Occasionally, someone asks me why I became a villain. The answer is simple. I'm too fucking ethical to be a hero.
You doubt me? Let's look at a textbook example of "heroic" behavior: The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon episode "A Thing About Rats", in which we are introduced to my first crush and lifelong inspiration, the only man I ever named a cat after, Dr. Baxter Stockman.
The thing you have to understand about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is that, while it may have been a gritty satirical comic book, as a cartoon it was patently aimed at the Jr High School crowd and younger. Totally PG. Definitely not a medium where the hero's ill behavior could be written off as a subtle meditation on the cult of celebrity or the inherently flawed nature of humanity or the like.
As we first see Dr. Stockman, he's trying to market his supremely efficient rat-catching invention, the Mouser (no, it doesn't catch mice. Just rats. Don't ask me.) Now, rats, though I love 'em like my babies, do in fact spread pestilence and filth. So Dr. Stockman has created an invention that is to the benefit of humanity. For his time, he is rather rudely and precipitously rejected.... which is nothing compared to what's about to happen to him.
The one man in the city who is interested in his invention, it seems, is chief-series-baddy The Shredder. The Shredder sets up a factory to mass-produce the Mousers, with the (unstated, at least to Baxter) aim of capturing his arch-rival, giant-rat-ninja-sensei Splinter. (For those of you unconversant with the series, it's more or less as if Darth Vader got hold of a short-green-dude-stomping-device.) The Mousers nearly succeed in this aim, which, considering they were designed to cope with normal rats (which don't have martial arts skills to speak of) is a pretty damned impressive testimony to Dr. Stockman's engineering skill.
Unfortunately, rather than the Nobel Committee, Baxter is accosted on his way home by the Gang of Four - or rather, the "heroes", the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, who have discovered his name engraved on one of the 'death machines.' Honest to god, what is this, PETA propaganda? Who else objects to a rat trap in such terms?
Leaving aside ideological objections, the Turtle's behavior at this juncture is nothing less than thuggish. They tie the good Doctor (whom they outnumber four to one, to say nothing of the fact that they are armed and in physically prime condition whereas Baxter, a cartoon scientist, is just... well, not) to a lamp post, and interrogate him. He tells them everything - and why shouldn't he? As far as he knows at this point, he was involved in a perfectly legitimate, if abandoned-warehous-based, business enterprise.
Now comes the point that I have never, in a decade and then some, been able to get over. The Turtles, in a hurry to reach Shredder (damn kids)... well, according to the episode synopsis on the Official Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle web site, "with no time to lose, they "borrow" Stockman's van." Even the Enemies' propaganda organ is forced to retreat behind shame-faced quotation marks here. What they do, pure and simple, is steal Baxter's van. In later episodes, this van and the equipment it contained, as well as other equipment that the turtles "found" in Stockman's workshop, equipment that presumably was the basis of the Doctor's livelihood as an inventor, will be used by Donatello to furnish many of the Turtles' gadgets and vehicles. The TMNT web site explains this away as being because Stockman is now a "guest of the state."
Let's break this down. Dr. Stockman has up to now been guilty of a crime in exactly the capacity that the Texas water utility is guilty of the death of the Yates kids. All he did was sell a legal and legitimate device - a rat-trap, if a fancy one - to a man who used it for nefarious ends (and honestly, how nefarious is taking a giant rat out of the sewers of New York City, anyway? Even if it was a grudge match it still seems like a bit of a public service.) Even if Baxter were in some way culpable, what right does this give the Turtles to his property? They're not agents of los Federales, that they should be allowed to carry out confiscations and commandeer vehicles.
Nevertheless, Dr. Baxter Stockman, who only ever really wanted to build a better mousetrap, ends up in a home for the criminally insane. After which the only employment he can find is once again with the Shredder, being continually verbally and physically abused by both his employer and the oh-so-noble Turtles who drove him to this strait. Eventually, as most of you probably know, he is mutated into a confused and embittered giant fly. This just makes me very depressed whenever I think about it.
Of course, lest you think that Dr. Stockman is merely a victim, I must dissuade you. Later on in the series, after it's become clear that the Turtles stand between him and any kind of decent, comfortable life, Baxter shows both initiative and panache in trying to destroy them with or without The Shredder's help. This is particularly notable in the 'Eye of Zarnov' multi-episode series. Even post-mutation Dr. Stockman still shows some taste... the cry of "Revenge! But first, sugar!" has long since been adopted as one of my personal mottoes.
So, with such an image before me in my youth, I ask you.... who would I side with? The 'heroes' or the 'villains'? Especially when the villains also get the cool costumes, great lines, and grandiose, melodramatic gestures? The answer, as we know, is history.