Some Good Advice for the Powers of Darkness

I owe some credit to the Evil Overlord list, which partly inspired this, and the thousands of extremely-lapsed-Catholic movies (and, for that matter, books) about the end of the world, which are probably inspired by the use of controlled substances.

1. Any Excuse Will Do

It doesn’t really matter where the prophecy comes from. You don’t have to follow Biblical or even traditional canon, because you are evil. Accordingly, if you want your activities to seem legit, pay some crazy Hebrew git a talent or so to write an appropriate “scripture” a few thousand years before you intend to act. Try to make it sound like a particularly awkward imitation of the King James Version when translated into English. Give hints, but be vague. You don’t want the Powers of Light to figure out your plans too quickly.

Examples: Omen, Constantine, End of Days, pretty much all of them.

2. But You Still Have to Follow the Rules?

Presumably God is the one preventing you from acting until the specific circumstances of the prophecy arise, although if He can do this we’re not sure why He doesn’t just put a stop to the whole thing. Apparently He is a big believer in allowing fornicating ex-Catholics with unusually good hair to do His job for Him. Anyway, we recommend you at least give this a try. Don’t wait until the millennium, the eclipse, the two-point rise in the NASDAQ, or whatever. Ignore the prophecy and start the Apocalypse at 3 p.m. on a Thursday in 1953.

Examples: Ditto.

3. Conceiving the Antichrist: Why In Vitro is Better

Yes, raping a maiden on an altar after choosing her from birth is highly traditional. There are problems with this, however. One significant one is that if she lives in the twentieth or twenty-first century, the odds of her getting to a correct age while still a virgin are not remarkably good. You can try the non-virgin approach in order to have the opposite of the Immaculate Conception, another popular method, but this also has problems. Are you sure that kid is yours, Mister Satan? Yes, the offspring has glowing eyes and fangs, but can you really guarantee that someone who would make out with the Devil wouldn’t also make out with, say, a vampire? And paternity testing is particularly problematic with black blood which possesses acidic properties. In any case, surgically implanting a virgin with an embryo conceived in a test tube may lose considerably in the area of impressiveness, but you can always convince your demon-worshipping fertility experts to use an altar as an operating table and recite the Lord’s Prayer backwards during the procedure.

Examples: End of Days, Rosemary’s Baby, we think Stigmata but we didn’t watch the whole thing.

4. If You MUST Choose a Virgin…

…Or whatever, choose one who lives in Asia. There is no logical reason why you should always choose an American or British individual, and frankly the less cosmopolitan the root culture, the more likely the virgin will remain ditto until the correct age. A girl from a religion which doesn’t acknowledge you exist is never going to figure out what is going on until it’s too late. Plus the Forces of Good are going to have a much harder time finding her amidst the teeming crowds of China or India. At the very least, if you must choose an American or Brit, choose one who lives on a farm way out in the countryside. This kind of scene is anathema to the Tortured Hero (see #6 below), who can’t keep his hair gel needs supplied in Yorkshire or Nebraska.

Examples: Omen, Rosemary’s Baby, Bless the Child, but frankly we know of none which feature Asian protagonists so pretty much all of them.

5. Demon Children and You: A Brief Discourse on Infernal Genetics

If you manage to get past the conception stage, things are generally easier, but there is still no guarantee of success. That fornicating ex-Catholic mentioned above is particularly alert for blond or black-haired Caucasians with eerie eye color, and it’s possible that the little tyke’s earthly parents may begin to have second thoughts. Personally, we recommend some genetic tinkering so that your demon-child ends up with brown hair, brown eyes, and a deeply tan skin tone. Naming him something like George, Chang, or Raoul is also not a bad idea. This will throw off pursuit long enough for him to grow up. Or, if you really want the thing done right, forgo the whole foster parents concept and raise him yourself. Yes, we know you’re busy down there in Hell, but if you really want the world to end, you had better be willing to make this a priority.

Examples: The Omen, Bless the Child

6. The Tortured Hero: Individuals of Whom You Should Beware

First of all, you can forget the great majority of priests, particularly those older than 30. For some reason, the Almighty in His mysteriousness never chooses the devout, wise, and experienced to save the world from you. Yes, there may be some kind of underground society dedicated to foiling your aims, but they will spend most of their time doing bad Exorcism homages and should not be taken seriously. You need to watch out for individuals with the following characteristics:

• Rather young and attractive, for a priest.
• Rather young and attractive for an ex-priest, priest-in-training, etc.
• Lapsed Catholic with family problems. Dead spouse/girlfriend/child a big giveaway.
• Apparently assuages his personal pain with frequent weight lifting and body-hair removal.
• Encyclopedic knowledge of scriptures written by the git mentioned back in #1, but shaky on Biblical concepts like “thou shalt not kill” and “thou shalt not get thine ashes hauled at every possible opportunity.”

Examples: End of Days, Constantine, Stigmata, Bless the Child, The Order

7. One Last Important Rule

If you are forced to resort to sprouting wings and horns at any time, you will fail. Period. We recommend bringing along one of your demonic minions who resembles you and producing them at the correct moment, then sneaking off with your Virgin Victim and inflatable altar while the fornicating ex-Catholic attacks the decoy. If you cannot keep a grip on one dazed bint in restraints, you are a lousy Prince of Darkness and probably do not deserve to end the world.

Examples: The Golden Child (okay, it’s not strictly end-of-the-world), End of Days, Bless the Child. Constantine is a good instance in which the Prince of Darkness manages to keep on looking humanoid, although his son Mammon doesn’t do so well and definitely falls for this one.