Lord Betrayus

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Lord Betrayus "Sneakerous" Spheros (also simply known as Betrayus), or better known as Lord Betrayus, is the main antagonist of the video game Pac Man and the Ghostly Adventures and its sequel, as well as the main antagonist of the animated TV series, Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures. He is the arch-nemesis of Pac-Man who has been banished to the Netherworld.

Why He (Intentionally?) Deserved to Be Banished

 * 1) Even though he is cocky, cunning, deceptive, and villainous, he can be very empty-headed at times. Despite being evil enough to wipe a bunch of pac-people when he was alive, he is way too goofy and clownish to be taken seriously in any way. Because of this, he doesn't seem to pose any real threat as a ghostly overlord despite his many attempts at doing so (albeit them being either useful or useless), even more so than Dr. Robotnik from both Sonic Boom and Sonic Underground in a rather annoying way. All of his failures and moments of embarrassment typically have him look unfortunate and awkward in an extremely predictable way.
 * 2) * Like many old-fashioned ineffectual villains, he generally relies on his typically bumbling minions to do the dirty work of defeating Pac-Man for him since Betrayus is way too incompetent (or lazy) to do it himself.
 * 3) Not only is he a generic and incredibly lame villain that rips off Mezmeron from the 1982 Pac-Man TV series, but he is also an absolute manchild and a total crybaby as well.
 * 4) * An prime example of his childishness is when he was whining about how he never got over losing to Spheria at a pac-pong tournament years ago as shown in the episode "Pac-Pong Fever" and was constantly saying how she cheated even when Betrayus himself lost, which was something he held a grudge on for years. This is pretty pitiful.
 * 5) * He often blames others for whatever misfortune happens to him despite it usually being Lord Betrayus himself who caused it.
 * 6) * He regularly commands someone to come up with a plan and takes credit for said plan. However, if the plan goes awry, he forces all blame upon the plan's originator, who likely had no choice in the first place to concoct it. He even takes all the credit for the bright ideas his minions make.
 * 7) * For the fact that he cannot sleep without his stuffed toy and sucks on his thumb like an actual baby makes him pretty cringe-worthy for a typically ineffectual villain.
 * 8) He is also very cowardly and pusillanimous, letting others do the dirty work on his behalf. As well as being very petulant, irresponsible, and aggravated, he tends to throw tantrums whenever things do not go his way.
 * 9) * He throws fits when he isn't acknowledged in various schemes, and passes the blame onto others when he himself fails.
 * 10) He suffers from both; Flanderization and Character derailment. Where he went from being a decent antagonist with his moments of comedic relief since the very first episode, and he has later slowly become more of an overly childish & hammy, bossy, mostly condescending, downright idiotic, unfunny, and a whiny bungler who never succeeds at anything in an aimless manner despite being deceptive. This gets to the point that his Flanderization starts to wear thin.
 * 11) The worst part about his Flanderization is that he feels more or less like a very mediocre embodiment of Dr. Robotnik from Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, King K. Rool from the Donkey Kong Country TV series, and King Koopa from both The Super Mario Bros Super Show & The Adventures of Super Mario Bros. 3; three examples of video-game related villains that are genuinely funny with their cartoonishly evil personas 20 to 24 years prior to Betrayus.
 * 12) * In fact, his personality traits are almost identical to Dr. Ivo Robotnik from that show as well!
 * 13) ** These include him being a very over-the-top villain who opposes the protagonists for his own selfish benefits, seeing trivial events as potential opportunities to further his goal of ruling Pacworld since he's underhanded and vengeful, he's always acting like an immature & petty psychopath since he's a tyrannical jerk who happens to be inefficient a lot of the time, being completely neurotic and agitated, he is generally depicted as the show's object of ridicule for how bumbling he generally is, he has a superiority complex over his loyal but long-suffering and fallible minions despite Betrayus himself being a bungler who nearly succeeds at his plans, he comes up with elaborate yet silly-sounding insults towards those he disapproves of, and he has shown to have a personal vendetta towards those who hinder his progress (especially when Pac-Man is often praised for winning over him all the time and his brother Stratos is living the good life as a president; to the point of growing a certain level of hatred towards them).
 * 14) Much like The Storm King from My Little Pony: The Movie, while he can be amusing and sympathetic sometimes, Betrayus is an extremely campy and weak comedic villain that takes the idea of a "comedic villain" to a pitifully piss-poor extent that it becomes rather irritating & humorless than funny, and he mostly lacks the charm of a "comedic villain". In fact, aside from being a villain, his childish silliness & petty motives/actions are his sole characteristics and nothing much else other than that.
 * 15) His levels of flamboyance, pettiness, immaturity, egotism, ridiculousness, hamminess and occasional sarcasm are generally taken to the point of being stale and irritating.
 * 16) His voice is passable at best and very grating at worst. The biggest offenders of this are him whining, his voice cracks, his acts of yelling too much, and his moments of crying, wailing, or squealing.
 * 17) Misleading name: Despite his very name being Lord Betrayus, he doesn't nor is he even capable to betray anybody that has trusted him. Sure he is a self-centered, manipulative, and egotistical sociopath who wants nothing but to rule Pac-World after being banished and is often mean to characters that are loyal to him such as his ever so luckless servant, Butt-ler. Yet he never shows any real signs of committing acts of betrayal like genuinely helping out his enemies or being traitorous/disloyal to his minions.
 * 18) * As a matter of fact, he has shown to be betrayed by other pac-people in his past like his favoristic mother, the iconic Ghost Gang who often helps out Pac-Man a lot of the time (basically being disloyal to Betrayus), and some of Betrayus's minions constantly screw up at defeating Pac-Man in a traitorous manner. So his name is rather contradictory than anything else.
 * 19) He is somewhat of a hypocrite on occasion, these moments include:
 * 20) * Getting jealous over his brother, Stratos, and then asking Dr. Buttocks why people are so cruel when Betrayus himself often mistreats everyone around him.
 * 21) * In the episode "The Spy Who Slimed Me", he labels each and everyone in the Netherworld as a complete klutz (who also considers Dr. Buttocks as the most inept, pathetic, and worthless minions around) when Betrayus himself is completely incompetent with defeating Pac-Man.
 * 22) * In the episode "Heebo-Skeebo", when Skeebo was tied up and then locked into one of Betrayus's dungeons for being a clumsy charlatan of a hero, Betrayus first called him a "buffoon" considering that Betrayus literally is one.
 * 23) Aside from being an extremely childish and insecure coward for a villain, he often demeans and belittles the ghosts that continue to serve him in trivial ways (all for little to no reason), he seems to not care that much if his own minions indulge in toxic behavior with each other (e.g Butt-ler and Dr. Buttocks fighting with each other) and he always make them do whatever he wants them to do, no matter how stupid it can be.
 * 24) * Also, due to his egomaniacal nature, he has a superiority complex with almost everyone unless they're on his side, all in a rather immature way since he can act like a competitive and selfish little kid who calls his rivals "losers" despite him being a sneaky scoundrel.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) He does have his moments here and there with being funny or entertaining. Mainly because of how over-the-top he is.
 * 2) * He was a decent comic-relief antagonist in the very first episode "The Adventure Begins" who also had a somewhat sympathetic backstory for being banished and wanting his body back (especially since he was just a harmless manchild who became evil for childhood related trauma disorders), too bad he was badly flanderized as the series progressed.
 * 3) As mentioned at WH(I?)DtBB #1, there were moments here and there when he can be effective and come off as a little bit of a threat despite being ridiculous and extremely fallible. These include occasions in episodes like "Heebo-Skeebo" when Skeebo was sent to one of Betrayus's dungeons, right after Betrayus attempted using a fire attack to burn Skeebo.
 * 4) Some of his quotes are pretty hilarious, such as:
 * 5) *  "I AM THE BEST! ME! ME! IS THAT CLEAR? MMEE!!!"
 * 6) *  "Pulverize the old hag!"
 * 7) * "Oh, I see! My dear sweet mother is visiting her favorite son Stratos and not ME!! How can people be so cruel?" 
 * 8) *  "No-body is sneakier than ME!! So deal with them and leave Pacworld to me and MY ghosts!!! Also, my nose itches and I can't scratch it, YEOW!!"
 * 9) *  "What are you free-loaders doing?! Is that my credit card? I'm not paying for those pizzas and-"
 * 10) While his voice can be quite annoying at times, at least his voice actor Samuel Vincent did a decent job at voicing him and you can that he tried his best to have fun voicing Betrayus by doing a Peter Zimmerman voice impression.
 * 11) His ghost design and his Pac-Worlder design are both appealing.
 * 12) There are fans who simply support and adore this character throughout, much to the point that fans of the show (or people who don't like the show) both consider him to be the best part of the show.
 * 13) Since he is the main antagonist of the show, it's clear that he was MEANT to be hated due to how mean and despicable he is. (But not all villains are supposed to be hated, they can also be likable, understandable for their motives, and sometimes very funny/entertaining like for example: Doctor Doofenshmirtz, Thanos, Darth Vader, and Steppenwolf (Snyder Cut), etc.)
 * 14) He always recieves comeuppance for his sinful deeds, usually by Pacster eating him and belching out his eyeballs. So it can be argued that he isn't a Karma Houdini in the slightest.

Videos
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Trivia

 * His name is a play on the two words "betray us".
 * His name is also a pun on that of former CIA Director David Petraeus.
 * Probably unintentional due to obscurity, but he shares a lot of similarities with Klogg from The Neverhood (hammy, sharp-fingered, red and white colors, has a good guy brother) and Lucius from Jimmy Two-Shoes (ruler of Hell-in-everything-but-name, fire powers, attached to a stuffed pink rabbit).
 * And also, Lord Shen from Kung Fu Panda 2, particularly the association with fire, red/white/black colors, metal talons, and the supposed involvement in the genocide of the hero's entire race who may not have been eradicated after all.

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