Sure, Frodo’s great. Those Pevensie kids are adorable. Harry Potter’s the Arthur Pendragon of our time.
But really, how interesting are any of those characters on their own? Where would they be if it weren’t for those evildoers out there to constantly be the thorn in their sides? When one looks at what turns a good fantasy adventure into a great one, the answer is often its antagonist, be it evil witch, sexy Goblin King, or oddly well-preserved 3,000-year-old mummy.
What makes a great fantasy villain? They have to be menacing and powerful, of course, to be a true obstacle for our hero — but that can get pretty one-note after a while. Often a fantastic villain has an air of sexual allure, something to show us that wickedness is seductive.
But let’s face it: the most important ingredient of all might be likability; we may not want to be them, but we definitely have to want to watch them.
It’s not easy to find great villains. Sure, Sauron was uber-evil, but was it really that interesting to watch a fiery eye, um, look at things really hard? David Bowie was definitely a memorable presence in The Labyrinth, but were you ever actually worried about Jennifer Connelly’s Sarah?
Listed here are eight of the most engrossing fantasy villains seen on screens large and small.
Callisto - Xena: The Warrior Princess was one of the most influential and well-loved fantasy shows of all time, but even die-hard Xenites will admit its first season was a bit … shaky while the show found its voice. All that instability ended with the introduction of its first major villain, the mega-hot psycho babe Callisto. She was Xena’s physical equal, she could shriek like a banshee, and she looked damn good in chain mail. What’s more, she began her descent into evil due to losing her family when Xena’s army killed them, thus as evil as she was, well, it was always kind of Xena’s fault. You can’t ask for a better origin story than that.
Faith - While we’re on the topic of mega-hot psycho babes, Buffy the Vampire Slayer was doing fine being the Chosen One — emphasis on one – until another Slayer came to town. Sultry, slutty, and just as buff as Buffy, she owned most of Season 3 and stole every scene she was in, particular when she fully embraced her dark side and started killing people. Her path to redemption took a bunch of seasons and two series (she guest starred on the spin-off Angel several times), and though she ended up good in the end, she was great when she was bad.
Darkness - It takes a lot to have any kind of charm when you’re seven feet tall, fire engine red, and the proud owner of two ginormous ebony horns, but somehow Tim Curry managed to endow his character Darkness in Legend with an astounding suavity, which complimented his pure, vicious evil. Of course, if there’s one thing Tim Curry does well, it’s charm the hell out of us while playing purely evil characters (as evidenced by his immortal turn in The Rocky Horror Picture Show.) He is the very image of the Christian devil, and his mere presence is enough to send more than few shivers down your back, and yet when he gently told Mia Sara’s Lili that he simply wanted to sit and talk with her, you couldn’t help but be intrigued. Too bad those horns are such deal-breakers.
The White Witch - Come on, admit it: you knew she was evil from the moment you saw her, but weren’t you a little jealous of Edmund Pevensie when he got cruised and picked up by the cougar witch in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe? Didn’t you want to be the one snuggling with her under that blanket, eating Turkish Delight out of her icy, delicate fingers? As played by Tilda Swinton, Narnia’s reigning beeyotch was that special kind of evil that’s also slightly delicious. Sexy one minute and harsh the next, beautiful from one angle and androgynous from another, you just couldn’t take your eyes off her.
Dracula - This is an obvious choice, sure, but how can you not include the guy who made vampires sexy long before Lestat was a glimmer in Anne Rice’s eye? Though Bela Lugosi did an admirable job, it was Gary Oldman’s portrayal in 1992’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula that secured the Transylvanian Wonder as one of the most magnetic screen villains of all time. (Sorry, Gerard Butler in Dracula 2000. I know you tried your best.) When evil looks as good as Drac does in that gray suit and Jim Morrison sunglasses, you can see why Winona Ryder’s Mina Harker can’t keep help but steal his heart. Of course, Winona Ryder can’t help but steal a lot of things. BURN! (Is that joke still relevant?)
Voldemort - The first time we saw him, he was a face on the back of some dude’s head. The second time, he was as a … ghost? echo? whatever, just go with it … of his effeminate teenage self. But when he burst out of a cauldron, fully reformed and snakalicious, in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, it was clear a bombastic new villain was in town, and he had some serious staying power. Plus he has no nose. It’s freaky.
The Wicked Witch of the West - Long before she was re-imagined by Gregory Maguire as the sympathetic Elphaba in Wicked, The Wicked Witch of the West struck terror into all of our hearts as portrayed by Margaret Hamilton in the classic Wizard of Oz. She originated almost all of the cliches we have for movie witches nowadays, and her constant, insane cackling gave many a tot nightmares for years. When she said, “I’ll get you, my pretty,” we knew she wasn’t kidding around, and that scene when Aunty Em’s image in the crystal ball turns into the snarling witch’s face has been putting money into therapist’s wallets for the better part of a century.
Darth Vader - Is it any surprise? I know there are those of you who insist Star Wars isn’t fantasy, but surely you would admit that if there’s a shred of possibility it could fit into the genre, then Darth Vader must top the list of all-time greatest fantasy villains. From his first appearance in Star Wars: A New Hope, Darth Vader was like a figure pulled right from our sub-conscious, that dark part of us that was devoid of humanity and existed solely for evil. But then as the series went on, we realized there was so much more to the guy in the walking coffin, and by series’ end, we shed a tear at his death. Now that is a great villain.
The list goes on and on. Here are a few villains that didn’t quite make the cut:
Dark Willow - Speaking of the dark side, fans of Buffy’s Willow got two opportunities to the see the normally squeaky-clean good witch go postal: the first in the third season as a vampire from an alternate reality, and the other when her girlfriend Tara was killed three years later. Willow, distraught with grief, allowed herself to be overcome by dark magic, and for three awesome episodes, we saw pure rage in human form. Fortunately for residents of Sunnydale, she wasn’t bad quite long enough to make the list.
Prince Humperdinck - Sexy? No. Pure evil? No, just kind of nasty. But Prince Humperdinck from The Princess Bride had a comic timing and flamboyant bitchiness that made him a pleasure to watch. However, he was often upstaged by Christoper Guest as the Six-Fingered Man, so it’s understandable he didn’t make the top 8. But to exclude Wallace Shawn’s diminunitve Vizzini? Inconceivable!
Dick Cheney - In an interesting departure from their usual news-only programming, CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News all collaborated to air an ongoing pulp serial which ran from 2000 to 2008, featuring a dastardly villain named Dick Cheney, loosely based on Gargamel from The Smurfs. Shades of 1984 and A Brave New World could be found in this colorful series about a hunch-backed old man who attempted to bring about a totalitarian dystopia, though the show lost some credibility after it had its main character “accidentally” shoot a man in the face and suffer zero legal consequences. Fortunately for fantasy fans everywhere, the news networks wised up and stopped airing this disturbing show in January of ‘09.
