MST3K’s Dr. Clayton Forester. Pearl is OK, but the Doc is just more fun.
As far as compelling depictions of evil, the first thing that popped into my mind was Alex from* A Clockwork Orange*, but then again…he’s not really that film’s “Villian” in the traditional sense, is he…
Now Doctor Doom…there’s a Villian!
Oh, and Tuckerfan… stop spelling it Villian.
…next thing you know we’ll all be doing it. :smack:
Doctor Doom should be presented as more of a completely evil and scary force. The kind of guy that when he comes to town, every superhero craps their pants and wonders how the hell they’re supposed to stand a chance against him this time.
Gary Oldman and Christopher Walken played great villains in their small roles in True Romance: a disfigured pimp and a Sicilian hitman.
Alan Rickman as Hans Gruber in Die Hard is a classic.
Cliched to bring him up, but Anthony Hopkins as Hannibal Lecter is lots of fun. And as evil as he is, he’s usually not even the worst character in the movies!
Keyser Soze from The Usual Suspects is awesome, even if we don’t figure out who he is until the end. 
Tyler Durden from Fight Club ought to count too. 
Doh… actually I meant to do that, um, Vill-Ian McKellen is my vote. Yeah, that’s the ticket. :rolleyes:
Captain Hook - That he’s scared stiff of that croc is only the funnier!
Smee - The only villain you can hug!
Jafar - Just plain cool. Gotta love that staff!
Sauron - He’s an Evil Eye. What’s not to love.
Snape and Draco - They make me want to be a Slytherin!!
Darth Vader - So weak, yet so strong.
Mara Jade - Such a bi***, then WHOOSH to the Light side!
I vote for Ian McKellan as Francis Urquhart in House of Cards
Great villan, but wrong Ian. Ian Richardson was Francis Urquhart. I loved his evil wife, too but I can’t recall who played her.
Curses, my mistake.
Elizabeth Urquhart was played by Diane Flecher according to
http://www.tvheaven.ca/fu.htm
And I misspelled her name for good measure…
How about the original Cruella De Vil? She absolutely made me quiver in my seat. And Glenn Close’s take on it wasn’t too shabby either.
Ooooh, ooooh! I forgot Nurse Ratched, played by Louise Fletcher. :::eek!:::
Mojo Jojo - nothing better than a repititious villain. All the best villains are the ones that repeat what they say. There are no villains that rank above ones that say the same thing multiple times.
Susan
(me)
(who I am)
Hans Blofeld from the James Bond novels and movies. He’s been imitated and parodied so much that he’s become a cliche, but he started out original and powerful
Ferdy from The Collector. The only psychopath who isn’t a twitchy mess.
Moriarty from the Sherlock Holmes stories and movies. Once again, widely imitated.
Fu Manchu – implacable, relentless, ruthless, and always ready with a gloriously, needlessly complex plot to rule the world, or at least disturb it a little.
Kathleen Turner’s character in Body Heat. She was SOOOO bad!
Linda Fiorentino’s character in The Last Seduction. Ditto.
Oh, there are PLENTY of others but this’ll do for starters.
The Abominable Dr. Phibes, one of the really great disfigured madmen. Surgeon, Egyptologist, inventer, mystic. Kills 8 out of 9 victims recreating the plagues of Egypt. And he plays the organ too!
Well, you can’t find a more original villain than a guy with a big hat who summons giant monsters by pulling out its hair and drives a jeep accompannied by a guy in a coat with a funky voice that turns into a giant horned cross between a spider and a man that spits acid and has a mummy lackey who has a machine gun.
And gets killed by a 300-foot tall robot vampire from hell.
Try finding a show that has a more bizzarre villain than that.
hebe (can I call you hebe?) you’ve made my day.
Trelane from the original Star Trek series.
Has anyone here read Peter David’s novel Q-Squared?
The Brain, from “Pinky and the Brain.” He’s not the series’ villain, strictly speaking, but he’s cast in a villainous mold.
General Ino from the Doc Savage novel Ressurection Day. He was so good he was one of the few villains to outwit Doc. His chief assistant Proudman Shaster had a thing for decapitation. Not a pair you want to meet on the street.