This might sound like an odd choice but Suzaku Kururugi from Code Geass. For those who’ve watched tge show, the you’ll probably note that Suzaku isn’t technically a villain but a protagonist opposing the main protagonist, or perhaps even an idealistic antagonistic but that would be a stretch to many.

Suzaku, though framed in the show as an idealist with iron clad morals qho happens to be on the wrong side of a war, is in my opinion the most well executed deconstruction of liberal hypocrisy. I do not think the writers intended as much,in fact I think they are extremely libbed up, however I think that earnestness really bleeds through into the charecter, and for that reason it’s extremely apparent the pitfalls of liberalism.

So I’ll give some context on Suzaku without spoilers, though I’ll utilize them if I see fit later.

In the world of Code Geass the world is divided up among three (more like 2 and another block) global powers. The EU (the weakest), the Chinese Federation (not important for this discussion) and the largest and most powerful, the Holy Britainian Empire, also known simply as Britania. Britainia is basically if the Britsh crown fled to the non-independent American colonies, and then made that the new homeland and then going on to colonize even greater portion of the Americas and the world. The place where the story takes place is of course Japan, who was at first a neutral party that was eventually conquered and colonized by Britania.

Suzaku Kururugi is the son of the former prime Minister of Japan, who initially refused to surrender to Britainia, until eventually passing, causing the surrender of Japan and the state of affairs seen in the series. Suzaku goes on to join the Britannian military after the occupation, going through a program which grants citizenship to Japanese in enchange for their millitary service. This grants them the title of “Honorary Britainian” and is seen by Britainian’s as a “progressive” program instituted by the current Viceroy of Japan, a prince named Clovis.

So already you can probably see where animosity may stem in regards to Suzaku. He’s unquestionably selling his body and soul to the military machine currently colonizing and subjugating his people along with all their resources. I should mention as well that after the Britannian take over, it’s forbidden for Japanese people from even using the name Japanese, instead being referred to as “Elevens” based on the label that Britainia assigned to Japan, which they do with all their colonized territory. So Suzaku essentially works as a lapdog for an empire which literally denies the existence of his nation’s identity.

This would all be bad enough, however what makes Suzaku such a decrepit charecter is the fact that he postures himself as having the moral high ground throughout the story. He consistently belittles other Japanese for taking up armed resistance for not “working within the system” to change things. He constantly declares that ends don’t justify the means, while dutifully following every order given to him, justifying it by saying he’s trying to rise up the system and change Britannia from within. He commits or aids Britannia in committing various atrocities, on the scale of ethnic cleansing even, while declaring that the “terrorists” that he’s fighting against are at fault for Britannia’s crackdowns.

It should now be extremely obvious why I view him as a “villian” regardless of how the writers try to portray him. The show frames Suzaku as a moral paragon by comparison to his foil in Lelolouch, the series protagonist, who is more than willing to use ruthless tactics to achieve his ends. However when you tally up the damage that Suzaku does by being an imperial bootlicker, it’s so very clear that Suzaku is probably one of the most blood stained charecters in the show (and that’s not exactly am easy award to win).

I’ll go into spoilers now.

Some Examples:

These aren’t even all the examples I could give, nor are they they even all the worst. Yet Suzaku is supposedly the naive idealist trope instead of one of the most repugnant back stabbers to ever grace a screen.

His justifications for siding with the powerful, along with his adamant insistence that he’s actually morally justified compared to his enemies, leads to one of the most clear cut examples of how diseased liberalism can be. I can guarantee, if you’ve ever spoken to a liberal, eitheir in person or online, Suzaku is an almost perfect distillation of those people. A bootlicking moral grand stander who status quo’s his way into working against every ideal he supposedly purports.

Suzaku Kururugi is remarkably accurate to how real world liberals, particularly those from marginalized backgrounds, interact with the world and lend creed to colonizers.

He is honestly my favorite charecter in the show becuase of how much I despise him. It’s such a transparent interpretation of liberal idealism that I can’t help but adore how blatantly he lays the cards onto the table. I love having a rhetorical punching bag, and for a story to make me feel so viscerally enraged I must declare my admiration for their writing, even if I’m sure it was entirely unintentional.

Mr. Krabs

It’s hard to pick just one but I’ll go with one who doesn’t get the respect he deserves as a character: Anton Castillo from Far Cry 6.

Say what you will about the game but I was genuinely surprised that the villain was dismissed by so many. Aside from being played by a brilliant actor who delivered a fantastic performance his character is quite honestly one of the best depictions of a fascist dictator I’ve ever seen in fiction - and especially video games. Whatever other problems the game may have Ubisoft at least got its depiction of fascism very accurate.

Too many attempts at creating fascist-coded villains end up making them too intelligent or too crazy and they become unbelievable archetypes as a consequence. FC6 did not do this with Castillo; he is the perfect example of the kind of populist pseudo-intellectualism the far right loves littered with all the same hypocrisy and ruthlessness that actual fascist leaders have historically had - as well as an appropriate, believable level of cowardice and incompetence while still maintaining the illusion of a charismatic strongman.

I don’t know if he’s the ‘best’ Far Cry villain overall but he’s definitely the most realistic.

I really hated Castlevania’s seasons 3 and 4, but Camilla made for a very good parallel to how the imperialist bourgeoisie act upon destroyed states. During season 2 she acts as Dracula’s vampire rival, who wishes to keep humans as livestock rather than kill them all. After Dracula gets defeated and his human genocide is stopped, she exploits the chaos and power vacuum to try and conquer a corridor in Eastern Europe as her personal feasting grounds.

She’s completely uninterested in higher concepts such as “whether humans should exist” or any such thing. She’s simply a vampire that takes that to its logical conclusion. She doesn’t care if humans are good or bad, all she wants is to leech off of their blood while growing her domain ever further, and gives no fucks that the world is ending. Carmilla isn’t evil, she’s just doing what a vampire does.

I have no time to come up with a villain for that criteria. However, I will say that the terrifying villain could not rely on plot armor or fictional circumstances to achieve their agenda. They should not be Trump make a slow victimization of privileged groups with advantages to combat the victimization. They should not be like Donald Trump who make overt aggression, picks on the strong countries, made the strong countries suffer from the same US aggression as weak countries, and make gradually increasing aggression that gives the victims’ time to properly deal with the tariff.

That mad scientist villain on the M3: The Dark Metal anime can be terrifying for the lack of reliance on overpowered capability. That villain relies more on luck and circumstances for his evil agenda. The Monogatari anime series has a con-man that uses tricks that can work in real life. An example is the decision to spread supernatural rumour in a time at a place when no other supernatural rumour competes with it to ensure effective spread of the desired rumour. The first antagonist of Unbreakable Machine-Doll manga use charismatic charm and fear of overpowered villain in the scapegoating scehem while hiding the role of authority for the serial murder. The evil mastermind in Kubikiri Cycle use the focus on serial murder scheme, savant abilities, and exotic interests to hide a more realistic murder act for more conventional gain.

There is no fictional villain who comes even close to the villains that exist in the real world.

western economic system is fiction

Moralintern/Mercenaries from Disco Elysium

Edit: Actually scratch the Mercenaries. They’re “just” racist murderers. The moralintern, in propagating a murderous system they will defend with nuclear weapons which is slowly but surely destroying the world is much more terrifyingly relevant. Although it’s so relevant they might be disqualified from the list for literally just being capitalists

I havent seen that one but narcissism is a normal and imho inevitable reaction to the disgusting system we live in. It is villified in liberal literature while the contents of narcissism are the exact ones of the system itself. Chauvinism, hypocracy, complete denial of responsibilities is what every smart person will fall into if they dont have strong theory. I’ve been there and left it behind because I saw that its just me trying to survive in a comletely antisocial system.

To be fair, I will have to reframe most of my movie opinions because of marxism. I think smith from matrix is very fitting and relevant to the current reoccurence of capitalist violence (fascism).