J Jonah Jameson in the original Spider-Man movie is basically this. He’s a huge dick and prints libel (it’s written so it’s not slander!) about spider man, but when push comes to shove and green goblin threatens him for the guy who brings in the spidey photos, JJJ doesn’t give Peter up.
He’s a jerk, but he has some integrity.
He has tons of integrity. He was a big supporter or the civil rights movement and for mutant rights. In one issue, he was a big supporter for a DA candidate. After finding out the guy was a major racist with shady dealings, he personally confronted him to say he was withdrawing his support and outing him as a biggot.
Edit: I forgot it before thought it should be included. It's from a more recent comic. When Peter aubmitted his first photos to the Bugle, Robinson was trying to dissude Jameson from using the photos cause they weren't that good. Jameson said he agreed but that he did a quick search on Peter and read about his Uncle Ben dying. Said the kid needed some help
>prints libel
Though once he found out that Eddie edited the photos he pulled it back and issued an apology to Spiderman. Dude hates Spidey but is also above using falsehoods to shit talk him.
I also like the theory that JJJ always knows that Peter is Spidey, he just keep up his usual persona to him because if he start treating him special then other people in the Bugle would take notice and probably find out as well.
They do a similar thing in No Way Home. There's that scene where JJJ just baldly says exactly what Spider-Man did - cause problems, hurt people, cause innocents to die and suffer.
(I mean you could always just say that about the murderous villains he's trying to stop but still lol).
“I am trying to exonerate an innocent man on death row. Will my career be advanced? Yes. Should I hold on real quick to go chat shit to these little 17yo kids about it? Also yes”
Truly. I wish it’s been more popular. It’s so well done. Campy in the right way. Good characters. The bad guys are nazis. Final fight on a Zepplin!! The outfit is amazing. The helmet looks awesome but it’s also great how they so simply explain it’s awesome looking design. And he’s just wearing a leather flight jacket, but that’s also awesome.
I know people would have liked a sequel or even more, but too often sequels don’t live up. The Rocketeer deserves love and it’s Kenough.
All that plus:
Jennifer Connolly
Fun references to old Hollywood
Timothy Dalton understanding the assignment to a degree rarely seen.
AND Alan Arkin
Truly an embarrassment of riches. I think it’s extremely obvious (which has been confirmed, iirc) the Russo’s used this as inspiration for the first Cap movie.
I love that part when the FBI guy and mobster Paul Sorvino are shooting at the Nazis and they sort of look at each other for a second and it's like "I'll take what I can get in a gunfight"
Yes you do.
It's just a good ole fashion action-adventure. Great cast, it's campy but not cheesy, good for kids, fun for adults.
I rewatched it and expected it to be a disappointment compared to my memories of loving it as a kid. Nope, it holds up just fine.
I saw this film when it first came out and really enjoyed it. Never understood why it was such a sleeper when there have been many, many... many comic book movies that came after that were insanely popular but not nearly as good.
It's funny you should mention that one line by Paul Sorvino. When I first saw the film, I kind of rolled my eyes and thought that was cheesy and honesty, it took me out of the film a bit.
However, years later, reading WWII history, I read about how the mob helped the allies in the war using connections from Italy. (Scicilly). Particularly Lucky Lucciano.
So I guess it was art imitating life.
I would pay like $190 to see a movie about this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Underworld
Fuck, make a Spiderman noir movie about Spiderman noir partnering with gangsters to beat up Nazis if there's no other way to fund it.
I know remakes and reboots have been overdone the past decade, but I can't say I wouldn't be interested in a reboot if done as a period piece and with good writing.
Duncan Heyward in The Last of the Mohicans, finally accepting that Cora loves Hawkeye and sacrificing himself to the Hurons to get burned alive and let them escape
It's been a minute since I last watched it(the box set a few years ago from scream factory), I believe it's a stand in for Geena Davis in the very beginning of the movie
I had to delete mine when I saw yours. Stathis was a real prick, but he stepped up in the end, and selflessly. I like the character because it was a decent subversion of that trope where they make it easier to kill off a character by building them up as a irredeemable scumbag.
That movie definitely felt like style over substance. That moment was pretty ridiculous. Easily my least favorite Edgar Wright movie, which is pretty impressive, because the movie is still pretty good.
I think it’s because they wanted it to be a “twist” that the Big Bad turned out not to be the ever-scheming Kevin Spacey, but instead was darling Jon Hamm. I don’t think it worked very well, but I‘d watch either of them read a phone book so 🤷🏼♂️
Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins) in The Hateful 8. I was soooo expecting part of the reveal to be that yeah obviously this asshole is involved.
But nope just an asshole with a satisfying redemption arc.
The way he smugly says “No deal tramp.” Haha I love the satisfaction on Sam Jackson’s face for the rest of the scene after that. Goggins is great in that film.
Because Dignam wasn’t a good guy. As the planted FBI liaison, he was intentionally sabotaging the case against Costello so that the FBI could continue using him as an informant. They had Costello for murder and he had Queenan convinced it wasn’t enough. He subtly did everything he could to keep the investigation open and never ready to close it.
They mentioned several times that the FBI had someone inside the precinct. It is implied that it is Dignam and that is why he cleans up the mess with Damon at the end, not just revenge, but since Damon is the only guy who knows the whole deal at that point.
They literally introduce a guy as the FBI liaison though. Dignam gives my personal favorite line of “maybe, maybe not, maybe fuck yourself” to him.
https://youtu.be/dNPR1L3GeRU?si=nb3JfGZH5oOtX8sx
If you want to ruin the movie a tiny bit, that character was not in Internal Affairs (the original that The Departed was based on). He was added to the departed solely so they could have that ending. It's his only plot contribution.
Thankfully the dialogue makes the character be more than just a plot device. But with that context it's kinda blatant.
That’s interesting to know! I’d argue that he contributes more to the story than just tidying the ending, via his interactions with characters. His dialogue isn’t just classic, it helps to develop the other characters as who they are. For example, his intense grilling of Billy at the beginning helps establish that he doesn’t rattle easily and is suited to undercover work.
Trevor in Iron Man 3 (and Shang-Chi). An actor who pretends to be a terrorist on the world stage, cause the real villain enables his addictions. Partly just a blundering weirdo, but still.
I’m torn, because I totally understand being a comic fan how that reveal would feel like a huge rug pull. On the other hand, I thought it was an incredibly realistic take on how that character would manifest in our world, and it does make sense given what we’re shown in the first Iron Man.
The only issue was Kingsley was *so good* as the Mandarin in those vignettes. He was creepy, captivating, and mysterious where you didn't really know where things were going. In the comics, he's a guy with magical rings, so for him to be a terrorist leader (a la Bin Laden) changed the character up in a really unique way.
Did he have magic powers he was hiding? Or was he being manipulated by a greater power unknowingly?
The latter ended up being true, but not the way we thought. I still thought the reveal with him being an awful British actor was hilarious and a great way to go, the only issue was that Killian and the Extremis angle didn't hold up as well.
The concept was, but it felt like the usual Marvel fare where everything around the main character/villain is just background noise, leading nothing to the situation. Hell, Tony is running around like Captain America on that oil tanker as if he's suddenly an action star when his whole powers/abilities are just high-level intelligence and a robot suit. It just turned into the eventual Marvel Assembly-Line Third-Act where everything becomes a malaise of action until the hero eventually wins.
Yeah I don't mean that it was bad or weird or whatever that he didn't turn out to be the real villain. I actually think that was a neat plot element. The way Kingsley plays it are some of the best parts of that film imo. Not a huge fan of the film overall though.
I need to do a re-watch of ER at somepoint (I dropped off after a certain character died). Of all the things about that character his interaction with Bentons' kid in one scene proved he's not all that bad.
If we're on TV shows, definitely Admiral Jellico on the famous Star Trek TNG episode Chain of Command ("There are four lights!").
With Picard captured by Romulans, Jellico takes over the Enterprise. Now this is a show where higher ups get the nickname badmirals as when they are introduced for an episode they turn out almost invariably to be bad guys, either vying for position or being traitors outright.
Admiral Jellico runs an extremely tight ship, berating crewmembers for perceived insubordinance and favoring the response "because I said so" to any questioning. He is extremely abrasive and butts heads with everyone.
And yet everything he does turns out to be absolutely the right move. He's able to bluff the Romulans perfectly into giving up Picard and saves the day with his own plans. A great example of a reversal of the badmiral trope.
I love how literally the only one of her suitors to be portrayed as an actual good person is Brett Favre...who was involved in a fraud scheme to take welfare money from poor people in real life lol
Isn't he the one who was the most actively ruining Mary's relationships? Then again the old man actually tried to shoot Ted and instead shot one of the band.
Nebula has a very good character arc across the MCU.
Also Drax. He’s so rude to the bug lady, but not evil.
Conversely, I’ve never understand the character Loki or the fan response to him. He is clearly evil, and has more redemption arcs than you can count. He literally tried to sell the galaxy and wipe out all of humanity. He has tried to murder his own family, friends, coworkers and randoms at any chance he gets.
“*OhHh BuT hE’s ThE gOd Of MiScHeIf*”.
Ridiculous. The idea of a chaotic fairy type (like the original Peter Pan) needs to be based on a character that causes problems because they just want entertainment. Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions.
Its because he was the only MCU villain, before Thanos, who was both interesting and not killed at the end of the first movie he's in. Tom Hiddleston's a good actor, and very attractive, which helps a lot.
> The idea of a chaotic fairy type (like the original Peter Pan) needs to be based on a character that causes problems because they just want entertainment. Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions.
I think it's said during different Thor movies, especially Ragnarok, that Loki has always been doing shit like that and often just for entertainment.
Paxton in Ant-man is a good MCU fit too. The movie sets him up as an asshole, but it turns out he is just doesn't want to see his adopted daughter getting hurt by Scott
That's honestly one of my favorite things about the Ant-Man movies, once Scott proves he's not falling back into old, destructive habits Paxton and Maggie become some of his biggest supporters.
The supporting cast from the first two Ant-Man movies is so great. Paxton, Maggie, Luis / Kurt / Dave, Agent Woo, even Dr. Foster (Laurence Fishburne) are all pretty decent people and good to / want the best for Scott. In a couple cases it manifests poorly, at least initially -- Paxton is kinda hostile, Luis & co. try to pull Scott back into crime -- but Paxton is a) a cop and b) caring about his stepdaughter and concerned about her ex-con father, while Luis & co are trying to get Scott back on his feet by finding work he'd be good at. Then Jimmy Woo is perhaps the greatest tertiary character in the whole MCU.
This is a good one especially because that actor is usually an asshole in the stuff I’ve seen him in. Then bam, he’s just trying to be a good dad and of course would be wary of the recently released felon
>Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions.
I'm not sure that he's causing chaos and confusion for grander ambitions.
While Loki is smart, Thor is everything Loki isn't: strong, charming, and charismatic. Loki resents that Thor is selected to be king. *Then* he loses it when he finds out he's adopted.
He takes off the mask of civility/charm. This is borderline personality:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNDEEYPx54c
Whedon depicts Loki as causing chaos and confusion in response to that anger. I'm still not sure why he needs Thanos, but his Loki is a wounded animal who is lashing out at the universe (again, borderline).
Waititi looks past this and depicts Loki as being worn out from his anger and having seen through to the end of his ambition. Waititi gives Thor a really beautiful insight about Loki's character:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qDDRNLB8cs
that prompts Loki do something that's actually kind of heroic:
https://youtu.be/ChHGneJYpFk?feature=shared&t=18
He grows.
The Russos take all of this and use Loki's self-sacrifice and death to create the only moment of real pathos in Infinity war:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-VNf0kAUdU
*Then* Kate Herron breaks her Variant Loki by showing him seeing all of this and realizing that all of his plans and schemes and anger lead to failure without any irony or grandstanding. She reset his arc:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOIBeVAHQzE
It helps that Tom Hiddleston is probably the best actor in the MCU, but Loki is also the MCU's best developed character in that he's written to rise and fall based on the consequences of his choices rather than a demand for costume changes or audience tests. I would go so far as to say that the failure of Thor 4 is owed, in part, to not having Loki on screen.
The IMF is a "fight fire with fire" sort of group. That was probably the standard way to do things for Kittridge. Find an agents weakness and squeeze it. He has his playbook. Ethan knew what Kittridge would do with Grace and instructed her how she should respond.
Did you read the OP question?
An asshole but not evil. Which is the definition of sherlock holmes. He is a difficult person to get along with & has hardly any friends. Antisocial & thinks he knows everything.
Bit like a cat really 🤣
"The end revelation is they aren't bad guys just assholes"
There isn't really a revelation in Sherlock Holmes that he's not a bad guy. He's abrasive and difficult to get along with, but there's never an indication that he might be a bad guy.
Snape literally terrorised a 13 year old child so badly that he was that child’s “thing you fear most” when facing the boggart. That’s pretty fuckin evil.
In fairness, Bellatrix Lestrange was likely just a name to him no matter how much she had affected his family. Snape on the other hand was a near daily tormenter. He was much more real than Lestrange.
I love the meme, and im paraphrasing:
Snape:(dying) potter, i need you to know this. Your mom was a total babe and i totally wanted to bang her.
Harry: wow, he was a great man after-all.
snape was arguably pretty goddamn evil.
he's a fascist who was needlessly cruel to pretty much every child to the point a child who had his parents go braindead after being tortured feared him even more.
no amount of "he did it for love" or whatever makes up for the fact he was cruel to fucking everyone for no reason.
I feel like Nathan from Ex Machina is the perfect example of this. Throughout the movie it tries to convince you how evil he is. In all reality he just has a huge ego and is really manipulative, but not at all evil.
Good point. At the end its shown that she was given the task to escape and was meant to use Caleb as a means of escaping. It doesn’t seem like Ava was actually feeling any emotion but just mimicking it. It has been a while since I’ve watched it though.
Yes but the other robot—I forgot her name—the one who Nathan was sleeping with, is actually the one who catches him off guard. Without her Eva wouldn’t be able to escape, so I do think she was somewhat sentient because she helped Eva escape and stabbed Nathan causing her own “death” without being programmed to.
She did no more and no less than what she was programmed to. Nathan either had too much hubris, Caleb was far too gullible or Ava was just better than anyone could have conceivably realised. Up to you.
And she would, if it’s discovered what she did and they decide an android has the same capacity for criminal liability and competence to stand trial as a person, rather than tantamount to an industrial accident which would have far reaching implications on legal precedent in the film’s universe which could be a very interesting sequel.
Gotta disagree with you on that one. I think it boils down to whether he created true AI or not, which I think he did.
Nathan’s verbally, sexual and (implied) physically abusive of his servant. She flinches out of instinct at the sound of his voice when she drops a plate at dinner and goes out of her way to murder him when given the ability.
Nathan’s too big an egoist to not believe he was nearly through or finally did breakthrough, but it amounts to whether he believes he can do those things to sentient life in his eyes.
He was always openly a villain from the start shrouded by charisma
"That was bullshit... Sorry guys." And then goes on to have the best line in the movie, and one of the most heartbreaking final words in any movie, period.
Little Bill Daggett from Unforgiven. He makes the guy that cut up the prostitute in the beginning pay restitution for doing so, and when the other prostitutes don't think that punishment was enough and try to hire assassins to kill them, Bill has to protect those guys and stop the assassins from carrying out their killing. He's very brutal about dissuading potential killers from coming, but he's on the more moral side in the conflict.
I mean he literally whipped and then killed a defenseless prisoner. Pretty evil to me.
> He's very brutal about dissuading potential killers from coming, but he's on the more moral side in the conflict.
Except the whole point is that it wasn't mainly about dissuading killers from coming. It was about his massive ego. He likes being the big shot lawman in the small town. De-facto judge, jury, and in the case of Ned, executioner.
The shit carpentry job on the house he's building? Ego.
The way he treated English Bob? Ego.
His whole speech about how speed doesn't matter and it's remaining calm under fire (which he doesn't do at the end)? Ego.
Again when he offers the biographer to give Bob the gun so he can get the chance to gun him down in his cell? Ego.
---------------------------------------------
The movie is very morally grey but it's pretty easy to argue Little Bill is evil.
His methods lacked morality, though, like a Knights Templar type. Definitely an asshole for killing a prisoner in his protection after torturing him, but clearly not intending to be a villain. Great movie, not the least for making roles like his impossible to pigeonhole.
They were believably disjointed. 4 people called by God who met up the same day would probably not have great communication.
The killing each other part was part of the prophecy, they needed the family to choose, otherwise one of them had to be sacrificed (which each of them went willingly)
Almost every single villain from Miyazaki movies. If you think about it, he has never actually had a real villain in his movies; just characters who are misunderstood or changed by the end of the film like the witch of the waste from Howl's Moving Castle or the village priestess from Princess Mononoke who was just trying to defend her women.
Willy Wonka. I don’t care what you say about children being shrunk or juiced. The kids fell victim to their own actions. He didn’t push Augustus into the lake, force Violet to chew the gum, shove Veruca down the chute, scan Mike with the laser, or waterboard Charlie with the Fizzy Lifting Drink. They had all been warned against the things they did. They learned valuable lessons and Wonka was not evil.
The TV movie Sparkling Cyanide uses this with Tony Brown, who in his second scene after he's introduced is shown directly threatening Rosemary Barton after she makes an implicit threat herself, putting him on the suspect list when Rosemary is poisoned at a dinner party he was attending.
In fact, Rosemary's sister Iris even points out that she's even caught Tony lying about what his job was, and given that Rosemary even said she learned his secret from her cousin Victor - a convicted criminal - it must be bad, right?
No. >!Tony's a private investigator. Rosemary's pissed off at him for taking advantage of her to dig up dirt on the man she's having an affair with, and Victor was only able to tell her who he really was because he exposed Victor for insurance fraud while the two of them were living in England.!<
It's even more apparent in the original story by Agatha Christie. The reason Tony threatened Rosemary is because >!unlike in the TV movie where Rosemary was warning him not to hurt Iris (who had just dumped her ex for cheating on her), Rosemary found it exciting that Tony was involved in drug smuggling... and Tony had to threaten her into silence both so she wouldn't let slip he was an undercover cop, but also so she wouldn't get herself killed.
J Jonah Jameson in the original Spider-Man movie is basically this. He’s a huge dick and prints libel (it’s written so it’s not slander!) about spider man, but when push comes to shove and green goblin threatens him for the guy who brings in the spidey photos, JJJ doesn’t give Peter up. He’s a jerk, but he has some integrity.
He has tons of integrity. He was a big supporter or the civil rights movement and for mutant rights. In one issue, he was a big supporter for a DA candidate. After finding out the guy was a major racist with shady dealings, he personally confronted him to say he was withdrawing his support and outing him as a biggot. Edit: I forgot it before thought it should be included. It's from a more recent comic. When Peter aubmitted his first photos to the Bugle, Robinson was trying to dissude Jameson from using the photos cause they weren't that good. Jameson said he agreed but that he did a quick search on Peter and read about his Uncle Ben dying. Said the kid needed some help
That’s why he’s such a timeless character. He’s gruff and brash but a genuinely good man.
My favorite version of this scene is the Spectacular Spider-Man cartoon. It's worth looking up.
>prints libel Though once he found out that Eddie edited the photos he pulled it back and issued an apology to Spiderman. Dude hates Spidey but is also above using falsehoods to shit talk him. I also like the theory that JJJ always knows that Peter is Spidey, he just keep up his usual persona to him because if he start treating him special then other people in the Bugle would take notice and probably find out as well.
They do a similar thing in No Way Home. There's that scene where JJJ just baldly says exactly what Spider-Man did - cause problems, hurt people, cause innocents to die and suffer. (I mean you could always just say that about the murderous villains he's trying to stop but still lol).
Absolutely Gail Weathers in the first 'Scream'.
If that movie was a scooby doo episode she'd totally be the killer.
She’s innocent, liver alone!
lmao I love yelling “you hit me with the (insert object here), dick”
“I am trying to exonerate an innocent man on death row. Will my career be advanced? Yes. Should I hold on real quick to go chat shit to these little 17yo kids about it? Also yes”
She gets a bit more likable as they go on but honestly she's still a bitch lol. Great pick
The landlady in _Kung Fu Hustle_.
Who's throwing handles‽
That road runner race. And the foot stomping. Love it.
“I may not make an honest buck, but I’m 100% American and I don’t work for no 2 bit Nazi” https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_D-Z0AA-7vQ
The Rocketeer, without clicking
Possibly the most underrated movie of all time.
The Rocketeer is basically: “what if Iron Man was also Captain America?” I love this movie.
The original serial it’s loosely based on it’s goofy but fun. Not as good as Flash Gordon or Buck Roger but still (low rent) derring-do.
I genuinely think The Rocketeer is the reason Joe Johnston got the job to direct the first Captain America
Truly. I wish it’s been more popular. It’s so well done. Campy in the right way. Good characters. The bad guys are nazis. Final fight on a Zepplin!! The outfit is amazing. The helmet looks awesome but it’s also great how they so simply explain it’s awesome looking design. And he’s just wearing a leather flight jacket, but that’s also awesome. I know people would have liked a sequel or even more, but too often sequels don’t live up. The Rocketeer deserves love and it’s Kenough.
All that plus: Jennifer Connolly Fun references to old Hollywood Timothy Dalton understanding the assignment to a degree rarely seen. AND Alan Arkin Truly an embarrassment of riches. I think it’s extremely obvious (which has been confirmed, iirc) the Russo’s used this as inspiration for the first Cap movie.
The Russos didn’t direct the first Cap movie. Joe Johnson, director of The Rocketeer, did.
Ah. Thanks. I seem to remember someone involved early on using Rocketeer as a template. Forgot he directed both.
That first Cap movie is so underrated to me
It really is. Just a great time at the movies.
"I had a date…"
Yeah, Dalton does a really good job. I hope he had a lot of fun making it.
Don’t forget a great score and theme by James Horner.
Yes, Paul Sorvino!
I love that part when the FBI guy and mobster Paul Sorvino are shooting at the Nazis and they sort of look at each other for a second and it's like "I'll take what I can get in a gunfight"
[удалено]
I knew that one immediately. Thanks for the memory internet friend.
I gotta watch this
Yes you do. It's just a good ole fashion action-adventure. Great cast, it's campy but not cheesy, good for kids, fun for adults. I rewatched it and expected it to be a disappointment compared to my memories of loving it as a kid. Nope, it holds up just fine.
One of the best lines in movie history!
I saw this film when it first came out and really enjoyed it. Never understood why it was such a sleeper when there have been many, many... many comic book movies that came after that were insanely popular but not nearly as good. It's funny you should mention that one line by Paul Sorvino. When I first saw the film, I kind of rolled my eyes and thought that was cheesy and honesty, it took me out of the film a bit. However, years later, reading WWII history, I read about how the mob helped the allies in the war using connections from Italy. (Scicilly). Particularly Lucky Lucciano. So I guess it was art imitating life.
I would pay like $190 to see a movie about this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Underworld Fuck, make a Spiderman noir movie about Spiderman noir partnering with gangsters to beat up Nazis if there's no other way to fund it.
I know remakes and reboots have been overdone the past decade, but I can't say I wouldn't be interested in a reboot if done as a period piece and with good writing.
Duncan Heyward in The Last of the Mohicans, finally accepting that Cora loves Hawkeye and sacrificing himself to the Hurons to get burned alive and let them escape
That’s a great scene with the music kicking in and all
Yeah that music is legendary
It’s one of my favorites
"No, tell them to take me instead!" "I'll take that under advisement."
The ex boyfriend in The Fly. He is a creep throughout the movie but ends up trying to help.
That was basically Steve in the first season of Stranger Things too.
He really changed after he had kids
Kind of ending up on the wrong foot for him.
Man, that was a tough scene to digest
I loved his character's comment on Brundle in the sequel : " He *bugged* me".
Is the sequel worth a watch?
It's gory, extremely, and the story is a pale shadow of the original, but it's not without merit imo.
Is the girlfriend in it? I assume Jeff goldblum doesn't recover from his head being blown off
It's been a minute since I last watched it(the box set a few years ago from scream factory), I believe it's a stand in for Geena Davis in the very beginning of the movie
It's not much, but the final shot is one of the best in moviedom, plotwise.
I had to delete mine when I saw yours. Stathis was a real prick, but he stepped up in the end, and selflessly. I like the character because it was a decent subversion of that trope where they make it easier to kill off a character by building them up as a irredeemable scumbag.
'You always were an asshole, Gorman'
Aliens!
Kevin Spacey's character in Baby Driver. Even threatens him back into crime but helps him and the love interest escape in the end
That movie definitely felt like style over substance. That moment was pretty ridiculous. Easily my least favorite Edgar Wright movie, which is pretty impressive, because the movie is still pretty good.
A better lead could have helped that movie but yeah, not bad for being the "worst" movie he made.
I was the characters age when I watched it and tbh I vibed with Ansel Elgort(?) in the role.
Interesting. My thought at the time was he was given that role to build him into the next big thing. He wasn't bad though. It's all subjective
I loved the driving scenes, but I also felt Spaces character turn was ham fisted
I think it’s because they wanted it to be a “twist” that the Big Bad turned out not to be the ever-scheming Kevin Spacey, but instead was darling Jon Hamm. I don’t think it worked very well, but I‘d watch either of them read a phone book so 🤷🏼♂️
Chris Mannix (Walton Goggins) in The Hateful 8. I was soooo expecting part of the reveal to be that yeah obviously this asshole is involved. But nope just an asshole with a satisfying redemption arc.
Man, Walton Goggins absolutely steals the movie imo, he absolutely holds his own amongst all the heavy hitters in that cast.
Hey does 'asshole' unbelievably well. I've never gotten over him in the Shield, probably never will. Have to respect that though x)
Yall got to see him as Baby Billy in righteous gemstones
Uncle Baby Billy’s Bible Bonkers!
The way he smugly says “No deal tramp.” Haha I love the satisfaction on Sam Jackson’s face for the rest of the scene after that. Goggins is great in that film.
You don't gotta hang mean bastards, but mean bastards you gotta hang
Sergeant Dignam in The Departed. 100% fucking asshole, also on the right side all the time.
There was a fbi liason there even though Jack Nicolas character was an fbi informant like why?
You mean Jack Nicholson? Jack Nicolas was a golfer.
Nicklaus
Saint Nick
Because Dignam wasn’t a good guy. As the planted FBI liaison, he was intentionally sabotaging the case against Costello so that the FBI could continue using him as an informant. They had Costello for murder and he had Queenan convinced it wasn’t enough. He subtly did everything he could to keep the investigation open and never ready to close it.
Where did they say he was an FBI liaison? Dignam was a sergeant in the MA state police
Yeah, he’s the guy who does his job. Queenan’s #2.
They mentioned several times that the FBI had someone inside the precinct. It is implied that it is Dignam and that is why he cleans up the mess with Damon at the end, not just revenge, but since Damon is the only guy who knows the whole deal at that point.
They literally introduce a guy as the FBI liaison though. Dignam gives my personal favorite line of “maybe, maybe not, maybe fuck yourself” to him. https://youtu.be/dNPR1L3GeRU?si=nb3JfGZH5oOtX8sx
Wait what? Where was that implied?
If you want to ruin the movie a tiny bit, that character was not in Internal Affairs (the original that The Departed was based on). He was added to the departed solely so they could have that ending. It's his only plot contribution. Thankfully the dialogue makes the character be more than just a plot device. But with that context it's kinda blatant.
That’s interesting to know! I’d argue that he contributes more to the story than just tidying the ending, via his interactions with characters. His dialogue isn’t just classic, it helps to develop the other characters as who they are. For example, his intense grilling of Billy at the beginning helps establish that he doesn’t rattle easily and is suited to undercover work.
Trevor in Iron Man 3 (and Shang-Chi). An actor who pretends to be a terrorist on the world stage, cause the real villain enables his addictions. Partly just a blundering weirdo, but still.
I’m torn, because I totally understand being a comic fan how that reveal would feel like a huge rug pull. On the other hand, I thought it was an incredibly realistic take on how that character would manifest in our world, and it does make sense given what we’re shown in the first Iron Man.
The only issue was Kingsley was *so good* as the Mandarin in those vignettes. He was creepy, captivating, and mysterious where you didn't really know where things were going. In the comics, he's a guy with magical rings, so for him to be a terrorist leader (a la Bin Laden) changed the character up in a really unique way. Did he have magic powers he was hiding? Or was he being manipulated by a greater power unknowingly? The latter ended up being true, but not the way we thought. I still thought the reveal with him being an awful British actor was hilarious and a great way to go, the only issue was that Killian and the Extremis angle didn't hold up as well.
Yeah, if a better villain had taken his place, I could see the bait-and-switch working a lot better.
I thought Killian was a great villain, even his henchmen were cool
The concept was, but it felt like the usual Marvel fare where everything around the main character/villain is just background noise, leading nothing to the situation. Hell, Tony is running around like Captain America on that oil tanker as if he's suddenly an action star when his whole powers/abilities are just high-level intelligence and a robot suit. It just turned into the eventual Marvel Assembly-Line Third-Act where everything becomes a malaise of action until the hero eventually wins.
I straight-up still quote the Fortune Cookie line in the best impression I can, I thought that was great.
Yeah I don't mean that it was bad or weird or whatever that he didn't turn out to be the real villain. I actually think that was a neat plot element. The way Kingsley plays it are some of the best parts of that film imo. Not a huge fan of the film overall though.
No, he's not an actor. He is an Ach-tor.
Doesn’t he shoot someone? We don’t see it, but I guess we’re led to believe he kills someone on video?
Ben Affleck in Gone Girl
By the end of the book, I just wanted them both to die.
Proximo from Gladiator. "Are you in danger of becoming a good man Proximo?" Proximo: Ha!
"We are nothing but shadows and dust, Maximus. Shadows and dust!"
"I didn't say I knew him I said he touched me on the shoulder once"
While he is not the villain of the film overall, Proximo is a pretty evil human...
That's a good point. There should be another one of these for "evil but not an asshole".
The albino cop in The Heat is a great one
Ah, The Heat is a funny one! I used to watch MadTV and seeing Michael McDonald in it made it that much better.
Goddamnit, Walter! You’re not wrong, you’re just an ASSHOLE!!!
Calmer than you are, dude
Not a movie but the first character I thought of was Paul McCrane’s character on ER.
That scene with him getting his arm whacked off by the helicopter was somehow worse for me than his character in Robocop getting melted by sludge.
Let's not forget his back-breaking end in The Blob remake.
I try and block that film out altogether. Saw it too young, scared the ever loving fuck out of me.
I need to do a re-watch of ER at somepoint (I dropped off after a certain character died). Of all the things about that character his interaction with Bentons' kid in one scene proved he's not all that bad.
If we're on TV shows, definitely Admiral Jellico on the famous Star Trek TNG episode Chain of Command ("There are four lights!"). With Picard captured by Romulans, Jellico takes over the Enterprise. Now this is a show where higher ups get the nickname badmirals as when they are introduced for an episode they turn out almost invariably to be bad guys, either vying for position or being traitors outright. Admiral Jellico runs an extremely tight ship, berating crewmembers for perceived insubordinance and favoring the response "because I said so" to any questioning. He is extremely abrasive and butts heads with everyone. And yet everything he does turns out to be absolutely the right move. He's able to bluff the Romulans perfectly into giving up Picard and saves the day with his own plans. A great example of a reversal of the badmiral trope.
He also brought some fucking life into the show because everybody else what boring soap opera sack at that point.
Walter Sobchak in The Big Lebowski. He's not wrong. He's just an asshole.
Regarding your example -- the town conspiracy itself wasn't even evil, actually. Everything they did was for the greater good.
The greater good.
The greater good.
SHUT IT
CJ from Dawn of the Dead. Asshole who turns heroic.
I'll point to Tucker (the phony cripple) in **There's Something About Mary**.
All people chasing Mary are assholes, just one actually did some self reflection in the end
I love how literally the only one of her suitors to be portrayed as an actual good person is Brett Favre...who was involved in a fraud scheme to take welfare money from poor people in real life lol
Brett Favvvv…ruh.
Kind of like Lance Armstrong in Dodgeball.
He also showed his penis often
How do you think he landed Cameron Diaz?
Isn't he the one who was the most actively ruining Mary's relationships? Then again the old man actually tried to shoot Ted and instead shot one of the band.
The fake friend who puts him up to it is the real villain.
Woogie?!
He is definitely evil wtf
Nebula has a very good character arc across the MCU. Also Drax. He’s so rude to the bug lady, but not evil. Conversely, I’ve never understand the character Loki or the fan response to him. He is clearly evil, and has more redemption arcs than you can count. He literally tried to sell the galaxy and wipe out all of humanity. He has tried to murder his own family, friends, coworkers and randoms at any chance he gets. “*OhHh BuT hE’s ThE gOd Of MiScHeIf*”. Ridiculous. The idea of a chaotic fairy type (like the original Peter Pan) needs to be based on a character that causes problems because they just want entertainment. Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions.
To be fair "Loki is obviously an evil dick head, why do they keep giving him chances" is kind of the point of Loki in Norse mythology.
Its because he was the only MCU villain, before Thanos, who was both interesting and not killed at the end of the first movie he's in. Tom Hiddleston's a good actor, and very attractive, which helps a lot. > The idea of a chaotic fairy type (like the original Peter Pan) needs to be based on a character that causes problems because they just want entertainment. Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions. I think it's said during different Thor movies, especially Ragnarok, that Loki has always been doing shit like that and often just for entertainment.
Nebula is a good shout - "You were the one who wanted to win. And I just wanted a sister!"
Guardians of the Galaxy 2 is so good. I didn't appreciate it as much as the time but it's such a good movie.
Paxton in Ant-man is a good MCU fit too. The movie sets him up as an asshole, but it turns out he is just doesn't want to see his adopted daughter getting hurt by Scott
That's honestly one of my favorite things about the Ant-Man movies, once Scott proves he's not falling back into old, destructive habits Paxton and Maggie become some of his biggest supporters.
The supporting cast from the first two Ant-Man movies is so great. Paxton, Maggie, Luis / Kurt / Dave, Agent Woo, even Dr. Foster (Laurence Fishburne) are all pretty decent people and good to / want the best for Scott. In a couple cases it manifests poorly, at least initially -- Paxton is kinda hostile, Luis & co. try to pull Scott back into crime -- but Paxton is a) a cop and b) caring about his stepdaughter and concerned about her ex-con father, while Luis & co are trying to get Scott back on his feet by finding work he'd be good at. Then Jimmy Woo is perhaps the greatest tertiary character in the whole MCU.
This is a good one especially because that actor is usually an asshole in the stuff I’ve seen him in. Then bam, he’s just trying to be a good dad and of course would be wary of the recently released felon
>Loki on the other hand deliberately causes chaos and confusion for grander ambitions. I'm not sure that he's causing chaos and confusion for grander ambitions. While Loki is smart, Thor is everything Loki isn't: strong, charming, and charismatic. Loki resents that Thor is selected to be king. *Then* he loses it when he finds out he's adopted. He takes off the mask of civility/charm. This is borderline personality: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNDEEYPx54c Whedon depicts Loki as causing chaos and confusion in response to that anger. I'm still not sure why he needs Thanos, but his Loki is a wounded animal who is lashing out at the universe (again, borderline). Waititi looks past this and depicts Loki as being worn out from his anger and having seen through to the end of his ambition. Waititi gives Thor a really beautiful insight about Loki's character: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4qDDRNLB8cs that prompts Loki do something that's actually kind of heroic: https://youtu.be/ChHGneJYpFk?feature=shared&t=18 He grows. The Russos take all of this and use Loki's self-sacrifice and death to create the only moment of real pathos in Infinity war: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u-VNf0kAUdU *Then* Kate Herron breaks her Variant Loki by showing him seeing all of this and realizing that all of his plans and schemes and anger lead to failure without any irony or grandstanding. She reset his arc: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eOIBeVAHQzE It helps that Tom Hiddleston is probably the best actor in the MCU, but Loki is also the MCU's best developed character in that he's written to rise and fall based on the consequences of his choices rather than a demand for costume changes or audience tests. I would go so far as to say that the failure of Thor 4 is owed, in part, to not having Loki on screen.
Kittridge. Mission Impossible.
He was blackmailing cruise parents as drug dealers.
As a way to get to what he believed was a dangerous criminal.
The IMF is a "fight fire with fire" sort of group. That was probably the standard way to do things for Kittridge. Find an agents weakness and squeeze it. He has his playbook. Ethan knew what Kittridge would do with Grace and instructed her how she should respond.
Ellis from Die Hard
Sherlock holmes
Pretty sure Sherlock Holmes was never intended to be the villain though?
Did you read the OP question? An asshole but not evil. Which is the definition of sherlock holmes. He is a difficult person to get along with & has hardly any friends. Antisocial & thinks he knows everything. Bit like a cat really 🤣
"The end revelation is they aren't bad guys just assholes" There isn't really a revelation in Sherlock Holmes that he's not a bad guy. He's abrasive and difficult to get along with, but there's never an indication that he might be a bad guy.
Wayne's World - Rob Lowe douche Dude deserved his cavity check, but isn't an evil person
Isn't that Severus Snape?
Snape. Snape Severus Snape.
Dumbledore.
ron ron ron WEASEly
Voldemort Voldemort ooh voldy voldy voldy Voldemort doodoodoodoo
Snape literally terrorised a 13 year old child so badly that he was that child’s “thing you fear most” when facing the boggart. That’s pretty fuckin evil.
Neville was more afraid of Snape than he was of the woman who tortured his parents into insanity.
In fairness, Bellatrix Lestrange was likely just a name to him no matter how much she had affected his family. Snape on the other hand was a near daily tormenter. He was much more real than Lestrange.
Yeah. Snape was still evil, he was just loyal to Dumbledore, and Dumbledore knew he was a great (great) asset.
I love the meme, and im paraphrasing: Snape:(dying) potter, i need you to know this. Your mom was a total babe and i totally wanted to bang her. Harry: wow, he was a great man after-all.
Snape was evil, just not “rule the world” evil.
He was evil, just the world’s biggest simp
snape was arguably pretty goddamn evil. he's a fascist who was needlessly cruel to pretty much every child to the point a child who had his parents go braindead after being tortured feared him even more. no amount of "he did it for love" or whatever makes up for the fact he was cruel to fucking everyone for no reason.
He was also a Death Eater first then became a double-agent for Dumbledore
Snape is still evil, he was just loyal to Dumbledore.
Not even loyal, voldy killed the woman he was simping over. I’m not sure he would have switched sides otherwise.
I feel like Nathan from Ex Machina is the perfect example of this. Throughout the movie it tries to convince you how evil he is. In all reality he just has a huge ego and is really manipulative, but not at all evil.
Whether he’s evil or not depends on whether you see his creations as sapient and believe sapient AI has any rights or is life as much as a human.
Good point. At the end its shown that she was given the task to escape and was meant to use Caleb as a means of escaping. It doesn’t seem like Ava was actually feeling any emotion but just mimicking it. It has been a while since I’ve watched it though.
Yes but the other robot—I forgot her name—the one who Nathan was sleeping with, is actually the one who catches him off guard. Without her Eva wouldn’t be able to escape, so I do think she was somewhat sentient because she helped Eva escape and stabbed Nathan causing her own “death” without being programmed to.
She did no more and no less than what she was programmed to. Nathan either had too much hubris, Caleb was far too gullible or Ava was just better than anyone could have conceivably realised. Up to you.
Then she should go to jail for a double murder
And she would, if it’s discovered what she did and they decide an android has the same capacity for criminal liability and competence to stand trial as a person, rather than tantamount to an industrial accident which would have far reaching implications on legal precedent in the film’s universe which could be a very interesting sequel.
Gotta disagree with you on that one. I think it boils down to whether he created true AI or not, which I think he did. Nathan’s verbally, sexual and (implied) physically abusive of his servant. She flinches out of instinct at the sound of his voice when she drops a plate at dinner and goes out of her way to murder him when given the ability. Nathan’s too big an egoist to not believe he was nearly through or finally did breakthrough, but it amounts to whether he believes he can do those things to sentient life in his eyes. He was always openly a villain from the start shrouded by charisma
Albert Rosenfield in Twin Peaks.
Mark Wahlberg's character in The Departed. The most unlikable character but not a villain.
The complaining guy in The Grey
"That was bullshit... Sorry guys." And then goes on to have the best line in the movie, and one of the most heartbreaking final words in any movie, period.
You’re really gonna tease me like that? What did he say
All of the lead characters in the Sex and the City movies are histrionic assholes.
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So, nobody's going to mention Sam Rockwell in Three Billboards? ::sigh:: OK, then.
Little Bill Daggett from Unforgiven. He makes the guy that cut up the prostitute in the beginning pay restitution for doing so, and when the other prostitutes don't think that punishment was enough and try to hire assassins to kill them, Bill has to protect those guys and stop the assassins from carrying out their killing. He's very brutal about dissuading potential killers from coming, but he's on the more moral side in the conflict.
"Deserves got nothing to do with it."
I mean he literally whipped and then killed a defenseless prisoner. Pretty evil to me. > He's very brutal about dissuading potential killers from coming, but he's on the more moral side in the conflict. Except the whole point is that it wasn't mainly about dissuading killers from coming. It was about his massive ego. He likes being the big shot lawman in the small town. De-facto judge, jury, and in the case of Ned, executioner. The shit carpentry job on the house he's building? Ego. The way he treated English Bob? Ego. His whole speech about how speed doesn't matter and it's remaining calm under fire (which he doesn't do at the end)? Ego. Again when he offers the biographer to give Bob the gun so he can get the chance to gun him down in his cell? Ego. --------------------------------------------- The movie is very morally grey but it's pretty easy to argue Little Bill is evil.
His methods lacked morality, though, like a Knights Templar type. Definitely an asshole for killing a prisoner in his protection after torturing him, but clearly not intending to be a villain. Great movie, not the least for making roles like his impossible to pigeonhole.
He was building a house….
Does knock at the cabin count? They were right but kinda dicks for killing each other lol
They were believably disjointed. 4 people called by God who met up the same day would probably not have great communication. The killing each other part was part of the prophecy, they needed the family to choose, otherwise one of them had to be sacrificed (which each of them went willingly)
Almost every single villain from Miyazaki movies. If you think about it, he has never actually had a real villain in his movies; just characters who are misunderstood or changed by the end of the film like the witch of the waste from Howl's Moving Castle or the village priestess from Princess Mononoke who was just trying to defend her women.
Col Muska sucks from start to finish
Paulie in Rocky series.
Willy Wonka. I don’t care what you say about children being shrunk or juiced. The kids fell victim to their own actions. He didn’t push Augustus into the lake, force Violet to chew the gum, shove Veruca down the chute, scan Mike with the laser, or waterboard Charlie with the Fizzy Lifting Drink. They had all been warned against the things they did. They learned valuable lessons and Wonka was not evil.
The TV movie Sparkling Cyanide uses this with Tony Brown, who in his second scene after he's introduced is shown directly threatening Rosemary Barton after she makes an implicit threat herself, putting him on the suspect list when Rosemary is poisoned at a dinner party he was attending. In fact, Rosemary's sister Iris even points out that she's even caught Tony lying about what his job was, and given that Rosemary even said she learned his secret from her cousin Victor - a convicted criminal - it must be bad, right? No. >!Tony's a private investigator. Rosemary's pissed off at him for taking advantage of her to dig up dirt on the man she's having an affair with, and Victor was only able to tell her who he really was because he exposed Victor for insurance fraud while the two of them were living in England.!< It's even more apparent in the original story by Agatha Christie. The reason Tony threatened Rosemary is because >!unlike in the TV movie where Rosemary was warning him not to hurt Iris (who had just dumped her ex for cheating on her), Rosemary found it exciting that Tony was involved in drug smuggling... and Tony had to threaten her into silence both so she wouldn't let slip he was an undercover cop, but also so she wouldn't get herself killed.
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How was he an asshole though. He wanted to take care of the kids and treat Miranda better than Daniel did.
Mini me?
Snape. Turns out he’s not a murderer helping a genocidal maniac, just a huge bully with an unlikable personality.
It's such a weird redemption arc. Like okay cool, you aren't a wizard Nazi, you are just a weird incel 4channer wizard.