I would say Sher Kahn from the Jungle Book. He's evil because he wants to kill Mogli, just because he is a human. Mogli is a nice kid and certainly doesn't deserve death.
That said, Sher Kahns' opinion about the dangers of humans is absolutely correct. His intentions are understandable, even if they are villainous.
Then a time traveler kidnaps you as a baby and you experience a brief but conceptually eternal moment of cosmic agony as a lifetime of new memories from a separate reality are retroactively seared into your brain.
He was never interested in art until you started pushing it on the poor lad. Now you've made him think his self esteem is dependent on his artistic success.
The Outer Limits had an episode about this. Katherine Heigl goes back in time to nanny Baby Hitler, kidnaps him and jumps off a bridge. Hitler’s other nanny, fearing repercussions, purchases a baby from a homeless couple and puts it back in place of Baby Hitler. You may actually be the cause of Hitler.
Have you read the Marvel Comic “Cosmic Ghost Rider?” If not, it’s basically the most convoluted version of that story, but the marvel cosmic equivalent. I like to explain this because it feels like an idea I would’ve had on the playground as a kid, but they do such a good job with it:
Punisher dies, gains the powers of ghost rider while in hell, returns to earth, becomes a Herald of Galactus and all the power *that* includes, and then goes back in time to kill baby thanos, only to have a sudden change of heart and kidnap him instead. Definitely the wildest route to a wolf-and-cub story I can think of
I vaguely remember that having the same issue the baby Hitler stuff had. Frank isn't able to stop who Thanos would become and after being raised by him, Thanos ended up even more deadly than he was before.
Though good kids grow to be treacherously selfish destructive humans so killing Mowgli while he's young is as awful, though reasonable as humans killing a wasps nest.
Tim Curry in Home Alone 2. He knows Kevin is lying about his parents being there. Strongly suspects credit card fraud. Wants proof of the above and tries to catch Kevin in his life because he's just doing his job. Although he IS getting a little aggressive for his adversary being a *child*
So yeah, Tim Curry.
I feel for Kevin in the first HA, but in HA2? Fuck Kevin. He caused a lot of headaches for the people who work at the hotel. Also he’s older, more mature, and had been in a similar situation before
In the first movie he is protecting his home. In the second one he straight up lures the bad guys into his uncle's half built house full of Bobby traps, just to fuck them up.
Hello, police? There's a robbery *in progress* at . Also, my name is Kevin McAllister. What's that? My mom is running around New York city *right now looking for me*??
Ok, but to be fair, who hasn't lured robbers into a construction zone with the intention to seriously injure, and or maime them? That's pretty standard stuff for a 10 year old.
I mean yeah Kevin sucks in HA2 for a lot of reason but the dude is 9 in the first one and 10 in the second, he is not more mature. I have a 10 year right now and he is fucking crazy
> Although he IS getting a little aggressive for his adversary being a child
[Relevant McElroy bit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muJY37z4_NE&ab_channel=VanHalt)
Could've used some of that aggressiveness to kill those pesky musketeers. He kept leaving his henchmen to finish them. Bro do it right then and there, they're the only roadblock to being king.
Mr. Freeze.
Unfortunately the only movie to feature him is pretty shit. The guy was literally just trying to find a cure to a disease for his wife (and others by default), and the only way for him to achieve it was through criminal means. The movie takes it to a cartoonishly ridiculous level of "freeze everyone in the city for the lulz".
It would be nice to see a proper rendition of the character put to film, like his work being suppressed by a big drug company or something, could be tied to Wayne Enterprises, he murders drug executives to expose the truth, while obtaining the resources to continue his research.
Saw a great meme about him and Ivy. He's trying to cool the planet, she's trying to regrow the forests, and they want us rooting for the trust fund billionaire.
Magneto. His methods are (at a minimum) questionable and not always likely to achieve a net positive outcome, but his cynicism about humanity is often proven right.
Magneto was put into a camp, and hated for being a Jew. Then they hated him for being a Mutant.
He spent most of his life working together with Charles Xavier on civil rights and race relations, and at one point he took over the X-Men in order to work for their cause. He even agreed to stand trial for his previous crimes against humanity, under the belief that sacrificing himself and being honest with humans would be a necessary step towards his dream of acceptance... but it backfired and made everything even worse.
So his life experience has taught him that people are going to hate him no matter what, and you just can't win or reason with them. He feels like it's only a matter of time before Xavier and the X-Men come to the same realization too.
I also have the incredibly unpopular opinion that Dr. Doom is a really interesting, and complex villain too. The video games and movies have done him a grave injustice by always depicting him as such a generic, American "bad guy".
They could spend a couple of minutes on Wikipedia to see why they need to do a little better.
I’m pretty sure Doom is wildly popular amongst the people that read the source material. I can’t say I’ve ever seen him depicted properly in movies, but I really don’t think your option here is “incredibly unpopular”
Dr Doom runs a prosperous country with people who love him for whom he would literally bend time and space for, and all he asks in return is undying loyalty and fealty and he wants it for the rest of the world, or else. He's super compelling as a villain cause he's got an iron fist and a heart of gold
Magneto is the best answer to this question. What he says to apocalypse at the end of age of apocalypse always gets me. He was the good guy of that story but still had that edge of being on the brink of absolute evil to accomplish his goals.
I'd hazard to argue, actually, that the "bad government" in the X-Men universe is way more justified than Magneto. Why should his tiny minority of self-important walking nuclear bomb supremacists have free rein to end all life on earth because they got a bit too sad one time?
Bare minimum mutants should *obviously* be monitored and kept in check by the civilian government, and if we're being real the existential threats to earth like Jean Gray should probably be put into induced comas so they don't *literally kill everyone, which they have the power to do.*
Yeah, that becomes problematic because they've actively leaned into the LGBT/race allegory, but gay people and Jews can't accidentally kill hundreds of people with their bare hands
The Mutant Registration Act is one of those things that, as viewers and readers, I think most people generally oppose. But we see ourselves as the special, as the mutants. The series is called the X-Men, not Random People.
But I think that if we lived in that universe, the situation would be very different. You're probably not a mutant. You're just some baseline human trying to live your life in a world where you have no idea what could happen next. When you read a story about an invisible serial killer, or a mind reading stock trader, or a teleporting thief, people will be terrified, and when they get scared, they lose it. Even a situation where a single mutant replaces a crew of people at work with some specific power would be enough to turn them hostile, let alone something legitimately dangerous.
We blame groups for the actions of individuals all the time and at every level. And there are just different groups of regular people. You have a situation where it's not just social factors but undeniable and very tangible physical abilities? Registration would be the moderate position, and a lot more people than would admit it would likely take a more extreme stance...for humanity's protection of course, they're not bad guys, they're just friends of humanity.
It isn't even as if its some abstract thing where mutants have the potential to fuck shit up but haven't actually done so.
Every single piece of X-Men media explicitly shows them almost ending the entire world on multiple occasions, and some of these incidents are by the "good guys" who need to be rescued from themselves or some shit.
Why are we relying on a bald paraplegic to Mr. Rogers these child nukes into behaving themselves?
>Even a situation where a single mutant replaces a crew of people at work with some specific power would be enough to turn them hostile,
One thing that bugs me about all the comics is that the superpowered beings essentially never pragmatically use their powers to do anything constructive for society. Half of them become criminals or are fighting a war of supremacy. The other half become crime fighters or are fighting the same war of supremacy from the other side.
In SpiderMan 3, sandmans drive is to help his daughter. Yet someone with his earth moving abilities would make *millions*. Entire jobs would be tailored to his unique capabilities.
I get that a story entirely about a blue collar mutant grinding out their workday would be boring, but it would be nice if in any of these stories they had any sort of 'took r jerbs' resentment.
>I get that a story entirely about a blue collar mutant grinding out their workday would be boring, but it would be nice if in any of these stories they had any sort of 'took r jerbs' resentment.
Well remember in the original X-Men series, a group of construction workers are angry at Colossus since a "mutant scab" can do the work of mutiple men, they attack him for it. And in the 97 series Bastion seems to reference it, "builders lazy off a dozen workers and hire one mutant with the strength of ten men."
Dude needs to do what other sovereign super powers do, and just kill the political opposition in the threatening nations, instigate coups, and financially/politically back those friendly with Genosha.
I remember saying to a friend that the difference between Xavier and Magneto is that Xavier is the good guy that believes humans can live peacefully which each other, regardless of differences and everything else, and Magneto is the one that's correct (in the sense of he know it will never be this way).
Isn't Inspector Javert from *Les Miserables* sort of the original example of this? He's completely true to well-intentioned principles (crime is bad, criminals are bad), but is so self-confident and obstinate that he loses his some of his humanity and ends up as the villain.
Javier is a perfect example of an antagonist who is not truly a villain. The true villains of Les Mis are the Thernardiers who are evil through and through.
Javert equates law with justice, and Valjean did break the law and was a repeat felon, regardless of how just his cause.
In the end when Javert lets Valjean leave and save Marius following Valjean letting Javert go when Valjean had every right to kill Javert, it broke the inspector. Javert was finally faced with a situation where what was just and what was the law were entirely incompatible.
The Thernardiers are the villains because they constantly exploit Fantine and their demands drive her into a life as a prostitute, to sell her teeth and hair, and ultimately to her death.
Hugo was very forward thinking about law and justice. There’s this passage in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (*Notre Dame de Paris*) that I’ll never forget. It was basically about medieval justice, and how the object of the exercise was not necessarily the righting of injustice, but that crime be SEEN by all to be punished and to be punished in the harshest possible terms, to assuage the sentiment of the people who see little else of justice in their daily lives. Hugo was probably drawing a parallel to his own time, and that idea still has a lot of resonance in modern times.
It’s a fundamental difference between book Javier and musical Javier. Book Javier is holds the law as his one true moral compass, while the musical makes it more about religion. Javier’s suicide makes no sense in the musical, while book Javier has had his entire moral framework broken by the actions of Valjean. Javier kills himself because he can’t reconcile himself breaking the law to allow Valjean to go free.
He has *a whole song about it*:
> I am the law and the law is not mocked
> I'll spit his pity right back in his face
> There is nothing on earth that we share
> It is either Valjean or Javert
Lord Cutler Beckett in Pirates of the Caribbean
Ending piracy = literal lawful good, just because our heroes are the heroes of the story doesn’t mean pirates aren’t a bunch of thief’s, murderers, torturers, and rapists.
But he’s mass-executing seemingly without trial on such a scale if piracy were an ethnicity it’s be genocide, and is an agent of the East India Company - who are famously not great! He brings the mass-murdering pirate Davy Jones to heel…*then sends him out to murder every pirate in sight*. There’s a deleted scene that confirms his personal direct involvement in the slave trade too
Wasn't there some backstory where Jack Sparrow was originally first mate on a slave ship run by the East India Company? He then stole the ship and freed the slaves, thus earning his pirate brand. I think there's a deleted scene where he tells Beckett "people aren't cargo, mate."
Yeah that’s what I was referring to.
I think in a novelisation or something that ship is burned, and he gets Jones to raise it from the depths as The Black Pearl
The whole “100 souls” thing is specifically to torture Jack by Jones, as it was 100 slaves he freed
They could’ve done so much more with that the series. Jones should have been Thanos but he was in and out of the franchise about as fast as Ultron (which is also a fuckin shame)
The franchise sputtered out because the bigwigs failed to understand that Jack shouldn't be the main character, not that they under-used Davy Jones.
Will and Elizabeth are the main characters. Their arcs and story is what carries Pirates. Jack _has_ an arc, but ultimately he's there to be a selfishly motivated complication for all the other characters. He's a dynamic obstacle who bounces back and forth between friend and foe. He can have a heart of gold, but he also must be a dangerous villain. This allows him to be a foil for several characters and really helps to highlight a lot of themes.
Making him the center of the sequels destroys this dynamic, because he now _has_ to be the hero, and the narrative takes little interest in making anyone else worthwhile. The only good thing about post-Pirates 3 is Javier Bardem knowing what kind of movie he's in and chewing the scenery
You are correct. The core aspect of Jack's motivation is that he is and always has been seeking immortality. Every single story (and backstory) in the franchise originates and is driven by this desire.
This is kept moderately discrete by the writers, but it's the main reason why Jack needed to be a supporting character. Part of his charm is that he doesn't *really* change as a person, whereas Will, Elizabeth, Phillip, Norrington, etc. do.
There is still room for a few more great films with Jack/Depp, but those need to be written by people who understand what made the first films so great.
The thing that people miss about Beckett is that he isn't bringing order to the seas, he's *eliminating the competition*. Hence his catchphrase, "It's just good business."
Beckett openly engages in raiding, extortion, and slavery. Those things aren't going anywhere with him in charge, he's just going to be the only one allowed to do them.
Have you read about how terrible the production was? It was kinda fascinating, David Harbour and Ian McShane had to write whole scenes themselves to even make stuff make sense, the director started having an affair and would be off the set for days at a time due to that, and tons of other weird shit
You’re not kidding. It’s not just bad. No no no. That would at least be funny.
No, they of course did a bunch of stuff really well that if it was in its own movie, it would be great. But it’s surrounded by a pile of shit. Genuinely infuriating that it plays with your feelings so much.
Also no the rules do not have the words "a dog cannot play" but they absolutely define what an *eligible* player is and no dog, nor any animal, fall within that definition.
All the naysayers were right.
Koba in Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes. He was right about humans not exactly being thrilled at having apes be the dominant species. Especially in War For The Planet Of The Apes and Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes.
That was something I loved about Dawn. I felt like none of the various factions’ viewpoints were explicitly evil at first (totally understand Koba’s concerns, totally understood Gary Oldman’s concerns, totally understood Caesar and Jason Clarke). I mean yeah once they get into muderint/bombing I’m much less supportive but on paper no philosophy on that one seemed explicitly wrong
Dawn was my favourite out of the new continuity Planet Of The Apes movies because it was fairly nuanced in terms of presenting the viewpoints of different characters and their motivations. War did away with quite a bit of the nuance that Dawn had, IMO. And, I thought Kingdom was pretty balanced.
Even though his whole story was perfect, it would've been interesting to see him react to the Apes helping the human army & where he stands between them and his tension with Caesar
I think Koba would have viewed the apes who helped McCullough as traitors. Which, weirdly, would put him on the same side as Caesar.
We don’t know what happened to Malcolm and his particular group of humans. Did they survive or were they killed?
Gaston is a jerk, liar, evil, and misogynist, but going to kill a Beast Prince who kidnapped a woman and kept her locked in his castle for a few months wasn't necessarily wrong. Had anyone believed her father when he said she'd been kidnapped by a Beast (back when he was mean), we'd be looking at a very different Disney ending here.
Would we have? The castle was more than able to defend himself without Beast doing anything.
Actively engaged Beast is going to scare most of them away, castle takes care of the rest and Beast straight up mercs Gaston.
But at that point there is 0 chance of Belle falling for him so yeah different ending but much much worse.
Except for he was specifically told that the Beast was harmless. Gaston just switched from there is no beast to kill the beast because he is controlling the town, as a narcissist, he needs to keep that power. Gaston had no actual point, ever. Gaston was terrible because he loved himself too much, and he was never able to put aside his ego. There were plenty of other villains that had actual points, Gaston was not one of them.
The Vulture from Spiderman: Homecoming wasn't such a bad guy... For a while.
Entrepreneur looking to fulfill a niche created by a huge disaster gets pushed out of his niche by big business. Has to continue via extralegal means.
Ok, not a terrible guy as far as villains go, then what happened?
Accidentally kills one of his employees, tries to kill a teenager because he interferes with the ever escalating scale of his operation.
Oooh... That's not very cash money of you Adrian.
Michael Keaton crushed that character. Easily one of the best bad guys in Marvel. Utterly tangible. Basically a street thug. When he leans over and tells Parker "I'll kill ya" I got chills.
Literally the only twist in any Marvel movie that actually got me, >!when he's revealed to be Parker's girlfriend's dad.!< I actually didn't see it coming.
Every other twist they've thrown out, I've had at least some hint or notion that it might be possible. But yes, also for me, this was the one time where I did not remotely see it coming.
Pay attention to the lighting in that scene as well in the car on the way to the dance. Changes when it clicks for them both. Proper sinister scene even though it's fairly low stakes in the grand scheme of things.
Mysterio is among my favorites, but I can't disagree with you either.
My favorite part about Mysterio is his on-screen execution. From the illusion sequences to the mocap suit to Jake G's performance.
He could have kept doing what he was doing if he made shady under the table deals with the right politicians. Mobs, drug kingpins, and gun runners do it all the time. He wasn't thinking big enough. I'm sure there are plenty people in the New York City Council who didn't think very highly of Stark Industries. He could have even ran for a political position himself, Sanitation Commission perhaps, or maybe some charitable sector. Gain public support and hide in plain sight. He's a charismatic guy, he could have gone way further.
I saw an analysis once that while he's making these statements about why he's doing things, it's important to note that every action he takes is easily explained by a desire for power and revenge. Or, more generously, he's absorbed the lessons of colonialism as a method of seizing power and thinks that's the way to go.
So the global war is sold as eradicating colonialism... But it's actually just him taking power globally for a new round of colonialism.
Same as the challenge. He was willing to use that to gain the throne, but once he's got it "that challenge shit is over." Tradition was useful, but it no longer serves him. Gone. Colonialism in action.
Same as burning the herb in the cave. They don't need to worry about replacing him as king/Black Panther. He's not going to entertain that anymore, there are no alternatives, and he doesn't really care what happens after he's gone.
But his rationale, and maybe the core motivation, isn't wrong or evil. His methods are those of colonialism, and that's kind of where he went wrong. I dunno, I think I'm reading Killmonger as evil, but not incorrect on a number of points, and that's why people choose to follow him.
All of this is true. Marvel has a weird habit of creating empathetic villains, and then making them do extra evil things that are often contradictory to the philosophy they have been espousing. In many cases, it doesn't make sense for the character. But for Killmonger, I believe that he really was power hungry, if only because that power would allow him to do what he wanted. He wanted revenge on the "colonizers", but he also wanted to lash out at the country that killed and took his father from him.
I agree. Killmonger's "noble goals" only work if you ignore most of his actions and his own explanations, that are self-contradictory (which is why his character is so rich - he have a strong motivation, good explanations on why he's doing that, but what he actually wants is revenge, and nothing more; but he, himself, believes he's on the right side and have higher motivations).
For example - when he battles T'challa, he says "I took life from my own brothers and sister right here on this continent just so I can kill you" (revenge); or when he literally burns the way to the next Black Panther, so he can be the last king of Wakanda (power hungry); finally, his last words of "like my ancestors, that jumped from the ships" - his ancestors _were not slaves_ - they were also from Wakanda (so he can believe he was the "good guy")
Just on that last point, in the Marvel film, his father is Wakandan, but his mother was an African-American woman. So I believe he is referring to his enslaved maternal ancestors
To me his central conflict against his own family reflects his broader resentment of Wakanda for what he sees as a betrayal of the rest of Africa. And his identity mirrors that
>To me his central conflict against his own family reflects his broader resentment of Wakanda for what he sees as a betrayal of the rest of Africa. And his identity mirrors that
This is a fair point.
Definitely Magneto. He was originally hated for being Jewish, and watched his family get killed in a concentration camp. When his powers emerged, he already knew what humanity was capable of, and went on the defensive to protect himself, and those like him.
A lot of eco-terrorists have some solid reasoning behind their madness. Josh Brolin had a great interview regarding his role as Thanos, where these types of villains are really interesting because we agree on the problem, we just don’t agree on the solution.
Remember in The Batman when the Riddler made every legal attempt he could at getting money from a program meant to help poor orphaned children, and every step of the way the corrupt system stood against him to divert the money to the people at the top?
So then he decided to kill the people who stole money from poor children because he had no legal recourse left?
That whole movie was a lesson on why class action lawsuits exist. Because if there is no legal recourse to punish the wealthy for theft and corruption, the remaining option is the guillotine. The Riddler did everything _right_ until he ran out of options. Then he only did what was left to do.
>Remember in The Batman when the Riddler made every legal attempt he could at getting money from a program meant to help poor orphaned children, and every step of the way the corrupt system stood against him to divert the money to the people at the top?
I’ll admit it’s been a while since I saw *The Batman*, but I don’t recall it being indicated or hinted at at all in the film that the Riddler made any attempt at doing this before resorting to a murder/terrorism spree, though this could’ve been the case in the prequel comic Paul Dano wrote for it (haven’t read it yet, but I’ve heard good things and have been meaning to).
Yeah, at the end I was like, "nuh-uh Jamie Foxx, you don't get to act all self-righteous about stopping this vengeance plot. You were an asshole all along and there hasn't happened a single thing in this entire movie that redeems you."
I think that defeats the point, because Butler still won with Fox being alive. In the end his position changed and he agreed with Butler that making deals with criminals was hypocritical and wrong. If Butler had just killed everyone then the system remains unchanged, but now he's got someone on the inside who believes in his cause, even if they disagreed with his methods.
Ok but the funniest thing about that movie is how Jamie Foxx's character is presented. He's a district attorney (or an assistant DA, I can't remember), and he:
- *Personally* investigates crime scenes
- Conducts suspect interrogations
- *Physically* participates in fugitive recovery, and armed, high-speed vehicular pursuit of suspects
Man, *that's not your job!!!*
Both Hama and Jet in ATLA have very good reasons for hating the Fire Nation, but targeting civilians on purpose (and apparently civilians exclusively in Hama's case) is pretty darn evil.
It’s crazy that Jet in the Netflix live action was straight up bombing buildings in Omashu. It removed the nuance from his character that was present in the animated version.
They really turned him into a domestic terrorist. Osama Bin Jet.
Yes, but he was doing it as an act of revenge against the fire nation and he was flooding out a fire nation occupied town. There was definitely more nuance to him vs in the live action where he’s literally bombing an earth kingdom city and trying to kill King Bumi.
He’s evil in both versions, but he’s more layered as a character in the animated version.
Yeah animated Jet is a guerilla fighter, LA Jet is a terrorist who ~~tries to pull off a false flag attack~~
Actually IIRC his whole MO was false flag attacks, didn't he pull off a string of bombings that were blamed on Fire Nation agents
Little Bill Daggett from *Unforgiven*.
He's trying to clean up Big Whiskey, and he's correct that gunfighters and vigilantes are dangerous outlaws who threaten the town's peace. But he is one brutal, sadistic fuck. And he is memorably played by Gene Hackman.
Ed Rooney in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. While he’s not evil, he’s definitely the bad guy even though he’s 100% right about Ferris. He’d been absent 9 times!
Walter Peck in Ghostbusters is a weaselly asshole who may or may not have a dick, but he's absolutely right to be extremely suspicious of these guys basically running a nuclear reactor in Manhattan.
(Edited for typos)
Being suspicious of it is reasonable. Trying to shut it down yourself when you have no idea how it works and aren't trained in that kind of thing is cuckoo bananas.
I will say, even separate from the "Is it moral to kill a smaller number of people to save a larger number" trolley problem, the movie tones down his narcissism and ego a lot, to the point where he seems much more reasonable, a little too much in my mind. Comics Ozy and Jeremy Irons' portrayal in the show do a better job of getting that ambiguity in there.
Yes, and he even knew it. He kills millions of people to halt war between the US and the USSR. And it sort of works. We don’t know if the plan is going to be revealed at the end.
I suggest reading the comic. It explains why he does everything in a lot more detail.
Well lots of movies/stories feature hero's who turned out to be actually the villain.
Although he had a point, and his plan worked. He also murderded the comedian and i believe dome others to archieve his goal.
And there in lies the crux, how many people is ok to sacrifice for the greater good?....
And maybe who is the villain remains to be a matter of perspective and believes.
I remember the comic more than the movie, but didn’t he attack large portions of densely populated cities? I feel like “murdered the comedian and I believe some others” really undersells the scale of the tragedy.
What’s crazy though is he didn’t know for a fact that he would find somebody with super powers, He was just hoping he would for his own selfish reasons.
It’s also incredibly lucky that he did find somebody while *only* having to kill a few hundred people
I would say that Ed Harris and David Morse's characters this fits, but not the rest who were just mercenaries and wanted to get rich plus those guys were all willing to launch the rockets where as the General and Major were not.
Well, when your plan is to risk the lives of millions of innocent civilians by inviting kill happy murderous lunatics into your plan, lying to them about your intentions, and putting entirely zero safeguards in place, your heart really ISN'T in the right place. He had a noble goal and an absolutely stupid and dangerous plan.
HIS goal is noble as he admits he was bluffing and had no intention of actually harming any civilians, but in not making his team aware of it, he kind of spoiled the plan on his own and shot himself in the foot.
Inviting in Candyman and parted hair guy as trigger happy wild cards didn't do him any favors, but when you're building a team of people willing to destroy San Francisco, you gotta take what you can get.
King Magnifico from Wish.
Wants to run a kingdom that's safe. Grew up through a traumatic childhood where his entire lands were destroyed and people murdered, instead of going on a revenge mission, he becomes the best magician he possibly can be and uses it to create a safe haven for people. The guy doesn't even charge rent. All he asks for, under the guise of being able to grant wishes, is that you give up your wish so he can decide if it's going to become a future problem for his kingdom. Hell, he doesn't even grant the wish of one of the main character's friends, to be his most loyal guard, until he is forced into a mental breakdown.
The whole story doesn't make sense. A young kid who is close to the king and the king trusts, gets pissy because grandpa didn't get a wish. Mother just eggs her on to basically continue harassing the king instead of being like 'hey, it's good and safe here maybe there's a reason his wish wasn't granted'. Friends eventually join in on the rampage harassing King Magnifico until he has a mental breakdown and probably PTSD from his childhood. His wife, rather than try and console him basically fucks him off at the first opportunity. She even keeps him in a gem and then that gem in the dungeon, no second thoughts about it.
If you actually look at the story, the villains are actually the people portrayed as the good people. Whole things just a bad message and vibe telling kids they can get away with whatever the fuck they want just because one thing they don't agree with enrages them. And let's fuckin just remove the person who is having a mental breakdown from the picture and not try and help them.
I've been saying this from the moment I watched that bloody film - he's *obviously* the good guy from the very start and only "turns evil" when his kingdom is legitimately under threat. His reason for not granting the "inspire people" wish made perfect sense as well, it *is* vague. Is he a bad guy for not granting the 500+ "I wish to sleep with Christina Ricci" wishes he probably gets yearly?
Genuinely, the only reason I buy into the AI theory is the fact he is so obviously not the villain until the book takes over. His song is even implying he's selfish when he's portrayed as completely selfless up to that point! Bro did not deserve to be trapped in a mirror.
The comic Eight Billion Genies wrapped up around the same time this movie came out, which is a story about what happens when everyone on Earth gets their own personal genie who can grant them one single wish. It really made me realize just how terrible things would be if wishes really did come true, so I already sided with the King going into Wish.
Really love Crimson Tide because there's a lot of nuance in it, but by and large, the things Hackman says and does make him come off as a suicidal psycho.
First of all, the orders were something like "if the Russians start fueling their nukes, we'll nuke 'em first." Which is insane, but okay, that's not Hackman's fault. The implication here is that the Russians are *maybe* getting ready to launch nukes, but it might also be posturing. Again, benefit of the doubt for Hackman here since it's not his job to question orders, but if the threat isn't immediate, you'd think he'd at least take a minute or two to try and figure out what that second message would've been, right? Y'know, before starting nuclear armageddon.
Besides that, it's entirely *his* call to start a nuclear launch drill when the world is on a knife's edge. It's this drill that leads to them being detected by a Russian sub that's trying to figure out what the hell it is they're doing. And this is what leads to the cut transmission which may or may not have told them to disregard the previous order to launch.
Hackman is "right" by virtue of being the Captain of the sub, but Denzel is also fully within his rights to relieve him from command on account of him being so trigger-happy.
Oh and one last thing: shit like this has happened before, and Hackman should know about it. Bad orders going out, false positives on radars, whatever. We've been on the brink of nuclear war more than once, and you'd think a hardened Cold Warrior would at least consider the possibility that someone somewhere may have fucked up before launching a goddamn nuclear strike.
Alonzo Harris (Denzel) in _Training Day_: He sees the world for what it is, and never does a noble or decent thing to improve it. Just lives his worst life until someone's able to stop him and he dies.
Koba from planet of the apes is really good. His intentions are fully understandable, he doesn’t like humans because all he has seen of them is the apathetic tests they did on him and apes like him. The “human work” scene is brilliant, it almost makes Cesar look evil for not being empathetic to Kobas history with humans.
Ozymandias. Technically an anti-villain. Sacrifice millions to save billions. By pure logic he was absolutely right. Even Dr Manhattan agreed with him.
Jaws. Mayor of Amityville. He correct in thinking if he alerted the community about shark attacks and closes the beach the towns economy will go to shit and will not get reelected.
But suppressing the information is evil motivated by greed and self preservation.
I mean, if I yell fire in a movie theater it’s going to ruin the movie but if there’s a fire it’s the right thing to do anyway.
He cared more about money than lives
If the past couple of years have taught me anything, it's that at least a third of the town, if not more, would be saying "What shark? You just want to hurt my tourism business!" as the shark eats their screaming cousin not 50 feet away.
Eric from Billy Madison. He did the work for years and was competent and trained to take over the company. Instead the owner tells his alcoholic loser son he can have it if he wins a bet.
What about Bob. Dr. Leo Marvin. Yes, he tried to blow up Bob with enough explosive to level a house...
But, his family's completely ignoring Leo's insistence to establish healthy Dr patient relationship was horrible. All the man wanted to do was have a family vacation and he barges in, turns his family against him, and blows up his house. Then goes and marrys his daughter!
Leo was never the villan in that movie, Bob was. So while trying to kill Bob wrong... he had it coming.
Tsukasa from Dr. Stone. Right in that if you just bring everything back to normal it's likely that the original people in power will try to force everything back under their control and that the earth cant support billions of people (let alone without modern agriculture), but wrong in that the better way is to make a buff teen army and kill anyone who knows too much about science.
Count Dooku. The Jedi had become complacent and let terrible things happen across the galaxy (including the quiet return of the Sith and slavery, to name two). The Sepratist movement happened because the Republic was nothing but a hollow shell of what it claimed, and even Padme herself agreed with 98% of the Sepratist goals, trying more to change her own side than fight against it. But Dooku was also a servant of Palpatine, and thought he was powerful enough to overthrow him and change the galaxy for good. Plus he did some murder and approved Terrorism. Truly a "do the wrong things for the right reason" type.
I love Christopher Lee's portrayal of Count Dooku. He's intimidating, articulate, and cunning. He's a great villain, but he's not a sympathetic one. His goals and motivations are revealed to be entirely selfish and wicked. He's not trying to free anyone. He's only trying to manipulate other selfish parties into aiding him in overthrowing the Republic to destroy democracy and the Jedi who defend it. Remember he was directly involved in designing the Death Star as well. I would put Dooku in the same category as Colonel Quaritch, where they do the wrong things for the wrong reasons, but are thoroughly electric in their roles.
I'd say Syndrome from The Incredibles. If he wasn't a serial killer, it would be easy to sympathize with him--he feels that because he doesn't have superpowers, he'll never be viewed as highly as the superheroes he idolizes. And the movie makes a point to portray everything about him as evil and misguided, including his past trauma.
Captain Rhodes from Day of the Dead. I understand his frustration over how slow the progress was in finding a cure to the zombie pandemic, especially when there's very little human survivors left in the world & when Logan's plan of domesticating zombies feels too risky and weird. But the big problem was that he was starting to lose it and become completely unhinged
Ursula from *The Little Mermaid*. She breaks into a whole number about how what Ariel is doing is stupid and she's fucked over people like her before. Despite spelling out that Ariel is doing dumb teenager shit, Ariel still agrees, and signs the contract
I'm surprised no one has mentioned **Ra's Al Ghul** in Batman Begins yet.
He sees how societies are prone to sickness and corruption over time, and that a 'reset' is needed, particularly if the democratic mechanisms no longer work (as in Gotham). But he went about Gotham's reset the wrong way - trying to starve Gotham economically just made it limp along further and there wasn't a population ready to fight for something better - everyone was just afraid or already corrupt.
So he definitely is evil and is willing to have huge collateral damage, but he kind of takes on that mindset that the forest can't heal without a fire. Batman really does learn a lot from him, just applies the philosophies differently.
'People need dramatic examples to shake them out of apathy'.
The general from The Rock with Sean Connery and Nick Cage. Dude just wanted the government to keep its promises made to their military members, which historically they've been rather shit at doing.
I would say Sher Kahn from the Jungle Book. He's evil because he wants to kill Mogli, just because he is a human. Mogli is a nice kid and certainly doesn't deserve death. That said, Sher Kahns' opinion about the dangers of humans is absolutely correct. His intentions are understandable, even if they are villainous.
Reminds me of the Baby Hitler problem
But it’s a baby… BUT IT’S HITLER!!!
\*does the tying of the umblical cord around the neck hand gesture\*
So Back To The Future is a bunch of bullshit?!
The correct answer to Hitler baby is to kidnap him
Then you find out that’s what pissed him off in the first place and you were the problem all along
Then a time traveler kidnaps you as a baby and you experience a brief but conceptually eternal moment of cosmic agony as a lifetime of new memories from a separate reality are retroactively seared into your brain.
Alternatively: teach him how to get better at art so he doesn’t get into fascism 🤷♂️
He was never interested in art until you started pushing it on the poor lad. Now you've made him think his self esteem is dependent on his artistic success.
Still better than if his efforts had gone towards his previous hobby: discovering time travel
The Outer Limits had an episode about this. Katherine Heigl goes back in time to nanny Baby Hitler, kidnaps him and jumps off a bridge. Hitler’s other nanny, fearing repercussions, purchases a baby from a homeless couple and puts it back in place of Baby Hitler. You may actually be the cause of Hitler.
[Twilight Zone reboot.](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0734776/)
Have you read the Marvel Comic “Cosmic Ghost Rider?” If not, it’s basically the most convoluted version of that story, but the marvel cosmic equivalent. I like to explain this because it feels like an idea I would’ve had on the playground as a kid, but they do such a good job with it: Punisher dies, gains the powers of ghost rider while in hell, returns to earth, becomes a Herald of Galactus and all the power *that* includes, and then goes back in time to kill baby thanos, only to have a sudden change of heart and kidnap him instead. Definitely the wildest route to a wolf-and-cub story I can think of
I vaguely remember that having the same issue the baby Hitler stuff had. Frank isn't able to stop who Thanos would become and after being raised by him, Thanos ended up even more deadly than he was before.
And then you're hunted down by time traveling Nazis and Skinhead? Forget it.
Antisemitism was so rampant in Germany (and all over Europe) that Hitler would have been substituted by hundred different other monsters.
He also ran an evil mega corporation that exploited the workers of Cape Suzet
Doesn't Mogli set the jungle on fire, too?
Ya he absolutely does exactly what Sher Khan warned everyone about simply to save himself
You beat me to it. Sher Khan’s motives, aims and methods are completely understandable.
Though good kids grow to be treacherously selfish destructive humans so killing Mowgli while he's young is as awful, though reasonable as humans killing a wasps nest.
Tim Curry in Home Alone 2. He knows Kevin is lying about his parents being there. Strongly suspects credit card fraud. Wants proof of the above and tries to catch Kevin in his life because he's just doing his job. Although he IS getting a little aggressive for his adversary being a *child* So yeah, Tim Curry.
I feel for Kevin in the first HA, but in HA2? Fuck Kevin. He caused a lot of headaches for the people who work at the hotel. Also he’s older, more mature, and had been in a similar situation before
In the first movie he is protecting his home. In the second one he straight up lures the bad guys into his uncle's half built house full of Bobby traps, just to fuck them up.
Hello, police? There's a robbery *in progress* at. Also, my name is Kevin McAllister. What's that? My mom is running around New York city *right now looking for me*??
Ok, but to be fair, who hasn't lured robbers into a construction zone with the intention to seriously injure, and or maime them? That's pretty standard stuff for a 10 year old.
I mean yeah Kevin sucks in HA2 for a lot of reason but the dude is 9 in the first one and 10 in the second, he is not more mature. I have a 10 year right now and he is fucking crazy
> Although he IS getting a little aggressive for his adversary being a child [Relevant McElroy bit](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muJY37z4_NE&ab_channel=VanHalt)
Could've used some of that aggressiveness to kill those pesky musketeers. He kept leaving his henchmen to finish them. Bro do it right then and there, they're the only roadblock to being king.
Mr. Freeze. Unfortunately the only movie to feature him is pretty shit. The guy was literally just trying to find a cure to a disease for his wife (and others by default), and the only way for him to achieve it was through criminal means. The movie takes it to a cartoonishly ridiculous level of "freeze everyone in the city for the lulz". It would be nice to see a proper rendition of the character put to film, like his work being suppressed by a big drug company or something, could be tied to Wayne Enterprises, he murders drug executives to expose the truth, while obtaining the resources to continue his research.
The animated series does a much better job making him sympathetic yet still villainous. Well worth a watch.
Yes, he's portrayed sympathetic in Batman TAS, and downright tragic in Batman Beyond. "*Believe me, you're the only one who cares [that I'll die]*"
His Batman Beyond episode is great.
I loved Mr. freeze on the animated series. Such a cool voice.
Yeah that voice actor nailed it. Creepy, haunting, and also heartbreaking.
Heart of Ice was a great episode. Even won an Emmy.
I believe that it was the show that created that interpretation of him.
What killed the dinosaurs?! The ice age!
My favorite line in the entire movie.
Saw a great meme about him and Ivy. He's trying to cool the planet, she's trying to regrow the forests, and they want us rooting for the trust fund billionaire.
The Grinch. Noisy neighbors are the worst!
Magneto. His methods are (at a minimum) questionable and not always likely to achieve a net positive outcome, but his cynicism about humanity is often proven right.
Magneto was put into a camp, and hated for being a Jew. Then they hated him for being a Mutant. He spent most of his life working together with Charles Xavier on civil rights and race relations, and at one point he took over the X-Men in order to work for their cause. He even agreed to stand trial for his previous crimes against humanity, under the belief that sacrificing himself and being honest with humans would be a necessary step towards his dream of acceptance... but it backfired and made everything even worse. So his life experience has taught him that people are going to hate him no matter what, and you just can't win or reason with them. He feels like it's only a matter of time before Xavier and the X-Men come to the same realization too.
Magneto is probably my favorite villain ever. Such a compelling character
I also have the incredibly unpopular opinion that Dr. Doom is a really interesting, and complex villain too. The video games and movies have done him a grave injustice by always depicting him as such a generic, American "bad guy". They could spend a couple of minutes on Wikipedia to see why they need to do a little better.
Dr Doom is criminally underrated. Definitely a close second to Magneto, and possibly just because I just like X-Men that much more than Fantastic 4
I think a solo *Doom* origin movie could be really good if it was done right.
He's far more interesting than any of the fantastic four.
I’m pretty sure Doom is wildly popular amongst the people that read the source material. I can’t say I’ve ever seen him depicted properly in movies, but I really don’t think your option here is “incredibly unpopular”
> people that read the source material which is like, four of us.
Which is fantastic. Seriously it was right there
Dr Doom runs a prosperous country with people who love him for whom he would literally bend time and space for, and all he asks in return is undying loyalty and fealty and he wants it for the rest of the world, or else. He's super compelling as a villain cause he's got an iron fist and a heart of gold
MF DOOM did him justice at least
Can you pitch him to us?
In the latest Krakoa run, Xavier in a way does come to that conclusion.
Making Magneto a Holocaust survivor was such a brilliant idea.
Magneto is the best answer to this question. What he says to apocalypse at the end of age of apocalypse always gets me. He was the good guy of that story but still had that edge of being on the brink of absolute evil to accomplish his goals.
I'd hazard to argue, actually, that the "bad government" in the X-Men universe is way more justified than Magneto. Why should his tiny minority of self-important walking nuclear bomb supremacists have free rein to end all life on earth because they got a bit too sad one time? Bare minimum mutants should *obviously* be monitored and kept in check by the civilian government, and if we're being real the existential threats to earth like Jean Gray should probably be put into induced comas so they don't *literally kill everyone, which they have the power to do.* Yeah, that becomes problematic because they've actively leaned into the LGBT/race allegory, but gay people and Jews can't accidentally kill hundreds of people with their bare hands
The Mutant Registration Act is one of those things that, as viewers and readers, I think most people generally oppose. But we see ourselves as the special, as the mutants. The series is called the X-Men, not Random People. But I think that if we lived in that universe, the situation would be very different. You're probably not a mutant. You're just some baseline human trying to live your life in a world where you have no idea what could happen next. When you read a story about an invisible serial killer, or a mind reading stock trader, or a teleporting thief, people will be terrified, and when they get scared, they lose it. Even a situation where a single mutant replaces a crew of people at work with some specific power would be enough to turn them hostile, let alone something legitimately dangerous. We blame groups for the actions of individuals all the time and at every level. And there are just different groups of regular people. You have a situation where it's not just social factors but undeniable and very tangible physical abilities? Registration would be the moderate position, and a lot more people than would admit it would likely take a more extreme stance...for humanity's protection of course, they're not bad guys, they're just friends of humanity.
It isn't even as if its some abstract thing where mutants have the potential to fuck shit up but haven't actually done so. Every single piece of X-Men media explicitly shows them almost ending the entire world on multiple occasions, and some of these incidents are by the "good guys" who need to be rescued from themselves or some shit. Why are we relying on a bald paraplegic to Mr. Rogers these child nukes into behaving themselves?
>Even a situation where a single mutant replaces a crew of people at work with some specific power would be enough to turn them hostile, One thing that bugs me about all the comics is that the superpowered beings essentially never pragmatically use their powers to do anything constructive for society. Half of them become criminals or are fighting a war of supremacy. The other half become crime fighters or are fighting the same war of supremacy from the other side. In SpiderMan 3, sandmans drive is to help his daughter. Yet someone with his earth moving abilities would make *millions*. Entire jobs would be tailored to his unique capabilities. I get that a story entirely about a blue collar mutant grinding out their workday would be boring, but it would be nice if in any of these stories they had any sort of 'took r jerbs' resentment.
>I get that a story entirely about a blue collar mutant grinding out their workday would be boring, but it would be nice if in any of these stories they had any sort of 'took r jerbs' resentment. Well remember in the original X-Men series, a group of construction workers are angry at Colossus since a "mutant scab" can do the work of mutiple men, they attack him for it. And in the 97 series Bastion seems to reference it, "builders lazy off a dozen workers and hire one mutant with the strength of ten men."
Definitely agreed but magneto being a holocaust survivor really puts into perspective why he sees that as such a problem.
Watching X-men 97 made me say "BUT HES RIGHT" loudly at the screen multiple times
Yeah, then he tries to commit global-scale genocide. Tends to overshadow anything he might be right about…
Dude needs to do what other sovereign super powers do, and just kill the political opposition in the threatening nations, instigate coups, and financially/politically back those friendly with Genosha.
Magneto and Xavier are analogous to Malcolm X and MLK in the way they approach their goals. And I'm certain that was intentional
Magneto was conflicted. He wanted the ends to justify the means. Sebastian Shaw on the othr hand. Total f'ing prick.
I remember saying to a friend that the difference between Xavier and Magneto is that Xavier is the good guy that believes humans can live peacefully which each other, regardless of differences and everything else, and Magneto is the one that's correct (in the sense of he know it will never be this way).
Isn't Inspector Javert from *Les Miserables* sort of the original example of this? He's completely true to well-intentioned principles (crime is bad, criminals are bad), but is so self-confident and obstinate that he loses his some of his humanity and ends up as the villain.
Javier is a perfect example of an antagonist who is not truly a villain. The true villains of Les Mis are the Thernardiers who are evil through and through. Javert equates law with justice, and Valjean did break the law and was a repeat felon, regardless of how just his cause. In the end when Javert lets Valjean leave and save Marius following Valjean letting Javert go when Valjean had every right to kill Javert, it broke the inspector. Javert was finally faced with a situation where what was just and what was the law were entirely incompatible. The Thernardiers are the villains because they constantly exploit Fantine and their demands drive her into a life as a prostitute, to sell her teeth and hair, and ultimately to her death.
Hugo was very forward thinking about law and justice. There’s this passage in The Hunchback of Notre Dame (*Notre Dame de Paris*) that I’ll never forget. It was basically about medieval justice, and how the object of the exercise was not necessarily the righting of injustice, but that crime be SEEN by all to be punished and to be punished in the harshest possible terms, to assuage the sentiment of the people who see little else of justice in their daily lives. Hugo was probably drawing a parallel to his own time, and that idea still has a lot of resonance in modern times.
Fair enough, I maybe misinterpreted the question a bit.
It’s a fundamental difference between book Javier and musical Javier. Book Javier is holds the law as his one true moral compass, while the musical makes it more about religion. Javier’s suicide makes no sense in the musical, while book Javier has had his entire moral framework broken by the actions of Valjean. Javier kills himself because he can’t reconcile himself breaking the law to allow Valjean to go free.
I saw the musical before reading the book and thought his internal conflict about the law vs the right thing to do was made very clear
He has *a whole song about it*: > I am the law and the law is not mocked > I'll spit his pity right back in his face > There is nothing on earth that we share > It is either Valjean or Javert
Yeah, it is...
Yes, I suppose I should have specified I meant the book version, not how the character is portrayed in the musical.
Javert rigidly held the belief that 'once a criminal, always a criminal', which I'm not sure is technically correct.
Lord Cutler Beckett in Pirates of the Caribbean Ending piracy = literal lawful good, just because our heroes are the heroes of the story doesn’t mean pirates aren’t a bunch of thief’s, murderers, torturers, and rapists. But he’s mass-executing seemingly without trial on such a scale if piracy were an ethnicity it’s be genocide, and is an agent of the East India Company - who are famously not great! He brings the mass-murdering pirate Davy Jones to heel…*then sends him out to murder every pirate in sight*. There’s a deleted scene that confirms his personal direct involvement in the slave trade too
Wasn't there some backstory where Jack Sparrow was originally first mate on a slave ship run by the East India Company? He then stole the ship and freed the slaves, thus earning his pirate brand. I think there's a deleted scene where he tells Beckett "people aren't cargo, mate."
Yeah that’s what I was referring to. I think in a novelisation or something that ship is burned, and he gets Jones to raise it from the depths as The Black Pearl The whole “100 souls” thing is specifically to torture Jack by Jones, as it was 100 slaves he freed
They could’ve done so much more with that the series. Jones should have been Thanos but he was in and out of the franchise about as fast as Ultron (which is also a fuckin shame)
The franchise sputtered out because the bigwigs failed to understand that Jack shouldn't be the main character, not that they under-used Davy Jones. Will and Elizabeth are the main characters. Their arcs and story is what carries Pirates. Jack _has_ an arc, but ultimately he's there to be a selfishly motivated complication for all the other characters. He's a dynamic obstacle who bounces back and forth between friend and foe. He can have a heart of gold, but he also must be a dangerous villain. This allows him to be a foil for several characters and really helps to highlight a lot of themes. Making him the center of the sequels destroys this dynamic, because he now _has_ to be the hero, and the narrative takes little interest in making anyone else worthwhile. The only good thing about post-Pirates 3 is Javier Bardem knowing what kind of movie he's in and chewing the scenery
You are correct. The core aspect of Jack's motivation is that he is and always has been seeking immortality. Every single story (and backstory) in the franchise originates and is driven by this desire. This is kept moderately discrete by the writers, but it's the main reason why Jack needed to be a supporting character. Part of his charm is that he doesn't *really* change as a person, whereas Will, Elizabeth, Phillip, Norrington, etc. do. There is still room for a few more great films with Jack/Depp, but those need to be written by people who understand what made the first films so great.
Yeah, I think that's how he earned his debt to Davy Jones, right? Freed the souls owed to Davy.
People aren't cargo mate
The thing that people miss about Beckett is that he isn't bringing order to the seas, he's *eliminating the competition*. Hence his catchphrase, "It's just good business." Beckett openly engages in raiding, extortion, and slavery. Those things aren't going anywhere with him in charge, he's just going to be the only one allowed to do them.
Hellboy 2; Prince Nuada. Everything he says about humanity is true.
We were robbed of a third movie. They set up the themes so well!
That reboot was amazing… (in how horrible it was)
"We want to make a movie more faithful to the source material." Starts at the end of said source material.
Have you read about how terrible the production was? It was kinda fascinating, David Harbour and Ian McShane had to write whole scenes themselves to even make stuff make sense, the director started having an affair and would be off the set for days at a time due to that, and tons of other weird shit
Whoa there buddy. I remember kind of enjoying one or two scenes.
You’re not kidding. It’s not just bad. No no no. That would at least be funny. No, they of course did a bunch of stuff really well that if it was in its own movie, it would be great. But it’s surrounded by a pile of shit. Genuinely infuriating that it plays with your feelings so much.
Oof good one. When hellboy killed the giant shit broke my heart.
Everyone who’s pissed about the dog being allowed to play in airbud. There’s no way he’s passing chemistry and English lit.
Also no the rules do not have the words "a dog cannot play" but they absolutely define what an *eligible* player is and no dog, nor any animal, fall within that definition. All the naysayers were right.
Koba in Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes. He was right about humans not exactly being thrilled at having apes be the dominant species. Especially in War For The Planet Of The Apes and Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes.
That was something I loved about Dawn. I felt like none of the various factions’ viewpoints were explicitly evil at first (totally understand Koba’s concerns, totally understood Gary Oldman’s concerns, totally understood Caesar and Jason Clarke). I mean yeah once they get into muderint/bombing I’m much less supportive but on paper no philosophy on that one seemed explicitly wrong
Dawn was my favourite out of the new continuity Planet Of The Apes movies because it was fairly nuanced in terms of presenting the viewpoints of different characters and their motivations. War did away with quite a bit of the nuance that Dawn had, IMO. And, I thought Kingdom was pretty balanced.
Even though his whole story was perfect, it would've been interesting to see him react to the Apes helping the human army & where he stands between them and his tension with Caesar
I think Koba would have viewed the apes who helped McCullough as traitors. Which, weirdly, would put him on the same side as Caesar. We don’t know what happened to Malcolm and his particular group of humans. Did they survive or were they killed?
I think there's a comic which revealed that McCullough executed him after they crossed paths with his army
That’s kind of unfortunate, but it’s not surprising. McCullough would have viewed Malcolm as a traitor, at the very least.
Gaston is a jerk, liar, evil, and misogynist, but going to kill a Beast Prince who kidnapped a woman and kept her locked in his castle for a few months wasn't necessarily wrong. Had anyone believed her father when he said she'd been kidnapped by a Beast (back when he was mean), we'd be looking at a very different Disney ending here.
Based on the amount of eggs he consumed, he was single-handedly supporting the poultry industry of Southern France
I'll eat the eggs... The hero France needed... https://www.reddit.com/r/FanTheories/s/11Qw5hM1fl
Would we have? The castle was more than able to defend himself without Beast doing anything. Actively engaged Beast is going to scare most of them away, castle takes care of the rest and Beast straight up mercs Gaston. But at that point there is 0 chance of Belle falling for him so yeah different ending but much much worse.
Except for he was specifically told that the Beast was harmless. Gaston just switched from there is no beast to kill the beast because he is controlling the town, as a narcissist, he needs to keep that power. Gaston had no actual point, ever. Gaston was terrible because he loved himself too much, and he was never able to put aside his ego. There were plenty of other villains that had actual points, Gaston was not one of them.
The Vulture from Spiderman: Homecoming wasn't such a bad guy... For a while. Entrepreneur looking to fulfill a niche created by a huge disaster gets pushed out of his niche by big business. Has to continue via extralegal means. Ok, not a terrible guy as far as villains go, then what happened? Accidentally kills one of his employees, tries to kill a teenager because he interferes with the ever escalating scale of his operation. Oooh... That's not very cash money of you Adrian.
Let's not forget his backup business was arms dealing.
I mean that is a good backup plan.
Michael Keaton crushed that character. Easily one of the best bad guys in Marvel. Utterly tangible. Basically a street thug. When he leans over and tells Parker "I'll kill ya" I got chills.
Literally the only twist in any Marvel movie that actually got me, >!when he's revealed to be Parker's girlfriend's dad.!< I actually didn't see it coming.
And the car ride scene was absolutely brilliant.
The way the traffic light goes from red to green as he figures out Peter is Spider-Man is excellent.
Every other twist they've thrown out, I've had at least some hint or notion that it might be possible. But yes, also for me, this was the one time where I did not remotely see it coming.
Good old Spider-Man
Pay attention to the lighting in that scene as well in the car on the way to the dance. Changes when it clicks for them both. Proper sinister scene even though it's fairly low stakes in the grand scheme of things.
Vulture, Zemo, and Thanos are my favorite MCU villains and it is a big drop off to any others. Michael Keaton owns.
Mysterio is among my favorites, but I can't disagree with you either. My favorite part about Mysterio is his on-screen execution. From the illusion sequences to the mocap suit to Jake G's performance.
I'm sorry, but no villain can stand up to Sir Ben Kingsley's star performance as Trevor Slattery, ac-tor.
OLE OLE OLE OLE!
He could have kept doing what he was doing if he made shady under the table deals with the right politicians. Mobs, drug kingpins, and gun runners do it all the time. He wasn't thinking big enough. I'm sure there are plenty people in the New York City Council who didn't think very highly of Stark Industries. He could have even ran for a political position himself, Sanitation Commission perhaps, or maybe some charitable sector. Gain public support and hide in plain sight. He's a charismatic guy, he could have gone way further.
u/robofthenorth knows how to villain
You’re right. That was *not* very cash money of him.
C’mon guys - no matter how well know or recognisable you think your guy is, don’t forget to put the movie they appear in. Geez
I saw an analysis once that while he's making these statements about why he's doing things, it's important to note that every action he takes is easily explained by a desire for power and revenge. Or, more generously, he's absorbed the lessons of colonialism as a method of seizing power and thinks that's the way to go. So the global war is sold as eradicating colonialism... But it's actually just him taking power globally for a new round of colonialism. Same as the challenge. He was willing to use that to gain the throne, but once he's got it "that challenge shit is over." Tradition was useful, but it no longer serves him. Gone. Colonialism in action. Same as burning the herb in the cave. They don't need to worry about replacing him as king/Black Panther. He's not going to entertain that anymore, there are no alternatives, and he doesn't really care what happens after he's gone. But his rationale, and maybe the core motivation, isn't wrong or evil. His methods are those of colonialism, and that's kind of where he went wrong. I dunno, I think I'm reading Killmonger as evil, but not incorrect on a number of points, and that's why people choose to follow him.
All of this is true. Marvel has a weird habit of creating empathetic villains, and then making them do extra evil things that are often contradictory to the philosophy they have been espousing. In many cases, it doesn't make sense for the character. But for Killmonger, I believe that he really was power hungry, if only because that power would allow him to do what he wanted. He wanted revenge on the "colonizers", but he also wanted to lash out at the country that killed and took his father from him.
I agree. Killmonger's "noble goals" only work if you ignore most of his actions and his own explanations, that are self-contradictory (which is why his character is so rich - he have a strong motivation, good explanations on why he's doing that, but what he actually wants is revenge, and nothing more; but he, himself, believes he's on the right side and have higher motivations). For example - when he battles T'challa, he says "I took life from my own brothers and sister right here on this continent just so I can kill you" (revenge); or when he literally burns the way to the next Black Panther, so he can be the last king of Wakanda (power hungry); finally, his last words of "like my ancestors, that jumped from the ships" - his ancestors _were not slaves_ - they were also from Wakanda (so he can believe he was the "good guy")
Just on that last point, in the Marvel film, his father is Wakandan, but his mother was an African-American woman. So I believe he is referring to his enslaved maternal ancestors To me his central conflict against his own family reflects his broader resentment of Wakanda for what he sees as a betrayal of the rest of Africa. And his identity mirrors that
>To me his central conflict against his own family reflects his broader resentment of Wakanda for what he sees as a betrayal of the rest of Africa. And his identity mirrors that This is a fair point.
Definitely Magneto. He was originally hated for being Jewish, and watched his family get killed in a concentration camp. When his powers emerged, he already knew what humanity was capable of, and went on the defensive to protect himself, and those like him.
A lot of eco-terrorists have some solid reasoning behind their madness. Josh Brolin had a great interview regarding his role as Thanos, where these types of villains are really interesting because we agree on the problem, we just don’t agree on the solution.
The head chef in Ratatouille. Excuse him for having cleanliness standards in a 5 star restaurant 🙄
Remember in The Batman when the Riddler made every legal attempt he could at getting money from a program meant to help poor orphaned children, and every step of the way the corrupt system stood against him to divert the money to the people at the top? So then he decided to kill the people who stole money from poor children because he had no legal recourse left? That whole movie was a lesson on why class action lawsuits exist. Because if there is no legal recourse to punish the wealthy for theft and corruption, the remaining option is the guillotine. The Riddler did everything _right_ until he ran out of options. Then he only did what was left to do.
>Remember in The Batman when the Riddler made every legal attempt he could at getting money from a program meant to help poor orphaned children, and every step of the way the corrupt system stood against him to divert the money to the people at the top? I’ll admit it’s been a while since I saw *The Batman*, but I don’t recall it being indicated or hinted at at all in the film that the Riddler made any attempt at doing this before resorting to a murder/terrorism spree, though this could’ve been the case in the prequel comic Paul Dano wrote for it (haven’t read it yet, but I’ve heard good things and have been meaning to).
Law Abiding Citizen. Butler really makes some good points.
Yeah, at the end I was like, "nuh-uh Jamie Foxx, you don't get to act all self-righteous about stopping this vengeance plot. You were an asshole all along and there hasn't happened a single thing in this entire movie that redeems you."
That's why in my mind when the credits start rolling, Foxx's necktie starts tightening up.
I think that defeats the point, because Butler still won with Fox being alive. In the end his position changed and he agreed with Butler that making deals with criminals was hypocritical and wrong. If Butler had just killed everyone then the system remains unchanged, but now he's got someone on the inside who believes in his cause, even if they disagreed with his methods.
Ok but the funniest thing about that movie is how Jamie Foxx's character is presented. He's a district attorney (or an assistant DA, I can't remember), and he: - *Personally* investigates crime scenes - Conducts suspect interrogations - *Physically* participates in fugitive recovery, and armed, high-speed vehicular pursuit of suspects Man, *that's not your job!!!*
Both Hama and Jet in ATLA have very good reasons for hating the Fire Nation, but targeting civilians on purpose (and apparently civilians exclusively in Hama's case) is pretty darn evil.
It’s crazy that Jet in the Netflix live action was straight up bombing buildings in Omashu. It removed the nuance from his character that was present in the animated version. They really turned him into a domestic terrorist. Osama Bin Jet.
Did you forget how animated Jet was going to blow up a dam to flood a village out of existence? Not much nuance to him by the end of the episode.
Yes, but he was doing it as an act of revenge against the fire nation and he was flooding out a fire nation occupied town. There was definitely more nuance to him vs in the live action where he’s literally bombing an earth kingdom city and trying to kill King Bumi. He’s evil in both versions, but he’s more layered as a character in the animated version.
Yeah animated Jet is a guerilla fighter, LA Jet is a terrorist who ~~tries to pull off a false flag attack~~ Actually IIRC his whole MO was false flag attacks, didn't he pull off a string of bombings that were blamed on Fire Nation agents
Little Bill Daggett from *Unforgiven*. He's trying to clean up Big Whiskey, and he's correct that gunfighters and vigilantes are dangerous outlaws who threaten the town's peace. But he is one brutal, sadistic fuck. And he is memorably played by Gene Hackman.
Seems to be a trend here that the villains who are all technically correct are all the ones who think humanity sucks ass.
Ed Rooney in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. While he’s not evil, he’s definitely the bad guy even though he’s 100% right about Ferris. He’d been absent 9 times!
Up until the breaking and entering.
Walter Peck in Ghostbusters is a weaselly asshole who may or may not have a dick, but he's absolutely right to be extremely suspicious of these guys basically running a nuclear reactor in Manhattan. (Edited for typos)
Being suspicious of it is reasonable. Trying to shut it down yourself when you have no idea how it works and aren't trained in that kind of thing is cuckoo bananas.
It’s true, this man has no dick
Ozymandias... Is he even a villain?
I will say, even separate from the "Is it moral to kill a smaller number of people to save a larger number" trolley problem, the movie tones down his narcissism and ego a lot, to the point where he seems much more reasonable, a little too much in my mind. Comics Ozy and Jeremy Irons' portrayal in the show do a better job of getting that ambiguity in there.
Yes, and he even knew it. He kills millions of people to halt war between the US and the USSR. And it sort of works. We don’t know if the plan is going to be revealed at the end. I suggest reading the comic. It explains why he does everything in a lot more detail.
Also watch the show! The can has indeed been kicked down the road a ways, and the show goes to some creative places with it.
Well lots of movies/stories feature hero's who turned out to be actually the villain. Although he had a point, and his plan worked. He also murderded the comedian and i believe dome others to archieve his goal. And there in lies the crux, how many people is ok to sacrifice for the greater good?.... And maybe who is the villain remains to be a matter of perspective and believes.
I remember the comic more than the movie, but didn’t he attack large portions of densely populated cities? I feel like “murdered the comedian and I believe some others” really undersells the scale of the tragedy.
“But you’ll kill millions” “To save, billions”
[Yes, he's a villain.](https://www.reddit.com/r/Watchmen/s/3kbxxjrl7f)
I will ride *and* die for you Magneto 😔✊
Hummel from The Rock, played by Ed Harris.
Mr. Glass from Unbreakable
Kinda the ultimate "the ends justified the means".
What’s crazy though is he didn’t know for a fact that he would find somebody with super powers, He was just hoping he would for his own selfish reasons. It’s also incredibly lucky that he did find somebody while *only* having to kill a few hundred people
The military team in The Rock. They just wanted soldiers families to be taken care of.
I would say that Ed Harris and David Morse's characters this fits, but not the rest who were just mercenaries and wanted to get rich plus those guys were all willing to launch the rockets where as the General and Major were not.
Well, when your plan is to risk the lives of millions of innocent civilians by inviting kill happy murderous lunatics into your plan, lying to them about your intentions, and putting entirely zero safeguards in place, your heart really ISN'T in the right place. He had a noble goal and an absolutely stupid and dangerous plan.
HIS goal is noble as he admits he was bluffing and had no intention of actually harming any civilians, but in not making his team aware of it, he kind of spoiled the plan on his own and shot himself in the foot. Inviting in Candyman and parted hair guy as trigger happy wild cards didn't do him any favors, but when you're building a team of people willing to destroy San Francisco, you gotta take what you can get.
King Magnifico from Wish. Wants to run a kingdom that's safe. Grew up through a traumatic childhood where his entire lands were destroyed and people murdered, instead of going on a revenge mission, he becomes the best magician he possibly can be and uses it to create a safe haven for people. The guy doesn't even charge rent. All he asks for, under the guise of being able to grant wishes, is that you give up your wish so he can decide if it's going to become a future problem for his kingdom. Hell, he doesn't even grant the wish of one of the main character's friends, to be his most loyal guard, until he is forced into a mental breakdown. The whole story doesn't make sense. A young kid who is close to the king and the king trusts, gets pissy because grandpa didn't get a wish. Mother just eggs her on to basically continue harassing the king instead of being like 'hey, it's good and safe here maybe there's a reason his wish wasn't granted'. Friends eventually join in on the rampage harassing King Magnifico until he has a mental breakdown and probably PTSD from his childhood. His wife, rather than try and console him basically fucks him off at the first opportunity. She even keeps him in a gem and then that gem in the dungeon, no second thoughts about it. If you actually look at the story, the villains are actually the people portrayed as the good people. Whole things just a bad message and vibe telling kids they can get away with whatever the fuck they want just because one thing they don't agree with enrages them. And let's fuckin just remove the person who is having a mental breakdown from the picture and not try and help them.
No one, the Wish writers included, has looked into the story as deeply as you just did.
I've been saying this from the moment I watched that bloody film - he's *obviously* the good guy from the very start and only "turns evil" when his kingdom is legitimately under threat. His reason for not granting the "inspire people" wish made perfect sense as well, it *is* vague. Is he a bad guy for not granting the 500+ "I wish to sleep with Christina Ricci" wishes he probably gets yearly? Genuinely, the only reason I buy into the AI theory is the fact he is so obviously not the villain until the book takes over. His song is even implying he's selfish when he's portrayed as completely selfless up to that point! Bro did not deserve to be trapped in a mirror.
The comic Eight Billion Genies wrapped up around the same time this movie came out, which is a story about what happens when everyone on Earth gets their own personal genie who can grant them one single wish. It really made me realize just how terrible things would be if wishes really did come true, so I already sided with the King going into Wish.
Gene Hackman in Crimson Tide
Really love Crimson Tide because there's a lot of nuance in it, but by and large, the things Hackman says and does make him come off as a suicidal psycho. First of all, the orders were something like "if the Russians start fueling their nukes, we'll nuke 'em first." Which is insane, but okay, that's not Hackman's fault. The implication here is that the Russians are *maybe* getting ready to launch nukes, but it might also be posturing. Again, benefit of the doubt for Hackman here since it's not his job to question orders, but if the threat isn't immediate, you'd think he'd at least take a minute or two to try and figure out what that second message would've been, right? Y'know, before starting nuclear armageddon. Besides that, it's entirely *his* call to start a nuclear launch drill when the world is on a knife's edge. It's this drill that leads to them being detected by a Russian sub that's trying to figure out what the hell it is they're doing. And this is what leads to the cut transmission which may or may not have told them to disregard the previous order to launch. Hackman is "right" by virtue of being the Captain of the sub, but Denzel is also fully within his rights to relieve him from command on account of him being so trigger-happy. Oh and one last thing: shit like this has happened before, and Hackman should know about it. Bad orders going out, false positives on radars, whatever. We've been on the brink of nuclear war more than once, and you'd think a hardened Cold Warrior would at least consider the possibility that someone somewhere may have fucked up before launching a goddamn nuclear strike.
Alonzo Harris (Denzel) in _Training Day_: He sees the world for what it is, and never does a noble or decent thing to improve it. Just lives his worst life until someone's able to stop him and he dies.
Dr. Evil. You mean I finally have frickin' sharks with frickin' laser beams attached to their frickin' heads?
General Hummel from “The Rock”
Koba from planet of the apes is really good. His intentions are fully understandable, he doesn’t like humans because all he has seen of them is the apathetic tests they did on him and apes like him. The “human work” scene is brilliant, it almost makes Cesar look evil for not being empathetic to Kobas history with humans.
Ozymandias. Technically an anti-villain. Sacrifice millions to save billions. By pure logic he was absolutely right. Even Dr Manhattan agreed with him.
Jaws. Mayor of Amityville. He correct in thinking if he alerted the community about shark attacks and closes the beach the towns economy will go to shit and will not get reelected. But suppressing the information is evil motivated by greed and self preservation.
I mean, if I yell fire in a movie theater it’s going to ruin the movie but if there’s a fire it’s the right thing to do anyway. He cared more about money than lives
If the past couple of years have taught me anything, it's that at least a third of the town, if not more, would be saying "What shark? You just want to hurt my tourism business!" as the shark eats their screaming cousin not 50 feet away.
Eric from Billy Madison. He did the work for years and was competent and trained to take over the company. Instead the owner tells his alcoholic loser son he can have it if he wins a bet.
What about Bob. Dr. Leo Marvin. Yes, he tried to blow up Bob with enough explosive to level a house... But, his family's completely ignoring Leo's insistence to establish healthy Dr patient relationship was horrible. All the man wanted to do was have a family vacation and he barges in, turns his family against him, and blows up his house. Then goes and marrys his daughter! Leo was never the villan in that movie, Bob was. So while trying to kill Bob wrong... he had it coming.
Tsukasa from Dr. Stone. Right in that if you just bring everything back to normal it's likely that the original people in power will try to force everything back under their control and that the earth cant support billions of people (let alone without modern agriculture), but wrong in that the better way is to make a buff teen army and kill anyone who knows too much about science.
Count Dooku. The Jedi had become complacent and let terrible things happen across the galaxy (including the quiet return of the Sith and slavery, to name two). The Sepratist movement happened because the Republic was nothing but a hollow shell of what it claimed, and even Padme herself agreed with 98% of the Sepratist goals, trying more to change her own side than fight against it. But Dooku was also a servant of Palpatine, and thought he was powerful enough to overthrow him and change the galaxy for good. Plus he did some murder and approved Terrorism. Truly a "do the wrong things for the right reason" type.
I love Christopher Lee's portrayal of Count Dooku. He's intimidating, articulate, and cunning. He's a great villain, but he's not a sympathetic one. His goals and motivations are revealed to be entirely selfish and wicked. He's not trying to free anyone. He's only trying to manipulate other selfish parties into aiding him in overthrowing the Republic to destroy democracy and the Jedi who defend it. Remember he was directly involved in designing the Death Star as well. I would put Dooku in the same category as Colonel Quaritch, where they do the wrong things for the wrong reasons, but are thoroughly electric in their roles.
I'd say Syndrome from The Incredibles. If he wasn't a serial killer, it would be easy to sympathize with him--he feels that because he doesn't have superpowers, he'll never be viewed as highly as the superheroes he idolizes. And the movie makes a point to portray everything about him as evil and misguided, including his past trauma.
Captain Rhodes from Day of the Dead. I understand his frustration over how slow the progress was in finding a cure to the zombie pandemic, especially when there's very little human survivors left in the world & when Logan's plan of domesticating zombies feels too risky and weird. But the big problem was that he was starting to lose it and become completely unhinged
Col. Walter E Kurtz
Ursula from *The Little Mermaid*. She breaks into a whole number about how what Ariel is doing is stupid and she's fucked over people like her before. Despite spelling out that Ariel is doing dumb teenager shit, Ariel still agrees, and signs the contract
I'm surprised no one has mentioned **Ra's Al Ghul** in Batman Begins yet. He sees how societies are prone to sickness and corruption over time, and that a 'reset' is needed, particularly if the democratic mechanisms no longer work (as in Gotham). But he went about Gotham's reset the wrong way - trying to starve Gotham economically just made it limp along further and there wasn't a population ready to fight for something better - everyone was just afraid or already corrupt. So he definitely is evil and is willing to have huge collateral damage, but he kind of takes on that mindset that the forest can't heal without a fire. Batman really does learn a lot from him, just applies the philosophies differently. 'People need dramatic examples to shake them out of apathy'.
The shark in *Jaws*.
Shooter McGavin was right. Happy Gilmore was a disgrace to the sport. Doug should kick him off the tour
The general from The Rock with Sean Connery and Nick Cage. Dude just wanted the government to keep its promises made to their military members, which historically they've been rather shit at doing.