I was going to add Cesar from Manon of the Spring, but he was more selfish and avaricious than evil. He blocked a spring in order to force a farmer to sell him his land. Ah, but there’s a character in Zola’s The Earth who qualifies – a wealthy old woman who worked her niece to death.
Jack Wilson in Shane is high up on the list of sociopathic hired guns. He would have killed without being paid. And that smile . . .
Porky Minch (from Mother 3) is, if not the most, at least a contender.
His plan is so sinister, so insidious, so thoroughly destructive and thought out that even though you are doing everything you can to stop it, you can frequently do nothing but gawp in fear and sadness. He rips out your (you the player!) heart in Chapter 1 and doesn’t give it back until after the end of the game.
DON’T READ IF YOU HAVEN’t PLAYED–SERIOUSLY
[spoiler]He doesn’t just destroy the village of Tazmilly, he sucks out its soul. Bit, by bit, by bit until there’s nothing left. He sees nothing wrong with destroying the world just because.
And his tendrils of evil snag lesser people too. He turned a magypsy–a being of pure magic! He turned a young boy into a robot and forced him to duel his twin brother to the death![/spoiler]
And through the whole thing, he tells you, repeatedly, that he has no goal other than his sick, twisted, amusement. He is evil.
Joffrey Baratheon - A Song of Ice and Fire
This little bastard stated torturing animals then moved to launching people from catapults. He was only twelve.
I swear, if Lucas sees your post and actually does that I will hunt you down. . .
Some great nominations so far: the Joker, Emperor Palpatine, Joffrey Baratheon, Keyser Soze and Mrs. Danvers are right up there. I’ll add Col. Tavington, the amoral, brutal, cunning British cavalry officer in the 2000 Mel Gibson film The Patriot, who was loosely based on this SOB: Banastre Tarleton - Wikipedia
How about Livia from I, Claudius?
I’ll see your Dudley Smith and raise you Noah Cross from Chinatown. I haven’t read Ellroy’s novels and only know Dudley Smith from the film version of LA Confidential but unless Smith also raped his daughter in the novels, I think Cross has him beat.
Buffalo Bill, from Silence of the Lambs.
Kathy Bates in Misery/. In her own little movie universe, she was totally evil.
Doctor Who’s the Master is pretty evil.
I’m having a hard time thinking of who is the most evil character. Darth Vader is probably not the most evil, and I would certainly say Palpatine surpasses him in the evil department, but he’s a better embodyment of evil, if you know what I mean. If you say “Name an evil character” to someone, Vader would be pretty high on the list of answers you’d get.
Mephisto is pretty evil, but is he the evilest? How about Superboy prime? He mucked a lot of stuff up with those reality altering punches. Heck, even Sgt Slaughter was pretty evil when he turned on his country to go against Hulk Hogan, but I admit that’s pretty far off target.
Louise Fletcher got death threats for years after her portrayal of Nurse Ratched and the bitch is even worse in the book!
Before the increasingly godawful sequels he was definitely on the short list: the Hannibal in Silence killed (the mediocre flautist) and maimed (the nurse for instance) for sport and amusement.
For comic, I’d posit Stewie Griffin- murderer, matricidal, abusive, manipulative.
A debate could be had as to whether a conscience is needed for real evil, for otherwise all sociopaths would be the same in all but number of kills.
Celie’s father in The Color Purple is up there as well. (Read spoiler before nitpicking.)
He’s actually her stepfather, but she doesn’t know it and he raises her from infancy before raping her so it’s no less a crime than incest.
Kate from E of E is certainly one of the most evil characters ever. And no explanation, unlike Darth Vader, who we can kind of follow what happened.
I’ve always felt Sauron was more evil than Melkor, because Sauron served evil, whereas Melkor wanted what he felt was his rightful kingship, and he had a reasonable case (not that I agree) for being the rightful king. Saruman comes off more evil than Melkor.
Anyway, I’m going go for Xenu, the CoS killer of trillions.
Good one, and Sian Phillips was perfect. (The “don’t touch the figs” scenes is one of the best in miniseries history.) Messalina (Sheila White) and Caligula (John Hurt) weren’t slackers either. Caligula had the slightly exonerating circumstance of being barking mad, and Livia the slightly “for consideration” aspect that some of her murders were for the state, but Messalina was purely motivated by selfishness. And Patrick Stewart’s Sejanus was also a great piece of work in the miniseries.
Don’t touch the figs from I CLAUDIUS.
Tom Hagen’s no slouch in the evil department. A horse’s head is bad but I don’t think Michael or Vito either one would have had a prostitute cut open to get at the senator.
Gotta disagree there about Michael. He was as much responsible as Tom. And Michael came to love using violence when he was justified. Tom didn’t feel he needed to wipe out all his enemies where Michael did. Tom knew that today’s enemies could be tomorrow’s allies.
I think that Morgoth needs to be higher on the list, here: He tormented Turin (and to a lesser extent, his sister) for his entire adult life, in every way imaginable, not for anything Turin ever did to him, but to punish Hurin his father, whom he had chained to a mountaintop and “gifted” with supernatural sight so as to see all the sufferings of his children. This doesn’t do anything to further the ambitions The Second Stone mentions, but is just pure and simple revenge.
This ought to be a feud.
The brackets could be:
Legendary/Historical
Movies/TV
Literature
Other (Comics, Video Games, etc.)
Hrmm. Very similar, but I think Saberhagen’s Berserkers were more evil. They were after any organic life and were often subtle in going about it.
Such callous disregard for the borders of the thread. Surely Der Trihs is the most evil character of all time!