How To Introduce A Threat

Added: 2026-05-11

[00:00:00]About a year ago, we released a video about how not to introduce a villain, and it quickly became one of our most watched breakdowns. We talked about why certain bad guys feel like a letdown and how a poor introduction can ruin a character before they even get started.

[00:00:16]Then came Grand Regent Thrag. His arrival changed everything we thought we knew about building fear. But how did this happen? And what does he teach us about how to introduce a threat?

[00:00:29]There are several ways to introduce a threat. One of them is by building an atmosphere of dread through theatrics.

[00:00:36]You know, something with a foreoding tone, spooky lighting, and maybe several shots of how terrified other characters appear. We can clearly see this with Maleficent in Sleeping Beauty. Another way of introducing a threat is through a narration of the villain by another character, just like in Tylung's case.

[00:00:54]Other times, the villain just appears drenched in aura, just like death in Puss and Boots. There are several other ways, but Thragg's introduction in Invincible follows a different structure. It relies on long-term foreshadowing. The story hides him and instead builds his presence through the actions, behavior, and status of other characters. This approach uses showing without direct confirmation, allowing the audience to form a clear understanding of his position before he appears. To do this, the movie focused on characters who operate under the same system and demonstrate what that level of power looks like in practice. It all starts with Omniman, who for a long time was thought to be the ultimate hero until that night with the Guardians of the Globe. He calls the Guardians together, and for a second it feels like a normal meeting. Then it turns into something else entirely. No warning or speech or buildup. He crushed Red Rush's skull while everyone else watched in total horror. He smashed Darkwing against the floor until he was gone. And he drove his fist right through Green Ghost. By the time he ripped Martian Man to pieces, broke Warwoman's neck and decapitated the immortal, we were all convinced that Omniman was the strongest being in existence. He ended the greatest heroes on earth and knelt there in the mess he made, looking like a god of death.

[00:02:24]Now, something very important has happened in your head. You've just seen what the peak of power looks like, or at least you think you have. Later, Omniman fights. Sorry, beats the [ __ ] out of his own son, Mark Grayson, who is supposed to be invincible. But this time, it's public, brutal, and totally heartbreaking.

[00:02:45]>> I can always start again. Take another kid.

[00:02:49]>> He drags him through a city, smashes him through buildings, mountains, and seas.

[00:02:54]And all the while, he just looks disappointed until compassion eventually sets in. But the scary part is that Omniman was just the beginning of the foreshadowing of Thrag. You see, after he left Earth and ended up on the planet Thraxa, we saw that he wasn't the only one with that kind of power. When Mark finally finds him, they have a tiny moment of peace before the Viltrim Empire catches up. Three Viltromites, Lucen, Vidor, and Thula show up, and they don't care about anything but the mission. Mark tries to stop Lucen, but Lucen is so strong that at one point he beats Mark with just one finger.

[00:03:33]I'm not an insect like these creatures.

[00:03:36]>> It makes the hero we love look like a tiny bug. Now, even though Omniman manages to beat Vidor and Thula in a bloody battle, the story shows us that victory is never certain. A severely wounded Lucen with his intestines literally hanging out, flies in and shatters Omniman's spine with the last of his strength.

[00:04:01]As Omniman is being carried away, General Craig steps in. He is the first one to really point toward the shadow of Thrag because he has the personality of a ruthless soldier with zero sympathy for his enemies. He tells Mark that his father will be executed and that Mark has to take over the mission to prepare Earth for their rule. But the most chilling part is how he uses the word we. He says, "We will check on your progress soon." And unlike your father, we do not change our minds. That word does a lot of work telling you he is not alone. Decisions don't come from him.

[00:04:38]And there is someone bigger behind him.

[00:04:42]So now the picture's changing. Omniman was terrifying. These new Viltromites are just as strong, maybe stronger, but they all answer to someone. Then we see Anessa, and she adds even more weight to this feeling. She's so powerful that she helps Mark fight a giant sea monster and acts like it's a boring chore. But when she tries to reason with Mark and fails, she makes him bleed with the very first punch.

[00:05:12]Anissa is so strong that Mark could barely land a blow. Donald even tells Ceil that she is faster than Omniman.

[00:05:20]The scariest part is that she could have ended Mark easily, but admits that that was the duty of another Viltramite. And who was that? Conquest. This is where things get really extreme. Conquest is a towering beast of a man with a mustache and a huge body that looks like it was carved out of stone. He has deep wrinkles and a giant scar across his face that blinded one of his eyes. And he even has a mechanical arm. This particular viltrammite is just out of his mind. He laughs while he fights even when he's being hurt. And that madness makes him even more dangerous. With a lust for the smell of blood, he arrives on Earth with the intention to play with his food before eating it. At one point, he pushed Mark with so much force that they leveled a huge part of the city, killing hundreds of people in a split second.

[00:06:14]Later, he punches a hole right through Adam Eve's stomach and just watches her bleed, telling Mark how wasteful it is to care about people. The guy is pure unfiltered evil. A man so strong he literally wrecks the entire planet just by himself. But here is the masterpiece of the whole introduction. Even Conquest, this monster who loves pain and laughs at death, is nothing compared to Thrag. Conquest with all his strength, is still scared of Thrag. He bows his head respectfully when Thrag gives him orders. And for those of us who haven't read the comics, we first got a glimpse of who Thra might be when the trailer for season 4 was released.

[00:06:54]At the end of the trailer, we see a broken skull. We hear the heavy thud of boots. And then we see him. He's wearing a cape made from fur. And he looks terrifying.

[00:07:03]>> Leave no one alive.

[00:07:05]>> You've seen what his servants can do. So you know that when the master finally arrives, the heroes are finished. This is how you introduce a threat. You build a mountain of fear using everyone else and then you just let the villain sit on top of it. But the question now becomes, will Thrag actually live up to this buildup when the episodes start rolling?

[00:07:27]Unfortunately, the answer to that question came with some disappointment.

[00:07:32]Like we said before, last year we released a video titled How Not to Introduce a Villain. That video blew up and it made sense why. In it, we broke down a simple idea. The introduction of a villain can determine whether we will end up respecting and fearing the villain or not. We looked at a few examples that missed the mark, and each one failed in a clear way. Belleather from Zootopia was an afterthought because she barely did anything for the whole movie until the very end.

[00:08:02]Unfortunately, you can't just have a villain show up at the finish line and expect us to be scared. A real villain needs to cast a long shadow from the very first minute, even through other characters, as seen with Thrag. As for Maxim Lal from Despicable Me 4, the movie kept telling us he was a big deal, but he never actually did anything impressive. He was kind of clumsy and small, and he only won because he got lucky. If you have to tell the audience someone is scary, instead of showing them being scary, you've already lost.

[00:08:36]Even the chameleon in Kung Fu Panda 4 made a huge mistake. She showed off her powers, but she only hurt people we didn't really care about. If the stakes aren't personal, we don't feel the threat. Now, we've spent so much time talking about how perfect the buildup for Thrag was. We saw everyone from Omniman to Conquest shaking in their boots just at the thought of failing him. But now we have to ask the tough question. When the curtain finally pulled back, did he actually meet the hype? Or did he fall into those same traps the chameleon or Maxim fell into?

[00:09:10]You see, in the comics, Thrag was a totally ruthless menace with a look that could freeze your blood. But the first time we actually hear his voice in the show during the second episode of the fourth season, something felt a little bit off. We get this big dramatic backstory about the scourge virus that wiped out billions of Viltrammites.

[00:09:29]General Craig, who we know is a total tough guy, looks incredibly sad and hopeless while reporting to the Grand Regent. Then Thrag speaks for the first time. He asks, "How many are dead?" When Craig hesitates, Thrag says, "Do not make me ask you twice." Now, that line is terrifying because you can see that Craig is so scared he can't even look Thrag in the eye. Clearly, the show was still using that great trick of showing us how others react to him. But the voice itself didn't quite have that booming heavy power we expected for a guy who rules an empire of monsters. Lee Pace is the voice actor here. And don't get me wrong, he's amazing. He played the elven king Thanduel in the Hobbit and you can hear that same elegant and cold command in his voice here. He was also great as Ronin in Guardians of the Galaxy. But for Thrag, who is supposed to be the strongest Viltromite alive, a lot of us were expecting something a bit deeper and more grally. This is because it's hard to think a guy is going to rip a planet in half when he sounds so fancy and polite. But it gets interesting.

[00:10:37]When we finally saw his face, it wasn't exactly bad to be fair, at least for a while. There's a scene where he's standing over Conquest. Now remember, Conquest is the guy who almost ended Mark and Eve. Yet here he is kneeling and begging Thrag to make his death a lesson. The camera helps here because it looks up at Thrag. The lighting also hits him just right. Then there is his firm stance. He's also got his fist clenched and a mean scowl on his face.

[00:11:09]And with the way his cloak sits on his shoulders, he looks like a true king of shadows.

[00:11:15]You have work to do yet.

[00:11:18]>> But when we see him without the cloak, the aura starts to slip away. He looks clean, controlled, almost too polished.

[00:11:27]Compared to the scary look and voice of the leader of the coalition, Thaddius looks like a supermodel. He's got this very neat buzzcut and a perfectly sharp lineup. He's actually a pretty cute guy.

[00:11:40]Someone even joked that he looks like Mario if Mario didn't have a big nose and spent all day at the gym. Anyway, it's hard to maintain that threatening ambiance when the villain looks like he's about to pose for a magazine cover instead of destroying a galaxy. But the moment where Thrag really lost his aura was in the sixth episode when he decided to attack the planet Telescria. He's talking to the skull of the dead emperor Argal, promising that he will get revenge. He thinks the heroes have grown complacent. So, he sends in Anessissa, Craig, and Lucan to lead a brutal invasion. It's total chaos, and for a while, it looks like the bad guys are going to win. But then, Mark, Nolan, and Oliver show up, and the heroes have momentum again. Then, Mark and Oliver fly right through the Viltramite warship, breaking it in half. As the ship falls apart, Thrag sees the skull of Argal falling out into the sky. And what does the most powerful being in the universe do? He yells, "No." Like a grandma who just dropped her favorite plate. It was such a dramatic, silly reaction that all that scary energy he built up just evaporated. Then he flies down and clutches the skull like he's cuddling a teddy bear. It made him look small and emotional instead of cold and unstoppable. Now, to be fair, he did get a little bit of his aura back at the very end of the episode. There's this fantastic shot of him and his crew flying back toward his empire. He's holding the skull with a look of pure hatred on his face, and you can see the blood on Craig and the blood lust in Anessa's eyes. That part was totally epic and felt like a promise of the war to come. So now we have a strange situation, a villain who was built perfectly, but doesn't fully match that build the moment he arrives. Luckily for Thrag, he had another episode to redeem himself, to get all that lost aura. And boy, the way he did it is something that still terrifies everyone till today.

[00:13:43]In episode 7, it's like Thrag heard all those complaints and decided to show the whole universe why he's the boss. This is where we see him let it rip, and honestly, it's one of the scariest things you'll ever see. His true menace starts with a flashback to a very sad day for the Viltromites, the burial of their emperor, Argal. Thrag is giving a big speech to all the soldiers, and you can feel the tension in the air. Then, in the middle of everything, he turns to one of the high-ranking officers standing right behind him and asks a simple chilling question. Might you also betray us someday? The poor guy says he will not, but Thrag just looks at him and says he doesn't believe him. Before anyone can even blink, Thrag reaches out and chops the man's head clean off his shoulders.

[00:14:31]>> I do not believe you.

[00:14:36]>> But he didn't stop there. He decided that the only way for his people to be strong was to get rid of anyone he thought was weak. So he ordered a purge, which basically meant the Viltromites started fighting each other until only the absolute strongest were left alive.

[00:14:52]By the end of it, the entire empire was drenched in blood and there were piles of bodies everywhere. Imagine a king who is willing to kill millions of his own people just to make sure the survivors are the toughest of the tough. That's the kind of monster Thrag really is. He carries a lot of guilt about it, sure, but he believes that natural order means the strong must rule and the weak must go. When we get back to the present day, the big war finally happens. The heroes, including Mark, his dad, and their friend Thaddius, all team up to attack the Viltromite home planet. They even bring battle beast and special weapons, thinking they finally have a chance. But Thrag was just waiting for them. And when the fighting starts, it's like watching a professional athlete play against a bunch of toddlers. The scariest part of his power is how he moves. He's faster than any other Viltramite we've ever seen. We are talking speed of light. kind of fast or even more. This is why he easily dodges Nolan when he tries to hit him. Then he returns the missed favor by punching Nolan so hard that he sends him crashing into the planet like a falling star.

[00:16:04]After failing to convert him back to the Viltramite course, Thrag launches him back into space with an uppercut. And it takes ages before Nolan can regain hold of himself. Then the naive Oliver tries to be brave and flies at Thrag while making a joke, but Thrag catches Oliver's punch, easily, rips his arm right off, and breaks his jaw.

[00:16:30]When Mark sees this, he gets so angry that he charges at Thrag with everything he's got. He brags about killing Conquest. And when Thrag urges him to show him, Mark hits him with a punch that would have leveled a building, but Thrag doesn't even move. He stops the blow with his hairline.

[00:16:52]We are not even going to mention how easily he brushes off the attack of Battlebeast or the slap he gives Mark that sends him flying through space.

[00:17:01]Thrag was simply untouchable. Even Space Racer's gun couldn't touch him. Bro, dodge those planet destroying bullets without even looking. Eventually, led by Nolan, the heroes decide to do something crazy. They use their own bodies to fly through the center of the planet Viltrum to blow it up. It's a massive explosion that destroys their home forever. The other Viltromites are in shock, devastated because they lost everything they loved. But Thrag turns his sadness into pure red-hot rage. He flies at Daddius, the man who started the whole rebellion, and rips his head off right in front of everyone.

[00:17:41]Then he goes back for Nolan, and in a fit of fury, Thrag punches right through Nolan's chest. It's a terrifying sight to see the mighty Omniman looking so small and helpless. Then Thrag looks at Nolan and says, "What a waste." before grabbing Mark by the head. He starts squeezing Mark's eyes, popping them, and you can tell he's just seconds away from popping Mark's skull like an egg. He only stops because he realizes there are so few Viltromites left alive that he can't afford to kill any more of them, even the ones who betrayed him. And with that, Thrag ends the episode on a high.

[00:18:18]He has successfully shut up his naysayers. And the question on everyone's mind at that point was, how the heck can the heroes kill an unkillable villain like this? That's exactly why our last video matters so much. You see, when a villain reaches this level of threat, the ending has to carry real weight. Lucky for you, we went deep into that in our breakdown on how to end a movie. So, go check it out now.