Dark Action Girl



""I don't think so, Admiral. You see at this point, I'm pretty much the Queen Bitch of the Universe.""

- Kerrigan, Queen of Blades, Starcraft: Brood War

Those stupid boys and their ridiculous little games. What's a girl to do? Well, if you're this girl, most likely kick their asses.

The villainous version of the Action Girl. Likes dressing in black and keeping her nails particularly long and sharp. A popular combination with The Baroness, but usually not The Vamp or the Femme Fatale, since she prefers to pummel The Hero to a bloody pulp instead of seducing him, but there are certainly exceptions, and these exceptions can be incredibly dangerous.

She's usually someone's Evil Counterpart. She tends to enjoy beating up tougher-looking characters, and a man's refusal to fight back tends to annoy her, and the chivalrous guy can end up badly battered.

You'd think that this would be the point where the Action Girl and the Dark Magical Girl intersect. Go on, keep thinking that way. We'll see how long you live. Hang on, let me get my stopwatch.

The Dark Action Girl is the Dark Magical Girl's polar opposite - fiercely independent, cruelly carefree, and rarely interested in making friends. Just as the Dark Magical Girl almost always does a Heel Face Turn, the Dark Action Girl almost never does. If she is brought over to the side of good, even if only for an episode, expect her to be hesitant about it at best - and if she stays, she'll remain more standoffish and cynical than the rest of the True Companions or the Five-Man Band. Typically, the Dark Action Girl will only aid the Action Girl against another villain because she considers herself the only one allowed to defeat her.

If The Messiah offers her friendship, expect her to take it as an insult. The Dark Action Girl is generally immune, or at least resistant, to The Power of Friendship. The Power of Love can soften her up sometimes, but it's a crapshoot; the foolish boy could just as easily wind up getting used and discarded, rejected violently, or just plain killed for his trouble. Deliver Us From Evil sometimes happens, but even then, the resulting Action Mom is almost always more of a Noble Demon with the child serving as a Morality Pet. Though, more often than not, especially if her little one is the fruit of an Unholy Matrimony, you just get an Evil Matriarch. Of course, if the child starts picking up some of her mom's habits, she might become a Little Miss Badass.

For some reason, while heroic Action Girls can fail to live up to their reputation, you will almost never find a Faux Action Girl Dark Action Girl. This is probably because no matter what standards the decade or culture sets for women, villains can break those standards anyway.

For many guys (and certain girls), a major source of Fetish Fuel.

If there's no Action Girls on the good side, all of the heroic females being damsels in distress, the work is likely using the Madonna-Whore Complex trope.

Compare Classy Cat Burglar, Dark Magical Girl, and Dark Chick.

Action Girl + Dark Action Girl = Designated Girl Fight.

Anime and Manga

 * LadyDevimon from Digimon Adventure was thrown in, apparently at the last minute, as one of these. The only reason for this, however, appeared to be to set up an Evil Counterpart with whom Angewomon could have a Cat Fight, complete with slapping and hair-pulling. They even brought her back in Digimon Adventure 02 just to repeat the process.
 * Karinka from Steel Angel Kurumi toes the line. She beats the living hell out of another main character, and lives primarily so she can destroy the main character and steal her boyfriend. Oh, yeah, she curses like a sailor, too, or at least would if Japanese had cursing.
 * The Japanese language does have cursing. It is simply that the Japanese have a different idea of cursing from the English.
 * A brief glimpse of Caerula Sanguis' distant past in Volume 9 of Battle Angel Alita: Last Order shows that when she was part of the Chinese Triads, she was very much an example of this trope. After meeting Victor Byron, however, she softens a little. She softens further after meeting John Farrell in Volume 8, to the point that she became something of a Hero Secret Service,, eventually extending her protection to the whole of humanity.
 * Adiane from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann.
 * Gretel of Otogi Juushi Akazukin.
 * Naruto has a load of bait-and-switch Dark Action Girls who sometimes don't live up to their initial posturing or pull a whiplash-inducing High Heel Face Turn, but the standout is Tayuya, the flute-playing, Cluster F-Bomb-dropping genjutsu expert of the Sound Four, who easily cows her Ax Crazy coworkers, punches out the eponymous hero, and demonstrates, perhaps better than anyone in the series so far, save Uchiha Itachi, why genjutsu is NOT the "soft" one of the three main ninja skill sets. She then goes toe to toe with Shikamaru, the smartest guy in the whole series, and proceeds to back him into a corner and break his nigh-unbreakable binding jutsu with sheer brute force and bloody-mindedness. The only thing that stops her is having an entire forest dropped on her courtesy of Temari, a Badass Action Girl whose idea of a "cat fight" is breaking her opponent's spine and then tossing them across the room.
 * Konan of the Akatsuki fully earns her Dark Action Girl creds when she
 * Though, by the time this happens,.
 * Revy from Black Lagoon is a Protagonist version of this.
 * Balalaika was also one before she graduated to The Baroness.
 * Come to think of it, every major female character in Roanapur is a variant of this theme.
 * It's debatable whether Roberta (as of the anime) actually outdarks Revy. Her motives are selfless, after all: Give. Me. My. Morality. Pet. Back. Now. SAFE.
 * Just you wait till the El Baile De La Muerte arc (which is being released now in OVA format). If you thought Roberta was scary before...
 * This is remarked on by the appearance of Fabiola Iglesias, the Action Girl who replaces Roberta as Garcia's caretaker and serves as her Foil.
 * Hibari Ginza from Speed Grapher.
 * Nena Trinity from Gundam 00, though she's more of a Dark Female Gundam Pilot.
 * Considering that Nena has only actually been able to kill stationary (like the wedding) or otherwise helpless (like ) targets, she could actually qualify as a Faux Action Girl rather than a Dark Action Girl. The fact that   Even moreso, Throne Drei is built specifically for stealth and support purposes, therefore, asking it to actually kick ass is like sending in a squishy cleric to deal with tough enemies that can deal a lot of damage.
 * Also, we may be able to include Soma Peries and  (from the second season on).
 * Hilling Care definitely qualifies for this, both inside and outside of a mobile suit. And even though she technically lost against the, she did put up a spectacular fight.
 * Kycillia Zabi of the original Mobile Suit Gundam is a Dark Action Girl/Lady of War cross. And Four Murasame of Mobile Suit Zeta Gundam and Stella Loussier of Mobile Suit Gundam SEED Destiny are Dark Action Girl/Tyke Bomb blends.
 * Dorothy Catalonia and Lady Une of Gundam Wing. The former's a Blood Knight and The Strategist with latent Death Seeker tendencies, the latter's The Baroness, The Dragon, and a Psycho Supporter to Big Bad Treize Khushreneda, whom she does most of the dirty work for. Both of them prefer to avoid physical combat, but when forced to fight, are quite competent, with Une being a crack shot and a capable pilot, while Dorothy is absolutely lethal with a rapier.
 * Other Dark Action Girls include Haman Kahn of Zeta Gundam and Gundam ZZ, who's probably one of the most dangerous pilots in the entire franchise as well as a Magnificent Bitch par excellence, Sarah Zaviaroff, Lyla Mira Lyla, and Natasha Zaviaroff (one of the few not villainous examples).
 * Then, Victory Gundam gives us several. We have Lupe Cineau, Fuala Griffon, Renda de Baroma (an Anti-Villain version, as well as the female half of Battle Couple with Colonel Badass Duker Iq), and especially
 * Marida Cruz, anyone?
 * Although Rizelle of Chrono Crusade prefers to use her powers to get other people to do her dirty work for her, when confronted by Rosette, she proves herself to be one of these, using her marionette strings and Femme Fatalons to cause a massive amount of (Clothing Damage) damage in the process.
 * Several female arrancars from Bleach, the biggest examples being Halibel and her Amazon Brigade (Apache, Mila Rose, and Sun-Sun), as well as Cirucci Thunderwitch.
 * The  have Bambietta Basterbine, a Cute Bruiser with a Commissar Cap, who is seen gleefully joining the   and killing almost everyone in her way.
 * Subverted with As Nodt, whom everyone thought he was a male at first.
 * Gun X Sword's Fasalina, who (unlike the only other girl in her group, Melissa, who was merely confused) fully embraced the methods of The Claw and, most of the time, puts up a damn good fight against the heroes.
 * Inuyasha: Kagura started off as this and eventually softened via Character Development into an ally of the good guys that fitted the cynical and aloof version of a Heel Face Turned Dark Action Girl; strictly speaking, she was a Dark Action Girl due to being enslaved to the Big Bad, which made her a Broken Bird as well.
 * One Piece has its fair share, from Miss Double Finger (and arguably Miss Merry Christmas) to Kalifa. Boa Hancock is shaping up to be this as well.
 * Don't forget Perona. Her entire personality screams DARK!
 * She's more of a Dark Magical Girl though, with the fact she dosen't fight directly, uses ghosts, and the face-heel turn.
 * Nico Robin deserves separate mention here. She'll crush your testicles, and that's if you're a prospective Nakama. Her overall body count probably ranks higher than many of the series' Big Bads, as well.
 * Dominique the Cyclops from Trigun.
 * Sabrina and Lorelei of the Pokémon Special manga. Interestingly enough, both of them have joined forces with the protagonists at some point due to an Enemy Mine situation; in fact, Sabrina does so against Lorelei.
 * Arguably, Karen also qualifies. She's also a Dark-type specialist, to hammer the point home.
 * Anemone from Eureka Seven.
 * Ophelia from Claymore. As a complete and total lunatic, obsessed with taking lives, she even kills her own fellow Claymores.  She makes BioShock (series)'s Sandar Cohen seem at least somewhat sane.
 * Road Kamelot and Lulu Bell from D.Gray-man.
 * Lust from Fullmetal Alchemist.
 * Medusa and her sister, Arachne, from Soul Eater
 * Evangeline from Mahou Sensei Negima, before her Heel Face Turn. Not that she'd ever admit to having made one.
 * Tsukuyomi and Poyo count, too.
 * Actually, Eva and Poyo fit more as Dark Magical Girls than DAG's. Tsukuyomi, however, is a Dark Action Girl through and through.
 * Ikaruga, Angel,, and Ultear from Fairy Tail.
 * Puella Magi Madoka Magica has Kyouko Sakura. It should be noted, though, that she gets better, to the point of even
 * Any of the Sailor Animamates from the last series of Sailor Moon. Sailor Animamates were the servants of Big Bad Sailor Galaxia, who was hunting down Star Seeds/Sailor Crystals across the universe..
 * The Doom and Gloom Girls, Queen Beryl's last and strongest warriors from the anime, who very nearly succeeded in defeating the Sailor Senshi.
 * Also the Ayakashi Sisters, Evil Counterparts of the Inner Senshi and pretty competent combatants.
 * Esmeralda, as well.
 * Gavrill Madaraki from Franken Fran, the almost-invincible shapeshifting leader of an army of pillaging thugs.

Comic Book

 * Lady Shiva is generally regarded as the deadliest martial artist in The DCU. When Matt Thorne, the Crime Doctor, is on the run from the criminals he has betrayed, he asks for sanctuary from Oracle and her team. Injured and hurt, Thorne sees Shiva and remarks "Holy Mother of God. I'm almost honored they sent her to kill me."
 * Rose Wilson, aka Ravager of the Teen Titans, is the most badass girl they've had on the roster. Previously, she worked for Deathstroke the Terminator, one of the DCU's top assassins (and also her father), though she eventually realized how messed up her relationship with him was.
 * Y: The Last Man, thanks to the premise, has several examples as villains. Most notably, there's Alter and her Amazon Brigade, the (unrelated) Daughters of the Amazon, Toyota, and Hero,.
 * Especially Toyota.
 * Scandal from Villains United and Secret Six first appears to simply be a Middle Management Mook. However, she's shown to be extremely dangerous in combat, quite possibly insane, and very hard to kill (and it's revealed that her father is the immortal supervillain Vandal Savage).
 * Black Cat, one of Spider-Man's love interests. Her Heel Face Turn is often a Batman Gambit, her betrayals less an indication of her turn than the prime motivator all along. Though she doesn't need love in her life, she can appreciate it when it's there and remembers it fondly after abandoning it, which is why she doesn't return to the Heel Face Revolving Door by whacking the Hero.
 * Destrii, from the Doctor Who Magazine comic. She begins a Heel Face Turn after being beaten to a pulp by her father figure, the Big Bad, for daring to side with the Doctor.
 * Most of the main characters in the Chaos! Comics universe were these.
 * For a while, it seemed that Typhoid Mary was going to be this. Then she went and soared merrily over the Moral Event Horizon, diving right into her current personality.
 * Maggie Burroughs post-Face Heel Turn in Freddy vs. Jason vs. Ash: The Nightmare Warriors.
 * The X-Men villain Mystique. Though her powers don't offer any real advantage in a fight, she's a skilled martial artist who supplements her physical prowess with an arsenal of firearms. She frequently makes fake Heel Face Turns that turn out to be Batman Gambits to screw the X-Men over, and when she betrays them, she naturally shoots or beats the shit out of whichever X-Man she'd gotten especially close to while she was "good" (see Iceman).
 * Mariah from Sin City. She mostly appears in Hell And Back as a deadly assassin who has a rivarly with vampish Blue Eyes, also a part of the same guild.
 * Both Mejai and Ansea Latal from Le Scorpion.
 * Kriss of Valnor is beyond greedy, but her badassness matches Thorgal's, which is really saying something.
 * Sin, daughter of the Red Skull and just as evil as her father. She has currently taken up his mantle as the new Red Skull.
 * X-23, due to being raised to be an assassin.
 * From Usagi Yojimbo, we have Noriko, the Blood Princess.
 * Zephyr Quinn of Matt Fraction's Casanova.
 * Reka in The Secret History.

Fan Works

 * Tiffany Stevens in The Secret Life of the Backyard Kids.

Film

 * The Baroness from G.I. Joe the Rise of Cobra. Slick leather outfit, tall boots, and two guns, she is a crossover with the Femme Fatale, as she seduces quite a few characters, but her usual MO is kicking butt. Counterpart to GI Joe operative Scarlett.
 * Disappointingly, she turns out to be Brainwashed and Ax Crazy and not doing it purely For the Evulz.
 * Lori (Sharon Stone) in Total Recall.
 * Many, many bad Bond girls, but particularly Xenia Onatopp (Famke Janssen) in Goldeneye and Fiona Volpe (Luciana Paluzzi) in Thunderball.
 * Selina Kyle in Batman Returns. You know that she's Catwoman, right?.
 * Lola from the The Transporter 2, could also double as Psycho for Hire.
 * Viper from Doomsday, although her most memorable scene was not fighting but lighting a man on fire in order to cook him for the hungry crowd.
 * Ni Chang from The Forbidden Kingdom.
 * The Die Hard series has Katja in Die Hard 3 and Mai Linh in Live Free or Die Hard. Both of them are martial artists and the girlfriend of a more cerebral Big Bad, serving as his Dragon.
 * It can be argued that Selene from Underworld fits this trope quite nicely until she realizes that she's been fighting the wrong war.
 * O-Ren Ishii, Elle Driver, Gogo Yubari, and Vernita Green from Kill Bill.
 * The Bride as well.
 * Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty, one of the deadliest villains in Disney Animated Canon history.
 * Shenzi, Zira, and Vitani are nonhuman examples from The Lion King films.
 * Bellatrix Lestrange from the Harry Potter series.
 * The Russian gangster, Mona Demarkov, in Romeo Is Bleeding is a particularly ruthless and sadistic example, without the benefit of magic powers or Waif Fu.
 * Dr. Ilsa Hayden in Judge Dredd. She has a Cat Fight with Action Girl Judge Hershey.

Literature

 * Bellatrix Lestrange of Harry Potter.
 * Zandramas in David Eddings' Malloreon fits this role perfectly, right down to being an evil counterpart to Polgara.
 * Protagonist example who is still "Dark": Lale of The Assassins of Tamurin.
 * Hester Shaw in Mortal Engines becomes a completely merciless killer.
 * Stalker Fang is at least as much of a bad girl. Being horribly crippled then turned into Brain In a Jar inside a Killer Robot chassis can do that to someone.
 * Angelina, supposedly reformed murderess turned Special Corp agent/wife of 'Slippery Jim' DiGritz. Always carries an arsenal of lethal weaponry on her person, and has the ability to produce a .75 calibre recoilless from Hammerspace whenever she thinks her husband is getting too slippery for her taste. Supposedly, her more psychopathic impulses have been removed by the psych-techs, but Jim frequently has to restrain her natural enthusiasm for killing and torture.
 * Asajj Ventress, Count Dooku's main follower...cruel, skilled, and a major threat, with a tendency to pull a Not Quite Dead every time she seems defeated.
 * The Star Wars Expanded Universe actually has a lot of these. Mara Jade (pre-Heel Face Turn), Aurra Sing, and just about every female Sith ever are among the most notable.
 * War from Good Omens.
 * Rare heroic example: Rachel from Animorphs, who begins as an Action Girl but gets closer and closer to this trope as the series goes on. Taylor could be seen as an actual villainous example, though she generally avoids using her unique fighting skills in favor of psychological manipulation.
 * Phrygiar Navaris from the Codex Alera is a psychotically obsessive swordswoman and one of the top five blades in her civilization - she normally hires herself out as a mercenary, and has racked up a kill count in the hundreds during her life (and those are just the ones we know about). Aquitainus Invidia from the same series is more like The Vamp, The Chessmaster, and the Reliable Traitor all in one person, but she's more than capable of getting her hands dirty if she has to.
 * Makala of Blade of the Flame, both before her in-backstory death and after she . Exhibits Clingy Jealous Girl traits after the spoilered event too.
 * Death's Mistress, aka Sister Nicci, of the Sword of Truth series. She serves the Imperial Order in their war against the "good" factions, a terror to the forces of the New World and a heroine to the Order, and is one of the main threats to Richard Rahl in Faith of the Fallen. Interestingly enough, she is also a Dark Magical Girl, Femme Fatale, and a Stalker with a Crush at times.
 * Kitiara from Dragonlance.
 * Ivana Vasilyeva from Dale Brown's Wings of Fire.
 * Penny from Lies, the third book in the Gone (novel) series.
 * Lara Raith in The Dresden Files alternates between being Harry's Friendly Enemy and a reluctant ally. Being a White Court vampire, she is superhumanly strong, fast, and durable, but still needs to feed on the life energy of humans.
 * The White Witch, Jadis, from The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. Extra points in that she's supposed to represent Satan.
 * Miss Hakkendottir from the steampunky The Hunchback Assignments: beautiful, thoroughly evil, and considers Mooks a disposable/consumable resource. Extra points for her two half-mechanical attack dogs...
 * Lisbeth Salander of The Millennium Trilogy. She slashes the throat of one thug with a broken bottle and scares his gang off by acting herself, violates her sadistic guardian and blackmails him with evidence of his rape, reveals her solution to her pedophile father was to Kill It with Fire, attacks then chases down a Neo-Nazi who she causes to crash before leaving for dead, and that's just the first book. And she's one of the good guys.

Live Action TV

 * Sarah Corvis in the Bionic Woman reboot is to be a prime example. She teaches the Action Girl protagonist just so that she can fight her later. Sarah also seems to like to drop hints, though it's been shown she does have a motivating romantic interest.
 * Faith on Buffy the Vampire Slayer is half this, half Dark Magical Girl. Her abilities are action-based, not magical, and the fights between Buffy and Faith are adrenaline-spiked highlights among the series' many action sequences. Directors, stunt directors, actresses, and stunt doubles always seemed to go all out whenever one of these scenes came up. At the same time, her issues are much more of the DMG vein, and she is eventually redeemed DMG-style in a two-part episode of Angel. However, even after Faith returns and joins up with Buffy, the two constantly butt heads, often violently.
 * Darla. While in flashbacks, she's less action-y and more just plain evil, during the first season, she was pretty much The Master's Dragon. That is, until she died.
 * God of Evil Glory should be mentioned, seeing as she was the Big Bad of a season.
 * Callisto, Xena's Evil Counterpart from Xena: Warrior Princess. She does pull a Heel Face Turn later in the show's run, actually.
 * It basically takes divine intervention, though.
 * To be precise, it requires Xena -- who, at this point, had died and become an Archangel -- to take on all of Callisto's sins and suffering, thus damning herself to Hell for All Eternity. This removes all of Callisto's memories of being evil, which, not coincidentally, leaves her with more or less no memory of her life after turning twelve.
 * Ebony of The Tribe. She was also The Baroness and a female Magnificent Bastard.
 * Gretchen Morgan from Prison Break. Really dark action girl. Do not mess with her.
 * Ana Espinosa from Alias.
 * Fiona Glennane from Burn Notice is one of the rare exceptions of this trope to do a Heel Face Turn.
 * Tenaya 7/Tenaya 15 from Power Rangers RPM, who more or less doubles as The Dragon for a better part of the series.
 * Just Tenaya?! Previous seasons had Scorpina, Archerina, Astronema, Trakeena, Vypra, Nadira, Toxica, Marah, Kapri, Elsa, Morgana, Necrolai, Miratrix, and Camille. Sentai, of course, had their counterparts, not to mention others from pre-PR seasons, Dairanger, and Kakuranger (which had a whole team of them).
 * NCIS: Ziva's connection to the Mossad hints that she used to be a dark action girl - the few images we get of her past show her shooting a guy from the back of a motorbike. She used to be a professional killer. It's okay, though. Now, she never kills anyone! ...Well, hardly ever.
 * That doesn't make her this trope though. She is shown repeatedly to have had friends and people she cared about. It should also be noted that she was killing people to protect her country, not for profit. Especially since Gibbs is shown to have been involved in assassinations as well.
 * Miss Parker from The Pretender.
 * Vlad from season 4 of Lexx. Most of her scenes with Kai involved her beating the snot out of him.
 * Isabella Gisborne from Robin Hood. One of only two Sheriffs in various versions of the story (the other being from Robin of Sherwood) to successfully
 * Corrupt Corporate Executive Tess Mercer of Smallville has repeatedly demonstrated that, in addition to being an expert Manipulative Bastard and Chessmaster, she is not a slouch in the physical department either, having fought Lana, Lois, Green Arrow, Zod, and, most recently, fellow Dark Action Girl Mad Harriet on relatively equal footing (she had to cheat against Zod by using Kryptonite brass knuckles, of course). Harriet and the Female Furies also fulfill this trope, as did Lana when possessed by Isobel Thoreaux.
 * In Doctor Who,.
 * Cold-blooded Israeli assassin Mikel Dayan in Leverage. She's more of a Punch Clock Villain than anything else though.

Newspaper Comics

 * Princess Aura in Flash Gordon, although she eventually does a Heel Face Turn.

Tabletop Games

 * From the Dark Eldar of Warhammer 40000, comes the wyches, each one a leather bound gladiatrix with a well-earned penchant for murder. The greatest of them and the absolute queen of this trope (to her fans at least) is Lelith Hesperax, who can murder an entire enemy squad before they can even fight back. She's so Badass, an in-joke is that her hair counts as a power weapon.
 * Also note, that while wyches are not exclusively female, a majority of them are. The Dark Eldar value skill and potential above all else, so there are virtually no gender barriers. That also means that the Dark Eldar can hold this trope to every career path, from Haemonculus to Incubus to Archon.
 * And on that note, their fantasy counterparts are just as hardcore - only they replace the Blood Sport aspect with a Blood Cult; they're refered to as the "Brides of Khaine" (he's the elven god of murder).

Theatre

 * The Witch from Into the Woods placed a curse on The Hero and his wife before the events of the show, practically abused her daughter, Rapunzel, by locking her in a tower for years, and cut off Rapunzel's hair and banished her into the desert. While the Witch had to work with the heroes for a time, she was the first cast member to start taking initiative when the Bigger Bad started killing everyone, and was dead set on sacrificing Jack to the Giantess. Then, towards the end of the show, . And on top of all that, she's got attitude.
 * She is, however, one of the more sympathetic versions of this trope: She apparently really did care for Rapunzel, despite having no idea how to properly raise her, and is devastated (and sees her attempts to keep her away from the prince confirmed as correct) when.

Video Games

 * Annie from League of Legends is this and a Black Magician Girl
 * Sarah Kerrigan, post-infestation, in Starcraft and Starcraft II. Queen of Blades, ruler of the Zerg swarm, Manipulative Bastard, and Chessmaster extraordinaire. In the aftermath of the Overmind's death, she manages, through grit, will, and a burning need for vengeance, to exact bloody revenge on all her enemies and establish herself as the de facto ruler of not only the Zerg swarm, but also the entire Kroprulu sector (see quote at the top of the page). At the start of Starcraft II, the entire sector lives in fear of her inevitable return.
 * Christie from Dead or Alive is either this or just an Action Girl. I'm not sure, but I think she fits this trope.
 * Professional assassin with creepy The Only One Allowed to Defeat You Les Yay fixation on Helena? Fits like a glove.
 * Rider of Fate/stay night embraces this image, although she does show a nice side -- how much depends on the scenario.
 * Her alignment is Chaotic Good. I guess you don't have to be evil to be a Dark Action Girl, though.  probably counts as one too.
 * Larxene of the Kingdom Hearts series certainly fits the bill. She's well aware of it, too - her personal title is "The Savage Nymph", and she delights in taunting the heroes with "clues" that turn out to be completely fake. Plus, in RE:CoM, she manages to martial-arts kick Sora to the ground...TWICE. Not to mention, she's an absolute bitch to fight and, well, a bitch in general (and a sexy one too!)
 * Sonia, Ursula, and Limstella in Fire Emblem 7. And definitely Petrine from Fire Emblem 9.
 * Ashera from Fire Emblem 10 is arguably even more of one then Petrine, considering she's an evil goddess who's really fucking hard to beat.
 * Hilda, Deet'var, Pamela, Eng, Maybell, and Bleg from Fire Emblem Jugdral. Especially Hilda, who's quite possibly one of the most evil villains in Fire Emblem history.
 * Selena from Fire Emblem 8 is an Affably Evil version.
 * She isn't evil, just a case of My Country, Right or Wrong.
 * Idoun and Brunya from Fire Emblem 6.
 * Ocelot in Metal Gear Solid believes in Equal Opportunity Evil and always has some female henchmen in his gangs. As with everything in the series, things are a bit more complex with Sniper Wolf, Olga, and Fortune, but Laughing Octopus, Raging Raven, Crying Wolf, and Screaming Mantis of the Beauty and the Beast Corps are just completely insane.
 * Speed Buster, the not-so-nice old lady with a BFG from No More Heroes, is probably what happens when the Dark Action Girl survives into her 70s.
 * In fact, every female opponent in No More Heroes probably qualifies under this trope, especially Bad Girl.
 * After being killed, corrupted, and resurrected in undeath, Sylvanas Windrunner slips easily into this role. Unusually, she's often portrayed with sympathy (depending on your interpretation, she could easily be considered a protagonist), and actually doesn't like her new role very much. Indeed, the only things that seems 'dark' about her are her fighting method and aloof personality, not her goal (which seemed...nice).
 * It is heavily implied that Nathyrra of Neverwinter Nights Hordes of the Underdark used to be one. Almost every female drow that shows up in the campaign, as well as in the original after her Face Heel Turn and if you keep her on the dark side in Hordes of the Underdark, also qualify.
 * Risky Boots, the villainous pirate captain in the obscure Game Boy Metroidvania Shantae.
 * Menardi, from Golden Sun, fits this trope, although
 * Just ask any soldier of Tolbi, and they'll tell you she still fits the bill, no matter her intentions.
 * Bodhi from Baldur's Gate II: Shadows of Amn. Even if your PC is a heavily armoured warrior with an Infinity+1 Sword or two, she can probably wipe the floor with him or her in single combat with her bare hands, while wearing less than required by decency. And she's also pretty much a Complete Monster.
 * Your PC may count as well, depending on how you play the game. And the fight goes much faster if you employ your One-Winged Angel Super-Powered Evil Side.
 * Viconia De Vir is a Femme Fatale who has a long history of mass murder and will openly insult your fellow party members for little reason beyond spite. Only slightly subverted in that she's on your side and can join the party, but she still qualifies.
 * However, she can pull a sort of Heel Face Turn if a male protagonist pursues a relationship with her in Throne of Bhaal, eventually changing her alignment from neutral evil to true neutral (though she gets killed in a rather bittersweet epilogue for her trouble. Yeesh).
 * Tavion and Alora from the Jedi Knight sequels. Both are dark jedi and (sub-)bosses.
 * Rubi Malone easily outshines, or outdarkens, Shego. Let's see, she's a Guns Akimbo, Bottle Fairy Psycho for Hire, spends half the game on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge, goes into an Unstoppable Rage when the blood of some mook she shoots gets on her face, and has a penchant for the Groin Attack, using a gun or a sword. Oh, she wears a Slasher Smile during these last two actions. And she's voiced by Faith. Put it this way, she is far too dark to ever be a Disney Villain.
 * Tati from Rise of the Kasai, while not really a villain, qualifies for this trope. She's absolutely vicious and won't hesitate to kill any Kasai warrior she sees. Hatred runs through her veins.
 * Sasha from In Famous would also fit this trope.  and she's also one of the boss encounters in the game.
 * In Vampire: The Masquerade Bloodlines, if your character is female, Mercurio says something about not wanting to speak of some matters (a vampire being a slut) in front of a lady. Your response is that a knee to the crotch tends to get men talking. He immediately talks.
 * Jack of Mass Effect 2, a shaven and tattooed biotics experiment, whose experiences have left her unstable, to say the least...though traveling with Paragon Shepard can make her a bit more balanced and less sociopathic.
 * This can be applied to a female Commander Shepard, as well, if you choose Renegade options in the game. By the third game a fully renegade Shepard would not only beat everyone else on this list, but be darker and eviler than all of them.
 * Kat in Halo: Reach is a case of a Dark Action Girl in the protagonist's team. This doesn't make her exactly "good", however.
 * Selvaria Bles in Valkyria Chronicles. She is practically invincible, and she has ZERO interest in serving anyone else but the Big Bad, Maximillian. Her virtue, however, is due to loyalty, not due to for sheer lulz and evil.
 * The female Imperfects, from Marvel Nemesis Rise of the Imperfects, would definitely fit here in this trope. Solara incinerates people, Fault Zone loves to make the ground tremble with her seismic accelerators, and The Wink seductively slashes people. All three are fueled by hatred and vengeance, just like their male comrades, Brigade, Hazmat, and Johnny Ohm.
 * And then there's the killing machine, Paragon, though she's not really one of the Imperfects.
 * Juri Han from Super Street Fighter IV. Notable because the vast majority of playable female characters in the Street Fighter games are good.
 * Also, Cammy and the Dolls used to be Dark Action Girls, as Bison's Brainwashed Bodyguard Babes. Cammy has a full Heel Face Turn once her inner humanity is unlocked.
 * Crimson Viper seems to fit in as well.
 * She may be of neutral alignment, but Rouge the Bat qualifies for this.
 * Shade The Echidna. And how.
 * The Tales (series) has a few of these, along with several heroic Action Girls. Notable Dark Action Girls, however, include;
 * Legretta, Arietta, and Nebilim from Tales of the Abyss.
 * Pronyma from Tales of Symphonia. Sheena starts out as this, but, before long, undergoes a Heel Face Turn and loses the "Dark" part.
 * Elraine and Fortuna from Tales of Destiny 2.
 * Emeraude and the Fodora Queen from Tales of Graces.
 * Melanie and Schwartz from Tales of Legendia.
 * Gauche and Droite from Tales of Vesperia.
 * Pretty much every female character from the Blood Rayne series, including the main character. Especially the main character.
 * Morrigan from Dragon Age is a Badass Black Magician Girl with a snippy attitude and a morally ambiguous stance.
 * Queen Myrrah heads into the fray with some new battle armor for Gears of War 3's multiplayer.
 * Septerra Core has Selina, who apparently goes back and forth between this and Action Girl a couple of times throughout the game.
 * BioShock (series) 2 has an entire stable of Big Sisters, all of them psychotic, suped-up DAGs
 * Resident Evil has Alexia Ashford. She's completely sociopathic and believes all around her exist only to be experimented on. When in human form, she does not seem so threatening. Then she transforms into a monster that uses her blood like napalm and fights Wesker to a stand-still.
 * The Soul Series has a few. Tira is the best example, completely insane and just loves to kill. Ivy is one but on the good side, just a good side that doesn't care about all the other good sides.
 * From Tekken, we have Anna Williams, who's also a bit of a sadist. Nina might count with the Black and Gray Morality of the series, but she's debatable.

Web Comics

 * MAG-ISA -- Lucia fits this trope.
 * Sal Walters, from It's Walky, tends to weave in and out of the "dark" portion of Action Girl. She wasn't above opening a can of whupass on her own brother, though.
 * Considering that until, Agatha freed the other Jaegers, she was doing pretty well holding her own against guards and Othar, Jenka from Girl Genius likely qualifies. Mamma Gkika, being one of the Jager Generals, probably falls somewhere between this and Lady of War. Von Pinn is just Ax Crazy. And then there's Dupree, who's axe CRAZIER. She routinely attempts to murder entire towns (and, it's implied, only fails because her commanders won't let her) and actively taunts Von Pinn, who can tear Jagers apart with her bare hands.
 * not a bad example of this trope, either.
 * Oh, and every single one of the aforementioned characters are sympathetically portrayed, and, except for, are more-or-less on the side of good. Girl Genius is basically Black and Grey Morality Played for Laughs, because that allows for far more Crazy Awesome Mad Scientists.
 * Kria, the demon mare of Dan and Mab's Furry Adventures, is a Dark Action Mom. But given the comic, her appearances are pretty much entirely Villains Out Shopping.
 * Hortense in The Adventures of Dr. McNinja...at least, so far as we know.
 * In Blade of Toshubi, Lamika, aka Lady Snow Blood, kind of falls into this trope.
 * Sabine, Crystal, and, to an extent, Tsukiko (she mostly creates undead Mooks but can fight very well if she has to) from Order of the Stick.
 * Lifolei (which is on the 'good' guys side!) and Thlassa of Juathuur.
 * Kusari from Sluggy Freelance - a masked assassin with superhuman powers who unfailingly follows the orders of the villainous Hereti-Corp executives. Her perhaps even more dangerous "sister", Oasis, is too nuts to count, especially as she imagines she's actually good.
 * Reng-Lo from Harkovast, who is notable for being a skilled warrior and complete psycho.
 * Sakido from Slightly Damned certainly had a history as one of these. She was one of hell's most elite warriors in The Great War before retiring to the ring of the slightly damned. She shows us what she's made of when
 * Lazuli plays the role much straighter, and is pretty terrifying.

Web Original

 * A recurring character from v2 to v4 of Open Blue was Kapitänin Karla Weir. She worked for a 19th-century equivalent of Nazi Germany, was rumored to perform raids on colonies belonging to fellow member states of The Federation, and was frequently called on by intelligence officer and literal baroness Rhianna von Adolph to help her with carrying out the occasional dirty work.
 * Rhianna herself qualifies, being a highly-skilled Knife Nut armed with a diamond-coated combat knife. Unlike Karla, she makes a comeback in v5, if only reduced to a backstory role.
 * In The Gamers Alliance, there are quite a few characters who fit this trope such as Adela,, Endoran, Etna, Glaurung, Nina, Shyralis, Tarna, , Varalia and Zenobia.
 * Whateley Universe example: Vamp, the bad girl of The Necromancer's Five-Bad Band. She beat Bladedancer in a fair fight.
 * Don't forget Winter (the daughter of supervillains) and Cutlass (wants to become a henchwoman to a supervillain), who ripped up the Cadet Crusaders. Or Olympia, who may be closer to Ax Crazy. Or...
 * In Dragon Ball Abridged,  is one.
 * Tex in Red vs. Blue is not only the only woman in blood gulch (until much later), but also the only capable soldier. She's technically on the side of the Blue Team, which doesn't stop her from abusing and scaring the shit out of her allies. She is also the one character who wears black armor.
 * Sara from Trinton Chronicles can count as this with her bone control powers.
 * A fair amount of villains in Survival of the Fittest fit this, on at least two occasions, being a homage to Mitsuko Souma. Examples include Angelina Kaige (v1), Mariavel Varella (v2), Melina Frost (v3), Clio Gabriella (v4), Reiko Ishida, prior to Character Development (v4), and countless others.
 * From the That Guy With The Glasses site, Diamanda Hagan and Judas Liz.
 * Common for evil women on The Gungan Council. Notable examples include Xyra Sizhran, a manipulative Stormcommando.
 * Electra from Greek Ninja somewhat falls under this trope.

Western Animation

 * Shego (pictured) of Kim Possible.
 * Ravess from Storm Hawks.
 * Master Cyclonus as well, when The Gloves Come Off.
 * Blackarachnia of Transformers: Beast Wars is a bad, bad girl, ready to dish out pain by the bucket at the drop of a hat, as well as a treacherous Femme Fatale when it suits her. These two things, in combination, made her very popular in the fandom.
 * Despite the previous having a counterpart in Animated, the far better fit for this trope would be.
 * Airachnid of Transformers Prime. This is a woman (well, FemBot) who got bored with her job as a Torture Technician and decided, as a hobby, to hunt endangered species and keep trophies from her kills. Of course, rather than finding endangered species to hunt, she makes her own.
 * Jinx of Teen Titans fits this trope to a T (heh heh heh). She's also the leader of the H.I.V.E F.I.V.E, all male, and the only one with ambition. Her supposed Heel Face Turn was triggered by high ranking villains dismissing her as useless (and possibly a crush on Kid Flash). Of course, the phrase "Dark Action Girl" really brings Raven to mind...though she's more an example of another trope. Or, more accurately, two.
 * And let's not forget Blackfire, Starfire's diabolical big sister.
 * Azula from Avatar: The Last Airbender, as a charismatic and powerful leader, combines this trope with Magnificent Bitch.
 * Mai, the Deadpan Snarking Knife Nut, is also one of these  She certainly dresses like one. She wears red and black clothes, uses a dark makeup palate, and has black Femme Fatalons.
 * Ty Lee is a subversion of this. First of all, she's a lot nicer than most Dark Action Girls. Second, she's a Punch Clock Villain who doesn't seem to have any real interest in evil, other than because she's friends with the princess of the Fire Nation.
 * Galatea in Justice League Unlimited is also an Evil Twin.
 * Demona and Hyena from Gargoyles are particularly Ax Crazy ones.
 * Fox is a Heel Face Turner, though it doesn't change her personality one iota. Well, except for the Mama Bear thing.
 * Silver Sable from The Spectacular Spider-Man, an incredibly dangerous and clever combatant who serves as The Dragon to her father, mob boss Silvermane. Black Cat from the same series might also be considered an example, though, being something of a Catwoman figure, she's sometimes antagonistic but not exactly evil.
 * Probably should be mentioned that, in the comics, Silver Sable is a very different character with no connection to Silvermane. She is an Anti-Hero mercenary and Action Girl, and is usually on Spider-Man's side. Neighbours with Doctor Doom.
 * Cheshire from Young Justice.
 * Crasher from Challenge of the Go Bots.
 * Saranoia, Smoke, and Ella Mental from Yin Yang Yo.
 * Vanessa Warfield of the evil organization V.E.N.O.M in MASK
 * The Flock of Fury in El Tigre is a whole family of dark action girls.
 * Molotov Cocktease in The Venture Brothers, an assassin and ex-Soviet agent (and on-and-off love interest for Brock Sampson), combines this with The Baroness.
 * Andrea Beaumont from Batman: Mask of the Phantasm combines this trope with being a Femme Fatale Broken Bird.
 * Averted in most of the movie, considering that nobody is even aware the Phantasm is female until the final act.
 * Magica de Spell from DuckTales.
 * Amazing that Inque from Batman Beyond hasn't been listed yet. In addition to being a really effective, if not, really badass shapeshifting blob, she's the embodiment of implacable. Frozen, diluted, and dissolved, in that order, all things that would assuredly damage or kill her and is STILL alive. On top of that, just about all of her encounters with Batman are usually with her cornering or nearly killing him. She even manages to nearly off Bruce Wayne in steroid armor.