Villain Team-Up: Difference between revisions

 

Compare [[Evil Is One Big Happy Family]] and [[Legion of Doom]].

{{examples}}

* [[Spell My Name with an "S"|Malik/Marik]] and Yami Bakura from ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!]]!'' Battle city arc.

* In the episode of ''[[Inuyasha]]'' entitled 'Naraku and Sesshomaru Join Forces'...Take a wild guess.

* Final arc of ''[[Tiger and Bunny]]'' saw a Villain Team-Up of [[Big Bad]] {{spoiler|Maverick}} and villain from one of the earlier episodes, {{spoiler|Doctor Rotwang}}. They got along very well, despite that one of them was [[Fantastic Racism|NEXT-hater]] and the other was secretely a NEXT himself {{spoiler|until they were at the verge of [[Disney Villain Death]], with Rotwang begging Maverick to save him, only for him to reveal he is a NEXT and kick him in the face}}.

 

* Two of DC's big [[Crisis Crossover]]s, ''[[Infinite Crisis]]'' and ''[[Final Crisis]]'' had ''one'' of the threats being the team up of almost every single villain in the DCU (or the Earth-bound ones, anyway).

** The original ''[[Crisis on Infinite Earths]]'' had this as well—Brainiac and Luthor took advantage of the chaos caused by the Anti-Monitor to gather an army of EVERY known super-villain on the remaining Earths—and unleashed it on the worlds left unprotected when the heroes went off to battle the Big Bad. They also cut down on unnecessary duplicates (Earth-2 Luthor, anyone?).

* [[Doctor Strange]]'s enemies Dormammu and Umar are a brother/sister pair of [[Dimension Lord]]s. Usually they don't cooperate, which is good because it goes badly for him when they do. (Subverted in nearly all instances, since Umar is more clever than her brother and wants to see him fall more than she wants to defeat Strange.)

 

* The Disney Fanfic ''[https://web.archive.org/web/20120502125504/http://www.fanfiction.net/s/6048380/1/The_Hellbound_Hearts The Hellbound Hearts]'' consists of several Disney villains forming a loose companionship to get revenge on their enemies, and eventually take over the world. Then there's another group that wants to take advantage of the war to take over the world. And Frollo...he's just...there...

* ''[[Ultimate Sleepwalker|Ultimate Sleepwalker: The New Dreams]]'' plays this trope with an unusual spin. Instead of any of Sleepwalker's enemies teaming up, it's [[Spider-Man]]'s enemies that reunite as the Sinister Six to carry out Doctor Octopus's latest diabolical scheme. Sleepwalker and several other heroes are hastily recruited by the web-slinger into an impromptu team to even the odds.

* ''[[A Dark Knight Over Sin City]]'' has various [[Batman]] villains teaming up with [[Sin City]] villains.

* ''[[Fallout Equestria]]'': Red Eye and the Goddess, though both are plotting behind each other's back.

* [[Played With]] in the ''[[Calvin at Camp]]'' episode "A Stalkers Life"—multiple villains appear to attack the kids, yet they do nothing but trip each other up.

 

* In superhero movies this seems to be required for sequels. A single villain can occupy for the first movie, but once a sequel comes out you've got to throw more and more villains together. ''[[Batman Returns]]'': Penguin + Catwoman, ''[[Batman Forever]]'': Riddler + Two Face, ''[[Batman and Robin (film)|Batman and Robin]]'': Mr. Freeze + Poison Ivy (whether Bane is a villain or a henchman, you pick). ''[[Superman (film)|Superman]]'': Lex Luthor, ''[[Superman II]]'': Lex + 3 Kryptonians. ''[[Spider-Man (film)|Spider-Man]]'' avoided this for the first sequel, but made up for it by throwing in three villains (Sandman, Venom, New Goblin) for ''Spider-Man 3'', two of which team up (Sandman + Venom).

** The whole point of ''[[Batman Returns]]'' was to demonstrate that this trope doesn't work, and the fact that Catwoman and Penguin work with each other for all of five minutes seems to support it.

* [[Double Subverted]] in ''[[The Thief and the Cobbler]]''. When the evil grand vizier Zigzag goes to join the [[Big Bad]], the Mighty One-eye (who has an entire army of monstrous one-eyed men at his command), One-eye is unimpressed and has Zigzag thrown to his alligators. However, with his charisma Zigzag is able to convince the alligators to spare his life and help him out of the alligator pit. This impresses the Mighty One-eye enough to let him join him.

 

* In Lies, the third book of the ''[[Gone (novel)]]'' series, {{spoiler|Caine and Zil team up to burn down Perdido Beach, which acts as a distraction to let Caine escape to the island.}}

* In the [[Star Trek Novel Verse]], Villain Team-Up is essentially the idea behind the [[Star Trek: Typhon Pact]] series, only with a twist. It's uncertain if the Typhon Pact will be an enemy of the United Federation of Planets or not. Politically, everything is still highly uncertain, following the formation of the Pact in [[A Singular Destiny]] (a novel detailing the aftermath of [[Star Trek: Destiny]]). While the Pact members were historically antagonistic, their outlook appears to be changing. The extent to which they will remain "villains" is unclear. The Tholians, at least, look set to remain enemies, whether the rest of the Pact follows their lead or reins them in is anyone's guess.

* In ''The Warlord of Mars'', third book of the [[John Carter of Mars]] series, Matai Shang (a previously-offscreen but often mentioned [[The Chessmaster|chessmaster]]), Thurid (a minor villain from the previous book) and Salensus Oll (a newly-introduced [[Evil Overlord]]) pull off one of these, {{spoiler|which ends up falling apart messily, since all three hate each other's guts and have only temporarily-related goals}}. Rounding out the partnership is Matai Shang's daughter [[Daddy's Little Villain|Phaidor]], though she's genuinely loyal to her dad and is mostly along for the ride rather than a co-conspirator.

 

* In ''[[Smallville]]'', there have been a few villain team-ups. Firstly, in season 3, three of the meteor freaks Clark Kent had taken down teamed up to steal his powers and escape. There have also been team-ups between Brainiac and Bizarro, Lex and Toyman, and recently several Superman villains from the comics were teamed up by LuthorCorp to become Smallville's version of the Injustice Gang.

* ''[[Burn Notice]]'' had an episode with "Dead" Larry Sizemore and Tyler Brennen, two of Michael Westen's worst enemies, team up. Their partnership lasted just [[Incredibly Lame Pun|half the episode]], since Larry {{spoiler|never intended to work with Brennen long-term and simply stabs him in the chest, killing him.}}

* In ''[[Power Rangers in Space]]'', there was the United Alliance of Evil, a group formed by Dark Spectre and comprised of the villains from the first five seasons of Power Rangers, namely Lord Zedd, Rita Repulsa, the Machine Empire and Divatox.

 

* The Four Horsemen can be considered the [[Trope Codifier]] for professional wrestling. The heel group, known in wrestling as a "stable" or "faction," first formed with [[Ric Flair]], Ole Anderson, Arn Anderson and Tully Blanchard. Various incarnations lasted for 13 years; however, they have direct descendants running up to today's current wrestlers.

** The chain goes: [[New World Order]] (nWo), [[D Generation X]] (DX), Evolution (which had Flair as a member), Main Event Mafia, Fortune and Immortal (both of which had Flair as a member). Notable groups that are "nephews" of the Four Horsemen concept are the Dudley Boyz (formed in ECW as a stable of storyline brothers but later reduced to a tag team) and the Nexus (a group of rookies that took over WWE Raw for a time).

* [[The Miz]] and [[Ron Killings|R-Truth]], two heels in separate stories at the time, somehow found common ground and teamed up in September 2011. They were disqualified from a tag team title match at WWE Night of Champions when Miz attacked a referee. The next night on Raw, then-WWE COO [[Triple H]], sick of their antics, "fired" them. In a reverse [[Nice Job Breaking It, Hero|Nice Job BreakingItVillain]], this set off a chain of events where most of the WWE roster turned against [[Triple H]], leading to Triple H's ouster as the on-screen authority figure. Miz and Truth returned to WWE TV in mid-October 2011.

 

* ''[[Mario & Luigi: Dream Team]]'' has the newcomer, Antasma teaming up with Bowser in order to build a flying to take over the world.

* Not a straight example, since they teamed up to [[Take Over the World]](s) rather then to beat up the hero, but in ''[[Kingdom Hearts]]'', [[Sleeping Beauty (Disney film)|Maleficent]] teams up with [[Peter Pan (Disney film)|Captain Hook]], [[The Nightmare Before Christmas|Oogie Boogie]], [[Aladdin (Disney film)|Jafar]], [[The Little Mermaid|Ursula]], [[Hercules (1997 film)|Hades]], and, later on, [[My Friends and Zoidberg|Pete]]. One of the few villain alliances that actually managed to keep itself united without any form of internal struggles or betrayals entering the picture (the same can't be said about [[Chronic Backstabbing Disorder|Organization XIII]]).

* [[Sonic Generations]] has {{spoiler|Dr. Eggman team up with his past self, Dr. Robotnik. ("Nobody calls me that anymore.")}}

 

* The current story in ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]]'' has [[Card-Carrying Villain|Fructose Riboflavin,]] the [[Space Pirates|Pirates of Ipecac,]] and [[Woobie, Destroyer of Worlds|Galatea]] all teaming up although the pirates are there against their will, and it's arguable that Galatea [[Unwitting Pawn|doesn't really understand what's going on.]]

* The Hat and Robo-Cube in ''[[Stickman and Cube]]'', although this is more of a [[Puppeteer Parasite|hostile takeover]] on The Hat's part.

* In ''[[Sonichu]]'' a number of villains from the earlier issues (including Dr. Eggman and [[Pokémon|Giovanni]]) team up to take over CWCVille when Chris was away.

 

* In the Web Novel, ''[[The Impossible Man]]'', the villains team up to form The Amalgamated Union of Malicious Malcontents.

* In "Ayla and the Birthday Brawl" of the [[Whateley Universe]], Hekate's unseen master makes her team up with The Necromancer so she has a safe haven from a true Sidhe curse. The same unseen figured gets Don Sebastiano to give them intel, and The Necromancer gets his Children of the Night, the Felonious Four, and Obsession to help him.

 

* "The League of Villains" from ''[[The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron]]''.

** unlike other villain team ups however, these villains actually trusted each other (although didn't get along very well) The only reason Tee betrayed them was because they all belittled him, and Zix and Travoltron only left because Tee convinced them to do so. Other than that, the only reason they lost was because Jimmy outsmarted them all one at a time.

* Naturally, the episode of ''[[Hercules (Disney film)|Hercules: the Series]]'' where Aladdin appeared as a [[Special Guest]] featured Hades and Jaffar as partners as well. Interestingly (seeing as this is not Jaffar's "home" series) this story is {{spoiler| where Jaffar is finally [[Killed Off for Real]], Hercules breaking his staff (resulting in him becoming a spirit again) and sealing the villain in the River Styx forever.}}

 

* Tends to happen quite a bit in the [[Disney Theme Parks]]' stage shows.

** ''[[The Disney Afternoon]] Live!'' stage show that ran at [[Disney Theme Parks|Disneyland]] in 1991 had [[Tale Spin|Don Karnage]] and [[Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers (animation)|Fat Cat]] teaming up to steal a top secret plane.

* In the reknowned ''[[Dwarf Fortress]]'' [[Let's Play]] '[[Boatmurdered]]', a rather hilarious one occurs, when a group of goblins decide to team up with the elephants who were already holding the fortress under seige:

{{quote|''"I think they're starting their own little town in there, elephants and goblins living together in peace and harmony, joined only by burning hatred for dwarves."''}}

 

* [[Your Mileage May Vary|Depending on your viewpoint]], the Axis Powers - Italy, Germany and Japan - would fall under this.

** Also, the alliances between the Axis and the Soviet Union and their Central Powers predecessors and the upstart Bolsheviks in [[World War I]].