Top Ten Tuesday: DC Villains

Zack Snyder’s Justice League is out later this month on HBO Max, and it features the supervillain Darkseid. It gets you thinking about DC’s top villains, and today’s Top Ten Tuesday counts them down. [Note: Catwoman easily could have been included and likely would be top five, but she was left off as more of an anti-hero than the other villains.]

 

10. Scarecrow

The Riddler (who might shoot up into the ranking if Paul Dano has a strong showing in The Batman, which it looks like he might based off the first teaser trailer), General Zod, Poison Ivy, Black Adam, and Brainiac were among the DC villains that could have also made the top ten, but Scarecrow gets the No. 10 spot after Cillian Murphy played him for all three films of The Dark Knight Trilogy. Scarecrow also has the Halloween-like aspect to him, giving one of Batman’s oldest enemies a boost.

 

9. Harley Quinn

Harley Quinn first appeared in Batman: The Animated Series and hasn’t been around for three decades yet, but she’s already gone on to become one of the most popular comic-book characters in the world. The romantic interest of the Joker, Quinn has become a staple in video games and movies; and thanks in part to the job Margot Robbie has done with the character on the big screen, she can stand alone as one of DC’s top assets.

 

8. Two-Face

Another one of Batman’s original villains, Two-Face also gets a boost from the sensational job Aaron Eckhart did playing the part in all-time classic film The Dark Knight. The premise for Two-Face—formerly Gotham District Attorney Harvey Dent—is simple enough: a flip of the coin determines the fate of those in his path. Billy Dee Williams (as just Dent) and Tommy Lee Jones have also played the character.

 

7. Penguin

Oswald Cobblepot helps represent some of the other mobster villains in the DC universe. The look of the Penguin is iconic, as he usually dons a tuxedo—complete with a top hat, monocle, and sometimes a cigarette—along with an umbrella that also serves as a weapon. Danny DeVito played Penguin in distinct style for Tim Burton’s Batman Returns, and Colin Farrell will play the Batman rogues gallery baddy in The Batman.

 

6. Bane

Bane breaks Batman’s back as one of the rare adversaries that has gotten the best of the Caped Crusader, so not much more needs to be said. Like Harley Quinn, Bane originated in the early 1990s but has become one of the most well-known villains in the world. Tom Hardy played the monstrous and menacing figure in The Dark Knight Rises, concluding Christopher Nolan’s trilogy in epic fashion.

 

5. Doomsday

Similarly, but on a higher level, Doomsday kills Superman (in The Death of Supermanas well as Batman v. Superman: Dawn of Justice); so this one is pretty simple. The nearly unstoppable opponent of Superman and the Justice League belongs in the top five among DC’s best villains.

 

4. Ra’s al Ghul

Ra’s al Ghul is one of the more complicated villains for Batman and other DC characters, and the directions his stories can go makes him more intriguing. Often, Ra’s uses Lazarus Pits to heal up and stay alive while living for centuries. Christopher Nolan took things in a more realistic direction in his saga, making the League of Shadows live on while bringing back the character via hallucinations and flashbacks after Batman Begins. Also, Ra’s al Ghul’s daughter Talia complicates matters given her relationship with Bruce Wayne.

 

3. Darkseid

We’ll finally get a live-action Darkseid in film later this month with the Snyder Cut, and it’s long overdue. Those that saw Marvel’s latest Avengers movies featuring Thanos can think of Darkseid (Thanos is based on him) as a similar character but clearly more powerful (and probably less human-like and more evil). The tyrannical ruler of Apokolips conquers worlds and shows no mercy, and it’ll be interesting to see how much he actually gets in on the action later this month.

 

2. Lex Luthor

The archenemy of Superman gets the No. 2 spot among DC’s best villains. Lex Luthor has been around for 80 years, and he’s often been a thorn in the side of both Kal-El alone and the Justice League as a group. As the CEO of LexCorp, Luthor has near-unlimited resources, and he uses them to take Superman down a notch because of the contempt he holds for the alien being—though they will work together if it comes down to it for the good of Earth.

 

1. Joker

No. 1 on the list should come as no surprise. The Joker is seen by many as the best villain in history for any genre—not just comic books. The great Jack Nicholson, the late Heath Ledger (who won an Oscar for his portrayal in The Dark Knight), and Joaquin Phoenix (also won an Oscar for the role in Joker) helped take the character to another level in classic blockbusters, and the comic storylines featuring the Joker are as good as it gets.