Amph Census Favorite Villains of the Animated Disney Canon? (1998-2010)

Picking up again where we left off:
-part one
-part two
-full list

Up to 3 votes.



This is an easy one for me (there are just a lot of duds in villains here, especially in the middle)
1. Mother Gothel (sinister, gaslighting, manipulating, kidnapping, just such a twisted relationship)
2. John Silver (ambiguous, compelling, charismatic)
3. Dr. Facilier (traditional unapologetic, and entertaining, evil)

Honorable mentions:
- Yzma (very entertaining, just not taken seriously enough by the movie itself, but I guess kind of like Prince John in Robin Hood except he does it better... I should probably rewatch the movie sometime)
- Shan Yu (just terrifying, but hardly in it and silent, more like a force of nature)
- Clayton (very human evil, goes "feral," but Ratigan does it better)
- Lyle Rourke & Helga Sinclair (very similar to Clayton, who does it better, but all have such dark deaths)
- the Firebird (just cool and dangerous, but no Chernabog)

personal disclaimer: Home on the Range is one of the few Disney movies I've never seen (along with the Wreck-it-Ralph's to come). And I hardly remember Bolt or Chicken Little. (Meet the Robinsons is cool and underrated, same with Dinosaur and Brother Bear, but not as much in the actual villain department for me. Brother Bear's mature drama/conflict though...)





And if you haven't seen the movie, trust me, Mother Knows Best

 

I think Yzma is quite different from Prince John, so I don't think they compete. So she's top villain for me. Then Facilier nails it with the best villain song of the era, then I went with Rourke because I was torn between Rourke and Mother Gothel, but I can't listen to Mother Knows Best without hearing Bernadette Peters singing Children Will Listen and winning that match-up. May not be fair, but it's what happens, so I let that tip me towards the movie I expected would get fewer votes otherwise.

 

This was by far the easiest set to pick from.

Disney villains ain't what they used to be.

 

Gotta give a shout out to Zira who was way more memorable than a straight to VHS sequel villain had any right to be. My Lullaby is a top five villain song to me.

 

I only picked one from this list. I've always thought of him as a "likable" villain for sure.

 

There's still at least one more "era" to finish it up! I actually think the most recent ones have even more duds. Even with the success of Frozen... does anyone like it because it has a memorable villain? It's just the twist. And I wonder if anyone can ever name another 3 villains from 2011-2024 without looking it up and checking the list first.

For sure! Now you're making me tempted to do a poll on those Renaissance-era direct to VHS sequels. But Zira would probably be a clear winner, the organ maestro from the Beauty & the Beast "interquel" was scary but that story doesn't come close. The return of Lady Tremaine was done very well too, Jafar's return could have been better but I remember really like Aladdin and the King of Thieves. Somewhat Little Mermaid sequels. And that's when Aladdin, Little Mermaid, and Hercules had TV show prequels/sequels too...

 

Shan Yu is pretty underrated. A ruthless, utterly no nonsense force of nature and Miguel Ferrer is terrific. Also:

“How many men does it take to deliver a message”

“One.”

 

Had to go look that up.

 

For me, the first two polls were hard because I saw the majority of those films and had too many to choose from outside of the one obvious one from each (Maleficent and Frollo). This one has the most I've either never seen or only saw once years ago. At least I had the one I knew I was going to pick for this one: Dr. Facilier (funny enough, not the last time Keith David would voice a character in a frog-themed animated Disney project.)

 

Definitely very cold. On another day, maybe Shan Yu or Yzma would be up there with Mother Gothel. If it was simply a "force of nature" villains poll with all of them, it would probably just be Shan Yu and the Fantasia villains and the Horned King.

You mean you didn't have lyrics like these snippets in your lullabies?

The sound of Simba's dying gasp
His daughter squealing in my grasp
His lionesses' mournful cry
That's my lullaby


The melody of angry growls
A counterpoint of painful howls
A symphony of death, oh my!
That's my lullaby


The pounding of the drums of war!
The thrill of Kovu's mighty roar!
The joy of vengeance!
I can hear the cheering
Payback time is nearing
And then our flag will fly
Against a blood-red sky!
That's...my...lulla...by!​

 

All I could hear was...

This is an awful rip off of "Be prepared!"
You bought this b-rate cash grab nightmare,
Enjoy the second rate song team's opus to horror.
And they shall go where no one else dared!

And the performance and music are probably even worse.

That MOVIE might rank as a Disney villain.

 

As I posted in the Batman villain thread, my avatar is Boba Fett so my opinions on this matter clearly can’t be trusted.

 

THAT is what your avatar is?

I always thought it was like a messy card table with a spot light on a deck of cards in the middle.

Funny, the tricks your mind can play.

 

Definitely Shadow Man. He was creepy, and met a fitting end.

 

Facilier is really a throwback, just a charismatic scene chewing smooth talker that can also be terrifying when he needs to be. Really the last of what I’d consider the classical Disney villain mold as recently they’ve switched over to “the real villain is generational trauma” as their go to.

Plus I’m an absolute sucker for the Faustian bargain/ Devil at the crossroads type character trope so he’s just great.

 

"I'll turn him into a flea, a harmless, little flea, and then I'll put that flea in a box, and then I'll put that box inside of another box, and then I'll mail that box to myself, and when it arrives...I'll smash it with a hammer!"

It's Yzma, and it's not even close

 

Why do we even have that lever?

 

"That's impossible! How did you get back here before us?"
"Uh, how did we, Kronk?"
"You got me. By all accounts, it doesn't make sense."

 

"For the last time, we did not order a giant trampoline"

 

You guys are starting to convince me I should rewatch the Emperor’s New Groove sooner than later

Really? It’s on the same level as Be Prepared, maybe a little better.

I thought your avatar was some abstract art of some person reaching out to the sun in a green sky…

 

Oh man, I don't even know if I should vote in this one. Only saw Mulan, Princess and the Frog, and Tangled, and only once each so I barely remember them. Three of them (Meet the Robinsons, Bolt, and Chicken Little) I don't even know... those are Disney movies? I guess this was, indeed, a weird time for the company. Or else I was just completely out of the loop.

 

What I have learned from these pols is that I have not watched much Disney animation since the 70's.

 

Every time I read Kronks lines I hear Patrick Warburton speaking it. It was perfect casting for that role.

 

It was the era where PIXAR dominated.

While Disney Animation studio was releasing Treasure Planet or Home of the Range...Pixar was releasing Incredibles, Monter's Inc, Finding Nemo, Cars...

It was a second tier outfit for a good 15+ years as Pixar became the go to studio for hit films and iconic characters to merchandise to infinity and beyond.

It was only when Frozen hit it big that Disney Animation started getting back up there again.