Evil Redhead

""Those whose hair is red, of a certain peculiar shade, are unmistakably vampires.""

- Malleus Maleficarum

Some heroes are redheads and we all know that Heroes Want Redheads. By contrast, there are also Evil Redheads. These are characters who are Exactly What It Says On the Tin. (Not to imply that heroes can't want evil redheads.)

This trope is Older Than They Think - red hair was supposedly a mark of a witch and favored by Satan himself. In the Balkans, people unfortunate enough to be born with red hair were said to be doomed to rise as vampires when they died, if they weren't vampires already. In some parts of Eastern Europe, babies born with red hair were once common targets of infanticide.

Bullies in school media often have red hair because of the temperamental redhead stereotype. Note the dovetailing with the Violent Glaswegian, though that seldom overlaps. Contrast Redheaded Hero, wherein the hero's red hair makes them noble leaders, and Redheaded Stepchild, wherein the redhead is despised but not necessarily evil, as well as the growing tendency over the past few decades for heroes to have red-haired romantic interests, especially green-eyed ones.

May be used to visually demonstrate the difference between this character and the blond or dark-haired hero.

Compare Evil Albino, Blond Guys Are Evil, and Blondes Are Evil.

No Real Life Examples, Please

Anime and Manga

 * Iczer-2 is one in the original Iczer. However,
 * Yuriannu Faithful from Linebarrels of Iron is one for the villain team, who also engages in purposeful Foe Yay with the hero, has a Sexy Secretary alterego, and has a definite Evil Is Sexy vibe.
 * While not so much evil as "egotistical", flame-haired Maaya Nanako of Umisho claims to be leading male Kaname's Unlucky Childhood Friend. His memories of her are not at all pleasant.
 * In Death Note, Light's hair would turn stylistically blood red when he was at his most sinister.
 * He's also the only Japanese person in the series to have light brown hair - which frequently turns red, depending on the, er, light.
 * Jessie, the self-appointed leader of Team Rocket's Terrible Trio in the Pokémon anime (although she doesn't qualify as evil, just hot-tempered).
 * Nao Yuuki of Mai-HiME, being an Ineffectual Loner and Dark Magical Girl, also counts, though she's more "amoral" than outright evil.
 * In the third volume of the manga, Nao actually assists the other HiMEs by luring Nagi into a trap after their escape from a cavern deep underneath Fuuka. Of course, she says she's not doing it for them.
 * In Mermaid Melody Pichi Pichi Pitch, the first shown member of every Quirky Miniboss Squad is a redhead (Izuuru, Sheshe, Fuku). Also twisted with Sara, whose natural colour was bright orange but changed to black.
 * Aside from Fuku (who never attacks the Mermaid Princesses directly, anyway), the first real member of Michel's Winged Ones who shows up is Lady Bat, who also has burgundy red hair.
 * Sailor Moon pulls this one on multiple occasions.
 * The first season's Big Bad, Queen Beryl.
 * The second season's first member of the Quirky Miniboss Squad, Rubeus.
 * Kaolinite, Eudial, Mimete, and Cyprine, all from the Witches 5, in the third season.
 * VesVes the Tamer in the fourth season. At least she has the excuse that the Quirky Miniboss Squad to which she belongs is themed after the colours of the senshi. Strangely, though, the exception is CereCere the Illusionist, who is given pink instead of orange.
 * And Akane Karasuma, aka Sailor Lead Crow, in the fifth. Also a Dark-Skinned Redhead.
 * Her boss Galaxia has gold-blonde hair...which fades into blood red.
 * Ali Al-Saachez, Nena Trinity (though she's more batshit insane than anything else), and Patrick Corlasawar (though Patrick is more of an Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain than truly evil) from Gundam 00.
 * Bring Stabity and Devine Nova fits this trope to a T.
 * Sir Luciano Bradley, the Knight of Ten, from Code Geass.
 * Vita and Nove of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, who are shown to be vicious, aggressive foes.
 * These two aren't really evil, you know. Nove is more of a Perpetual Frowner while Vita is just really heavy on the Tsun side of the scale.
 * Arnage of Huckebein from Force plays it straighter (thus far?).
 * In Naruto, there are five red-headed villains to date, Gaara (before his Heel Face Turn), Jiroubo, Tayuya, Sasori, and Pain
 * Though she's not quite evil, Karin could qualify as well.
 * Recoome of the Ginyu Force and movie villain Bojack from Dragon Ball Z. When the latter transforms, his hair actually gets redder.
 * Subverted by Android 16, a red-mohawked Friend To All Living Things (but Goku).
 * Baccano's Claire Stanfield straddles the line between this and Red Headed Anti-Hero, as a red-headed Ax Crazy Heroic Sociopath in a Black and Grey Morality universe. It doesn't help that he's a complete Wild Card.
 * Koros from Daitarn 3
 * , The Mole from the manga series Kagerou-Nostalgia. A nearly emotionless killer completely in thrall to the Big Bad, he convinces the heroes that  before defecting back to the villains. He appears to have some regrets about this now.
 * Principal Gakuencho from the first Devil Hunter Yohko OVA
 * Mayo Sakaki from the 3rd Fushigi Yuugi OVA
 * Due to her...special shade of hair color, she could also count as Blondes Are Evil.
 * Eustass Kidd in One Piece. The argument that he was just a Jerkass and not evil can be thrown out once you learn he has.
 * Momomi Minoi, the Cute and Psycho Yakuza Princess from Mezzo Forte fits quite well. One of her recreational activities seems to be casually murdering her father's employees when they fail to meet her expectations...and that's just when she's having fun. If someone actually tries to get in her way, she will do her best to ensure that they experience far worse.
 * Gasai Yuno has bright pink hair. in the ending, but before that, God Deus help you if you try to separate her from her Yuki.
 * Kakyoin from Jo Jos Bizarre Adventure was one at first, but Jotaro 'snapped him out of it'. There are a couple of other characters or so, though: Midler in the video game is depicted as a redhead and Big Bad Diavolo's hair is coloured magenta. Or something.
 * Sa Sakujun from Saiunkoku Monogatari is...not a nice person. At all.
 * The Ranma One Half anime gets an episode full of this trope. When Happosai splits Ranma's male side and female side into two different people, the female side turns out to be evil to the core. The glowing eyes, floating red hair, and supernatural powers certainly don't hurt in making her seem any less sinister.
 * Kenshin when he was the Battousai. He turned away from that life, though.

Comic Books

 * Dark Phoenix from X-Men, in both the comic and The Movie.
 * Not to mention her clone, Madelyne Pryor, who became the Goblyn Queen.
 * Of course, Dark Phoenix is simply redheaded Jean Grey (a founding example of Heroes Want Redheads) on too much power or a confused godlike being, depending on the retcon/ret-retcon. The way she's thought of more for that one arc than for her decades of being a hero before and after it is a trope of its own. Maddie didn't start out evil, either.
 * Also in X-Men, Cain Marko, aka Juggernaut, is a redhead, though it's rarely explicitly shown thanks to his signature helmet of psi blockage.
 * Then there's Belasco, the red-haired, devil-horned sorcerer who stole Illyana Rasputin's childhood.
 * And the shape-changing Mystique, whose default body is a combination of blue skin and red hair. Her adoptive daughter, auburn-haired Rogue, starts out as a villain (the Scarlet Witch's hair has pretty much the same shade).
 * Notable aversion: Thomas is the evil member of the Cassidy family. Sean and Theresa are redhaired and heroic, while Black Tom has black hair.
 * Pamela Isley, alias Poison Ivy, of Batman fame.
 * Also, Hush, one of Bruce's childhood friends, introduced rather recently (and has taken The Only One Allowed to Defeat You route as of Detective Comics #846).
 * The Scarecrow and the Riddler can be redheads depending on the artist.
 * In the '90s, Lex Luthor died and was replaced by his young-adult evil clone from Australia, who had shoulder-length red hair and a red beard.
 * And who contained the original Luthor's brain. Naturally, the pre-clone Luthor had red hair before he went bald.
 * Carried over into the Smallville continuity, where the young Luthor was a redhead until the day of the meteor shower.
 * Not to mention that Lex Luthor was a redhead in his original appearances back in 1940. He did not "go bald" until his 5th appearance, when a different artist picked the wrong character (Luthor's bald henchman) and the new look stuck. Generally, any Luthor that has hair, such as the two Luthors who came from Earth-3 during Crisis, has been drawn as a redhead.
 * Lightning Lord, older brother of the Ranzz siblings of Legion fame...although his more iconic look is from after his hair has turned white.
 * Carnage's alter ego Cletus Kasady has red hair.
 * Rorschach isn't technically evil (Antiheroic Sociopath), but he does have red hair and acts like a stone-cold bastard most of the time.
 * 'Red' Gurdy Pickens, the recurring Villain Sue of B.A.'s campaigns, in Knights of the Dinner Table.
 * Norman and Harry Osborn, the first and second Green Goblin, are described as having reddish-brown hair.
 * Lucifer's hair is red most of the time in The Sandman and in his own comic. Of course he isn't exactly evil in them, but more like a rather amoral Anti-Hero.
 * Based on the cover art and the video game, Scott Pilgrim's ex-girlfriend Envy is one, though they made her blonde in the movie. To be fair,.
 * was retconned into being a redhead.  apparently made him dye his hair black to hide the fact that
 * Commander Winter from Lady Mechanika.
 * When Red Skull still had his original body, he was a red head. His daughter, Sin, is also a red head and completely Ax Crazy.
 * Chastity is the redhead of of all of Chaos Comics' band of Heroic Sociopaths!
 * Giganta is red head.

Fanfic

 * in Pretty Cure Perfume Preppy.
 * Kainatrol in Futari wa Pretty Cure Blue Moon has deep red hair and a red colour scheme, and is probably one of the more evil members of the Etherium and certainly the least likable. Even the first on-screen victim of her Mind Control Eyes, Mia, had red hair. (On the other hand, there's also Dawn.)
 * Fiona from Kira Is Justice.
 * Naruto fanfics that have the Kyuuubi assume a human form almost invariably have it appear as a beautiful red-headed woman.
 * The fact that the Kyuubi's fur is actually orange, not red, is never acknowledged.
 * In fanfiction, Ginny will get this treatment. Ron, too, but that goes without saying.
 * The red haired man on the Council in Naruto Veangance Revelaitons, who is only referred to by his gender and hair color

Film -- Animated

 * Buddy, aka Syndrome, the main villain of The Incredibles, had bright red hair that was styled in a flame-esque way.
 * Brad Bird, who directed The Incredibles, seems fond of this trope. Kent Mansley (the paranoid government agent in The Iron Giant, which was also directed by Brad Bird) also has red hair and blue eyes, just like Syndrome.
 * The comic book follow up has Mezmerella
 * In Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation, Dark Heart's human form is a boy with bright red hair. (A form of Color Coded for Your Convenience, since he also has red clothes and eyes, red being the main color of whatever form he takes.) He makes a Heel Face Turn at the end, though.

Film -- Live-Action

 * Maxwell "Wizard" Wallace from August Rush, played by Robin Williams with a lot of hair dye.
 * SPECTRE assassin Fiona Volpe in Thunderball -- so evil she's even immune to James Bond's legendary bedroom charms!
 * Gustav Graves from Die Another Day.
 * Malachai, the blood-thirsty teen from Children of the Corn.
 * Magenta from The Rocky Horror Picture Show certainly applies.
 * Randal Graves of the View Askewniverse could fit in here somewhat. Although he isn't technically evil, he thinks nothing of spitting water in customers' faces, ordering porno titles in front of children, manipulating his best friend into horrible but brilliant verbal traps, indirectly destroying several of said friend's romantic relationships, and generally causing chaos and frustration wherever he goes. And when he's not in black and white, he is titian-haired (dirty red-blonde).
 * The Red Queen. The Mad Hatter subverts the trope; he can certainly be pretty menacing at times, but he's unquestionably one of the good guys.
 * Scut Farkus from A Christmas Story.
 * Star Wars: in the movies, Emperor Palpatine or Darth Sidious has grey or white hair that turns bald. However, in the Star Wars Expanded Universe, particularly Dark Empire, even though the colours don't really match up to a number of things, the Emperor's young clones have red as their hair colour! Of course, when you consider the trope description and the fact that Palpatine is a Complete Monster, it is not too difficult to see why this is apparently his original hair colour!
 * In Gremlins 2, there's a scheming female boss who tries to seduce Billy and is a Jerkass to Kate. She ends up being trapped in Spider Gremlin's web! Guess who saves her bacon...

Literature
""I would always hesitate to recommend as a life's companion a young lady with quite such a vivid shade of red hair. Red hair, sir, in my opinion, is dangerous.""
 * Pictured above: Melisandre of A Song of Ice and Fire is an marginal example. As a Knight Templar priestess who worships a fire-themed god and often recommends human sacrifice by burning, she's regarded by many characters as an Evil Chancellor. However, she's also firmly committed to fighting the overtly evil Others, believing that the brutal actions she recommends are necessary for the greater good of humanity. Ultimately, her morality is somewhat debatable.
 * A Dance With Dragons certainly did not help the whole "evil" debate.
 * Jack from Lord of the Flies.
 * All Shades from the Inheritance Cycle have red hair.
 * Anne Rice's Vampire Chronicles has many red-haired vampires. Most notably, Maharet and her scary-as-hell sister Mekare - though the yandere-like Armand arguably fits the bill too. Maharet, however, is nothing approaching evil (apart from being a vampire, which she was made into against her will).
 * In the Illuminatus trilogy, Satan prefers redheads and they explore this trope in depth.
 * Well, it's a reference to old folk-beliefs. It works because the Black Mass participants believe it should. In an inversion, one of the participants is a protagonist who is taking his first steps in his path away from social conventions towards illumination. He and the redhead get some good sex out of the deal and get to meet Satan disguised as Billy Graham.
 * Both used and averted in Talking to Dragons, Book 4 of Patricia C Wrede's Enchanted Forest Chronicles. The first girl the protagonist meets (and his eventual love interest) is a redheaded fire-witch who's rude and temperamental, but basically good. Later, they meet another redheaded fire-witch (fire-witches in general are prone to red hair) who likes turning people into statues and uses torture to power her spells.
 * Lampshaded in the short story "Nobody Here But-" by Isaac Asimov where the protagonist suspects his girlfriend is bitchy just because she has to live up to her red hair.
 * Celia Madden of The Damnation of Theron Ware. (Though perhaps "evil" might be a bit strong, as "bitchy" serves just as well. But it still counts.)
 * The ghost of Peter Quint from the Victorian novella The Turn of the Screw, who the main character thinks has come back from the dead to try and corrupt the small boy she's been charged with watching over. Of course, the ghost . Apparently, at the time the novel was written, it was quite common for red-haired characters to be portrayed in this villainous way.
 * Lumiya from the Star Wars Expanded Universe -- formerly known as Shira Brie, as well as Admiral Natasi Daala. Also, judging by the images of his clones, plus some earlier life picture, Emperor Palpatine himself was one. Mara Jade counts, at least until she gets married to Luke Skywalker.
 * SO averted in Harry Potter. JK Rowling must like redheads.
 * Congrats, it's Word of God'd!
 * Brand from The Book of Amber, who wanted to destroy the universe and remake it in his own image. And his redheaded siblings, Bleys and Fiona, are also fairly morally dubious.
 * To be fair to Brand, the rest of the family had its own moral issues, though, by the end, some of the others had made some progress toward outgrowing it.
 * In The Day of the Triffids, the protagonist is fired upon without provocation by a nameless gang leader with red hair. He later shows up in an armoured vehicle as 'Torrence', representing a despotic feudal 'government' trying to extend its influence over Britain.
 * In the Andrew Vachss novel Strega, unlicensed private eye Burke does a job for the titular character, the crazy flame-haired relative of a Mafia boss, who wields a mysterious power over men.
 * The Lone Power, from the Young Wizards series, often appears as a young man with red(dish) hair.
 * Psycho Misandrist Adept Red of the Apprentice Adept series
 * Victoria from Twilight
 * Children of the Corn has Malachi.
 * In I, Coriander, Arise insists Coriander must be evil because of her red hair - "All these curls, red as the flames of Satan! This is vanity, this is pride."
 * In Good Omens, a woman first introduced as Scarlett and later Carmine "Red" Zuigiber is a Fiery Redhead who deals in weapons and seems to cause violence through her mere presence. She's eventually revealed to be.
 * Averted with Pepper, one of Adam's friends.
 * In Poul Anderson's Operation Chaos, the genie tries to invoke this, abusing Ginny for having "hair like hell". She ignores it.
 * Sisterhood series by Fern Michaels: lawyer Adel Newsom is definitely this. It's a good thing that she's actually stupid.
 * Ruin, the personification of entropy, chaos, and destruction in Mistborn - while usually either shapeless or impersonating people - physically manifests as a redheaded man.
 * Notably, the mind of Ruin {separate from the power) was actually once a man named Ati, and a note in The Way of Kings, which is in the same Verse as Mistborn, indicates that Ati was a nice guy before he became bonded to the power and it warped his mind. So his evil had nothing to do with being a redhead and his physical body was essentially completely irrelevant.
 * In Jeeves and Wooster, this is one of the reasons Jeeves advises Bertie to steer clear of Bobbie Wickham.

"He had said she had red hair. Well, she had; but that was no way to speak of it. When red-headed people are above a certain social grade their hair is auburn."
 * Morgan Le Fay in A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthurs Court. The narrator, when explaining why she imprisoned and tormented a man:

Live Action TV

 * In Burn Notice, one of the most vicious female characters to date (and definitely the youngest vicious character), Eve, is played by redheaded actress Aviva. Fiona comments that she's the first natural redhead she's seen since leaving Ireland.
 * Semi-averted in Waterloo Road. The show's only redhead, Danielle, hangs around with Aleesha, who is pretty evil (sabotaging Park Side Story, tricking Karla into the whole petition thing). However, Danielle, to her credit, has balked at many of Aleesha's more evil schemes and actively refuses to take part in them.
 * In Firefly, we have Saffron. Or Yolanda. Or Bridget. No one's sure what her real name is, we just know she has red hair.
 * Seska, the manipulative Cardassian spy from Star Trek Voyager.
 * Kimberly Mancini and Sydney Andrews from Melrose Place. Also, Violet from Melrose Place, 2009.
 * Peggy from Married With Children - according to Al, at least.
 * Garth Marenghi's Darkplace has the hero battling evil Scotsmen, with his own hair turned red after a killer bagpipe attack. Fortunately, his personality is not affected (probably because he's already a bigoted Jerkass).
 * Averted in Buffy the Vampire Slayer -- when redheaded Willow goes evil, her hair becomes black.
 * But Vamp Willow is redheaded but evil.
 * Glory had reddish-blonde hair and wore a lot of red.
 * Played straight with the Mayor.
 * Spellbinder Ashka from, well, Spellbinder was a redhead and also a power-hungry, cunning, vicious bitch.
 * Criminal Minds has some red-haired UnSubs, like Karl Arnold, aka The Fox.
 * Both film adaptations of Dune have this going on: David Lynch's has a strawberry-blond Feyd-Rautha (played by an enthusiastic Sting in brass underpants) and the miniseries features Ian McNiece as a Baron Harkonnen rocking the henna look.
 * In NCIS, McGee is wooed by a
 * ER's Kerry Weaver.
 * Joey Caruso from Everybody Hates Chris.
 * Kitty Monroe in True Jackson.
 * Sharona in Sonny With a Chance.
 * Budnick from Salute Your Shorts.
 * In The X Files "All Souls",.
 * The Sarah Connor Chronicles has Catherine Weaver.
 * In Supernatural,  The Song Remains The Same.
 * This was, however, a rather sad addendum to her original Heroes Want Redheads function (which was perhaps subverted in that the redhead wanted the hero!).
 * The Young Ones: three brunettes, one ginger, all unpleasant. Still, guess which one is the most violent and destructive.

Music

 * Garbage's Shirley Manson sings in a rather EVIL fashion.
 * Well, she DID get tapped to play Catherine Weaver, as mentioned above.
 * And before Garbage, this was Danny Elfman's stage persona. He looks so cheerfully demonic that you have to wonder why he wasn't cast as the Joker.
 * David Bowie's stage persona of The Thin White Duke, a heartless aristocrat, had predominantly reddish-orange hair.

Mythology

 * It's a common folk belief that many evil figures in The Bible, most notably Cain and Judas Iscariot, had red hair, despite there being no textual evidence of this. In Medieval times, when most of the population was illiterate, stained-glass windows in churches would tell various stories from the Bible in picture form and red hair was used as a shorthand for evilness, since it evoked the image of fire and Hell.
 * Averted -- actually, inverted -- in Robert Graves' King Jesus, where Jesus has red hair, this being one of the eight "signs of royalty".
 * To quote I'm Sorry I Haven't a Clue, "Judas is carrot".
 * Straight-up subverted by David, whom Samuel was reluctant to appoint king because of his red hair, which was associated with violence and bloodshed, until God told him that David would shed much blood, but it would be that of Israel's enemies.
 * According to some translations of the Bible, the devil has curly red hair.
 * Older Than Dirt: the ancient Egyptian pantheon has the god Set, best remembered for hacking his brother Osiris into bits and scattering the pieces about the world. He was depicted as being a redhead -- or at least red-furred, since he was usually depicted with the head of an unidentifiable animal.
 * And then there was the attempted schtupping of Horus...sheesh.
 * There is some speculation about what kind of animal Set is often shown as, but it resembles an aardvark -- which don't have much fur on their heads anyway.
 * Loki, the god of mischief in Norse Mythology, in contrast to the much more masculine Redheaded Hero Thor. In Norse tradition, those born with red hair and blue eyes were thought to possess supernatural strength and were more likely to be harbingers of battle. The modern depiction of Thor with blond hair is wrong on multiple levels, as blonds were considered to be calmer and more strategic in battle, hence Odin's coloration.
 * Rumour has it that red hair was considered a positive factor in selection to become a druid - this may account for the malign reputation of red-headedness amongst those cultures that were hostile to Celts. (And probably among the Christian missionaries too.)
 * At least one painting of Pandora, the first-woman whose curiosity brought diseases into the world, gives her fiery red hair and a scary look on her face.
 * A few pre-Raphaelites depicted Salomé as a ginger, too.
 * Averted with King Menelaos of Homeric legend, always depicted as a redhead, because his name is Menelaos Xanthos, which means "Menelaos the Blond". Yeah, it's that sensible.

Tabletop Games

 * Ashnod the Uncaring, from Magic the Gathering.

Theater

 * Macbeth: Given their origin, the "dead butcher and his fiendlike queen" are generally portrayed as redheads.
 * The original Sweeney Todd was a redhead in the book. Modern depictions tend to run more toward Looking Like Cesare, though.
 * Many depictions of Yandere Stepford Smiler Mrs. Lovett have her as a redhead.
 * Because of the association with Judas, Shylock of The Merchant of Venice was originally portrayed as a redhead, and this was generally a common trait of "evil Jew" characters.
 * Redhead.

Video Games

 * Id from Xenogears.
 * Kuja from Final Fantasy IX when in his trance form.
 * Kuja gets two evil hair tropes for the price of one.
 * Ganondorf (and a few forms of his more bestial side, Ganon) in the various The Legend of Zelda games.
 * All the Gerudo, actually, but they're thieves, whereas Ganondorf is out-and-out evil.
 * The Legend of Zelda Spirit Tracks has Chancellor Cole, who has red hair and is found out to be evil pretty early in the game.
 * He's not explicitly stated to be evil, but there's something just plain off about the Happy Mask Salesman. Especially noticeable when you tell him you can't give him the Majora's Mask yet.
 * Aribeth has reddish hair (much more apparent from her portrait than her character model), though she is only evil for about half of the first campaign and you get to choose whether she stays evil in Hordes of the Underdark.
 * Tactical RPGs like Fire Emblem portray the enemy units as having red armor and hair.
 * Bowser from Super Mario Bros. Despite being a turtle he still has some hair.
 * Silver, The Rival in Pokémon Gold and Silver/Crystal, and Maxie, the leader of Team Magma in Ruby/Emerald (in Sapphire, the latter helps the player).
 * Subverted to some extent by Silver's manga counterpart, who is a red-haired antihero.
 * Silver in the games isn't exactly evil, just a bit of a jerk...
 * That, and Maxie is probably the most sympathetic villain from the main Pokémon series besides.
 * Erol in Jak II, although, most of the time, his hair is hidden by his helmet.
 * Tiamat from Last Scenario (although she ).
 * Walter Bernhard from Castlevania: Lament of Innocence. And damn, does he ever have fun with the 'evil' part.
 * Subverted in Portrait of Ruin: Stella and Loretta are redheaded twins (though occasionally coloured with violet hair), but they're just Brainwashed and Crazy.
 * Partially subverted in Curse of Darkness; Isaac is completely nutters, but
 * Another subversion: Axel Almer of Super Robot Wars. He's an honest Evil Redheads in Advance, as well as the GBA version of OG 2. However, in the subsequent remakes, he's more or less a Noble Demon, not outright evil...then he pulls a Heel Face Turn, making him a Redheaded Hero (as does his heroic self in Advance).
 * The Kingdom Hearts series has Axel, who eventually develops into an Anti-Villain
 * His predecessor Reno certainly counted in the original Final Fantasy VII. Guy was a bastard to fight if you were underlevelled on that bloody pillar.
 * in Tomb Raider: Underworld.
 * Late in Tales of Symphonia, it is revealed that However, just prior the boss fight,  If you choose to talk to Kratos in an event prior to this revelation, though,
 * Creed Graphite, the "scarlet-haired devil" from Tales of Hearts.
 * Kerrigan from Starcraft had red hair, but it changed colour when she turned evil. Foreshadowing?
 * Blood Rayne is a Heroic Sociopath who enjoys the cruelest and most brutal means of exterminating monsters. If the kill animations weren't indicators, her dialogs with her enemies don't do much to distinguish her from them.
 * Triumph Studios seems to love playing with this trope in their Overlord series of games, as Rose, one of the mistresses from Overlord, is a redhead. In Overlord II, all three mistresses have hair colors that are various shades of red. However, Rose and Kelda (the most redheaded of the mistresses) are actually non-evil (Rose believes in Order and Kelda is the Victorious Childhood Friend) and arguably the Only Sane Women of the setting.
 * Sandra the gem thief from Legend of Mana.
 * Marisa Kirisame during Story of Eastern Wonderland. That is, when she was still evil. Or redheaded.
 * In Trauma Team,
 * Almalexia in The Elder Scrolls Morrowind.
 * If played as a Renegade, default female Shepard in Mass Effect.
 * Crimson Viper, from Street Fighter IV.
 * Giygas from Earthbound appears to be this.
 * The Draugr in Skyrim tend to have red hair and beards.
 * in Phoenix Wright Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations.
 * To get an idea of how evil, watch this (spoiler warning!).
 * Then we have from the previous game.
 * There's also  from Ace Attorney Investigations 2.

Visual Novels

 * Neither is entirely evil per se, but are both red haired, Yandere, psychopathic characters in Tsukihime, and both have rather unsavory goals.  is 'evil' here precisely because her hair is red, even.  is essentially the poster girl for Stepford Smiler, Break the Cutie, Emotionless Girl, and Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds.

Web Comics

 * Psycho for Hire Valentino from the Marilith webcomic. To her defense, she was made a psycho killer in a gulag.
 * Lysinda and Oasis from Sluggy Freelance. Particularly emphasized with Lysinda, who sports red hair even when the rest of the strip is in black and white.
 * Belkar Bitterleaf generally looks bald in most panels, but look at the close-ups or his feet: He's a stubbly Chaotic Evil redhead. He does have hair. Not much of it, though.
 * Pompey, Vaarsuvius' second Evil Counterpart in the Linear Guild has bright red hair - part of his being an evil opposite to V involves the fact that V wears red and has purple hair while Pompey wears purple and has red hair.
 * While he's only made a few appearances in the comic, the Norse deity Loki is a literal Fiery Redhead and identified as being Chaotic Evil. On the other hand, he seems pretty nice and gets along well with Thor.
 * Player 2. He's entierly red, but his actual hair is ginger. Also the only Player with a Beard of Evil.
 * Christian has dark-reddish-brown hair and a soul patch to boot.
 * Mal from Head Trip probably counts, although she isn't completely heartless.
 * Evil Diva has the red hair of the character she's supposed to have. White Sheep, unfortunately for her.
 * Cerise from Eerie Cuties and Magick Chicks, who is not only part of Melissa's clique, but also plots to overthrow Melissa and take over.
 * Bob, of Bob and George, is a LITERAL fiery redhead: his hair is red, his powers are fire-based, and when he's really pissed off, his hair tends to burst into flames. His place in the comic tends to swing between Heroic Sociopath and outright villain.

Web Original

 * In The Gamers Alliance, Duchess of the Eastern Horde and her sister Nina are quite evil and ambitious villainesses who have red hair. It runs in the family.
 * In Survival of the Fittest, Melina Frost of V3.
 * While not an actual redhead, Maxwell Lombardi has dyed red streaks in his hair. And given that he is one of the few killers in v4 to actually enjoy killing...well, he fits.
 * Broken Saints -
 * The MS Paint Fan Adventure Alanna has Tristan, primary antagonist and confirmed murdered.
 * N'Ktane in Tasakeru fits the bill.
 * Monster High: Alpha Bitch catgirl, Torelie Stripes.

Western Animation

 * Vicky, the babysitter from hell from The Fairly Odd Parents.
 * South Park did an entire episode, "Ginger Kids", where Cartman was convinced that "gingers" (pale, freckled, red-headed kids) were monstrous, Children of the Corn-like abominations. In what would have been a surprising example of Hypocritical Humor were we speaking of anyone other than Eric Cartman, after his friends tried teaching him a lesson by making him up to look like a "ginger" while he slept, Cartman soon decided that "his people" were the master race. And since this is Cartman we're talking about, he was attempting genocide before the end of the episode.
 * The Ginger kids return in the 200th and 201st episode and demand the town hand over Muhammad so they could obtain his ability to not get ripped on. It is revealed a now Ax Crazy Scott Tenorman is their leader. He justifiably wants revenge on Cartman for making him eat his parents. He puts him through an ordeal much like the one the Joker put Commissioner Gordon through in The Killing Joke.
 * Jack Spicer from Xiaolin Showdown, Hotstreak from Static Shock, and Montana Max from Tiny Toon Adventures, all voiced by redhead Danny Cooksey, who also played red-headed antagonistic jerk Budnick on Salute Your Shorts. Perhaps Danny Cooksey himself is evil, too. Nobody knows.
 * If he is, he's bound to be harmless. He also lends his voice to the heroic-but-cowardly Dave from Dave the Barbarian (who, notably, is not redheaded--but his more aggressive sisters are). This overlaps with Jack's notable cowardliness, so we've little to worry about from Mr. Cooksey if he's a villainous type.
 * Don't forget the first appearance of his Teen Titans villain, Control Freak.
 * Aaand subverted with Keef on Invader Zim, who is terrifyingly nice.
 * And back to Xiaolin Showdown, Wuya's true form has red hair.
 * The Wicked Witch in Cyberchase has bright, flaming red hair. In fact, it could be considered orange.
 * Kelly from Stoked.
 * Princess Morbucks from The Powerpuff Girls, who is probably the best example of Screw the Rules, I Have Money.
 * Don't forget Blossom's two Evil Counterparts, Brick of the Rowdyruff Boys and Berserk of the Powerpunk Girls (who is a comic-only character).
 * Lee Kanker in Ed, Edd n Eddy
 * Subverted in the direct-to-DVD followups of Disney's Cinderella:, who was a Rich Bitch in the original movie, is now less evil and more like a Well Done Daughter Girl.
 * Demona, from Gargoyles.
 * Mertle from Lilo and Stitch.
 * Spectra's human form in Danny Phantom is a redhead.
 * Vanessa Warfield from MASK.
 * Candace, from Phineas and Ferb, is a more benign example of the trope. She's not really evil per se; she just wants her brothers to get caught doing the outlandish things they do. Several episodes prove just how much she loves them.
 * Ed Wuncler III from The Boondocks.
 * Looney Tunes: Yosemite Sam.
 * Cops: Dr. Badvibes is a maniacal scientist who makes diabolical machines and gadgets for Big Boss's gang of Crooks.
 * On Batman the Brave And The Bold, The Music Meister is a redhead. And of course, one or two characters from the comics, like Poison Ivy, fit as well.
 * Sideshow Bob from The Simpsons.