Anti-Villain/Live-Action TV: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

* [[Manipulative Bastard|Ben]] on ''[[Lost]]''. Or most of the Others, for that matter. They murder, kidnap, and generally terrorize the Survivors, but they [[Well-Intentioned Extremist|genuinely believe that they are "the good guys"]]. Plus, they're [[Villains Out Shopping|pretty relaxed when they aren't being mean]].

** A good dose of [[Affably Evil]] and [[Well-Intentioned Extremist]], plus the fact that [[Anti-Hero|his rival can be kind of a dick]], seems to be making one of these out of {{spoiler|the Smoke Monster}}, of all people. This can be put down to "the writers want us to be on our toes".

** Also, Abruzzi after the incident with the killed child, which gave him nightmares and hallucinations of Jesus. He found faith in Christianity, but, at the same time, couldn't separate from his evil ways and his revenge on Fabonacci. Right before he dies, he actually prays, "forgive me".

* Lt. Jon Kavanaugh on ''[[The Shield]]''. By all means, he ''should'' be the good guy, considering that he's going after Vic and the Strike Team for police corruption and the death of Terry Crowley, but his methods are so thoroughly repulsive and immoral that it becomes impossible to sympathize with him, especially as time progresses and his obsession with catching Vic gets worse and worse. It gets to the point where he's willing to plant evidence in order to frame Vic, which ends up getting him arrested. By the time it's all said and done, he's just glad to be ''done'' with the whole thing so he never has to deal with Vic Mackey and his corrupting influence ever again.

** Noah Bennet (a.k.a. HRG) began as an agent of the evil Company, who hunts down those with superpowers and either captures them or kills them. Bennet quickly gained sympathy due to his genuine love for his family, especially his [[Morality Pet|adopted superpowered daughter]]. It was also revealed that many of the people he captured were given training to keep their powers under control and offered a chance to use them to help others (in the case of Isaac and Eden), and the only superpowered people he killed were those who used their powers to hurt people. He quickly moved into [[Anti-Hero]]/borderline hero territory at the end of Season One, after he joined forces with fellow Company prison escapees Matt Parkman and Ted Sprague in order to shut down the mechanisms The Company was using to track all the people they caught and released.

** Season Three gives us Daphne Millbrook, a professional thief who works for and with other villains, but is clearly disgusted by most of them, never kills anyone herself, and is eventually revealed to {{spoiler|have been working with Pinehearst because its leader would otherwise take away her superspeed, which is the only thing stopping her from being crippled by cerebral palsy}}.

****** End of Season 4, he seems to be rehabilitated...again. Mostly due to the fact that {{spoiler|Matt Parkman trapped him in a nightmare where he was the only person in the world, which, of course, was messed up by Peter Petrelli borrowing Matt's power and following him in after he had a dream that Sylar would save Emma, a friend of his. Which...Sylar does, with a [[Crowning Moment of Funny]] when he tied up Puppeteer Doyle like...a puppet.}}

* Prince Jack in ''[[Kings]]''.

** Lindsey might also count. He's largely misguided by Wolfram and Hart, but sees Angel as the truly evil one - for most of the series. He eventually {{spoiler|leaves W/H when he's ordered to cover up the murder a group of blind children.}} This doesn't stop him from {{spoiler|coming back as a villain later on}}, though.

*** Yeeeeah, Lindsey doesn't really count. For one thing, he knew from the get-go that Wolfram and Hart was evil. For another, he didn't leave after the blind kids thing, he was ''promoted.'' He only left after they {{spoiler|gave him an evil hand and he saw what they did to former employees.}} He never believed he was working for good, every evil thing he ever did was either with W&H or out of hatred for Angel, since he cut off his first hand.

* [[Affably Evil|Mayor Wilkins]] in ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]''. Whilst unquestionably evil ({{spoiler|his ultimate aim seems to be to grow into a big demon and eat a few dozen teenagers}}), he has a genuinely fatherly love for Faith. So much so that, even when she's on the other side of the [[Heel Face Revolving Door]], he's still the person she remembers with the most fondness, judging by her interaction with the First.

* Sam Adama in ''[[Caprica]]'' is a ruthless gangster who genuinely cares about and is fiercely protective of both his family and his culture. That Taurons are a minority on Caprica that suffers a great deal of prejudice also factors into this.

* In ''[[Supernatural]]'', Lucifer ''tries'' to come off as this, declaring that his "crime" was loving God too much. It doesn't really work, since there are three groups he can give it to: Demons, who hate God and humanity both and would probably be less in awe of him if they knew that was his motivation; Angels, who were all faced with the exact same situation and made the other choice; and Humans, who are going to be wiped out en masse by his war against heaven. In fact, the conclusion most people come to is that he's a bratty child throwing a tantrum and breaking his dad's toys.

** His brother, {{spoiler|Gabriel/The Trickster, does this much better. After it's dicovered who he is, it's easier to see why he killed Dean so many times: he was trying to stop Sam from snapping and going after Lilith after Dean dies, therefore trying to stop him from breaking the final seal. He comes across as more the little brother who can't stand his brothers' arguing, to Lucifer's bratty persona. Sadly, in Gabriel's case [[Redemption Equals Death]] and he's killed by Lucifer - but not before leaving Sam and Dean a DVD which tells them how to put Lucifer back in his box.}}

* Nucky Thompson, the main character of ''[[Boardwalk Empire]]''. Yeah, he's a corrupt [[Sleazy Politician]] who started looking into becoming a kingpin of the illegal booze trade the moment Prohibition started, but he's also often a genuinely kind man with good intentions, has much more enlightened views on women and minorities than his peers, has some genuine [[Freudian Excuse|Freudian issues]] going on, and seems positively cuddly when contrasted with the viciousness of [[Al Capone]] or the cold-blooded sadism of [[Complete Monster|Arnold Rothstein]].

* [[Glee]]'s Sue Sylvester occasionally edges towards this trope, as her [[Morality Pet]] moments with her sister, Jean, have been expanded into a real relationship, her positive treatment of Becky has continued, and she has genuinely attempted to help Kurt deal with both a situation that verged on religious harassment and serious bullying - to the point where she ''resigned her Principalship'' in order to be able to help him better.

* ''[[Smallville]]'': Lex Luthor evolved from a [[Sliding Scale of Anti-Heroes|Type III or IV]] [[Anti-Hero]] into an [[Anti-Villain]] in Season's 4 & 5, retaining most of his sympathetic qualities, but becoming directly antagonistic. Eventually, he lost those as well, and evolved into the [[Corrupt Corporate Executive]] and sociopath we all knew he'd eventually be. His father, Lionel, evolved the other way. Beginning the series as an unrepentant [[Big Bad]], Lionel became an [[Anti-Villain]] in the later seasons, as his crush on Martha, revelations about his past, and attempts to make up for his many mistakes humanised him. Some would argue that he even managed to become an antihero (Type IV) before his Season 7 exit.

* Most of the bank robbers in ''The Kill Point'' are basically decent people who made a bad mistake and spend the rest of the show regretting it. Except for Mr. Rabbit, who is [[The Sociopath]].

** This changed in the "6:02 AM EST" episode, when Walternate revealed that he was willing to [[Moral Event Horizon|kill his son in order to save his own universe]]. Contrast this with our Walter, who has always been trying to find a way to save ''both'' universes.

*** In the same episode, Walternate also captures ''the mother of his grandchild'' and locks her in a cell when his disregard for his own son's life causes her to attempt a [[Heel Face Turn]].

** Then there's Mags Bennet, who is a clearer [[Anti-Villain]], committing crime, but only in the best interest of her kids and grandkids. It helps that she has a [[Morality Pet]] in the form of Loretta McCready.

* HG Wells from [[Warehouse 13]] is this when's she actually a bad guy. She was a [[Nietzsche Wannabe]] and literally a [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds]], but she's nowhere as malicious as either Macphearson or Walter Sykes, and she spends most of her time on screen helping out the Warehouse team.

* Arguably, Babe Carey, from All My Children, circa 2003-2007. She never wants to do bad things and is usually, in some way, pushed into doing the wrong thing (for the right reasons) because of the effects of others' actions. She doesn't want to be bad and, in ideal circumstances, she would even be good. She strives and wants to be good. However, she is not strong enough to rise against her circumstances.

* General Hummel in ''[[The Rock]]''. From the very beginning he's established as a war hero, and the whole purpose of his hostage taking and terrorist threats is to get some justice for the families of soldiers killed in illegal clandestine operations. In the end, it turns out that his threats of chemical attacks were all an elaborate bluff, and he was never actually willing to kill anyone. His men, on the other hand...