Smug Snake/Playing With
Basic Trope: A scheming villain whose fatal flaw is overconfidence.
- Played Straight: Eugene 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.
- Justified: Eugene was mocked and teased viciously all throughout his youth, so he began to develop a big ego as a psychological defense mechanism.
- Inverted: Eugene is a villain with no self-esteem.
- Subverted: Eugene ultimately decides that his objective is more important than his pride.
- 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.
- Deconstructed: Eugene's ego and arrogance leads to him becoming a General Failure.
- Reconstructed: ...But then he masters his ego and becomes a successful Magnificent Bastard and President Evil.
- 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.
- Averted: Eugene lacks the charm and grace of a Magnificent Bastard, but he has a normal-sized 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.
- 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?"