CN archetypes

[Clueless]

Ambient selfishness ("Are we gettin' paid for this?") combined with bloodthirsty enjoyment of violence ("... she *has* a name! I call her Vera..."). And let's be honest - if Mal weren't there and Jayne weren't scared of him? He'd probably have betrayed them more than once. Jayne is a great example of the principle that evil people can have friends too.

 

[delericho]

Ambient selfishness ("Are we gettin' paid for this?")

Selfishness is neutral. Anyway, I don't work for people who aren't going to pay me, either.

(Of course, selfishness that drives you to evil acts is a trait of some evil characters, but in that case, it's their acts the mark them as evil, not the motivation.)

combined with bloodthirsty enjoyment of violence ("... she *has* a name! I call her Vera...").

You're declaring him evil because he gave his gun a name?!?

And let's be honest - if Mal weren't there and Jayne weren't scared of him? He'd probably have betrayed them more than once.

Possibly. It's a shame we'll never know.

Whether Jayne is Neutral or Evil is a question of a few degrees. I can certainly see your arguments, but differ in just where I draw the line. (Joss Whedon actually does seem quite good at creating characters who are quite hard to pin down exactly on the alignment scale. Most of his heroes have quite a lot of darkness in them, and most of his villains are less than total in their evil.)

Jayne is a great example of the principle that evil people can have friends too.

They certainly can. I've always found the caricatures of alignment (Good = stupid, Evil = psychotic) rather silly.

 

[The_Gneech]

Conan. At least before he was king.

Pretty much what I was gonna say. During his adventuring days, he was always ready to use the promotion-by-assassination technique on whatever band of cutthroats he happened to lead at the time, was always ready to toss away anything he gained on a whim, and generally cared more about carousing than anything else.

You couldn't quite call him evil, because he wouldn't kill anybody who wouldn't have been just as happy to do the same to him, and he was forever rescuing damsels and being surprisingly chivalrous to them (if gruffly chivalrous); but he was a pirate and a bandit, you wouldn't call him broadly good, either.

Once he became king of Aquilonia, he suddenly found himself caring about what happened to the people who looked to him for leadership, which probably nudged him into true neutral territory, but he never became "lawful" -- his rule tolerated various fringe groups that were frowned on by the general public for instance, and he personally chafed at all the pomp, ritual, and political hoo-ha that he had to put up with.

-The Gneech

 

[sckeener]

Riddick, in Pitch Black and Chronicles of Riddick.

the Conan of Scifi

 

[Klaus]

Almost any character that yells as he is running "I'm making this up as I go!"

 

[Umbran]

Riddick, in Pitch Black

I dunno. Maybe not selfish enough. In Pitch Black, he spends a lot of effort helping others when he probably could have gotten free and clear solo. He isn't nice about it, but he nearly sacrifices himself for the good of others...

 

[Klaus]

I dunno. Maybe not selfish enough. In Pitch Black, he spends a lot of effort helping others when he probably could have gotten free and clear solo. He isn't nice about it, but he nearly sacrifices himself for the good of others...

A *few* others.

At first he helped because there was no way for him to get the fuel to the transport ship, so he was helping for selfish reasons. In the end, when he decided to go back, it's because he was starting to care for the three survivors (the pilot lady, the "boy" and Goliath). I'd say he was CE and became CN by movie's end.

 

[JoeGKushner]

Guts from Berserk.

He's content to work for Griffith only because Griffith did the one thing that impressed him, beat him at swordplay. Outside of that, his morale base isn't very high, as he's willing to do quite a lot of things ranging from assassinating nobles to killing rogues hired by his boss. Only his quest to improve his swordskills gives him any sense of 'order' and even then, it's just to find stronger foes even at the cost of his life.

 

[sckeener]

I dunno. Maybe not selfish enough. In Pitch Black, he spends a lot of effort helping others when he probably could have gotten free and clear solo. He isn't nice about it, but he nearly sacrifices himself for the good of others...

hmmm... I agree he did good deeds, but I tend to think of CN people valuing friends more than morals, society, laws, ideals, organizations, etc....so his actions for me still fit CN. He just cared about those people. He wasn't about to sacrifice himself for some no name random person. He was about to leave them all at one point...and would have if not for Carolyn Fry, the pilot second class.

 

[Burke]

Mr. Mxyzptlk is CN. He doesn't care about doing evil, or personal gain, or anything like that. He just wants to be entertained and he figures beating Superman is a good challenge.