whilst he tries to figure out what to do. This backfires on him badly when Bartlet merely leaves, making Haffley look incompetent, arrogant and uncaring, causing public opinion to swing into a serious backlash against him and forcing him to eat crow and accept Bartlet's budget terms.
    • An infrequent recurring character called Larry Claypool represented the 'slimy-but-low-level Obstructive Bureaucrat meets Amoral Attorney' kind; a lawyer for a right-wing organisation that frequently sought to embarrass the President by muckracking, he often issues subpoenas to the characters requiring them to testify about issues that will cause embarrassment to the President and his staff, and comes off as smugly as possible whilst doing so. He's frequently described as an idiotic, pompous blowhard, but a dangerous one since he has the unerring ability to find things that might cause serious damage to the administration in his muckraking.
  • Malcolm Dietrich in season two of Murder One was a very, very obvious attempt to replicate the magic the show had with Richard Cross, the Magnificent Bastard from the first season. For whatever reason it just didn't work, though undoubtedly at least part of this was due to not being able to score as good an actor as Stanley Tucci, who had played Cross.
  • Prison Break
    • Brad Bellick in the season 1 practically embodies this trope. As a corrupt correctional officer, he certainly acts all "magnificent-y bastard-y" like. He deals with former mob-boss Abruzzi, has a history of inmate abuse, insults Ax Crazy Magnificent Bastard "T-Bag" in his face and interrupts Michael's plans quite often. But at the same time he is unattractive, obnoxious, sleazy, importunate, cowardly... You catch my drift.
    • Agent Kim from season 2 is another notorious example, lording and sneering over our heroes while being generally inept in almost all of his endeavors, then getting done in by the most unlikely of culprits.
    • Don Self after he was revealed to be The Mole. Where Bellick had at least some sense of magnificence, this guy is just too annoying to like.
  • Trymon in the TV series adaptation of The Colour of Magic. Ungarnished ambition, oily hair, and being played by Tim Curry all result in a decidedly un-magnificent Bastard.
  • Heroes: season 3 Big Bad Arthur Petrelli: between his ludicrous amounts of power, constant dog-kicking and smug, smarmy tone throughout it all.
    • Eric Doyle, the creepy puppet-master from season 3 also qualifies. Creepy and smarmy, he's the kind of villain audiences just love to hate.
  • Grunchlk of Farscape, a bloated, scheming, greedy merchant with a nasty habit of overcharging his clients and betraying them should a better offer appear. In the episodes he appears in, every single character despises him with a passion, especially Scorpius, who takes great delight in stabbing him in the back of the skull with a Mind Control probe and forcing him to eat two of his own fingers.
    • Farscape also gave us Commandant Grayza; a smug, vindictive and generally repulsive Peacekeeper who wasn't nearly as smart as she thought she was, and eventually got completely owned by the Scarrans before being removed by her own lieutenant for incompetence.
    • Prince Clavor from the "Look At The Princess" trilogy: a whiny, posturing and thoroughly smug little bastard that wants the throne of the Royal Planet for himself- but probably wouldn't have been able to string half of his plan together without Scarran help. And he pays for it throughout the story: his mother plots to keep him off the throne, his fiance plans to assassinate him if he ever takes power, Crichton slaps him about... finally, the Scarran ambassador decides that control over the Royal Planet isn't worth another minute of Clavor's smugness, and fries the bastard alive.
  • In Survivor, we have Richard Hatch, Boston Rob, Edgardo & The Four Horsemen, Coach, and Russell Hantz, although the latter tends to be a cross of this and Entitled Bastard.
    • Richard Hatch and Boston Rob don't count since they both backed up their arrogance by actually winning(albeit it took Rob four times in order to do so. He was definitely a Smug Snake in his first season, but during All Stars he took the leap into Magnificent Bastard territory. Richard on the other hand has always been shown as being very smart). The other examples mentioned above(as well as many many others on the show) are, however, justified.
  • In the American Version of Big Brother Jessie was sooooo full of himself. And in the recent Season, Enzo practically has this written on his forehead.
  • Charles Miner from American version of The Office replaces Michael and responds to his eccentricity with realistic exasperation. However, his time in charge is largely characterized by appointing his employees with mismatched roles, bullying Jim at any chance he can get, and being all-around smug.
  • Mad Men
    • Bobbi Barret, the wife and manager of comedian Jimmy Barret, ends up like this in one episode. Jimmy had previously insulted the wife of the owner of Utz potato chips, which he was doing a commercial for. Don Draper takes most of the episode negotiating with Bobbi to get him to apologize. After the two end up having sex (don't ask) Bobbi agrees to a dinnertime apology. But Jimmy spends all his time at the dinner hitting on Don's wife. When Don takes Bobbi aside, she says that according to Jimmy's contract he doesn't have to apologize, unless Don gets them more money. So Don shoves his hand up her dress and says that if he doesn't, he will ruin Jimmy. Jimmy apologizes. One word: OWNED
    • Pete Campbell is constantly this, although he does get somewhat better about it as the show goes on.
  • Lester from Primeval is a curious case, he starts off as an archetypal Smug Snake, but it is revealed that this is more a Jerkass Facade than anything else, his awesome powers of Sarcasm really shine through in season 2 when he is given his own Smug Snake nemesis in his assistant and Starscream wannabe, Leek and by season 3 his return from a Ten-Minute Retirement is given a Standing Ovation, and yet all the time he retains his aura of smug self-satisfaction. A rare heroic Smug Snake perhaps.
  • In Kamen Rider Dragon Knight, Drew Lansing (a.k.a. Kamen Rider Torque), one of Big Bad General Xaviax's lieutenants, fancies himself both an expert manipulator and fighter. Eventually, he proves lacking in both areas.
  • While we're on the subject of Kamen Rider, this trope would not be complete without mention of Houjou, from Kamen Rider Agito. He spends the entire series trying to undermine the G3 crew in multiple ways, from guile-ing his way into becoming the G3 Operator, to proposing a competing powered armor system, to trying to capture Agito just to render G3 obsolete. The worst part is, every time his shit gets shut down he only seems to get worse.
  • Strange that no one has yet mentioned Benjamin of Jekyll. His comeuppance was most satisfying.
  • The members of the Fellowship of the Sun in True Blood tend to follow this trait. Filled with empty smiles and holier-than-thou attitudes, this vampire-hating church isn't above kidnap, murder or rape of ordinary people whose only crime is having a sexual relationship with a vampire, all while declaring their good intentions and other propaganda. Especially annoying, since many (most?) vampires of the show would most definitely deserve staking, but you couldn't root for these people to do it even if you wanted to.
  • Every Big Bad from Power Rangers has at least one scheming lackey utterly convinced that they are superior to the remainder of the universe and willing to backstab anyone in their way. This usually ends with them being converted (if brainwashed into snakedom) or, much more often, exploding violently by either side's hand.
  • Justin in Wizards of Waverly Place has tendencies towards this that get dialed right Up to Eleven in the movie. His sister Alex has the same tendencies but is a true Magnificent Bastard more often.
  • Being set in a world of power-crazed politicians, The Thick of It has a fair few. Julius Nicholson and Steve Fleming both consider themselves to be Magnificent Bastards but they also have big egos and tend to foil their own devious plans by bragging about them.
  • While not really a villain, new med student Cole in season 9 of Scrubs fits the bill. Due to his wealthy family contributing tons of money to the school, Cole sees himself as "untouchable" no matter what he does, always has a smug smile on his face and a smarmy tone in his voice, and is involved in an emotionally unhealthy relationship with Lucy. Recent developments indicate he may have a decent side to him but even this might be further manipulation.
  • In The Vampire Diaries, the modern Jonathan Gilbert. Smug, sadistic, and smarmy, a lot of viewers consider him the only villain they're really wanted to die as soon as possible.
  • Both Vern and Omen of Dark Oracle have severe Smug Snake tendencies, with both being arrogant, self-centred, quickly offended, and prone to wildly overestimating their own abilites. Of the two, Omen is the most serious threat, as he almost has the power to back up his bragging; both eventually Heel Face Turn and, in Omen's case, lose most of the Smug Snakeness.
  • Bela Talbot of Supernatural, a thief and dealer in occult items, was intended to be a Chaotic Neutral foil to the Winchesters and a Magnificent Bitch. Unfortunately, she was so disdainful and so treacherous that she gradually became exaggerated into this trope in her appearances prior to her Karmic Death.
  • Morgana from Merlin walks around with a perpetual Evil Smirk on her face, even though every single one of her plans to kill Uther, Arthur and Merlin have completely failed.
  • Rick Flag of Smallville is a competent schemer (at least so far) but his fondness for Cold-Blooded Torture, Sociopathic Soldier status, and 1960s-ish supervillainy keep him here, especially when compared to Lex Luthor and Lionel. He's slimily arrogant, viciously vile, and at least partially insane: he's a Badass Normal who's spent so much time around superheroes that he self-identifies as one.
    • Lx-3 (Old!Lex), an Axe Crazy clone of Lex Luthor might count as well, as he has all of Lex's cunning and superiority, and none of his style.
    • Genevieve Teague, Big Bad of Season 4, is a competent schemer, but she's also a paranoid Abusive Mom and her grand scheme to not die ultimately gets her killed. She also lacks Lex's Jerkass Woobie status, Zod's presence and Lionel's sheer panache. Unlikeable, unmourned and The Unfought she's definitely a Smug Snake.
    • Lots of one-shot villains count as well, as does Regan Matthews, a slimy Corrupt Corporate Executive who served as Lex's Dragon throughout Season 8. Arrogant, condescending and just plain unpleasant, he was nevertheless unusual for a Smug Snake as his defining trait was his Undying Loyalty to Lex.
  • Many, many criminal defendants from the various Law & Order shows.
    • The detectives in Law And Order: SVU also, at least Once an Episode, usually at the end. Elliot and Olivia routinely subject their suspects to psychological and/or physical torture while lying to them about their rights and invoking the upcoming Prison Rape, pressure and bully witnesses so they testify for them and at least one commited suicide due to Olivia's abusive treatment, stalk and harrass victims to metaphorically twist their arms into collaborating in what can be considered non-psychic Mind Rape, etc. All to "make justice" aka getting favorable outcomes to their cases. Lots of people say they ARE this trope.
    • Some of the defence attorney's more than cross the line into Smug Snake. Mike Cutter debateably started out as an Antiheroic variant.
  • In Deadwood, you can practically see the trail of slime behind E.B. Farnum as he skulks around town, engaging one poorly thought-out scheme after another.
    • Cy Tolliver appears to be covered with a sickly layer of slime too.
  • This is why short-lived BBC sitcom Prince Amongst Men didn't work -- the title character was a Smug Snake, when he needed to be a Magnificent Bastard. Not only that, but the creators missed the point that we sympathise with, for example, Blackadder because the world really does seem out to get him and he's just fighting back. Gary Prince's world seemed to be incredibly on his side, to the point where he was a Jerk Sue.
  • Brennen on Burn Notice is a Dangerously Genre Savvy Insufferable Genius who consistently aspires to Magnificent Bastardry and fails to achieve it because, no matter how many times it backfires, he just can't resist leaving Michael unattended long enough to contact his allies and/or cut a side deal with one of Brennen's own allies.
  • The Law and Order/[[Homicide: Life on the Street]] crossover "Sideshow" features Independent Counsel William Dell, a clear No Celebrities Were Harmed version of Kenneth Starr. During the course of the two-parter, he abuses his grand jury subpoena power, lies to police, commits blackmail, derails a major character's judicial appointment, cons defendants with bogus immunity agreements, sabotages a plea bargain between the Baltimore prosecutors and a key witness, and finally gives full state and federal immunity to a murderer so he can secure uncorroborated (and probably false) testimony implicating the President in his crime. When confronted at the end of the episode about his decision to torpedo a murderer investigation for political gain, he accuses McCoy and Danvers of being "petty" and "savage" in their lawyering, because "the stakes are so damn small."
  • Jeremy Clarkson of Top Gear tackles any task or challenge on the show with the attitude that it will work because he says it is going to, even if his co-presenters warn him otherwise. Which makes it all the more hilarious when things go horribly wrong as a result.
  • Jade from Victorious, to everyone.
  • Uncle Teddy AKA Flosso from Flash Forward should be the poster boy of this trope...or not. He is a Fat Bastard who smokes a lot, is a Card-Carrying Villain, has people killed without a qualm, thinks he is so smart, and bullies Simon around. However, he gets his comeuppance when he has Simon come with him, just the two of them, reveals Simon's professor's corpse in a car trunk, and tells Simon to comply and that this is his last warning. In a Crowning Moment of Awesome, Simon says "I'm calling your bluff! You need me too much!" The look on Flosso's face at that point was priceless. Simon shoves Flosso down to the ground and presses on the windpipe of that Fat Bastard. He smokes a lot, so he suffocates rather quickly and dies. Get this, it is pointed out that Flosso was just a middleman! It sort of makes you wonder what the people he works for are like. You will learn to hate this guy in one episode. He deserved to get killed off.
  • Criminal Minds: Being a show about Serial Killers more than a few of the villains are like this, especially those that suffer from Antisocial Personality Disorder or Narcissistic Personality Disorder. George Foyet, The Boston Reaper, and a Recurring Character in Seasons 4 & 5, is one of the best examples, being a total sociopath and Complete Monster who suffers from Lack of Empathy, It's All About Me, and an ego the size of a blimp. He takes offense at the idea that anyone would dare to try and stop him, torments Hotch for no better reason than his incredibly petty ideas of Revenge by Proxy, is killing people for the fame more than anything else, and takes such a sadistic delight in everything he does that it's impossible to admire him, despite his undeniable Evil Genius. The poster boy for this trope, however, is probably the Season 2 Final Boss, Frank Breitkopf. While he has more sympathetic qualities than The Reaper, Keith Carradine plays him with such slimy arrogance that it's impossible to like him, or even admire him. He comes off like an evil college professor: you are going to learn something, no matter how painful it might be.
  • Who Wants to Be a Superhero?: Dr. Dark is intentionally played as this in the second season. He talks in a raspy voice and spends his screentime boasting about how evil and brilliant he is. Then when his big plan in the second season fails, he confronts the superheroes personally and gets beaten up in a fight that lasts about a minute and a half.
  • Not only does Lisa Niles from General Hospital fit this to a T, she gets bonus points for being a total psycho. She seriously believed that killing Robin would make Patrick fall in love with her. All her attempts to off Robin failed. Most recently, Lisa fell into a coma after accidentally sticking herself with a syringe full of toxic drain cleaner that she meant to use on Robin.
  • Laurie Foreman from That '70s Show, who was the only somewhat major character with no redeeming moral qualities, a general smugness about her, and was intentionally made this way, with the characters themselves lampshading it.
  • Dr Seth. Griffin from St. Elsewhere started out this way, particularly when he tried to pit fellow first year residents Carol Novino and Susan Birch against each other. Birch ends up taking the fall for a patient death for which Griffin was responsible and is kicked out of the residency program.
  • Villainous CIA representative Clyde Decker from Chuck, most definitely. He's always seen with a smug, shit-eating grin, and frequently discusses about a big plan meant to take down Chuck and his allies. However, it turns out, that Decker himself is just a pawn in a larger plan by Daniel Shaw to bring down Chuck as we find out "Chuck Versus the Santa Suit".
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