Where would we be without our favourite movie villains, lurking in the deep dark depths of our subconscious ready to scare us before we go to sleep? There’s no denying that Hollywood has given us some good ones over the years so here is a list of some of the most frightening evil characters to jog your memory:
1. The Joker – The Dark Knight.
What could be more terrifying than a crazed maniac who feels no empathy for any living thing and actually takes joy in causing pain and disruption in the world? Well, if you were wondering this then you’d need not look any further than the late Heath Ledger’s extraordinary take on ‘The Joker’ in 2008 movie The Dark Knight.
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2. Lord Voldemort – The Harry Potter Movies.
Just the look of him is terrifying, but when you take the time to watch the world-famous Harry Potter movies and find out that he is “a raging psychopath, devoid of the normal human responses to other people’s suffering” (in the words of author JK Rowling), then you soon learn that Lord Voldemort is based on the stuff of true nightmares.
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3. Darth Vader – Star Wars.
One of the most infamous ‘baddies’ of all time, Star Wars’ very own antihero Darth Vader will live on with every sci-fi lover as one of the most petrifying and conflicted villains ever to grace the silver screen.
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4. The Emperor – Star Wars.
Taking a step even further towards pure evil than Darth Vader is his master, The Emperor, whose sole desire is to bring order to the galaxy by using any means possible, i.e. a relentless amount of death and destruction.
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5. Agent Smith – The Matrix Trilogy.
Anyone who has watched The Matrix will know what we mean when we describe the inherent evil of Matrix guardian Agent Smith who, for the most part, remains completely expressionless unless he is erupting in to his evil laugh.
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6. Sauron – The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
It would take a ridiculously long amount of time to sit here and explain how the Dark Lord Sauron came to be, but suffice to say his quest for the ‘one ring’ is completely unyielding, bringing huge amounts of devastation to the innocent people of Middle Earth.
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7. Hannibal Lecter – The Silence of the Lambs.
Taking basic human fear and terror back to its roots, 1991 movie The Silence of the Lambs sees Anthony Hopkins give an extraordinary portrayal of cannibal serial killer Hannibal Lecter. There can be no illusion about the fact that this film is not for the faint hearted but it is very much worth a watch to see Hopkins’ astounding performance.
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8. Norman Bates – Psycho
Inspired by a real-life murderer, Norman Bates is the representation of everything we fear in the modern-day world in classic horror movie Psycho (1960), showing no mercy to his victims whilst preserving his mother’s dead corpse at the ‘Bates Motel’.
9. Freddy Krueger – A Nightmare on Elm Street.
What could be more nightmare-ish than an evil being who can actually kill you in your dreams? A ridiculous concept it might be, but that by no means changes how scary Freddy Krueger’s evil character is and has been since A Nightmare on Elm Street was first released back in 1984.
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10. Maleficent
Widely considered to be the most evil character that Disney has ever portrayed, Maleficent a.k.a. the “Mistress of All Evil” has even had her own movie spin off made, where Angelina Jolie took on the illustrious role.
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