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Are Disney Villains Going Extinct? (Patreon)

Published:
2017-03-01 05:45:23
Imported:
2026-06

Content

An important question for a tumultuous time. 

Files

Are Disney Villains Going Extinct?

Disney Animation Studios has seen an uptick in quality and consistency in the last five years... as well as an uptick in red herrings and plot twists replacing the traditional villain narrative. Did the era of the Disney villain end a long time ago?

Comments

Hayley Nystrom

haha, ummm, do you keep tabs on Doug Walker's videos at all? Crazy coincidence today.

Booklover13

I noticed that too. Makes me wonder if I missed something that's making this subject topical at the moment.

Lindsay Ellis

oh, goddamnit, kill me. well, at least maybe I can get in on that sweet sweet algorithm, and have to suffer through some infuckingsufferable YT comments.

Hayley Nystrom

haha, sorry. Yours was better, if that helps ;)

Luninareph

I liked Maleficent too! The thing I disliked about it the most, actually, was how the three fairies were downgraded from protagonists to completely hapless comic relief.

Tanahamondo

Ughhhhhhhhh I hate Maleficent so much............. I understand why people liked it. But gawd. And also I might love the shit out of Zootopia (it was my fav movie from 2016), but I will readily admit that the villain is one of the weakest aspects. Although Bellweather does seem to oddly and uncannily share similar ideologies with certain political figures of today hmmmmmmmmmmm

Brett

They could keep it going pretty long, I'd imagine - although they might drop the "meta" references to earlier Disney stuff after a while. Look at the MCU, chugging along powerfully and lucratively with its relatively weak villains. Of course, the next step would be the make the VILLAIN the secret protagonist, with unreliable narrator and all that to completely flip our expectations. I don't think Disney has gone so far as to do a true Villain Protagonist yet in the movies.

Laura N.

I don't know why, but I started tearing up when I saw the clips from Moana from near the end of the film. I didn't think that movie touched me that much. I will definitely need to re-watch that movie sometime. <3

Nicholas Theron Pace

I'm surprised you didn't mention the unseen man from Bambi. That's my favorite Disney villain.

SpookyQuill

Ugh the shit with the firefly in Princess and the Frog. Ugh.

SpookyQuill

I hate Maleficent too. It's catered to Angelina Jolie's ego so that Maleficent is so sanitized which makes all the other female characters in the movie either passive or insanely stupidly vapid (stupid fairies what did they do to you?!?). Also she's not a dragon. Fuck that movie.

Mar MB

"Comic". I rolled my eyes every time they were on screen, and having one of them played by Umbridge certainly didn't help.

Paul Grodt

I haven't seen Moana yet, but the way this describes the villain conflict, it sure does sound quite a lot like the conflict with No-Face in Spirited Away.

Jade Dale

I'm seeing this same phenomenon with DC Comics characters. Charismatic villains tend to become anti-heroes, with Joker being pretty much the last popular DC villain who hasn't been brightened to a grey shade hero. Frankly, I think the only reason it hasn't been tried is because the guy is a cannon serial killer and rapist. Morale ambiguity just isn't there to be had. The "anti-hero promotion" has even become connected to female representation. The fastest way for DC to publish more female lead books that would sell strong was to play with the grey shades of their famous femme fatales. Between Disney and DC, one could foresee an age in pop culture where the sheer demand for anti-heroes drives out the classic villain.

TalysAlankil

You just wanted to flaunt all your Disney villain merch (well, all the one you could carry to the west coast), didn't you, Lindsay :P Also, my personal guess for Gigantic is that the villain is going to be a human giant hunter rather than an evil giant at all. (Then again I am notoriously bad at guesses, so you never know)

Luninareph

Suffice it to say that I used "comic relief" to be polite. I had a similar experience :(

Joe G

Well, the MCU has so far coasted on a decade of mostly flat/uninteresting villains in favour of character development and interaction among the heroes. So I expect Disney to ride the zeitgeist as long as it goes.

Piper Malone

I really enjoyed this video overall. I could quibble with bits I disagree with but I wanted to point out the classic Disney Villain did get a Western Family knock off courtesy of DreamWorks with Trolls. Christine Baranski as Chef was a solid villain. (I didn't love Trolls but I feel it was fun enough to watch). I think like others I wish they had given her a song to sing. That all said its clearly a knock off and I think your arguments of why this change has occurred with villains is very solid.

Piper Malone

I maintain Bellwether works well for the villain in the story because the movie, while a buddy cop story, is so firmly about the concepts of bias (unintended and intended) and presumptions. Bellwether didn't create the biases she just exploited them. For a movie about overcoming bias this worked but I do think Ms. Ellis is correct that her plans and plot didn't get as much development because the movie was more about Judy and Nick (which is another flaw from the Buddy Cop genre... underdeveloped villains)

Maxwellll

I don't mind this trend of antagonists not being "Disney villains" in a classical sense. It makes it so the protagonists get more development and are more interesting. However, I think the fact that there was no main antagonist in Moana hindered it. You've got Tamatoa, who has a serviceable, but not fantastic, villain song, and Te Kā, who gets the big epic climax. I thought it weakened the story by spreading the conflict too thinly. I think they should have either had appearances by Te Kā throughout the movie and cut Tamatoa entirely, or somehow connect Tamatoa with Te Kā so that the story was less episodic.

Meg Scrabble

What does the comment about "Hades being the only character voiced by a literal heartless person" mean?