Evil laughter
An evil laugh is a stock megalomaniacal laugh by a villain in fiction. In comic books, where supervillains utter such laughs, it is variously rendered as Mwahahahaha!, Muhuhahaha!, Mwahahaha!, and Mwa ha ha! or BooWHAHAHA!. (Compare Ho ho ho.) These words are also commonly used on internet Blogs, BBSes, and games. There, they are generally used when some form of victory is attained, or to indicate superiority over someone else. The words are often used as either interjections or nouns.
The evil laugh has been used for thousands of years to convey a villans feeling of significance. For men it starts off as a low rumbling, in the back of the throat, slowly accending to a loud cackle. For women, on the other hand, it begins as a hoarse scratchy sound, and then rises to a maniacal laugh- however, this could work either way. Some protagonists have been known to use an "evil" laugh, either as a product of mental instability or merely to display a feeling of significance as a villain would. Father Grigori from the video game Half-Life 2 is an example of this. [1]
The Evil Overlord List notes that evil laughter often distracts the villain from important details that the hero can use to escape or prevail.
Popular culture
Characters that use an evil laugh include:
- Albedo from the game Xenosaga
- Albel Nox from the video game Star Ocean 3
- Ayeka from Tenchi Muyo!, and
- Bryan Fury from the Tekken Series
- Covenant Elite from the video game Halo: Combat Evolved. Usually they make evil laughter when they defeated the Master Chief.
- Dark Samus from Metroid Prime 2: Echoes
- Darth Malak from Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic Who also pressed one hand against his stomach while laughing, perhaps to assist containing the laughter.
- Devil Jin from Tekken 5
- Doctor Claw from the popular childrens cartoon series Inspector Gadget
- Doctor Eggman from the Sonic the hedgehog video games ("HOO! HOO! HOO! HOO! HOO!")
- The Dark Emmett from Evil City Mwahahahaha or BooWHAHAHAHA!
- Doctor Evil from the Austin Powers movie
- Dr. Nefarious from the video game Ratchet and Clank: Up Your Arsenal
- While not inherently evil, Don Kanonji (Bleach) sports a variation of evil laugh himself ("BOHAHAHAHAHA!!!!")
- Blofeld in the opening sequence of For Your Eyes Only
- Evil Emperor Zurg from Toy Story's Buzz Lightyear of Star Command
- Freeza, Raditz and Cell from Dragon Ball Z
- Ganondorf from the Legend of Zelda series
- General Skarr from The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
- Green Goblin from Spider-Man
- Grim from The Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy
- Hector Con Carne from Evil Con Carne
- Hobgoblin from Spider-Man
- Isaac from the video game Castlevania: Curse of Darkness
- Jabba the Hutt and Emperor Palpatine (exhibiting the rarer "evil cackle") from Star Wars
- Jack Spicer in Xiaolin Showdown
- Jafar from Disney's Aladdin
- The Joker from Batman
- Katsuhiko Jinnai from El-Hazard
- Kefka in Final Fantasy VI
- Bowser from the Mario series
- Kodachi "the Black Rose" from Ranma 1/2 ("OHHOHOHOHOHOHOHOHO!")
- "Lamont Cranston" in the radio drama The Shadow.
- Lezard Valeth from the video game Valkyrie Profile
- Luca Blight in Suikoden II (HOO HOO HOO HA HA HA!!!)
- Dr. Malcom Betruger from Doom 3
- Mandark in the animated series Dexter's Laboratory ("HA-Haha! Ha Haha Haha!")
- Master Hand from Super Smash Brothers
- Megabyte from ReBoot
- Millie Mudd from the comic strip Ozy and Millie is noted a few times for her evil laugh. Llewellyn, a dragon, also has a good one.
- Ming the Merciless from Flash Gordon
- Murray the talking skull from the Monkey Island game series
- Mojo Jojo from The Powerpuff Girls
- Naga the White Serpent from Slayers also have the same laugh.
- Professor Miloch from Blake and Mortimer
- Purple Tentacle from Day of the Tentacle
- Robert Blake's unnamed character in Lost Highway
- O'Malley in the machinima series Red vs. Blue
- Sarevok from Baldur's Gate
- Shao Kahn from the Mortal Kombat series
- Sideshow Bob from The Simpsons
- Soma Cruz from Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow
- The Phantom from The Phantom of the Opera (musical only)
- The Summoner from Diablo II
- Various characters from One Piece
- Vaati (high-pitched evil laugh) from the Legend of Zelda series
- Wacław from SKOS
- Wuya in Xiaolin Showdown
- X-Death in Final Fantasy V
- Alien hunter from the film Predator.
- ZeeBad from Doogal (American version) "The evil laugh comes from deep down the throat" in a parodical direct self-reference.
- Zim from Nickelodeon's Invader Zim
Other notable occurrences of the evil laugh in popular culture include:
- the fade-out of the video for the song "Tribute" by Tenacious D
- the song "Welcome to the Pleasuredome" by Frankie Goes to Hollywood
- the end of Vincent Price's spoken "rap" in Michael Jackson's Thriller
- the song "Feel Good Inc" by Gorillaz
- various occurrences in the Dilbert cartoons, usually though not always by Dogbert, and usually spelled "Buwahahah" or some variation.
- Manolo Yanes From After an Implementation he would do his "Muahahahahahah" to his colegues CSBS
- the song Peek-a-Boo by Devo
Professional wrestler Ted DiBiase was well known for an evil laugh whenever he performed as the Million Dollar Man during his run in the WWE. Although he doesn't usually laugh, The Undertaker does give a spine-chilling laugh once in while at the end of a promo, especially to his brother Kane. Also, The Boogeyman is known to use an evil laugh to coincide with his gimmick.
James Mitchell In Total Non Stop Action Wrestling will normally use an evil laugh at ringside and when conducting a promo in the ring.
The "evil laugh" has become an almost-total cliché in recent pop culture and is now almost only used in a comedy light or satire. For example, Gary Larson drew a Far Side cartoon which portrayed a lecture hall full of science students aspiring to be mad scientists. The mad science curriculum, asserts Larson, requires all students to take "one semester of maniacal laughter". In a similar vein, one panel in the webcomic A Miracle of Science show three mad scientists engaging in an impromptu evil laughter competition [2].