18 Characters With Over-The-Top Dark Backstories

When in doubt, give your character a pointlessly troubled past.
18 Characters With Over-The-Top Dark Backstories

Movie and TV characters are escapist fun, right? Creators can give them whatever fluffy, fun pasts they want to. Or they could leave things mysterious! That's also a choice. Then, later, we can all write fan fiction about how Luke Skywalker and Jean Grey met up during an accidental spaceship passing-by and hooked up. Or we can swing by our local Target and/or Mega Lo Mart and buy a bunch of action figures and take them home and make them all kiss. Movie and TV characters are fun!

But bizarrely often, creative types give their imaginary people heartbreakingly troubled pasts. Just like, really dark stuff. You think Miss Piggy is just a quirky lady? Haha, wrong! She was neglected by her mother! You think Mewtwo from Pokemon had a happy childhood? Come on, be serious! Because happy childhoods are... what? Boring? Overdone? Who knows. So we wind up with super-depressing stuff like:

MARK HAMILL'S BACKSTORY FOR LUKE SKYWALKER IS DEEPLY DEPRESSING. To make it easier to play Luke in the sequel trilogy, Hamill invented his own (additi
MEWTWO HAD THE WORLD'S CREEPIEST CHILDHOOD FRIEND. They grew him in a lab and gave him some human friends he could communicate telepathically with...
GOLDEN GIRLS' SOPHIA, BEST KNOWN FOR HER ZINGERS, HAS BRAIN DAMAGE. As the official introduction to the show tells us, a stroke destroyed part of her
MISS PIGGY WAS A SINGLE MOM'S NEGLECTED CHILD. Her father died in a tractor accident, leaving her mom with too many kids to raise and not enough time
LEO ON THAT 'ZOS SHOW RAN FROM HIS WIFE AND CHILD. In Season 3, he mentions having a son. In Season 5, he suddenly leaves. In a note, says he needs to
KAREN FROM WILL & GRACE GREW UP HELPING HER MOM PULL SCAMS. In Season 4, we learn that her childhood consisted of moving from town to town with her mo
THE ORIGINAL VERSION OF BANE WAS IN PRISON FOR HIS DAD'S CRIMES. A 1993 comic explains that his dad tried and failed to overthrow a (fictional) third-
THE DEATH STAR TRASH COMPACTOR MONSTER IS A ORCE-SENSITIVE SLAVE. In a short story, we find out the monster (called Omi) was kidnapped and taken to th
THE STORMTROOPER WHO FIGHTS FINN IN THe FORCE AWAKENS IS HIS FORMER FRIEND. FN-2199 was good buddies with Finn at Stormtrooper Academy. They parted wa
ON THE WALKING DEAD, MICHONNE MUTILATED HER ZOMBIE BF AND PUT HIM ON A LEASH. When the zombies emerged, she fought her zombified BF and his best frien
IN THE COMICS, DOOMSDAY (WHO YOU SAW IN BATMAN V SUPERMAN) WAS CLONED AND KILLED, OVER AND OVER. He was the product of nightmare Kryptonian genetic en
BRITTA FROM COMMUNITY WAS MOLESTED AT A BIRTHDAY BASH. She kind of hints, and creator Dan Harmon confirmed, that a homeless man dressed as a dinosaur
GREEDO WAS TRYING TO KILL HAN BECAUSE OF A CRUSH. Greedo was hugely into a woman called Uncelta (whose species we don't know), but she got her heart b
FIREFLY'S KIND, GENTLE SHEPHERD BOOK WAS A SPY WHO KILLED THOUSANDS. He was Henry Evans, a thug who became a spy for the Independents, killing a rando
CHEERS WRECKED DIANE'S LIFE. TWICE. In the pilot, when she and her fiance stop at Cheers for a drink on their wedding day, he runs off. He was her bos
SILICON VALLEY'S SWEET, DECENT JARED HAD AN UNSPEAKABLE CHILDHOOD. In actor Zach Woods' backstory, he went through awful foster homes after his parent
PROFESSOR MCGONAGALL HAS A HISTORY OF TRAGIC RELATIONSHIPS. According to J.K. Rowling's official backstory, soon after graduating, she got engaged to
IN 2016'S GHOSTBUSTERS, SLIMER WAS THE MUTILATED GHOST OF A GANGSTER. In a new backstory written for the 2016 remake, he was executed after he killed
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