Kai Lord
Hero
I don't think you need to "love to hate" villains for them to work, or work well. That is definitely a respectable judging criteria, but I think some villains just draw you into their performance whether or not you empathize with them, hate them, or are amused/entertained by them.John Crichton said:The anyone was more referring to the creators rather than any person/actor/shmo off the street. Just about any decent director can put together a good action sequence where the bad guy looks cool and does lots of bad-ass manuvers(especially with CGI the way it is these days) but it's much, much harder to have a villain REALLY make you love to hate him.
I too love all the Star Wars villains and don't want to knock anyone else's pick. Tarkin is a great villain, and serves the story incredibly well, but I feel he needs the rest of the story more than some of the others on the list. If you distill ANH to *just* the scenes where Tarkin is onscreen (meaning no footage of Alderaan blowing up, etc.) and do the same for ROTS with regard to General Grievous, I'm going to have *way* more fun watching Grievous. He's just a fun villain with great character traits whether he's fighting, insulting or threatening heroes, running for his life, etc. Tarkin is icy, refined, and appears utterly fearless. But in and of themselves those traits don't translate to as much entertainment for me. Don't get me wrong, I'm making a specific point to highlight what *I* enjoy in a good Star Wars villain, not suggesting that villains should exist in a vacuum.
I also like it when villains get up close and personal with the heroes. Save for the back and forth between Princess Leia (which was great) in the middle of the movie, Tarkin is somewhat detached from the principal characters, particularly the primary hero. I'm not suggesting that Tarkin would have been better off fighting the characters in close quarters combat since that not only wouldn't have served the story but it isn't even necessary for a good villain (Jabba is a good example of having personal issues with the heroes but still letting others do his dirty work), it was just a by-product of his character that makes me appreciate most of the others more.
So Tarkin was great and very necessary to the story, just not the most entertaining for me. And I still think you're selling Lucas and his cast and crew short for their amazing work at creating memorable villains. If any decent director could create such villains by making them badass and good fighters, how come the Star Wars baddies are such icons as opposed to merely par for the course? Why isn't Lurtz, the Uruk-hai captain from FOTR a household name? He looks cool, had a sweet fighting style, and had about as much screen time as Darth Maul and was in a much better movie that has been watched and rewatched the world over.
But Darth Maul is the one people remember. Why? I'd say its just that certain "X" factor that the really top tier villains either have or don't. Lucas somehow seems to know how to capture that lightning in a bottle whether he's making the great ESB or the much maligned TPM. The same can't be said for, well, probably any other filmmaker, let alone any "decent" one.
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