Mr. /co/lympus 2023

The 6th edition of the annual Mr. /co/lympus tournament took place in October of 2023.

The Elite Eight this time once again consisted of three returning men and five newcomers. Hank Hill, Skeletor, and Samurai Jack all returned from Mr. /co/lympus 2021. The five fresh additions included SpongeBob SquarePants, Zim, Optimus Prime from Transformers, Dale Gribble from King of the Hill, and Lord Farquaad from the original Shrek. Dale specifically was speculated to have gotten a general boost following the sudden and tragic passing of his VA, Johnny Hardwick. The simultaneous appearance of Hank and Dale would end up making KotH the second series in Mr. /co/ and the sixth series overall to have more than one member in the Elite Eight at a given time. Transformers and Shrek were entirely new series to the Elite Eight, and by extension became the first representatives of Hasbro and DreamWorks, respectively.

Other notable campaign efforts this year included Dr. Livesey's second run, Death from Puss in Boots: The Last Wish, Doctor Doom, Master Shake, N from Murder Drones, and Jack O'Lantern from Billy & Mandy's Jacked-up Halloween. The last two were both given the "Mr. Literally Who" award, the latter to pair with the multiple recipients in Ms. /co/ 2022 and 2023. Dr. Livesey in particular would end up having an even bigger campaign than the preceding year, which culminated in a series of strange thread events centered around the character.

In the end, the finals would be an eccentric villain showdown between Zim and Skeletor. After what was expected to be a tough match, Skeletor would prevail and become the sixth champion of Mr. /co/lympus. His victory marked several milestones: he was the first former Elite Eight member from Mr. /co/ to later win a future bout, the third in any solo 4chan tournament to achieve this after Fang and Midna, the first multiple time Elite Eight member to win a tournament, the first winner debuting in the 1980s, and the first winner from Mattel. While not having as many firsts, Zim was notably the first male Nickelodeon character to ever reach the finals of a tournament and only the second overall since Jenny.

Outside the main tournament, this year also marked growing prominence to several side tournaments. In addition to Barred from /co/ and Bottom 128 returning, a "Losers Bracket" tournament was also held.

Rules
Source: Stats anon's pastebin link

Some of the rules may be added, removed, or changed depending on the anons' inputs on the 2021 feedback poll.

How to nominate?

 * To nominate a character, a user must include their name, picture, and series in their post. Nominating 2 or more characters in a single post is not allowed.
 * All characters must either originate from /co/ media: Western animation and comics
 * Each valid nomination must garner at least nine (9) replies in order to qualify for the contest. These replies are only counted if they are all within a single thread, and do NOT carry over to other threads.

Eligible Nominees

 * All male /co/ characters (except those listed under "Excluded characters" shown below)
 * Any character that was allowed or has appeared in past Mr. /co/ tournaments (Grandfather Clause)
 * Characters can be any age
 * Puppets are allowed (e.g. Muppets, Sesame Street)
 * Generalization Statute: Multiple versions of the same character --- be it from various adaptations, spin-off series, or alternative universes --- are combined into a single entrant. In other words, you are voting for the entire history of that character, not just one particular iteration.
 * Example:   Zatanna (DC Comics, Young Justice, DC Super Hero Girls, etc.)
 * Character Limit: Each series can only have a maximum of three (3) males in the main bracket. These are decided by their votes in the qualifying poll. However, there is no restriction on the number of males that can be nominated from a single series.
 * Exceptions: Marvel Comics, DC Comics, and Disney core universe characters + related series (Mickey, Oswald, Goofy, and Donald)

Restrictions

 * Any character that is clearly not /co/ is not allowed (e.g. /a/nime and live action shows)
 * /v/ideo game characters that did not originate from /co/ media are not allowed
 * Real-life politicians that are portrayed as cartoon characters / caricatures are not allowed, satirical or otherwise.
 * No /mlp/ characters
 * No Board-tans
 * No "OC donut steels"
 * No meme creations (e.g. Virgin vs Chad)
 * One-Month Old Clause: Any character debuting from the 1st of the previous month to the start date are ineligible.
 * Which means that new cartoons or comics released from September 1, 2022 and later cannot be nominated.
 * Grandfather Clause: All characters who have previously made it into Ms. /co/ or Mr. /co/lympus tournaments, and are not banned by the Elite 8 rule, are eligible to participate regardless of the above restrictions. (Examples:  Dr. Eggman,  Saxton Hale,  JFK,  Wendy's,  Princess Zelda)

Excluded Characters
Elite Eight Rule: Characters appearing in the quarter-finals of the previous contest are not allowed to compete in this edition. They will be eligible for nomination next contest.

Jenny Rule: Mr. /co/lympus champions are permanently retired, and will be barred from participating in future tournaments.

Qualifying Results
Live nomination list by NightShiftAnon: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/19Qdaklm_fIA-EKv53An9TH3wUuPp1ceSVnithagq5eA/edit#gid=0

Qualifier Results: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/11o2pJRb47IHnWBLYdm_cn6w_OthxvVIFAyJEB8u9e5g/edit#gid=1708169770

A total of 1417 nominees were entered into the qualifying poll, a slight decrease from the previous tournaments.

Votes could be edited until the qualifying round ended, allowing for corrections and campaigning in the threads. No images were used for the qualifying poll. Tiebreakers were decided by who was nominated first.

Most of the Elite Eight from 2021 returned, with the surprising exclusion of J. Jonah Jameson. 13 newcomers joined the main bracket for the first time this year. Half of the newcomers from the previous year would return for a second round. Lastly, several characters returned after years missing the tournament, including a couple from the very first tournament.

Characters who appear in the bracket for the first time are labeled in bold.

Excluded by Series Limit
The following characters had enough votes to qualify for the main bracket, but were excluded due to the 3 characters per series rule.

Tournament Bracket
Challonge link: https://challonge.com/g49s7ke9

Side Tournaments
In addition to the main tournament, there has been a growing prominence on various side tournaments held by other anons alongside it.

Barred from /co/
Challonge Bracket - https://challonge.com/wc5g3z64

Just like with Barred from Ms. /co/ 2023, this tournament was hosted by an anon posing as Bill Clinton. Its members were made up primarily of nominees who had been denied by the hosts for one reason or another, along with a few others who narrowly missed during qualifiers.

The tournament was won by the Nostalgia Critic, who had only been nominated after one anon pointed out the oddity behind video game content creator Mike Matei being allowed on the nomination spreadsheet for a brief period. He would go on to mostly have a clean sweep, easily beating Panis Cupcake for the top spot after the latter had a one vote upset over Bill Wilson. Hilariously, the Critic's victory pairs with the winner of the very first Barred tournament from King of /v/ 2022, the Angry Video Game Nerd.

One other notable candidate who was defeated in the first round was Incredibly Gassy, a disgusting parody of Mr. Incredible known for his superpowered farting. While beaten in the first round by the Critic, Gassy would still be the subject of memes and became sealed in tournament history with his marriage to Dr. Livesey.

Bottom 128
Challonge Bracket - https://challonge.com/3knvofnc

Losers Tournament
One anon held a side tournament that hosted every single loser from the main bracket as they all got one more chance. Due to the sheer amount of match-ups with the Elite Eight factored in later, polls eventually had to be held over every 12 hours instead of the usual 24. For most of this tournament Round 1 drop-outs Death and Jack O'Lantern easily swept much of their competition and even continued to gain original art plus thread support. Both were taken out towards the end by Dr. Livesey and Optimus Prime, respectively. The former would go on to beat Prime and runner-up Zim to become an honorary 9th place in Mr. /co/ 2023, which many felt earned off his strong campaign, close loss to Hank Hill earlier in the tournament, and the special thread events that centered around him.

During the finals of the main tournament, voters chose to leave the door open for an official losers' bracket at the discretion of the hosts. Thus, this side event could be considered a testing grounds for this decision.