The Best TV Villains Of 2015

There’s a simple explanation behind the appeal of the best villains: People who do bad things are fascinating. It’s their motivations that drive the interest in their narratives. Are they doing the wrong things for the right reasons, or are they just out of their minds? It’s a question that’s usually asked of any good villain on TV. And it’s one worth asking because a good villain can make or break a show.

In 2015, we saw many villains on TV. But which ones stood out among the pack? The Uproxx staff put their heads together and came up with a compilation of the creepy characters, and charming sociopaths who made this year so unnerving..

(Some slight spoilers ahead.)

Chanel Oberlin — Scream Queens

“Good evening, idiot hookers.” That was our first introduction to Chanel Oberlin, the embodiment of every spoiled, rich, pretty co-ed who has ever walked a school campus. Brad Falchuk and Ryan Murphy were able to dabble in their brand of snark and superficiality with Nip/Tuck and Glee, but the creation of Chanel on Scream Queens is where they really perfected the recipe.

Chanel doesn’t have any special powers or army of knee-cracking henchmen at her disposal, but for someone who probably doesn’t weigh more than 110 pounds soaking wet, she’s just as ruthless as any mob boss. While the Red Devil looked the part – the killing thing helped, too – Chanel was the real villain of the show, dishing out insults that would make any high school bully wince. From the first episode, the show was criticized for being “too mean” and Chanel didn’t tone it down as the season went along, either. Perhaps Chanel just reminded critics a little too much of the real-life mean girls still roaming school hallways. — Joel Stice

Danny Rayburn — Bloodline

Ben Mendelsohn’s portrayal of Danny Rayburn is one of the best performances of 2015 — let’s start with that. With tortured eyes, a slow drawl, and a diabolical hiss lining his outbursts, Danny is a wholly unforgettable character one whose every decision was informed by the need for revenge. At times, it’s hard to know how to feel about Danny. On the one hand, he’s a product of a terrible incident, one that would have scarred even the strongest of us. On the other, Danny goes to great — and often unfair — lengths to extract what he sees as fit punishment for the crimes perpetrated against him. He doesn’t know which side of the treeline he should plant both feet on, and he constantly straddles a moral ambiguity that makes his most dastardly acts even more shocking. — Dariel Figueroa

Jim Hobart — Mad Men

In season one of Mad Men, Jim Hobart (H. Richard Greene) was the big game hunter, stalking his prey (Don Draper), setting traps (wooing Betty by offering her a chance at a renewed modeling career) and ultimately missing out on his prize, as Draper and the beating heart of Sterling Cooper walked out the door before they could join Hobart at McCann. Was he a villain? In a way. Hobart and his kind represented “The Man,” but in season seven, he grew horns and almost combusted from the heat of his small-minded rage when Joan stood up to him. Furthermore, Hobart broke Don’s heart and his spirit when the “white whale” was finally captured, only to be placed up on Hobart’s shelf like so many other lusted-over baubles.

Ultimately, Don’s inability to be anything less than the epic fantasy that he had envisioned for himself may be the villain of Mad Men‘s final season. It nearly destroyed the man and the many relationships that he had built. But Hobart’s wicked sales job on Draper and the empty promises that sparked that destructive spiral deserve their fair share of the credit, too. — Jason Tabrys

The Night’s King — Game of Thrones

The Night’s King is somewhat unique as a villain because he’s barely had any screen time through the past five seasons of Game of Thrones. In season four, we got a glimpse of him turning a baby into an Other. That’s a triple score villain move right there. And then in season five, he finally shows us what he’s got with that epic owning of Wildlings and the Nights Watch at Hardhome.

He’s a pretty straightforward bad guy: Wherever he goes, death follows. Figuratively and literally. He kills everyone, and then everyone he kills rises from the dead and joins his army. The people of Westeros are lucky there’s a thousand-foot-tall magic wall between them and this bad dude. For now. — Ryan Harkness

The Guilty Remnant — The Leftovers

The Guilty Remnant may have been the obvious Big Bad in the first season, but in the second season of The Leftovers, the organization sneaked in the back door. Liv Tyler’s Meg, the new face of the The Guilty Remnant, had only a brief few scenes in the third episode of the season, where she sexually forces herself onto Tom and threatens to light him on fire. We didn’t see her again for six more episodes. What we learned, however, was that The Guilty Remnant had quietly laid in wait, moving the pieces that propelled much of the season’s narrative from behind the scenes. It was a risky, but brilliant move for Damon Lindelof, and it paid off in spectacular, mind-blowing fashion. — Dustin Rowles

Wilson Fisk — Daredevil

Yes, David Tennant’s performance as Kilgrave in Jessica Jones is frighteningly good, but Vincent D’Onofrio’s turn as Wilson Fisk in Daredevil deserves credit, too. The character’s presence in Marvel’s first Netflix show is complex, nuanced and sometimes so subtle that whenever he explodes into a murderous rage, it’s surprisingly unexpected.

D’Onofrio plays him as a child of sorts, which isn’t far removed from the image of a giant, bald man whose every want or need is taken care of by someone else. He’s not an emotional child, though. He’s more of a blank slate, like the painting (and the wall it reminds him of) he so often stares at. But when a Russian mobster unintentionally embarrasses him on a date, Fisk explodes. Or, he makes the Russian’s head explode after beating him senseless with a car door. All of this is expected of the Kingpin, yet D’Onofrio manages to surprise the audience with his rage. — Andrew Husband

Chuck McGill — Better Call Saul

The first season of Better Call Saul takes viewers back to when Saul was still Jimmy McGill, a former con artist and overall ne’er do well turned fly-by-night lawyer with mostly good intentions — but one who’s still clouded by poor judgement. But the potential to be a great lawyer like his older brother Chuck (Michael McKean), whom he adoringly looks up to and takes care of, is there — as his primary motivator is always to prove himself and become a partner at the law firm Chuck co-founded, Hamlin Hamlin & McGill.

And eventually he does! While helping clients at a senior care home, he discovers that the facility is committing fraud against its residents and builds up quite the case. But after Chuck convinces him to take the case to Hamlin, Hamlin & McGill and Jimmy is informed that they “want the case, not him,” he eventually comes about the realization that it was always his brother keeping him from his dream. In a heartbreaking scene, Jimmy confronts Chuck, who sneers that he’ll never be a real lawyer, and that deep down he’ll always be “Slippin’ Jimmy.” It’s that epiphany that steers Jimmy from a successful law career to being the type of lawyer who uses a fake name to make people think he’s Jewish and gets under-the-desk BJs, eventually being forced to go into hiding as a sad, dejected Cinnabon manager. It was Better Call Saul‘s true villain, Chuck McGill, who was 100% responsible for putting him on that path. — Stacey Ritzen

Patti Levin — The Leftovers

At the start of season two of The Leftovers, things were looking good for Kevin Garvey. He had a new family and his archnemesis Patti Levin was no more. Just kidding. Despite her death (at her own hand), Patti literally found her (nasty, nagging) voice and haunted the increasingly paranoid Kevin. The voice in his head — one of this season’s many fantastical paranormal elements never explained — forces Kev to take drastic measures just to regain some level of sanity. For the sake of spoilers, we won’t go further into Patti’s depravity. Just know that the family-hating woman doesn’t move on easily. — Lindsay Kimble 

Richard Wayne Gary Wayne — Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

While you were busy combing the background of every pivotal Mad Men scene for clues about Don Draper’s fate, Jon Hamm was busy building an impressive comedy resumé that includes a turn as the antagonist in the wonderful Netflix sitcom, Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

Hamm plays Richard Wayne Gary Wayne, a doomsday cult leader who cons a group of women into hibernating in a bomb shelter to ride out the Biblical apocalypse for a decade and change. The character is like a Charles Manson-David Koresh hybrid, if that character were in a dark comedy and played by, say, early-’90s Richard Gere. Hunky, crazy, charismatic, musically gifted (?)… Richard Wayne Gary Wayne is proof that Hamm’s second act will be funnier than his first, and that we should all embrace comedy-club-groupie Hamm the way we did stoic-chain-smoking-misogynist Hamm. — Mike Bertha

Kilgrave — Jessica Jones

Unlike other comic book-inspired villains, Kilgrave (David Tennant) isn’t driven by goals or an appetite for power. Instead, he’s a result of unchecked privilege and entitlement that he takes to a completely different level with the benefit of mind control. With the ability to make anyone he talks to do whatever he says, even something they’d never consider doing, such as walking off of a balcony, his evil influence knows no bounds. What really makes the performance, however, is the way his potential for destruction and a lack of concern for people’s lives gets folded into David Tennant’s natural charm. — Keith Reid-Cleveland 

Bear — Fargo

He may not have had the sparkling charisma of Mike Milligan (Bokeem Woodbine), or the cartoonish swagger of his older brother Dodd (Jeffrey Donovan), but Bear Gerhardt (Angus Sampson), who stayed in the background much of the first half of Fargo‘s dynamite second season, would eventually dominate every scene in which he appeared. First emerging as a gruff, reasonable pragmatist, he’d soon come into his own as a terrifying force to be reckoned with.

While his armed negotiation for his jailed son, Charlie (Allan Dobrescu), with inebriated lawyer Karl (Nick Offerman) was a definite highlight, it wasn’t until his scene with his niece Simone (Rachel Keller) deep out in the woods that cemented his legacy as a villain. It was during his long drive back, when the show used its split-screen technique to show us everything that his family had lost, that we were given Bear’s Godfather II moment.  — Christian Long

Ramsay Snow — Game of Thrones

Between his treatment of Theon, hunting a woman down with dogs, sacking Winterfell, and flaying anyone who gets in his way, no one harbored any delusions that Ramsay Snow was anything but a villain of the highest order. After the death of Joffrey, someone had to fill the “Miserable Little Sh*t That Everyone Wants Dead” position that he left vacant. Still, season five saw his villainy elevated to new, horrifying heights with his marriage, rape, and constant abuse of Sansa Stark. Sansa has long been one of Game of Thrones major victims, between losing her family and the cruelty dealt to her by Joffrey and Cersei. Still, the cruelest blow is being entrapped in her family’s home with a monster who has no intention of ever letting her rest.

We saw Sansa escape with Theon in the final episode of the season, but many fans were disappointed that she never got her revenge on her tormentor. After all the hell that Ramsay has unleashed on the Stark family alone, fans are left wondering if any punishment will be sufficient. — Alyssa Fikse

Tammy — Rick and Morty

In a vacuum, Tammy’s long con would be pretty sinister. She posed as a high school senior who befriended Summer only to get intimate with Bird Person, and all to plan a wedding that was merely a setup to trap galactic rebels. Oh, and she shot her recently betrothed at point blank range while he was still trying to comprehend the situation. That’s all boiler plate “not nice” stuff, and the show maximized its impact by saving the reveal for the end of a season full of dark moments, one where loved ones tended to cause the most grief. — Chet Manley

Calvin Zabo — Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.

Calvin Zabo, played by Kyle MacLachlan, gave Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. something it’s always needed: A big, funny, over-the-top bad guy. MacLachlan showed up, started shoving scenery in his mouth, and just didn’t stop. But as the season progressed and we saw a few more sides of him, it became clear there was more to him than maniacal cackling and claiming he kills people “with style.” Hopefully he comes back; nobody wrecked the house quite like him. — Dan Seitz

Ads — South Park

South Park concluded its most visceral season yet with the emergence of a new evil — ads. The enemy manifests itself in the form of Leslie, long thought to just be the chatty girl interrupting P.C. Principal’s many pointless assemblies. She’s controlling the hyper-contradictory media and avidly turning the town against political correctness with more aplomb than Caitlyn Jenner on a Sunday drive and all with the silent help of Whole Foods. Because really, “What is PC but a verbal form of gentrification?”

This is where the show’s brilliance shines the strongest and proves ads are wholly sinister, holding a smudged mirror towards the American public. Ads have harnessed the power of the PC to push more pop-ups, bunk news stories, and distractions to the forefront as they seek to take gentrifying to intergalactic levels. It’s unclear what their motives are, but one thing is certain: They are a seemingly unstoppable enemy. You can’t get rid of them with guns, and you certainly can’t f*ck them to death a la Mr. Garrison. They’re hiding throughout the show it seems, and could come back with a vengeance as South Park eyes its 20th season. All the while, me might be none the wiser until the next season finale. — April Siese

Boyd Crowder — Justified

Boyd Crowder was one of the great underrated villains — and characters, in general — in television history. Over six seasons, he morphed from a neo-Nazi with a gift for gab and an affinity for blowing stuff up into a man of God with a gift for gab and an affinity for blowing stuff up and then into an international drug smuggler with a gift for gab and an affinity for blowing stuff up. The man was a treasure, thanks in part to the words the writers let him say, but mostly because of Walton Goggins’ performance. I will miss him tremendously now that the show is over. — Danger Guerrero

×