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"Mature Content Warning!" |
| “ | No fair? What do you think this is, a game? | „ |
| ~ Henry Evans' famous catchphrase. |
| “ | If I let you go, do you think you could fly? | „ |
| ~ Henry asking Mark directly if he could fly if he dropped him |
| “ | Hey, Mark? Don't f**k with me. | „ |
| ~ Henry threatening Mark. |
Henry Evans is the main antagonist of the 1993 psychological thriller drama film The Good Son.
He is the cruel, wicked, heartless, and arrogant cousin and archenemy of Mark Evans, the film's titular main protagonist.
He was portrayed by Macaulay Culkin in his first (and so far only) villainous role.
What Makes Him Pure Evil?[]
Background[]
- Even if he wasn't always evil, he would have abandoned any redeeming qualities he may have had before the events of the film.
- He drowned his baby brother Richard over a rubber duck that once belonged to him, purely out of envy because the baby was getting more attention.
- While it could be argued that he had insecurities over the fact that his brother had more attention than him, these insecurities just show how selfish he is, and it is not played for sympathy.
In General[]
- While he was genuinely affable to Mark at first, he subverts it later on when his mother and him start to get closer.
- He also subverted his love for his mother later on, as evident when he tried to kill her.
- Although he did not make an attempted murder on his father, nothing suggests that he loves him in any way.
- Even though he never confirms whether or not he committed any other worse crimes than him killing his baby brother, this is more likely as it is possible that he had manipulated his parents for years even before he met Mark.
- It is also more possible he committed the crimes by himself with no one else around to call the police on him, which let him get away with all of them.
The Good Son[]
- His playfulness with Mark when he first arrived was just a cooling off period to welcome Mark into the family, and he gradually got more and more dangerous as the movie went on.
- At a cemetery, he pressured Mark to smoke a cigarette, which he was reluctant to do since he didn't want cancer, before giving in, only to cough in disgust and hand it back to Henry, who callously replied that Mark was "gonna die anyway".
- He killed a dog that chased him and Mark earlier with a homemade crossbow and smiled when he lied that he was "just trying to scare him", leaving Mark horrified.
- He almost shot a cat with his crossbow, Mark thought he was just trying to scare her and that it was a good shot, only for Henry to callously say "but the sight's not right yet", meaning that he had planned to kill it.
- He convinced his cousin Mark to help him bring a dummy named "Mr. Highway" to a bridge, and when Henry pushed the dummy over onto a highway, it resulted in a massive car accident that ends up wounding lots of civillians, with him smiling at it, showing no remorse whatsoever while Mark looked on in complete horror.
- He insinuated to Mark that he might kill his little sister Connie, which made a concerned Mark spend the night in Connie's bedroom in case Henry might try to harm her.
- He tried to drown Connie in a frozen lake when they were skating together.
- To add further insult, he was pretending to reach in to try to save her.
- He almost suffocated Connie in her hospital bed by putting a pillow on her, only for his mother to stop him.
- He kept trying to manipulate his family, as well as Mark's therapist, Dr. Alice Davenport, who was requested by Mark's father Jack to keep an eye on him following his mother's death, into making Mark look like the crazy one instead of himself.
- When Dr. Davenport asked Henry about Mark's mental issue, he dismissed her question by answering that it was confidential between him and Mark.
- He enviously claimed Susan is his mother and not Mark, as well as openly referring to Mark's mother as "maggot food".
- When Mark climbed down Henry's treehouse, the latter threatened the former not to "f*ck with [him]".
- He hinted to Mark that he poisoned the food in his family's refrigerator when Mark went to grab something to eat because he had trouble sleeping, forcing his fearful cousin throw all of the food from the fridge down the garbage disposal, and Henry orchestrated this incident to make Mark appear unhinged, while it was offscreen, it is still heavily implied that he did it.
- After Henry delivered a short, insincere apology and lied that he kept the duck as "something to remember Richard by", he asked his mother for his duck back, to which Susan refused, and he forcefully grabbed the duck from her hand and ran off to the cemetery to throw it down the well.
- It is possible he could have also plotted to push his mother down the well if she had tried to retrieve the toy duck because of his envious, selfish, untrustworthy, and cunning nature.
- He asked Mark if he would cry at his mother's funeral, before he spitefully referred to Susan as Mark's mother and not his, dismissing her as his own mother, then hinting to Mark that he might kill her.
- Fearing for his family, Mark wrestled Henry to the couch and held a pair of scissors near his throat, threatening to kill him if he tried to kill Susan. Henry then pressured to his cousin to do it, knowing fully well Mark would be charged with murder if he were to kill him in cold blood.
- When Wallace entered the living room, Henry lied to his dad that Mark was trying to hurt him, making Wallace separate them and lock Mark in his study until Dr. Davenport arrived, giving Henry an opportunity to kill Susan.
- While he was right that Mark was trying to hurt him, Mark was only angry at him because of the terrible acts he committed, not out of malice.
- After inviting his mother out for a walk in the woods, Susan asked him to tell her the truth if he killed Richard, with Henry sarcastically asking "What if I did?", much to his mother's shock, having now learned the true nature of her son, including confirming Mark's suspicion.
- Fearing he would be sent to prison or a mental hospital, Henry tried running away and lied to his mother that he would ‘commit suicide’ by jumping off a cliff.
- Once she arrived at the cliff, he revealed his presence and pushed her off the ledge, trying to use a rock to drop it on Susan when she was hanging onto a branch for dear life, only failing due to Mark's intervening.
- Before he was about to die, Henry emotionlessly said to his mom that he loved her, despite not showing any mutual emotion to her and even tells her to give her other hand to help him up, even though it would result in Mark's death.
- He showed himself to be a hypocrite to the point of hating his mother deeply, yet being surprised to see her choosing Mark over him and letting him fall from the cliff to his defeat and final demise, suggesting he took her love to him for granted. Furthermore, this was just after he tried pushing her to fall to her death.
- It's very obvious that if Susan saved him and not Mark, Henry wouldn't have learned anything from the experience and would have continued to harm and kill innocent people for his own amusement, however, maybe if she saved the 2 of them, he would’ve been in the hospital.
- Despite being a child, he is shown to have a clear moral agency and willingly commits his crimes. This is shown when he keeps trying to frame Mark for his crimes, and his crimes are taken very seriously at most times.
- While it’s implied that he may be insane because of how much he smokes weed, this has not been made clear by the narrative.
- As mentioned before, he heavily suggests that he killed his brother Richard, meaning that he was already evil before he started doing drugs & smoking.
- While it’s implied that he may be insane because of how much he smokes weed, this has not been made clear by the narrative.
- Despite being a child, he is shown to have a clear moral agency and willingly commits his crimes. This is shown when he keeps trying to frame Mark for his crimes, and his crimes are taken very seriously at most times.
- It's very obvious that if Susan saved him and not Mark, Henry wouldn't have learned anything from the experience and would have continued to harm and kill innocent people for his own amusement, however, maybe if she saved the 2 of them, he would’ve been in the hospital.
- While the movie does bring into question whether or not the concept of pure evil exists, with Mark's therapist, Dr. Davenport, saying that "evil" is a word people use when they've given up trying to understand someone", Henry is portrayed as being irredeemably ‘monstrous’ and does not show any remorse for his actions, nor has any sympathetic traits that could qualify him as "misunderstood".
Trivia[]
- Henry is morally opposite to Mark Evans, as he's Pure Evil and Hate Sink, whilst Mark is Pure Good and Love Exalted.
- Ironically, he's also a Chaotic Evil to his mother's Lawful Good.
- Yet even more ironic, his actor Macauley Culkin also portrayed Kevin McCallister from Home Alone franchise, an Inconsistently Admirable. Many people also consider Henry to be an evil variant of Kevin.
- Henry's status as Hate Sink is also the polar opposite of Kevin's status as Love Exalted.
External Links[]
- Henry Evans on the Villains Wiki
- Henry Evans on the Hate Sink Wiki
