— Captain Spaulding, Clowns are supposed to be funny. They're supposed to make everyone laugh, especially children. This is the entire point of their existence. Is supposed to be a. Sometimes they succeed.

But for some people, clowns awaken There are children who won't go near a clown without screaming. Their face is., most often the makeup they use, the emotions aren't real, the smile is just painted on. The outfit and big shoes are downright grotesque. There's something seriously wrong with a clown to some people, and this resonates deep within the part of us that still believes that there is a, that will get out if you don't keep the door closed. It's startlingly uncommon to find clown characters who are genuinely good.

More commonly, writers tap into the fear: the Monster Clown is a classic villain. Expect the Monster Clown to parody humor, with classic jokes becoming deadly; acid in the plastic flowers pinned to their lapels and joy buzzers with fatal amounts of voltage, among other things. If they work in a circus, it'll be a. Likewise, also expect them to crack while killing them and laugh maniacally. Sometimes, a Monster Clown just LOOKS like a clown, and doesn't do what clowns normally do, like tell jokes or work in a circus or go to kids' parties. If there is a clown in a work that just looks like one, it's almost guaranteed that it is a Monster Clown. Because, you know, you just don't go about dressing like a clown without doing anything clowny.

Sooner or later, our heroes will have to put these clowns to the sword. And sometimes. Also take note that many of these clowns may or may not be and also commit their horrific crimes while acting.

You’ve got problems, I’ve got advice. This advice isn’t sugar-coated—in fact, it’s sugar-free, and may even be a little bitter. Welcome to Tough Love.

Sympathetic clowns are generally a little more muted in appearance and behavior, whether or not this is faithful to the job. Generally, audiences are more receptive to clowns who act more like ordinary people, and have less extravagant makeup. Surly clowns who tiredly work with ungrateful children are more common, probably because they speak to the average overworked audience; they may be an example of. Is a sub-trope of Monster Clown. A villainous clown that is instead of fear is a. The seems to be related.

May be combined with,,,. Clowns' ghastly white makeup puts them into territory. The Monster Clown is often. The opposite of this trope is the (perhaps sadly) rarely seen any more. • So you're watching a ad in Japan and.

Note Okay, it wasn't a real ad, but dayum. • The US Postal Service used this in an 'Because we have to get out of this house.' 'Come on it's not that ba- Oh, yeah, that has to go.'

• In E -Trade commercial with the talking baby, the baby says he rented a clown named Bobo, who we see standing in the background making balloon animals, before getting a scared look on his face and saying 'And I really underestimated the creepiness.' Subverted in that the clown doesn't actually do anything creepy other than just be there. Which may or may not be enough to be freaky for a clown. • The with two moms looking for clowns for their kids' birthday parties. The one using KGB finds Benny the clown,. Blacksite Area 51 Russound Volume. The second finds Biffo, a fat, hostile clown who scares all the children into running away and then randomly destroys the drink table. • A Motel 6 commercial features a guy not being able to sleep because of all the disturbing clown paraphernalia decorating the guest room he's staying in.

• Krinkles the Clown, of Post's Sugar Rice Krinkles. For one, the technology for filming and broadcasting in color was well established by then, but they made the decision to not just shoot everything in black and white, but paint up the set—including Krinkles himself—in black and white. And, to put it in perspective, this ad campaign was chosen after discarding the prior ◊ • And then, there's Those with coulrophobia, do not watch. (Though it's not entirely the poor bastard's fault.) • A Little Caesar's has two girls wandering in the woods. One of them mentions rumors that a deranged clown haunts the forest.

As it turns out, they're right, but thankfully he has a liking for cheap pizza. Where do fall in this trope?

• Taco Bell's commercial has clowns as Gestapo officers. • gives us the absolutely revolting Champ, a paedophilic. • the witch from because her first form is rather innocuous until you provoke her like poor Mami. Then she reveals (and by that we mean vomits out) a second form (an unholy fusion of a caterpillar, a jack-in-a-box and with ) and. The movie somehow manages to make her even creepier with the new theme she gets called 'Wo ist die Kase'. This is appropriate since Madoka Magica is very much a.

• The fact that she is an who frequently gets with her victim in fanworks does little to make Charlotte less disturbing. Same goes for the fact that reveals that she was an utterly adorable. • Hisoka from.

An and powerful who becomes sexually aroused by strong or amazing people, regardless of the gender or age. However, his character resembles more of a mysterious magician than a funny clown. • If you're a strong and charismatic person, you will luckily be spared by him for a while, but if you're a weakling or uncharismatic person, you're already dead. • In there are two rival biker gangs. One gang, called the Clowns, dresses in clown-like outfits and acts very much like evil clowns. They also assault Kaori both physically and sexually in a disturbing scene. • One appears in the circus scene in the beginning half of the animated movie.

• the clown Maverick from Rockman X manga. • from, leader of the Dark Masters. He's a scary clown with four swords, a desire to use them on anyone he sees, and the demeanor of a sociopath. Not to mention being more of a match for Digimon that were ten times his size. Arguably, he was a far more dangerous villain that Apocylpmon, the final foe of the original series. • Subverted by his incarnation, who's little more than a who gets eliminated just as he and his partner are doing a.

• in the movie. Though he also appears in, his Monster Clown behavior and appearance there is downplayed.

• Tongpu, alias Mad Pierrot from. • Mayuri Kurotsuchi, 12th division Captain from is one of the most depraved clowns in the history of fiction. • Although he's not actually a clown, the from is a Monster Clown. He even refers to himself as the Auguste clown once.

• Also, the lvl 2 akuma that could imitate shapes, Pierrot. That bastard was scary enough to be the picture on 's page. • Inverted with Allen himself, who uses the Innocence Crowned Clown. But his adoptive father, Mana, may have been a straight example. • And Allen was beaten up by clowns until he got adopted. • Alan Gabriel from has a clownish appearance to go along with his.

• The Shirogane in are dedicated to wiping out an entire clan of these called, approriately enough, the Midnight Circus. The clowns are actually robotic constructs powered by alchemy, and their clownish appearance is actually meant to invoke laughter in humans. • The Clown in the manga claims to be the of insanity itself. • • The anime had two robot guards modeled after him. The creators probably thought the show just wouldn't be complete if they didn't use the design.

•: • In the manga, Ryuji Otogi/Duke Devlin's father is a Monster Clown - apparently he was considered too scary for. He is even scarier without his mask. • There is also Saggi the Dark Clown, a monster card, as well as one of the Player Killers in the manga—who was apparently too creepy for the anime and 'toned down' to, as put it, 'a gay clown'.

(Specifically, he was a different kind of clown; a ventriloquist with a in the shape of Kaiba, who claimed that he had put Kaiba's soul into the doll.) • bonz also used the Fiend-type Crass Clown, later switching it for the resilient • Add the monster card Peten the Dark Clown to the mix—which, like Saggi, can be found in Kaiba's deck. And is also used in virus combos. • In, there was Ghost Kaiba, an Eliminator who posed as Kaiba's vengeful spirit in order to deceive Yugi. His origins differed depending on the version: In the original, he was a who worked for Pegasus (who may have actually been able to use magic to disguise himself, seemingly being able to change his body mass) while in the dub, he was a.

Whatever the case, his true form resembled an obese, hideous clown. • In, the 3rd season treats us to three matches at the same time — three of the newest heroes against three emotionally-themed Monster Clowns. The Masked Knight of Impassivity used to push Jesse Anderson to the edge, the Masked Knight of Anger uses an anchor-themed knight to push around fossil-slinging Jim Cook. And the Masked Knight of Laughter hams it up with against military man Axel Brodie with an appropriate Monster Clown deck featuring and. • In there was Jeagar, a former circus clown who became a member of Yliaster and a top-ranking henchman to Rex Godwin, the of season one. Calling him evil may be a stretch, however (selfish and arrogant, sure, but probably not evil) and he made a eventually. • In, Chibodee Crocket developed a pathological fear of clowns after an incident in his childhood when he was kidnapped by a Monster Clown, which lead to the loss of his mother.

• Cranked by Romano, the Gundam Fighter for Neo-Portugal, who not only dresses up as a clown but has a mecha that looks like one. Naturally, he becomes Chibs's next opponent. • has a clown that sings an old folk song whenever someone sees him. In his wake he always leaves a corpse. • had the demonic and sleep-disturbing Penchinon.

THIS is the clown that eats you. Or turns you into a rampaging monster. *shudders* • Penchinon is a pirate. Pagliaccio, the Zonder doll that can fold herself into a sphere, is probably a better example. • Pagliaccio actually means 'clown' in Italian.

•: The that took over Yeon was disguised as such. • has Buggy the Clown, though this is somewhat subverted as he's relatively. • Lafitte, on the other hand, is an extremely soft-spoken, seemingly polite fellow with white face paint and a massive grin that was run out of his home territory for being too brutal in his role as a peace officer, and that's by the standards of an organization that is willing to burn an island and its inhabitants to deal with some snoopy archaeologists. • Borderline example in, particularly in the anime, where his near-constant is accompanied by purple lips and a ghostly white face.

And it might be stretching a bit to put Don Quixote Doflamingo here, as he doesn't especially resemble a clown, but his nickname is 'Joker', he dresses garishly, and his is even more terrifying than Caesar's. • That's practically the job description of Orgel from. His title is Hell Clown, and making humans suffer and break for fun and profit, by exploiting their fears, weaknesses and insecurities, is not only his personal hobby, but also what his employers might see as a merry performance. Also, he is a demonic parasite, whose true form is his clown mask and whose bodies are.

He once takes over a little girl in this way, just because she was nice to. Then lets Hamel know that he did it, and why he did it. That's actually his idea of a hilarious prank. • Baroque from is a worthy spiritual successor of Orgel. Even their favored are somewhat similar. Well, he is a, instead of a - similarity lies in the amount of death and suffering they cause. •: Pierrot in the second movie.

Made worse by being voiced by Ryusei Nakao, the same voice actor as and. • Tommyrod from.. Bonus point for the fact, that his face - including eyes - often seems to be painted on. As a bonus, setting off just one common phobia. • Near the end of the anime, a team of cyborg soldiers wearing body armor with deranged clown helmets is brought in to take out the titular character, including one (who, unfortunately, is in charge of artillery and ends up shooting at friend and foe alike.) • Subverted in.

Suzuki, a contestant in the Dark World Tournament, desperately wants to fit this trope, and it seems like he does after killing some laughing spectators.but then Genkai kicks his ass all over the place. Afterwards, he ditches the makeup and.

• From Dragon Quest: Legend of Dai, we have Kill=Vearn. For one, he seems to resemble a medieval court jester, but has an extremely disturbing personality revolving around destroying people all the way past when they cannot fight back, and grinding them to dust.

Just to add another freaky clown to it, he has a small helper named Piroro who, it turns out, is the real Monster Clown, being a different kind as well, a demonic ventriloquist who controls his more human sized body like a puppet. • In Super S, the monsters sent by the were rather goofy.

Until was sent to take a hold of poor Usagi's Dream Mirror and to tell the Amazon Trio '. It went in few seconds flat. • The Akanbes from take this trope to a previously unseen level. They are the employed by the Bad End Kingdom, created by fusing a clown nose containing a with an every day object, meaning that anything can be turned into a literal Monster Clown: from houses, trees to mirrors and even billboards depicting a famous duo that in the show. Then we have Pierrot himself: the emperor of the Bad End Kingdom and a colossal demonic clown bent on bringing the to the whole world.

• Bali-Lali from Manga/Bizenghast is a terrifying cyborg spider-taur wearing a jester's cap. • gives us Whippy and the Training Clowns in the episode 'Cowardly Creature.' They train the monsters that Nightmare creates to help them become evil and dangerous, and while Whippy is the only one who ever fights Kirby, it's possible that they are some of Nightmare's most powerful creations.

• has The Pierrot, a mysterious gang of Ghoul pranksters. Their members wear clown-themed masks, and are known for being extremely dangerous. It isn't clear what their goals are, besides ruining lives and 'having the last laugh'. Of several of its members was a particularly nasty to the original series, while the sequel has shown the group to be major players that should be feared. One of the more prominent members is an infamous, to boot.

• In, Belmod, one of the Gods of Destruction, is revealed to be a clown. As he's actually devoted to fighting for justice and destroying evil. He even sponsors, and is a fanboy of, his own group of Sentai-esque superheroes. • Subverted by a short-lived superhero called Funnyman whose schtick was. You guessed it. • While the weird-but-superheroic Jack-In-The-Box from is a, Jack's two descendants definitely fit this trope.

• The Joker, incidentally, was originally based on Conrad Veidt's role in. While the titular clown of this picture, he certainly was ◊ • 's gives the Penguin a bunch of clowns as henchmen, despite the fact that clowns are more the territory of the Joker.

According to the production notes, Burton's vision of the Penguin was inspired by, so a is a necessity. And in the briefly-mentioned backstory, the Penguin in that version also was a sideshow freak in his childhood, implying that's where his gang comes from.

•: The Joker once again acts as this trope. But he seems to be emphasizing the 'Monster' part of the trope this time around. Although he denies it, saying he's not really a clown; despite his appearance and gag-themed weapons, he's not able to make someone laugh without his signature chemicals. • looks to be taking the Joker's and to their logical conclusion by depicting the Joker as an scourge who has seemingly been menacing Gotham since it was founded. On top of that, the backup stories for the arc contribute several more options to the Joker's. It's telling that the most 'normal' of them is that the Joker has a. • DC also has the Ragdoll dynasty.

The father was a villain with contortionist abilities, who would eventually become a Mansonesque cult leader and eventually regained his youth via a. The son lacked his father's natural flexibility, so he remedied it with a series of operations that's left him severely deformed, but with greater flexibility than even his father. And don't ask about the sister. • NightHawk from, being an of Batman, naturally faces off against a homicidal maniac who kills and disguises himself as a party entertainer who was visiting the prison, and then goes on a rampage. But let's just say that NightHawk isn't Batman and hasn't heard of. • Violator from.

At first, he's just a clown who delights in murder and mayhem. Then it turns out that the grotesque human is just a skin-suit over a demon from hell. • The Comedian from arguably qualifies. In his original costume as one of the Minutemen anyway.

When he gets his second costume and becomes one of the Crimebusters, not so much. • Like the Joker's Glasgow smile in, the scar the Comedian gets in Vietnam is eerily reminiscent of a clown's painted smile. • Protoclown from. And then the subversion: Protoclown was genetically engineered to be the perfect, and deep down he's not such a bad guy. He just really hates being laughed.

• as Monster Clowns. He's never actually encountered a real Monster Clown in the comics, but his solo mission in has him fighting an army of clowns in a circus. • once fought vampire clowns. • Even has shown dislike of clowns. • Bali Lali from is a woman in a jester outfit.

She is closer to Good, being a hero but she certainly is creepy. • Clown, who was featured in Super Mystery Comics and Four Favorites, was so evil he worked for. • Eliot Franklin, from the, worked as a clown and wore his clown costume to commit crimes. He eventually became a professional hitman. • The Clown Cenobite (a.k.a. 'Winky Dink') from the comic story 'Dead Things Rot'. • A recent issue of the revamped CREEPY comic featured a murderous clown who killed 'demons' wherever he saw them.

He saw them everywhere. • The Painted Doll, a mass-murdering Joker- supervillain from. It's eventually revealed that his is because he's actually a succession of identical robots created by an evil engineering genius, with a new one being activated automatically whenever the previous one is damaged beyond repair. • Frenchy from the National Lampoon's feature which ran intermittently in the magazine in the late 80's and early 90's. He was the brainchild of Nick Bakay and Alan Kupperberg, and was not only bitter and diabolical but had. Ahem, a way with the ladies as well.

Sometimes he was too much even for the proudly non-PC Lampoon, which refused to publish one panel of a particular story. Crumb wrote a comic showing the marvels of the City of the Future. He depicted a squad of clowns who went around inflicting chaos to keep people on their toes - and they regulated population growth, finding people aged 65 and throwing cyanide pies in their faces. What a way to go! • In: I Love NY #4, Robyn fights a gang of monster clowns who are abducting children. • A fake one of these pops out of a door as an in.

Later, a living mannequin clown with a appears. • features as a Jokeresque character. You'll never look at that little pink pony the same way again. • In the, an glimpsed in (as well as in ) gives us Nightmare Granfalloon, Pinkie Pie's potential. • The vocaloid fanfic has four of them, portrayed by Teto, Tei, Ruko, and Ritsu.

• assists the primary villains in the first installment of the series. • In, Kallen's Zero mask, unlike the one Lelouch wears in canon, makes her look like this.

More specifically, it's an ornate clown mask that's happy on one side and sad on the other. Subverted in that, despite being ruthless at times, she's not actually evil. • is an early, downplayed example — the clowns genuinely like making their audience laugh, but they're a bunch of behind the scenes, humiliating Dumbo (and having a clown play his mother is pretty cruel, considering what happened to her) and not worrying about hurting him, or worse.

One of the clowns does get a moment, but that's about it. (When he insists 'You'll hurt the little guy', the other clowns just laugh him off and say that elephants can't get hurt because 'they're made of rubber.' ) • The Clown With The Tearaway Face from. Subverted in that once you get to know him, just like the other denizens of Halloween Town.

• had a nightmare about a fireman-clown trying to chase it into a filled bathtub. His only line was 'Run!' Considering it was a toaster's nightmare, and the clown was armed with a fire hose and a fork. • King Candy from, despite not being a true clown, evokes this imagery as his comical, loony persona erodes away to reveal his truly evil inner self. Becomes a bit more literal in the climax. • One of Riley's deep, subconscious fears in is the and Jangles the Clown. ' Whooo's the birthday girl?!'

In the, he's revealed to be a.