Top Tragic Tensed Scenes in Shakespeare Plays

When I was watching a lot of Top Tens from Watchmojo, I stumbled upon Top Ten Hilarious Death scenes. It then got me thinking, why don't I do my Top Death Scenes in Shakespeare? So I decided to choose the most memorable from those plays and call it...

Top Tragic Tensed Scenes in Shakespeare Plays:

1- Lavinia- After dealing with Demetrius and Chiron in a most cruel manner, the brothers cut off her hands and even her tongue. Her neck later gets broken by her own father Titus because her chastity being violated.
I have no words for this... except this... Two "stumps" up for her tragic scene and death!

2- Romeo & Juliet- Both lovers couldn't live a day without each other. Quite literally if I may add. I mentioned before that it was all Juliet's fault for Rome's death. Since when has faking your death helped people be together in the end. Have you heard of "Peter and the Wolf"? Tragic tale! Anyway, Romeo assumes Juliet is dead. He then kills himself by drinking poison in order to die beside her in the tomb. When Juliet awakes she finds that Romeo is dead. She tries to drink the poison with hope to meet the same fate, but instead she stabs herself with Romeo's dagger to complete a dual tragedy.

3- Macbeth- Macbeth doesn't have a good head on his shoulders. He boasts about his invincibility as he is going to battle, but because of his pride, karma got the best of him. Instead of keeping the crown safely on his head, his head is cut off and the crown is placed on the head of a new king instead. You'd think that the witches could've given Macbeth more of a heads up for heaven's sake!

4- Ophelia- Ophelia was crying a river, as well as drowning her sorrows while dealing with Hamlet's  emotional vibes, it was hard for her to know if he even loved her. Hearing about how Hamlet killed her father accidentally behind a curtain wasn't helping. Ophelia's mind wasn't flowing with joy at that time. She was talking about bushing up daises before she decided to take a little swim.

5- Polonious- This was clearly an accident. All Polonius had to say was "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" But no, he screamed for "help" and eventually got stabbed to death by Hamlet in the process.

6- Julius Caesar- Caesar didn't have a lot of friends. In fact all of them didn't like him. Even his close friend stabbed him in the back, quite literally if I may add.

7- Demetrius and Chiron- After mutilating Lavinia, Titus decides to "make" something out of them, by having them for dinner!

8- Gloucester- This guy is sight for sore eyes! It is plain to see that this eye popping scene with Gloucester is a sight to behold!

 

9- Cordelia-Thanks for hanging around for Cordelia. Hopefully you won't need the ropes for this one.

10- Cleopatra- Now this is something you'll really sink you teeth into. Let's just say that Cleopatra might've been on the movie "Snakes on a Plane".

11- Antigonus- Now this is a grizzly and yet random scene. Antigonus from "Winter's Tale" is pursued by "A Godless Killing Machine!" Not a loin, nor tiger; but a bear! Oh My! I can't "bear" to watch!

 

12- Hamlet- While having a duel, Hamlet gets scratched by at tip of a sword, that happened to be poisoned.

13- Claudius- He gets poisoned two ways by Hamlet. One by getting stabbed with a poisonous sword and the other by drinking the poison that was intended for Hamlet. Could this be the first "Double Tap"?

14- Rosencrantz and Guildenstern- They were killed by pirates. It makes you wonder if they were killed by Bloody Pirates of the Caribbean or the Dread Pirate Roberts?

15- Iago- After deceiving many, especially Othello, he was then tortured to death for his heinous acts!

16- Desdemona-  After being accused of cheating, she is then smothered to death with a pillow by her lover Othello. You think this was the first "pillow fight"?

17- Aaron-  Lucius from Titus Andronicus decides to bury Aaron chest deep, leaving him to die of starvation and thirst. What if Aaron found sand worms.

 

There you have it! Which Tragic Tensed Scene from Shakespeare Plays did you find memorable?

Top Ten Songs Inspired by Shakespeare

I've decided to do another Top Ten. This list will involve popular songs that were inspired by Shakespeare's writings. This list will be based not only on it's popularity but it's clever usage in making his works musical. Listed below will be the name of the song followed by the musician and the Shakespeare play it is referencing. Here we go:
 
10-"Cruel To Be Kind" by Letters to Cleo- "Hamlet"

I liked this song because it is not only written by one of my favorite girl punk bands, but it is also part of soundtrack of one of my favorite 90's movies "10 Things I Hate About You". Hey! Ironically, it happens to be number ten on the list!

9- "Sigh No More" by Mumford and Son's- "Much Ado About Nothing"

This band is slowly growing on me. I'm glad that they made a Shakespeare reference in their songs, especially from one of my favorite Shakespeare movie adaptions "Much Ado About Nothing". 

8- "Don't Fear The Reaper" by Oyster Cult- "Romeo & Juliet"

 I didn't even know that this song referenced Shakespeare. It took me a double take, but with that "take" I have now learned to like it more. "More Cowbell"? Yes please!

7- "Ariel" by October Project- "The Tempest"

What's not to like about this song? It is a duet by two women, their voices are very melodious and it tells the story about Ariel's imprisonment as a slave to Prospero from "The Tempest". 

6- "Miss Macbeth" by Elvis Costello- "Macbeth"

 This song was a bit unique. It was very upbeat and it too told the tale of a Shakespeare character. Lady Macbeth!

5- "Hey There Ophelia" by MC Lars- "Hamlet"

 I love this one! The whole song sums up the long play of "Hamlet"! You also feel well educated in Shakespeare's work after listening to it.

4-  "Check Yes Juliet" by We The Kings- "Romeo & Juliet"

It is by an awesome band that is basically telling a girl that if she loves a boy to run away with him, and leave her parents behind. Just be careful, "Romeo & Juliet" is not a happy ending.

3- "Double Trouble" from the movie "Harry Potter: And the Prisoner of Azkhaban"- "Macbeth"

All right Harry Potter fans, this is a perfect theme song for the witches in "Macbeth"! What's not to like about this? It is totally "Wicked"!

2- "Wytches Brew" by Omnia- "Macbeth"

This is another song that tells a tale. This one focuses on the evil witches in "Macbeth" and their plot to ruin a future king's downfall. Perfectly modernized and fits the theme of pagan worship and ritual that the witches were obviously practicing.

1- "Sigh No More" from Joss Whedon's "Much Ado About Nothing"

 The reason this gets number one is because of it's adaption with the ancient sonnet and modern music. They both worked perfectly well with each other and sounded beautifully as one. Plus this song has some family sentimental value to me.

Top Ten Shakespeare Villains

 After doing my Top Ten Shakespeare Plays, I decided to do yet another Top Ten. This time I decided to do Top Ten Shakespeare Villains. So here we go:

10- Sebastian, Antonio & Caliban- The Tempest
Sebastian is the brother of Alonso. Antonio is the brother of the main character, Prospero. They both try to murder Alonzo and Gonzalo while they were stranded on the island. They are then stopped by Ariel's subtle influence and even forgiven by Prospero for their wrongs. As a result no casualties were present.

Caliban is the offspring of the witch Sycorax, and the devil himself. Being half devil and half witch, it gives him more reason to be ALL evil, but because he is a slave to Prospero he is limited to act on his evil intentions. Again no casualties.

 9- Don John, Conrade and Borachia- Much Ado About Nothing
Don John is the bastard brother of Don Pedro, and is the chief villain in the play. Out of pure jealousy, he literally wanted to make everybody "miserable like unto himself." As we all know "misery loves company." Don John had his servants Conrade and Borachio try to help him succeed in this selfish act. They fail in this because of one's big mouth.

 8- Regan & Goneril- King Lear
Regan and Goneril are the rude daughters of King Lear. They lie to their own father about loving him, just to get their share of the kingdom. They even kick King Lear out of his own humble abode. They clearly had dad issues.





7- Tybalt- Romeo & Juliet
Tybalt is the cousin of Juliet(whom we will be talking about later). He is described to be fiery-tempered, especially when things don't go his way. He hates the whole house of Montague with a passion. Tybalt even considers Romeo a "villain" for loving his cousin, Juliet. He later kills Romeo's friend, Mercutio. Heck... he even hates the word "peace"!

6- The Weird Sisters AKA The Witches and Lady Macbeth- Macbeth
The Weird Sisters are the catalyst that later initiated Macbeth's lust for the future crown of Scotland. Their soothing words were music to Macbeth's ear holes. Those words even rang true to Lady Macbeth, of whom strongly encouraged her husband to make the prophecy come true by force. Due to this horrible act, it lead to sleepless nights and the fear of being caught "red handed"!


 5- Tullus Aufidius- Coriaolanus
Tullus Aufidius is the leader of the Volscians. He is also the arch-enemy of Coriaolanus. He later becomes a brief ally to Coriaolanus.
Both Tullus and Coriaolanus loathed each other entirely. When Coriaolanus was betrayed by his own people he decided to switch sides to seek revenge on the people that wronged him. Tullus embraces him with opened arms, but later ended Coriaolanus' life because Coriaolanus had a change of heart for "two drops of salt!"




4- Aaron, Tamora, Chiron & Demetrius- Titus Andronicus
Aaron is an evil moorish character in the play. With his villainy, he incites most of the other evil characters to carry out violence against the house of Andronicus.

Tamora is the evil queen of the Goths. After Titus sacrificed one of her sons to pay for the loss of his men, Tamora swore to avenge her son's death, but needed help from a cunning moor, and her remaining two sons.
Speaking of her sons. Chiron and Demetius are best known for raping and mutilating Titus' daughter Lavinia. Leaving her with no "helping hands" and literally "speechless".

3- Claudius- Hamlet
Claudius is the uncle and stepfather of the main character, Hamlet. He murdered his own brother to take the crown, married his brother's wife, and when his dark secrets were beginning to unravel he had his nephew Hamlet killed by Laertes with a poisoned tip of a sword. Speaking of poison, The irony in that act, eventually was the cause of his death. Talk about bad karma.

Now for first and second on the list it was going to be a close tie, but based on one being a fictional character and the other being an actual historical figure; reality took the lead. But before we get to that, here are some Honorable Mentions:

My friend Nathan Hatton suggested that Shylock from The Merchant of Venice should be in the list of Shakespeare Villains. This is what he had to say:

"Okay, my reasoning for Shylock is that he is the only anti-villain in Shakespeare's works. Even though his speech at the end during the trial would not have conjured sympathy from the audience, it was still present. That is what makes his case so special. And now today we have the opportunity to use hindsight in order to gain a better appreciation for Shylock's plight. He is probably the only 'villain' in Shakespeare's works that readers can actually understand why he did what he did. He's an incredibly complex character and I love that. Not to mention seeing Pacino's performance as Shylock is simply brilliant and worthy of the sympathy he deserves."

My friend Cody Christensen, was not only humorous, but also had some logic behind it. He convinced me that Juliet from Romeo & Juliet, was a perfect villain for this list. Here is what he had to say:
"I think it is totally Juliet from Romeo and Juliet. She made Romeo fall in love, kill her cousin, and even tricked him into thinking she was dead so he would kill himself. What a shrew! (Pardon my old English)."
Well played... well played!








 2- Iago- Othelo
 Iago is one of Shakespeare's most sinister villains ever created. Due to the unique trust that Othello places in him, Iago uses this to eventually betray Othelo while maintaining his reputation an honest guy. A perfect example of leading a double life
Iago is a schemer and a manipulator. He is very skilled in deceiving other characters so that his suspicion is covered by his act in being truthful.

Andrew Morrison said:
"My favorite villain in all of Shakespeare would have to be Iago from "Othello". The brilliance of the character is that! Were not for his asides and soliloquies, we would be in the same boat as Othello and believe that he is only serving Othello."


Britney Whipple adds in:
"He seems to do evil just because he can. It's a game to him. He's always jealous of Othello which is his justification for the crap he does."

Cody Christens concludes:
"I second Iago he is awesome and his only excuse is that he is a bastard."


1- Richard III- Richard III

Though Iago did lead Othelo astray with his trickery. Richard III did more then that! He ordered people to be killed, killed as well and to make it worse he even killed his own blood!

Rebecca Pearson went on by saying:
"Richard III for me [took] it to a whole new level considering he was a REAL person! I don't think he was as evil as Shakespeare paints him, but I think it's incredibly plausible that he may have killed his nephews. For me that just makes him an even more interesting character because it's fun to pick at what is exaggerated and what may be based on fact. Previously, few believed he was hunchbacked like in the play until they found his bones a few months ago..."

To add on to that. I think back then, when they said Richard III was 'twisted', it meant that he was 'pure evil'... 'twisted' if you will. Historians in the past took it quite literally, and pictured him with a hump on his back. 



Do you agree with the list? What is your Top Ten Shakespeare Villains?