Uh, whose idea was it to cast Jesse Eisenberg as Lex Luthor of all people? Eisenberg is known for a few movies, most of which he portrayed a stuttering, socially awkward guy who was incredibly smart. Lex Luthor is anything but – he’s suave, egotistical, successful, and his role model is himself.
See the issue? I understand not wanting to be typecast, but Eisenberg wasn’t the choice for one of the most memorable villains in the Superman franchise. You can’t really blame him for terrible acting since he was doing what he knew to do and what he got famous for.
The main issue with Whiplash is the guy that played him: Mickey Rourke. It isn’t that Rourke didn’t put time into the character. He did, and it showed in all his tatted-up, Russian glory. Rourke just played Whiplash like a mumbling, bumbling idiot.
Without subtitles, it was nearly impossible to understand anything said, which made him lose a lot of screen time. Less screen time is never a good thing for a villain. Honestly, Hammer Industries is a bigger villain in Iron Man than Whiplash.
The Green Lantern movie was one of the worst superhero films of all time, and I’m not saying that lightly. Even Ryan Reynolds makes fun of it. Naturally, Hector Hammond’s performance goes along with it. It’s impossible to forget that high-pitched screaming, but let’s focus on the real issue.
What I hated most about Hector Hammond was that he wasn’t really even portrayed as the bad guy throughout most of the film even though he was Hal’s direct foil. Peter Sarsgaard could have done a better job, but he played the character as if he was nothing more than a lackluster distraction.
Fantastic Four hasn’t really had a successful movie in three reboots – yes, three. The first of which is certainly the worst, however. Aussie actor Julian McMahon played Dr. Doom, which already seemed like a misfit from the start. It wasn’t really in his wheelhouse.
Then again, it could have been the director and producer’s fault with this one. Apparently, Jessica Alba was told that her crying was “too ugly” and that she had to be “prettier” when she cried. Maybe McMahon suffered the same kind of direction.
The only cool thing about Malekith the Accursed is his name. It’s a pretty awesome “evil” name, but everything else sucks pretty bad. The character is one of the most boring villains I’ve ever laid eyes on.
As far as supervillains go, Malekith had zero charisma or motivation. It’s part of what made this movie kind of suck next to the other Thor films. It certainly made Hela look like one of the most amazing villainesses out there (although she didn’t need Malekith for that).
How was Emma Frost even a villain? Supposedly, she’s the “secondary antagonist” of X-Men: First Class because she’s on Shaw’s team. Honestly, she didn’t even seem like that much of a bad guy, and she even swaps sides at the end of the film.
Granted, this is something she does throughout the comics, but there’s more time to expand on why. In the movie, she’s flakey at best and her reasonings fall flat. Emma Frost is great and could hold a movie on her own but trash this version.
Blackheart isn't the most memorable villain in Marvel, but that doesn't mean the character himself sucks. He's scary, demonic, and has some pretty awesome supernatural powers. In the Ghost Rider movie, he's something completely different. He's nothing more than a moody dude with pasty skin and a weird Russian accent.
His powers were also boiled down to a “lethal touch.” Honestly, Wes Bentley isn’t that strong of an actor. He can’t carry a movie as a villain on his own. That was made obvious in Hunger Games when President Snow was the puppet master behind Seneca. His performance was overall forgettable at best.
Here’s the deal with Apocalypse: everyone knew that the guy who portrayed him, Oscar Isaac, could act. He was in Star Wars, Inside Llewyn Davis, and Ex Machina. What gives? Apocalypse is supposed to be this bigger-than-life villain that’s on the same level as Thanos.
Instead, the character seemed nothing more than a B-movie villain that was no better than the killer donuts in Attack of the Killer Donuts. The script was the real villain here, and his performance was terrible because of it. Thankfully, it didn’t hurt Isaac’s career.
We had a perfect Green Goblin. No one will ever do better than Willem Dafoe because he looks like a goblin without makeup on already. He has the voice, the facial features, and the acting down pact. Then, The Amazing Spider-Man had to come in and nearly kill the Spider-Man series.
Peter Parker’s acting wasn’t nearly as terrible as Dane DeHaan. More work was put into his makeup than his performance. He did the usual threaten Peter’s love interest, but it was hard to focus on that when his ugly toad-like face was in the frame.
Where do we start with this one? First of all, Svetlana Khodchenkova is a pretty good actress – just watch Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. That being said, her portrayal of Viper was terrible. It had the worst dialogue in the entire movie, which really says something.
There were parts that were so awful and corny that my eyes rolled into another dimension. It doesn’t help that Viper had an uncomfortable resemblance to Uma Thurman's Poison Ivy. That’s not something you want to be compared to.
After The Winter Soldier, we all had hopes for a great movie. Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes was one of the best villain (anti-villain?) performances of all time. Then came Civil War. Honestly, we didn’t need Crossbones in the film. The villain was more or less the conflict among the Avengers team.
The acting wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great either. Frank Grillo put little effort into him, and that resulted in a forgettable character. I’m guessing you don’t even remember him popping up in the movie.
Honestly, there weren't many good villains from The Amazing Spider-Man series. Aside from Garfield's and Stone's chemistry, there wasn't much the movie could bring. The biggest issue with Lizard is that he isn't cohesive – he’s playing a variety of characters rather than one solid, rounded-out person.
He's a scientific genius, a crusading idealist, and then a huge Lizard that's hellbent on creating lizard people. Dr. Conners doesn’t seem like the kind of person that would want to turn New York into a bunch of lizards. It gets worse when you compare him to Doc Ock, who was undeniably one of the best villains in Raimi’s trilogy.
Plenty of people have railed on Jared Leto’s version of Joker. It was an…interesting interpretation of the character we’ve known for decades. While I don’t think it was as terrible as many people, it certainly didn’t stack up against Jack Nicholson (the King of Crazy) and the legendary Heath Ledger.
Now, that we have Joaquin Phoenix’s Joker, we know who’s really superior. Leto’s Joker seemed all-in-all unnecessary for the movie, which made his nonsense more aggravating than anything. Honestly though, the whole of Suicide Squad was unnecessary and terrible.
Mr. Freeze’s puns were chilling and not in a good way. Arnold isn’t that great of an actor, which is obvious by his series of terrible attempts in the ‘90s. We’re guessing they only added him as a joke, and it just kind of stuck.
The whole movie was an awful experience, but Mr. Freeze’s performance will stand as one of the worst I’ve ever seen. Maybe if he wasn’t stacked up against Uma Therman, it wouldn’t be so bad, but even she sucked.
Beating up on Daredevil almost feels like beating a dead horse, but nevertheless, we’ll continue. As bad as the film was, Bullseye was one of the worst parts. The character was funny, but he wasn’t even supposed to be that comedic.
Colin Farrell pumped the cheesiness up to 11 and rolled with whatever idea he had for Bullseye. This included an elaborate target carved into his forehead, which makes him possibly the least conspicuous assassin that ever existed.
The Matrix is a pretty good series, but the architect isn’t the reason this series succeeded. Any time he pops up on the screen, he’s boring. There’s sometimes I’ve thought about opening up a YouTube video of his rants just to fall asleep.
Okay, maybe I wouldn’t go that far, but it perfectly explains him. He also has this “smarter-than-thou” attitude which is incredibly cringey. Removing him from the movies would actually do justice to one of the best films ever made.
Lee Pace is a fantastic actor, and I’ll fight anyone who disagrees. The issue with his portrayal of Ronan is that it’s dull. It seemed to be mostly centered around the fact that the guy is big. Apparently, Lee Pace is a massive 6’5”. That’s not someone to mess with.
The problem was that he was opposite the Guardians and Chris Pratt. It was clear the movie focused more on them and not Ronan, meaning there was no way the performance would present a good villain. Think about how much time was spent on Loki? A ton. Ronan? Not so much.
Anyone that knows comic books knows that Frank Miller is incredibly talented...until it comes to movies. The Spirit was his only one so far to be directed solely by him, and The Octopus is a great example of how awful he is.
Samuel L. Jackson can only be described as "wacky" and not in a good way. He has zero powers and no real motive for being a bad guy. We know Jackson has talent, so what happened here? Apparently, Miller thought The Octopus could work on fancy clothes and guns alone.
Beating up on Batman & Robin is like going after low-hanging fruit, but you can’t deny that it deserves to be on this list. Everyone remembers Uma Therman from Pulp Fiction, and she was amazing in the film. That wasn’t something that transferred to this one.
Like many of the other performances in the movie, it was completely over-the-top – the dial was turned up to 11. The performance was supposed to be sexy, but it came off as crass and a little gross. Any good aspect was lost in a sea of one-liners and puns.
Maybe it’s because I have the luxury of looking back on other portrayals of Two-Face that have been spectacular, but maybe it’s just because Tommy Lee Jones plain sucked. Dent has a fantastic story, but did anyone care in the making of Batman Forever? Nah.
Even though his acting is beyond energetic, Jones didn’t put any effort into the character. It’s all about how loud he can be, which isn’t what Dent is about. There’s no excuse, and honestly, everyone involved should be ashamed.
Cara Delevingne is trying so hard to break into acting, bless her heart. She just isn’t good enough. Her performance as The Enchantress was just that. A better actor may have been able to carry Suicide Squad into…something slightly better than what it was – not award-winning, but not the dumpster fire it was.
The villain seems like nothing more than a mass-produced idea of what producers and directors think they should be, and Cara didn’t have the enthusiasm to make up for it. The most she gave the film was the hip action when she turned from Dr. Moon into Enchantress.
There are dozens of other guys that can play Venom, so why on earth did they pick Topher Grace? The actual image of Venom wasn’t terrible but choosing Grace and keeping his voice was a sin we’ll never forgive.
Apparently, Sam Raimi didn’t even want Venom in the movie, but the studio said to add him or else. Raimi really wanted to focus on Sandman, which is why his special effects and story were a million times better than Venom.
What can’t be said about Laurel Hadare? The movie itself was terrible, and Halle Berry knew as much when she accepted her rightfully earned Razzie. All of the shame isn’t on her shoulders, however. Laurel Hadare deserves a fair amount of criticism.
Even her justification for evil is incredibly stupid. The woman wanted to be young and beautiful. Who is she? Yazma from Emperor’s New Groove? Even her death was incredibly stupid. She wanted to die because her face was scratched. God, this whole character is stupid.
This is another decision that will baffle me until the end of time. Jamie Foxx as Electro? How does that make sense? They made it worse by dressing him up as a nerd and going so far that he was almost a caricature of the actual villain.
Electro is a pretty great villain. It’s obvious that no one had a clue what they were doing with the movie. Spiderman himself was the cool kid instead of the typical nerdy Peter Parker. Electro suffered from being needy, beyond clingy, and oh-so whiney.
Think of the worst villain you can think of. If you didn't think of Nuclear Man, you're wrong. The character never had a chance since the final Reeves version of Superman suffered from budget cuts after budget cuts. Throw in a huge script, and you have this knockoff bad guy.
Played by Mark Pillow, he looked like an '80s hairband reject. As if that wasn't bad enough, Gene Hackman was used to dub over the original dialogue, and he couldn't sound more bored. It was like the studio would’ve sued him if he didn’t do the voice over, so he did it with spite. The cherry on top of the sundae is that he needed constant sunlight to be viable.
What happened with the Mandarin? No, really. What happened? The Mandarin is actually a pretty awesome villain, but anyone that saw Iron Man 3 would walk away thinking otherwise. He’s supposed to be an amazing strategist, an absolute butt-kicking machine, and a literal genius.
Ben Kingsley was the chosen actor, who in all respects is phenomenal. He’s even won an Oscar. We’re guessing the director, Shane Black, decided to add a little “Twist” where The Mandarin was some drunken fool named Trevor. The twist never felt right, and we’ll never forgive him or Kingsley.
All I have to say about this one is, “uh….excuse me?” This movie was so awful that I regret going to the theater to see it (and this is being written during quarantine when I would kill to go to the movie theater).
About 20 minutes into the movie, it’s revealed that plants are killing everything. The most ominous shot of the plants is them blowing in the wind, which isn’t scary unless you have gnarly allergies. M. Night should’ve thought this one through.
My first question: What was the Super Mario Bros. movie? No one asked for it – or, at least, no one asked for that monstrosity. Then, worst of all, there was King Koopa. The movie didn’t need to be live-action and choosing Dennis Hopper to play Bowser?
The hair was cringey, but the tongue is what haunts my dreams. Dennis Hopper has been nominated for two Oscars, so what happened with Super Mario Bros.? His performance was awful, but you can only do so much with terrible writing and directing.
The story of Anakin Skywalker is great. A good guy turned evil because of some mad manipulation and protection of his love. Skywalker turns into the baddest baddie ever to grace the silver screen…or rather he’s supposed to.
Anakin, thanks to Hayden Christensen’s acting, comes off as whiney and unbearable. It’s so bad that his “I don’t like sand” monologue has become a running gag. Natalie Portman wasn’t that great, but she’s an Oscar-winning actress so there was clearly something going on behind the camera. Was this George Lucas’s fault?
The only question I have to ask is, “What was this?” The character started as Deadpool, which was something everyone wanted for ages. He was even played by Ryan Reynolds. Then, the film made him into some kind of monster created by Dr. Frankenstein.
This movie nearly killed Deadpool, and it killed the Origins franchise that was going to come about. It’s honestly hard to pick out one bad thing about Weapon XI. He was supposed to be Deadpool – you know, the Merc with the Mouth – but they sewed his mouth shut! They also took away his personality, another huge thing for Deadpool. Overall, the whole character was a parody of the original.
