Was Howard Good or Bad?
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kw25x — 9 years ago(November 27, 2016 11:34 PM)
Actually he shows signs of a person who wants to be in total control, similar to those men who perpetrate domestic violence upon their spouse and family.
Howard shows no sympathy towards Michele or Emmett and their injuries and plays the victim when they disrespect him by throwing how he has saved their lives in their face.
He threatens them with physical violence should they not obey him and insists that Michelle's family and friends are all dead, despite no evidence to the contrary, giving the impression that she has nobody but him.
Common traits of domestic violence abusers.
The whole dinner sequence contains a fair indication of his character.
The dressing down of Emmett when he speaks on Michelle's behalf that "she doesn't find it funny", referring to the monopoly joke, is one example.
It's further confirmed when Michelle finds the word "help" scratched on the glass and the photo of his daughter that is really that of the missing girl.
Howard has lost his wife and daughter and has obviously kidnapped the girl and kept her trapped in his bunker, pretending to play happy families, then when she dies (or is killed by Howard) he replaces her with Michelle.
Howard may not have harmed them physically but he has certainly used bullying, emotional and mental abuse upon them. -
Stovepipe99 — 9 years ago(November 28, 2016 07:40 PM)
Actually he shows signs of a person who wants to be in total control, similar to those men who perpetrate domestic violence upon their spouse and family.
Yup.
I think that where a lot of people get turned around when it comes to Howard's character is this whole idea that in an emergency you need discipline and order and it's
his
bunker and they should be grateful for being saved, etc, etc.
But it seems pretty obvious to me that Howard would act in almost the exact same way in a non-emergency. Particularly when (after he
kills Emmett
) he tells Michelle, "Now it's just you and me, like it was always meant to be." -
SingleServingJack — 9 years ago(January 24, 2017 03:37 AM)
Howard was a psycho. End of story.
He might have helped them, but he also wanted to keep them there. He never tried to get any information about whether they can escape, what is going on outside, etc. When he heard the helicopters, he immediately presumed they are not US military without checking.
He liked that they all were holed in there together.
My impression was that he would try to find excuses not to let anyone out for as long as possible and eventually, he would not let them out just like he did not let the little girl out.
He never even thought of Michelle as an individual - during the game they play, when he was supposed to answer "Little Women" and Emmett was giving him hints about the second word by pointing to Michelle, Howard kept saying "girl", "princess" and such. Emmett told him that when older, the girl is aand pointed to Michelle. And Howard still could not say "woman" because he did not think about her in those terms - to him, she was just a substitute for his daughter, his little "girl", his "princess".
So he helped them and saved them, yes, but not because he is a good guy trying to help. That's the point, he is trying to find some replacement family or something like that.
Laura:You left a dead prostitute buried alone in the desert?
Kyle:She's not alone. -
SingleServingJack — 9 years ago(January 24, 2017 03:28 AM)
Bad per se?
He kidnapped and killed another girl, that was obvious. He crashed into Michelle on purpose, probably wanting to imprison her as well, but circumstances (aliens) changed plans.
Howard was a dangerous psychopath.
Laura:You left a dead prostitute buried alone in the desert?
Kyle:She's not alone. -
osubuckeye420 — 9 years ago(June 20, 2016 11:55 AM)
I'd agree with this.
He seemed more mentally deranged/unstable than truly evil.
He had the opportunity to kill Emmett long before Michelle showed up, and he allowed him to live until he felt "betrayed".
He also had the opportunity to do terrible things to Michelle before he uncovered her plot, and didn't do any of those things.
That being said, it's pretty clear that he did some truly horrible things before the start of the movie, and I think that if you took a poll, many would say that he was deserving of his ultimate fate. -
himalayangourmet — 9 years ago(July 04, 2016 11:12 PM)
Our courts recognize a level of insanity that makes a defendant incapable of understanding what they have done. The mentally ill excuse is invalid as a defense 99% of the time.
Pedophiles are sick/mentally ill, but their actions are calculated and 100% morally wrong. Yes they have a sickness that LED to their actions but they are conscious of their behavior. Just like Howard was. He's evil. Plain and simple.
Pretty much every sick criminal has some level of mental illness but that excuse is garbage. People will be held accountable for the actions they are conscious of. -
bluemagicmist — 9 years ago(July 08, 2016 08:03 PM)
The courts don't recognize those diagnosed with one of the 4 Cluster Bs, which includes, Anti-Social Personality Disorder (psychopath/sociopath)and Narcissistic PD, as a valid excuse for crimes committed by them. They're defined as mental disorders in the DSM but not a 'get out of jail free, card' nor, are they considered for a stay in a psych unit. All four know right from wrong which is the determining factor.
People with NPD do not live in reality and are prone to delusions but are not schizophrenic. -
EdwardVe — 9 years ago(July 09, 2016 03:59 PM)
The question is whether or not one can be unintentionally evil. If you for instance look at Hitler; he was convinced the world would be a better place without the Jews among others. Does his evil deeds then make him evil, when he himself believe it's for the good of the world? We're all evil in the eyes of someone. The word evil should be reserved for fairy tales, while we in the real world look at the complexities of the human mind. The word evil is just a copout for people who fail to acknowledge what a human being can rationalize and get itself to do.
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andromache3 — 9 years ago(July 14, 2016 09:05 PM)
The question is whether or not one can be unintentionally evil. If you for instance look at Hitler; he was convinced the world would be a better place without the Jews among others. Does his evil deeds then make him evil, when he himself believe it's for the good of the world? We're all evil in the eyes of someone. The word evil should be reserved for fairy tales, while we in the real world look at the complexities of the human mind. The word evil is just a copout for people who fail to acknowledge what a human being can rationalize and get itself to do.
Are you joking? Just because Hitler convinced himself that the world was better off without people he considered undesirable, doesn't mean that he wasn't evil. Are you seriously going to justify mass murder, amongst other crimes and accept warped belief systems? Evil most certainly exists in this world. Stop trying to intellectualise the criminal acts of vile people.
"You have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love, I love, I love you." Mr Darcy -
chopperman — 9 years ago(July 16, 2016 10:22 PM)
i'll certainly agree the term "evil" is ridiculously overused and is thus devalued but true human evil obviously exists in people who can feel no remorse nor empathy with people they kill. and such people who must keep killing to satisfy a compulsion. hitler didn't see jews as fit to live, he fits that category. so would someone like ted bundy or john gacy. you can say it's just sickness and not evil, but this is a degree which cannot be corrected. no matter what you do, you could not fix those men from being compelled to end fellow humans lives just for their own satisfaction. they were evil.
Larry Gaylord: "a billion people come in on a day off, and they don't flip out!" -
EdwardVe — 9 years ago(July 19, 2016 02:51 PM)
I don't try to justify horrible actions. I'm just saying that evil doesn't exist. Psychopaths for instance aren't evil, as they can't understand the pain the inflict. If you don't understand that, how can it be evil? I don't accept warped beliefs, I'm saying that they can still be "pure" beliefs, even if it leads to horrible actions. I'm quite sick of people trying to distance "normal humans" from people who do horrific things, when people who do horrific things are just normal people with a malfunction. Like how we use the word "inhuman", when in fact the things we call inhuman are just horrific examples of what humanity can be. The biggest problems in the world will never get any closer to being solved if we just see everything as black and white, and accept that "some people are just evil".
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sean-van-der-smythe — 9 years ago(August 10, 2016 07:57 PM)
You've outed yourself as an ignoramus. Psychopathy does not necessitate doing harm to anyone. You clearly don't know what psychopathy is. Here's an example https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/03/how-i-discovered-i-have-the-brain-of-a-psychopath
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registers-944-48791 — 9 years ago(December 05, 2016 03:11 PM)
Psycopat by itself doesn't need to do harm. They just don't feel feelings and don't care for other living beings. They do what they wanna do, if for that it takes doing harm to othes, so be it.
If some living being is blocking a psycopat of achieving something she wants, and she's capable of killing him, she just takes the opportunity and do it.
Some of them feel pleasure torturing or watching somebody die. It may be sexual pleasure, or the feeling of power on taking somebody's life. It's interesting that the high value they see on a life is what may make them like to take it.