Decades of animation have given us some truly great and memorable villains. Some of them unsettle viewers for personal reasons, others become iconic to audiences everywhere, while still more achieve real cult status, and we’re here to celebrate some of the greatest of all time.
The very best animated villains linger in the mind long after the TV or movie credits have rolled. Disney alone has produced more than its fair share of legendary antagonists, but we’ve deliberately kept their presence to a minimum here. Those villains deserve a spotlight all their own, and they have one right here.
Instead, this list celebrates some of the greatest animated villains from across the wider world of animation, proving that evil comes in many forms, no matter who brings it to life.
The Joker – Batman: The Animated Series
Standing out as a chaotic streak of color against the noir and art deco-style design of Batman: The Animated Series, this Joker became one for the ages. Voiced with a playful menace by Mark Hamill, the show’s version of the Joker was never overused, which made his appearances all the more unsettling. Still, The Animated Series had a lot of fun with its take on DC villain, having been given the opportunity to twist his red grin into a menacing scowl in an instant and giving a whole new generation of comic book kids a reason to fear and love the Clown Prince of Crime more than a decade ahead of Heath Ledger’s scene-stealing live action performance in Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight.
Megatron – The Transformers: The Movie
“Megatron must be stopped, no matter the cost,” says Optimus Prime in The Transformers: The Movie, and he means it, because in a film that features a literal planet-sized Transformer, Megatron remains the number one villain of the piece. Having already slain a number of Autobots along with his Decepticon crew, he finally battles Optimus Prime and both are mortally wounded. But ol’ Megs isn’t gone for long, because he’s soon remade into Galvatron and re-ignites his mission to become the biggest animated metal bastard of all time. And we wouldn’t have it any other way! Y’see, although The Transformers: The Movie initially annoyed the crap out of some fans by notching up a slasher movie-level number of Transformer kills, it’s now considered a classic, and absolute peak Megatron.
Omni-Man – Invincible
Invincible‘s Nolan Grayson may be the most powerful superhero on Earth, but he is also an alien and initially works as an agent of the Viltrum Empire, sent here to weaken our planet and prepare it for an invasion. The way he goes about this mission is explored in an absolutely horrifying string of incidents during season 1 of Prime Video’s animated series, from ripping apart Earth’s mightiest heroes, the Guardians of the Globe, to a devastating rageathon through Chicago that kills thousands of innocent people. But what makes Omni-Man such a great villain is that it’s clear that he has been deeply affected by the love of his family and friends on Earth, yet he still moves forward with his deadly plans. Later, he begins a real redemption arc, but season 1 Omni-Man is as dark as they come.
Aku – Samurai Jack
Aku isn’t just a rote villain plopped into Genndy Tartakovsky’s Samurai Jack story to be a bit of an opp to our hero. He’s already won by sending Jack into a future where his rule has seeped into every crack, so Jack’s main mission can’t ever be to simply stop him. He has to travel back in time and get home first! Indeed, this proves to be a much harder mission, and this way, even when Aku’s dishing out grandiose monologues, having childish outbursts, or not even in the episode at all, he remains a menacing, credible danger, whether by trying to break Jack’s spirit through a string of hopeless situations or forcing him to question whether his mission is even possible. The late Mako Iwamatsu also gave such a rich, theatrical performance as Aku; it helped Samurai Jack (and his villain) become so beloved.
King Haggard – The Last Unicorn
1982’s The Last Unicorn remains a massively underrated animated movie. Peter S. Beagle wrote the script for it based on his terrific fantasy novel following a unicorn who sets out to discover what happened to all the rest of her kind when she realizes she’s the last one left. The late and great Sir Christopher Lee voices the villainous King Haggard, leader of the depressing Hagsgate, in the adaptation, and hoo boy does he sell this cursed man well, because when we find out that the only thing that makes the king happy is looking at unicorns, we also find out that he’s found a way to keep them around forever by chasing them into the sea outside his castle. It allows him to watch them come in and out with the tides. Frightened in their captivity, the unicorns are eventually freed and, along with his castle, Haggard falls to his death in the very sea that kept them prisoner. Good riddance.
Azula – Avatar: The Last Airbender
It’s harder than you’d think to craft an emotionally complex animated villain, but they knocked it out of the park with Azula, who tends to rely on strategy over strength to defeat her opponents in The Last Airbender. A notably skilled firebender, her ruthless nature has nonetheless been tragically shaped by her upbringing and her obsession with perfection. As a consequence, her fear of failure and inability to trust others cause her to unravel. Azula’s eventual downfall is accidentally driven by her own flaws, but that’s just one of the many reasons why she remains one of the most compelling animated villains ever.
Venger – Dungeons & Dragons
As the main antagonist of the 80s cartoon series Dungeons & Dragons series, Venger was such a menacing sorcerer that even his massive and arguably cumbersome gray skirt couldn’t dampen the threat of his arrival. Forcing children to fend off his sorcery and help poor villagers escape his terrorism, Venger traumatized 80s kids everywhere with his single red horn and vampiric teeth, riding in on his black horse to put so many spanners in the works that the young crew never found their way back home. In that respect, he became a kind of nightmare villain; the kind you can’t get away from in your dreams no matter how hard you try.
A script for the unproduced finale confirmed that Venger was set to be revealed as the Dungeon Master’s estranged son, but although that knowledge certainly would have added a tragic footnote to his story, it wouldn’t have helped the countless heroes whom he eliminated before the show’s new gang arrived to thwart his evil plans.
Lord Shen – Kung Fu Panda 2
While Kung Fu Panda‘s Lord Shen (Gary Oldman) is much more of a moustache-twirling villain than some others on this list, he’s definitely earned his place on it. He’s also probably the dumbest smart villain here, because his intelligent manoeuvres are regularly countered by his inability to escape a prophecy he himself is helping come to pass. After his role in the destruction of Po’s village and the loss of his family, Shen makes a series of increasingly cruel decisions to turn fate in his favour, refusing to accept responsibility for his past and ultimately falling to Po, who has made peace with his. Shen is one of those tragic villains who might have eventually found some kind of redemption if he’d just found a way to let go of his fear.
Cruella de Vil – One Hundred and One Dalmatians
What could be more upsetting to animal lovers than a vain, greedy person who wants nothing more than to kidnap puppies and skin them for fashion? Disney’s animated version of Dodie Smith’s “cruel devil,” voiced by Betty Lou Gerson, was the walking, talking epitome of evil in One Hundred and One Dalmatians, and although she’s been portrayed by many other actresses since, the animated Cruella de Vil’s wild, twisted red mouth and pale complexion have always been truly upsetting to witness. Unlike other villains on this list, she doesn’t want power or revenge. She isn’t a supernatural monster. Cruella is a regular human being, and she just wants to kill puppies. Awful woman.
The Lich – Adventure Time
Revenge? Power? Good, old-fashioned greed? Pah! A true villain doesn’t truck with such pathetic motivations. The Lich is more than happy to simply exterminate all life. Giving off “death is inevitable and life is meaningless” vibes, when The Lich appeared, you know the situation just got very real in the normally whimsical land of Adventure Time. His quiet, philosophical demeanor and cosmic nature make his power feel beyond the control of our heroes, possibly infinite, and the nihilism he brings to the show smothers it in ancient and unstoppable evil. Great guy. Good times.
Hexxus – FernGully: The Last Rainforest
Voiced by the always sensational Tim Curry, Hexxus is a malevolent entity that feeds on the byproducts of human-caused environmental destruction in 1982’s Ferngully: The Last Rainforest, delighting in corruption and growing stronger every time he encounters sludge, toxic waste, or pollution. By the end of the movie, he’s become a smoky, skeletal monster filled with horrors, embodying industrial devastation and putting the fear of god into kids who finish the movie and realize that there are human forces that will stop at nothing to turn a profit, even if it means destroying the world we live in. Oh, and he also has a fun song, “Toxic Love,” if you need a breather from thinking about everything he represents.
Scar – The Lion King
Scar is such a good emotional manipulator, and although he’s a literal lion, he doesn’t resort to physical force to reach the top. Why would he, when his psychological tactics work so well? No, Scar plots and plans until he finally gets the opportunity to murder his brother and steal the throne in The Lion King, convincing little Simba that he’s to blame, then letting his land rot as he basks in his own majesty. Jeremy Irons’ sharp, theatrical line-readings add an extra layer of threat to Scar’s inevitable rule, and he would have gotten away with it, too, if it weren’t for those meddling kids (and hyenas).
Judge Doom – Who Framed Roger Rabbit?
The reveal of Judge Doom as not merely a villainous Dip enjoyer but a homicidal toon continues to traumatize many a child, with his bulging, animated eyes and screeching voice pretty hard to forget during the climax of 1988’s Who Framed Roger Rabbit?. Actor Christopher Lloyd plays him with an enormous amount of menace in his live-action moments, but when Judge Doom toons out, he is terrifying on another level. The kindly Doc Brown of the Back to the Future films is immediately forgotten, replaced with a twisted amalgamation of surreal, hand-drawn intimidation, live-action, and a very real threat to kill all toons, which director Robert Zemeckis himself likened to Adolf Hitler’s Final Solution. Chilling and unforgettable.
