Top 5 Big-Screen Super Villains

Before we proceed to give you what you need, let’s banter. What makes a good villain? I’d say appearance. You want villains to sort of be judged by their covers. A villain should instill some form of dread like that Heath Ledger smile, the terror by knight, pun intended. You don’t want some needlessly gnawing look of a Doctor Octopus or the expressionless countenance of an Apocalypse. Your villain should intrigue without trying, God bless you Ultron. Banter aside, I think a villain is only as good as his/her motive. A motive makes a villain relatable instead of a mere evil maniac who’s bent on demolition for the love of it.

Here are our top five super-villains, from five to one. Tremble!

5. Ultron (James Spader)

Ultron, like the orphic Lucifer, defies his creator (Tony Stark). It was intended that he would be a global defence system against extra-terrestrial life forms, but Ultron is a rebel to the cause. He believes that the way to create a perfect world is to destroy humanity and start all over with robotic life. He finds humans to be a nuisance; he has a god complex. Ultron possesses the brilliance and charisma of his maker, Stark and the aggressiveness of Hulk. He’s not a villain for the infamy that comes with it alone, his mind is fixed on doing what he considers the only solution. He is a spawn of the mind stone, maybe that’s why he gives the best quotes cloaked in wry humour?

Comic Universe: Marvel

Movie(s): Avengers: Age of Ultron

Powers: Tech/machine control (Artificial Intelligence), strength, speed, stamina, durability, reflexes, genius intellect, a capacity for creative intelligence and self-repair, expert roboticist and strategist.

Nemesis: The Avengers

Movie Quote: “Do you see the beauty of it? The inevitability? You rise, only to fall. You, Avengers, you are my meteor. My swift and terrible sword and the Earth will crack with the weight of your failure. Purge me from your computers; turn my own flesh against me. It means nothing! When the dust settles, the only thing living in this world… will be metal!”

 

4. Magneto (Michael Fassbender)

This rendering of Magneto was birthed in the year 2011 when Sir Ian McKellen passed the iron wielding baton to a very virile Michael Fassbender. In three X-Men installments — First Class, Days of Future Past and Apocalypse, we see why this sympathetic bad guy is much-loved.

Magneto’s motive is emotive. He is a Holocaust survivor who still is broken from not having the power or will to stop the Nazis from killing his people – The Jews. So, now he fights off anyone who dares to plague his new people – Mutants. He doesn’t just want peace for mutants but desires a world where mutants are not disturbed. Ergo, he’s genocidal if adequately provoked. Such a great fella.

Movie(s): X-Men: First Class, X-Men: Days of Future Past and X-Men: Apocalypse

Comic Universe: Marvel

Powers: Controls magnetic fields

Nemesis: Charles Xavier

Movie Quote: “Some of you spoke to the police about what you believe you witnessed here yesterday. You want to know my powers, know who I am, see what I can do? Think of the person you love most in your life, now that person will know what it is to lose someone they love”

 

   3. Joker (Heath Ledger)

Comic lore has it that the Joker was once a poorly paid lab assistant, who decided to try stand-up comedy to cater for his pregnant wife. He fails at it, his pregnant wife dies, and then he agrees to help Red Hood, a cloaked villain, rob a chemical facility. Batman crashes the party, and Joker jumps into a chemical vat in the chaos, surfacing disfigured. The Joker comes out reborn, maleficent and blames the Bat for every woe he has ever suffered. The Villain was born, then came its most adept steward, Heath Ledger who gave the character the charm and stochasticity no other actor could/can. Ledger gave evil its fancy and a posthumous Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor is proof.

He’s Batman’s greatest match. He doesn’t have any superhuman abilities and so Batman, the super detective, doesn’t have his exact antidote. It’s nearly impossible to predict someone who cannot even predict himself, that’s how devious the clownish maniac is. The Joker doesn’t threaten us with domination and control. His only plan is total chaos and nihilism, heralded in humour and earnest derangement. Although his motives may seem senseless, the finesse with which The Joker carries out his dastardly acts means this list would be incomplete without him.

Movie(s): Dark Knight

Comic Universe: Detective Comics (DC)

Powers: No super-human abilities, only an incomprehensible will and genius to wreak havoc and inflict pain.

Nemesis: Batman

Movie Quote: “Do I really look like a guy with a plan? You know what I am? I’m a dog chasing cars. I wouldn’t know what to do with one if I caught it! You know, I just… *do* things.”

 

2. Bane (Tom Hardy)

Bane is one of the most awe-inspiring characters I have seen on-screen. Tom Hardy gave this masked madman an intimidating and rabid personality. Bane, literally meaning something causing misery or death, is bent on revolution. The learned jock was “reformed” in prison, from a tepid minor to a rage-filled fiend. He’s from the League of Assassins and personal bodyguard of Talia al Ghul. Because of this, the destruction of Gotham comes easy to him, for it is the personal goal of Ra’s al Ghul, his former leader. Of all Batman’s adversaries, Bane is the only one who manages to break the Bat.

Movie(s): The Dark Knight Rises

Comic Universe: Detective Comics (DC)

Powers: Eidetic memory, superhuman strength and endurance.

Nemesis: Batman

Movie Quote: “Oh, you think darkness is your ally. But you merely adopted the dark; I was born in it, moulded by it. I didn’t see the light until I was already a man, by then it was nothing to me but BLINDING!”

 

1. Thanos (Josh Brolin)
   

The all formidable Eternal with the deviant gene, the Titan wielding the infinity gauntlet and its gems. This is Thanos’ world, we are tenants. The philosophical bad guy “balances” the world by cancelling out half of it. Sustained by his terrifying band of lieutenants — Ebony Maw, Cull Obsidian, Proxima Midnight, and Corvus Glaive, nothing can stop him. Thanks to an amazing depiction by Josh Brolin, Thanos is the bad guy we love the most.

Thanos is immense, properly motivated, passionate and he totally considers himself the good guy. He’s the biggest believer in his obtuse mission, misguided beyond belief. He’s the villain who created his motivation; a believer in his own cause. And thanks to the gauntlet, Thanos is ready to destroy the world to save it

Movie(s): Avengers: Infinity War

Comic Universe: Marvel

Powers:  Superhuman strength, speed, stamina, immortality, invulnerability, telekinesis, telepathy, cosmic energy assimilation, immunity, and resistance.

Nemesis: The Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy…

Movie Quote: “I know what it’s like to lose. To feel so desperately that you’re right, yet to fail nonetheless. But I ask to what end? Dread it. Run from it. Destiny still arrives. Or should I say, I have.”