Greatest Villain Every

[DrunkonDuty]

My ratings for the others (out of ten):

Ozymandias 9 (I love a psycho who can justify throwing millions of lives onto the pyre of his ego all in the name of the Greater Good.)

Davros (Doctor Who) 7 (although thinking more of the mad eugenicist (sp?) than another let's destroy the universe type; marked down for that.)

Emperor Palpatine 3 (Vader was way cooler. Until he went soft.)

Syndrome, from The Incredibles 1. What a dork.

Dracula. 8. Style. Nasty. Sexy. And if we consider the Gary Oldman Dracula then I'm thinking he's a 9, maybe 10.

Iggwilv, the Witch-Queen 2. What has she ever actually done? On camera.

Iuz 2. Just don't like him.

Roy Batty (Bladerunner) 8. He's a psycho. But he's been placed into a situation where it's hard for him to be anything else. And then he proves his fundametal humanity by saving a life as his final act. Cool.

Voldemort 5. He has a nasty charm to him. But he's beaten by a bunch of kids.

The Joker 8. He's pretty cool. He's got style and nasty. Marked down for dress sense.

Sauron: He never appears, he's simply a glowering menace from afar, not an actual character. Now the Witch King, him I like, he gets a 7.

Gaius Baltar. 9 Love Baltar. WHat a . a total snivelling little bastard. What I want to know is how does he get those girls?

Alfred Bester. 7. Nice. He's great little fascist. And who doesn't love to hate a fascist? And he's a psi. If only he'd said 'Nuclear Wessels.'

Scoprius. 6 He's kindo of a panto stinker with a PVC fetish. Which is cool.

Don't know the rest.

 

[WayneLigon]

That really depends on which telling of the Joker's origin you take as being cannon. The one from the Killing Joke had the Joker being relatively normal everyday no-life until he met Batman, which lead to the chemical bath and the insanity.

That also being part of his charm. After 70+ years, no-one knows his true name or origin.

 

[Hawke]

Success Rate. Low. He get's his arse handed to him by the heroes (and the bloody FF at that) time and time again. But he keeps bouncing back with a new world dominating plot. And several times he's had the heroes on the ropes and let them go because he didn't like the way the victory would be won (either not honourable or it didn't satisfy his ego.)

Track Record. He's always got something on the boil. Let's face it, he's dedicated to becoming humanity's overlord. And he'd do a good job too: those trains would run on time. YEah, yeah, people who disagree with him would disappear in the night but that's the price of order right?

How Close to Winning: See success rate. He's come close to victory many times. Damn those spandex wearing fools!

Style: well here's where he gets his points. The guy's got style coming out his wazoo. I mean his name is Victor von Doom. OK, he may have changed it by deed poll, but it's still his name. And he will let victory slip from his grasp if it isn't going to be the right sort of victory. That's way cool.

He even saved Sue when Mr. Fantastic & Co could not... simply saved her so as long as Mr. Fantastic was alive he would know his wife only was there because of Doom, as a constant reminder that he couldn't save her and had to turn to his enemy for help.

Man. That's rough.

 

[Nellisir]

Personally, I'd vote for cunning and brains over winning through brute strength - Scorpius is a pretty good example. Someone who can convincingly play his opponents off each other, and conserves his resources. Just blowing stuff up doesn't rate. Someone who experiences setbacks, not defeats (at least, until the very final end of the story). Style also counts for something. And character development (thus, Vader is more interesting than the Emperor).

Ah. Thought of one.
Gerald Tarrant, from CS Friedman's Coldfire Trilogy. "Magic" on Erna responds to sacrifice, so Gerald sacrifices his wife, his children, and his faith for the power to cheat death. Now, lots of villains kill people, even people in their family -- but the sacrifice has to be something of personal value.

There might be someone in the Game of Thrones books that qualifies as well (or maybe, depending on the chapter, all of them.)

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

Luca Blight (Suikoden II), Prince of Highland who?

*sigh*

Level of evil by popular opinion poll. I know almost no one's played Suikoden 2 here, so Luca's probably not going to fare too well. I summed him up already, here's a lengthier bio if you wish to read: Luca Blight - Gensopedia

The main drawback for his evil credentials is probably if magnitude is considered important. Suikodens in general are seldom about saving the entire world from destruction and rather more about political intrigue and rebellion. Luca was sending thousands to be sacrificed to revive an ancient evil that theoretically could have messed the world up something fierce, if that helps...

Based on the rankings already assigned for the characters I'm familiar with...I'd rate Luca an 8 or 9, hard to tell.

 

[AFGNCAAP]

First, a figure from classic literature

Name: Iago (from Shakespeare's Othello)

1) Track record: He is a man fueled by hate seeking revenge for some slight (pass over for promotion, and/or alleged cuckoldry by his commanding officer).

2) Success rate: He's able to have all around him act as he plans, using the guise of "honest Iago" to set events in motion. He's able to bilk a noble out of wealth and diffuse the noble's rage when Iago fails to provide results. He plays his enemies (and hapless victims) against each other to achieve his goals.

3) How close to winning they get: He did—and he lost soon afterward. He was able to bring about the demotion of his rival and the fall of Othello through his manipulation. Only the honesty of Iago's wife after the tragedy unfolded let to Iago's downfall (and the "restoration of order," as it occurs in Shakespearean tragedies).

4) Style: Though not memorable in comparison to many modern villains, he is a villainous archetype: Senator Palpatine/Darth Sidious is a great example of an Iago-like villain.

Next, a comedic villain (but villain nonetheless)

Name: Xykon (from Order of the Stick)

1) Track record: Typical evil mastermind. Killed a guy just for his crown.

2) Success rate: Faced major setbacks, only to succeed later on. Still hasn't achieved his ultimate goal, though.

3) How close to winning they get: He's making his way there, but each time he has gotten close, he faced a setback (like losing a gate through destruction, getting his body destroyed, losing his phylactery, etc.).

4) Style: Direct and to-the-point. Not afraid to do what he wants to do, though he'll take advice from his lackeys when he feels like it.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

Thrawn Grand Admiral Mitth'raw'nuruodo.
Found in the Star Wars Expanded Universe


Track Record
I treat his track record as everything that happened before the novels he first appeared in.

As member of the Chiss Expansionary Fleet, he organized a pre-emptive strike against the rules of Chiss Warfare against the Vagaari.

He ambushed the Trade Federation forces send by Palpatine/Darth Sidious that were trying to destroy the Outbound Flight Project from the Jedi, exploiting weakness in their Droid fighter communication. After conversing with Sidious agents and Sidious himself, he decides to stop the Jedi - and does so, playing Vagaari and the Outbound Flight project against each other, though it results in more losses on the enemy side than he wanted.

He became a Grand Admiral under the Emperor, despite being a non-human.
He stopped the traitor Grand Admiral Zaarin that wanted to ursurp the emperor, stealing advanced technology and using it for his own goals.

He takes over the remains of the Empire a few years after Palpatins death.

Success Rate
He takes control over th cloning facilities on Wyland. He successfully raids Lando Callrissians for mole miners that he later uses in an attack on Sluis-Van. He does not manage to capture many ships there, but the ships he attacked are left crippled when Calrissian remotely activates the mole miners to destroy the ship briges Thrawn is capturing with them.
He manages to remove Ackbar from his post due to political intrigue. He gains access to the Katana Fleet to satisfy the Imperial need for more ships, manning them with clone troopers.

He then begins his actual attacks, using cloaking technology and his new Jedi "ally", a clone of Jorus C'Boath, to intimidate and confuse his enemies, also allowing him to blockade Coruscant for a while with a well-planned bluff.
He sees through a bluff from the Republic, allowing him to divine the real target of their attacks, preparing a fleet to him.

How close to winning he gets
Hard to determine, but probably very close - he might have been able to thwart the Republic assault on the ship yards, but he is assassinated by his body guard.

Style
Cold, planning. He learns to understand enemy species and authorities by watching their art. He is often one or two steps ahead of his enemies, anticipating their moves and seeing through their bluffs, often leading them in the wrong direction.
Despite being the "villain", he is more cold than evil. He is not interested in violence and murder just for its own sake. He treats strategy and tactics like a form of art. He did not rely on "super-technologies" (like Death Stars) and prefered to use existing technology in new ways. (An example might be the tactic of micro Hyperspace jumps and using interdictors to control/time allied ship movement).
He was a villain like no other at his time - all about planning, strategies, tactics, not about mustache twirling or using dark magic.

 

[avin]

Kafka: Have people not played Final Fantasy VI ?

Crazy, genocidal clown who became a god and blew up the world.

He got caught in the toilet

 

[roguerouge]

Name: Real-world Mosquitos

1) Track record: Within 5-14 days of birth, they are sucking the blood of every creature they can get.

2) Success rate: As many as a million deaths annually from malaria alone, so we're not counting Yellow Fever (and its 19th century heyday).

3) How close to winning they get: Why win when the status quo benefits you? Evil plans are for losers.

4) Style: You rarely see them coming... they're just that good!

 

[Nellisir]

Here's another (better) one...Lucifer, aka the Morningstar, from Sandman (and the Lucifer series). It's arguable whether or not he's a villain, but there's a certain lack of ...regard... for others that qualifies him in my book.