Lord Betrayus

Good

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 being the main antagonist of the animated TV series, Pac-Man and the Ghostly Adventures.

He is an utterly vengeful and power-hungry arch-nemesis of Pac-Man who used to be a Pac-Worlder and citizen, but due to his plan of starting a war, he became stripped of his body and was sent to the Netherworld as a form of being banished for committing genocide and familicide, he is also well-known for being responsible for the deaths of Pac-Man's parents and the entire race of the "Yellow Ones" before The Pacinator and Apex were introduced.

As a ghost, he now seeks to get his body back by seeking to obtain the repository Stratos keeps in order to rule Pac-World with an iron fist while he often sends his ghostly people to do his bidding while he remains on his throne, endlessly plotting revenge every time his plans are foiled.

Why He Intentionally Deserved to Be Banished

 * 1) For starters, even though he is cocky, cunning, malicious, ruthless, deceptive, and villainous, he can be pretty empty-headed at times. Lord Betrayus may have been evil enough to commit genocidal behavior towards Pac-World when he was alive and being somewhat of a strict and childish yet competent leader who once inspired genuine fear and loyalty in his troops and has led successful attacks on the Resistance for the time, but nowadays, he is simply way too goofy, infantile, and clownish to be taken seriously in any way as the main antagonist. 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 Sonic Boom, Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic Underground. All in a rather annoying and underwhelming way since he seems to be often viewed and depicted as a minor annoyance deserving to be poked fun at by anyone than being a threat.
 * 2) * Like many old-fashioned ineffectual villains, he generally relies on his typically ineffective minions to do the dirty work of defeating Pac-Man for him since Betrayus is way too incompetent (or lazy) to do it himself as a ghostly scoundrel.
 * 3) * All of his failures and moments of embarrassment typically have him look unfortunate and awkward in an extremely predictable way.
 * 4) Not only is he a generic and incredibly lame supervillain that rips off Mezmeron from the 1982 Pac-Man TV series, but he is a total manbaby as well.
 * 5) * A 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.
 * 6) * He often blames others for whatever misfortune happens to him despite it usually being Betrayus himself who caused it.
 * 7) * 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.
 * 8) ** Sometimes he attempts to take the credit for what inventions Dr. Buttocks come up with and Betrayus would selfishly use those ideas for his own schemes, which causes him to screw up and cause problems for others because of not knowing how to use those inventions properly, his ineptitude would better show because of his cowardice and narcissism.
 * 9) * For the fact that he cannot sleep without his stuffed toy and sucks on his thumb like an actual baby, this makes him pretty cringe-worthy for a typically ineffectual villain.
 * 10) 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 because of how insecure and immature he is.
 * 11) * He throws fits when he isn't acknowledged in various schemes, and passes the blame onto others when he himself fails.
 * 12) Character Derailment: He suffers from both; Flanderization and Character derailment, the latter moreso.
 * 13) * Where he went from being a decent antagonist with his moments of comedic relief in the very first episode, he has later slowly become more of an overly childish & hammy, pathetic, bossy, mostly condescending, downright idiotic, 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 fast when he becomes even more unlikeable than before.
 * 14) The worst part about his Flanderization is that he feels more or less like a very clichéd and mediocre modern-day embodiment of Dr. Ivo 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.
 * 15) * In fact, his personality traits are almost identical to AoStH's Dr. Robotnik as well! Examples of these include:
 * 16) ** Being a very over-the-top villain who opposes the protagonists for his own selfish benefits.
 * 17) ** As the main antagonist; he is given a character design that could make him seem like a potentially intimidating villain to Pac-Man, but his characterization is a lot more buffoonish and juvenile than necessary.
 * 18) ** Having some level of cleverness to see trivial events as potential opportunities to further his single-minded goal of ruling Pac-World by getting the repository since he's underhanded and vengeful.
 * 19) ** Being a tyrannical jerk that always acts like an immature, fussy & petty psychopath who happens to be very inefficient a lot of the time.
 * 20) ** Prone to being completely neurotic, high-strung, and excitable whenever he's humiliated or looked down upon.
 * 21) ** He is generally depicted as the show's object of ridicule for how bumbling and overreactive he generally is. Especially when he is supposedly the hot-headed and hare-brained comic foil to Pac-Man, Stratos, and even his own ghostly minions.
 * 22) ** He has a superiority complex over his loyal but long-suffering and inept ghostly minions despite Betrayus himself also being a bungler who nearly succeeds at his plans.
 * 23) ** He comes up with elaborate yet silly-sounding insults and retorts towards those he disapproves of.
 * 24) ** He shows 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 antagonistic hatred towards them for their status).
 * 25) Much like The Storm King from My Little Pony: The Movie, while he can be amusing and/or sympathetic sometimes, Lord 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, as he mostly lacks the charm of a "comedic villain". In fact, aside from being a villain with delusions of grandeur, his childish silliness, his constant shortcomings & petty motives/actions are pretty much his sole characteristics, and nothing much else other than that.
 * 26) His levels of flamboyance, pettiness, incompetence, immaturity, egotism, overreaction, hamminess, buffoonery and occasional sarcasm are generally taken to the point of being stale and irritating.
 * 27) His voice is passable at best and very grating at worst. The worst offenders of this are him whining, his nasal voice cracks, and his moments of crying, whimpering, wailing, or squealing.
 * 28) While his ghost design and his Pac-Worlder design as an adult are both passable, his design in his younger years looks very cheesy.
 * 29) Misleading name: Despite his very name being Lord Betrayus, he doesn't nor is he even capable of actually betraying anybody that trusted him throughout the animated series despite how mean-spirited he often is. 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 servant, Butt-ler. Yet he never shows any real signs of betraying others like genuinely helping out his enemies, being traitorous/disloyal to his minions, or actually double-crossing others outside of being selfish.
 * 30) * As a matter of fact, he has shown to be betrayed by other Pac-People in his past like his favoristic mother who favors Stratos over him, the iconic Ghost Gang who often helps out Pac-Man a lot of the time (basically being disloyal to Betrayus behind his back), and some of Betrayus's minions constantly screw up at defeating Pac-Man in a traitorous manner after being eaten and belched out (Spector is an example of a smug ghost who actually tried gloating about his success and was caught on camera of him betraying Lord Betrayus before Spector got deceived). So his own name is rather contradictory if anything.
 * 31) He is somewhat of a hypocrite on occasion because of how self-deluded he is; these moments include:
 * 32) * Getting jealous over his brother, Stratos, and then asking Dr. Buttocks why are people cruel when Betrayus himself mistreats everyone around him.
 * 33) * 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 inefficient with defeating Pac-Man.
 * 34) * 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 personality-wise.
 * 35) Despite being an extremely childish and insecure coward for a hegemonic villain, he often demeans, abuses, and belittles the ghosts that continue to serve him in trivial ways (all for little to no good reason), he seems to not care that much if his own ghostly people 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.
 * 36) * Also, due to his egomaniacal nature, he has a superiority complex with almost everyone unless they're on his side of the story with wanting to defeat Pac-Man, all in a rather immature way since he can act like a persistent, competitive yet selfish little kid who calls his rivals "losers" despite him being a sneaky scoundrel.
 * 37) In the PMATGA games, despite being able to commit villainous actions (especially in the second game), his boss fights are a joke since they're way too easy to be challenging; especially since it only takes 4 hits to defeat him in the first game despite it having some challenge to bounce the speedy projectiles back at him while dodging countless obstacles.
 * 38) * His final boss battle in the second game makes him seem like a total idiot since he could crush Pac-Man with the tennis paddle if he wanted to actually win over Pac-Man to get back the repository with his ghost army instead of making some pointlessly long tennis match with little to no challenge, especially since he increased in size because of the ray Dr. Buttocks used to make Betrayus giant.
 * 39) * It's even more surprising to know that even his own ghostly minions seem like they do a better job at posing more of a threat to Pac-Man than Betrayus thinks he does.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) He does have his moments here and there with being humorous or entertaining. Mainly because of how over-the-top and childishly eccentric 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 as his source of motivation for conquering Pac-World (especially since he was just a harmless man-child who became evil because of his childhood-related trauma disorders), too bad he was badly flanderized as the series progressed.
 * 3) * On the topic of sympathy, as mentioned at WH(I?)DtBB#6, there are times where his pathetic defeats and levels of humiliation can make viewers understand why he hates Pac-Man with a strong passion.
 * 4) As mentioned at WH(I?)DtBB #1 and #12, there were moments here and there when he can be effective and did come off as a little bit of a threat despite being ridiculous and highly 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.
 * 5) * He, as mentioned before at WH(I?)DtBB #12, did commit some heinous actions that make him a little bit formidable if he isn't being too comedic. Examples of these include the second game where he kidnapped Pac-Man's parents and needed to make Pac-Man bring the repository to him by tricking Pac-Man with a subtle lie with the help of Apex that had the potential to succeed. This is where he actually betrays Pac-Man for once (despite being deceived by Sir Cumference), which is a shocker since this was what makes his name somewhat meaningful compared to the last game and the animated series he starred in.
 * 6) Some of his quotes are pretty funny and comedic, such as:
 * 7) *  "I AM THE BEST! ME! ME! IS THAT CLEAR? MMEE!!!"
 * 8) *  "Pulverize the old hag!"
 * 9) * "Oh, I see! My dear sweet mother is visiting her favorite son Stratos and not ME!! How can people be so cruel?" 
 * 10) *  "No-body is sneakier than ME!! So deal with them and leave Pac-World to me and MY ghosts!!! Also, my nose itches, and I can't scratch it, YEOW!!"
 * 11) *  "What are you free-loaders doing?! Is that my credit card? I'm not paying for those pizzas and-"
 * 12) *  "This! Isn't! The Re-posit-torrryyyy!!!"
 * 13) *  "HOW, DARE YOU CALL ME A HOTHEAD!!"
 * 14) 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.
 * 15) His ghost design and his Pac-Worlder design are both appealing (the latter ranges from passable to decent-looking).
 * 16) 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, mh:greatcharacters:Eren Yeager, and Steppenwolf (Snyder Cut), etc.)
 * 17) He always receives 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
1EGAbNi-VFk gUc-d3PyLZQ VI_eT64UZFg HDrzPZDVf8o lIi5O3olH0s (Skip to 8:29 for the fifth video in the middle) prrKEt4Dan4 R3-0iBcoMg8 (Skip to 8:07 for the video on the bottom left)

Trivia

 * His name is a play on the two words "betray" and "us".
 * His name is also a pun of a former CIA Director David Petraeus.
 * His mother calls him "Tray-Tray" as a nickname of his.
 * 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, has fire powers, attached to a stuffed pink rabbit).
 * In addition, he is also similar to Lord Shen from mh:greatestmovies:Kung Fu Panda 2, as both are particularly associated with fire, have red/white/black colors, metal talons, and have supposed involvements in the genocide of the hero's entire race who may not have been eradicated after all.
 * There are plenty of fans out there 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.
 * This is currently the ninth longest page on this wiki among other contenders.

Comments
