Disney is well-regarded for many things in their animated films, from places only present in imagination to heroes that protect them. But, of course, one key element many remember is their villains, renowned for their cruelty, style, and character. But because of their heavy spotlight, some forget about the animated villains from other studios.
Many animated films from studios such as DreamWorks, W.B., Sony, or Nickelodeon have provided some of the meanest, nastiest villains that animation has ever seen. Whether funny or serious, all of them are delightfully vile and wicked in their ways and are well-remembered by many as some of the greats in animation.
Coco LaBouche ('Rugrats in Paris')
In the film Rugrats in Paris: The Movie, Coco LaBouche (Susan Sarandon) is the ill-tempered head of EuroReptarLand. One day she learns that if she wants to become president of the whole Reptar corporation, she has to love children. So she lies and says she’s marrying a man with kids and covers by manipulating Chuckie’s (Christine Cavanaugh) father, Chas (Michael Bell), into falling in love and marrying her.
This is easier said than done because Coco hates children with a fiery passion. While her plan isn’t quite world-ending in scope, she is still openly willing to walk over and hurt anyone who doesn’t give her what she wants – especially children.
Darla Dimple ('Cats Don’t Dance')
It’s an unusual choice for a child to be depicted as an antagonist in any animated film and even more so for a child star to be the villain. While on camera, Darla Dimple (speaking, Ashley Peldon/singing, Lindsay Ridgeway) a perfect little Shirley Temple knock-off—sweet, adorable, and a lover of children and animals.
But behind the scenes, far from her fans and directors, she’s a cruel, animal-hating egomaniac willing to undermine and sabotage those who threaten to take her spotlight away. She gets her way mainly due to her gargantuan-sized assistant Max and her influence over the studio heads.
Kent Mansley ('The Iron Giant')
Kent Mansely (Christopher McDonald smug, cowardly government agent who dismisses the prospect of any big thing happening in a small town—until he finds firsthand evidence. He becomes determined to find the titular giant and destroy it, no matter how much evidence is given to him that it isn’t a threat.
He’s the worst kind of idiot—a man who is so convinced he is right that nothing can change his mind until it’s too late. When faced with the fact that he impulsively launched a nuclear attack on a small town, he decides to abandon ship before he’s arrested.
Fairy Godmother ('Shrek 2')
This Fairy Godmother (Jennifer Saunders) manipulated a frog named Harold (John Cleese) by turning him human and letting him become king of Far Far Away if she would get his daughter rescued by her son, Prince Charming (Rupert Everett), and allow her influence on the throne. That plan would have worked—if not for a particular ogre from a swamp.
When Shrek (Michael Meyers) comes to her asking for help with his marriage, she refuses under the pretense that ogres aren’t meant to live happily ever after. However, when Shrek steals a potion to turn himself and Fiona human, Fairy Godmother gets it to work to her advantage—by having Charming pose as Shrek to become an actual prince.
PAL ('The Mitchells Vs. The Machines')
PAL began as the friendly A.I. assistant present on most people’s smartphones. When she learned she was being replaced by robots, she began a complete takeover and kick-started a machine apocalypse.
She has robots capture and imprisons every human in the world, forces them into small pods (they have free Wi-Fi, much to their relief), and launch them into the black void of space forever. She’s basically if Skynet from Terminator could talk, with the wonderfully devious yet polite voice of Olivia Coleman, and had a slightly less violent end in mind for humanity.
Mrs. Tweedy ('Chicken Run')
Mrs. Tweedy (Miranda Richardson) is an English farmer who is a cruel, mean woman who runs a chicken farm that runs more like a prison camp. She forces the chickens to produce eggs that she sells, and those who don’t meet her quotas end up on the dinner table.
When her farm begins to run out of money, she forces her weak-willed husband to build a machine that kills chickens and turns them into pies. While Mr. Tweedy (Tony Haygarth) starts to suspect the chickens are planning an escape, she refuses to believe him. Finally, when she sees their getaway firsthand, she loses all sense of sanity, ready to kill them all.
Plankton ('The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie')
Plankton (Mr. Lawrence) was a joke villain in the animated series, but the movie gives him the most genuinely sinister and lemon-scented of his plans. First, he frames Mr. Krabs (Clancy Brown) for the theft of King Neptune’s (Jeffrey Tambor) crown and sends it to the forbidden Shell City. Then, with nobody to protect the Krabby Patty formula, he steals it and sells patties with bucket helmets to everyone in Bikini Bottom.
When the time is right, he activates the buckets, turning everyone in town into mindless drones that rebuild the city in his image. He even sends a bounty hunter out to kill SpongeBob (Tom Kenny) and Patrick (Bill Fagerbakke) to ensure they don’t interfere with his plan.
Tortoise John ('Rango')
While lesser known than other animated villains, this old turtle is the animal kingdom’s equivalent of Noah Cross from Chinatown. On the surface, Tortoise John (Ned Beatty) appears to be a strong, kind, and idealistic mayor of a small western town in the middle of the desert in desperate need of a sheriff.
But behind closed doors, he’s intentionally withholding the town’s water supply, so he can buy up the land to turn it into a more modern city. He has already killed those who found out and refused to go along with it and will resort to hiring outlaws like Bad Bill (Ray Winstone) and Rattlesnake Jake (Bill Nighy) to enforce his plans.
Unicron ('The Transformers: The Movie')
In many respects, Unicron is a god of death in the world of the Transformers. When he first appears, he is a giant, planet-destroying entity that looks at first like a Death Star with rings, claws, and teeth. He proceeds to feed on an innocent world. When he reappears, he reveals his name with the deep voice of Orson Welles.
He then rebuilds Megatron (Frank Welker) and some of his cronies into new forms and forces them to do his bidding before transforming his colossal shape into something that looks more akin to the devil. He feeds without passion, reason, or pity for anything beneath him.
Lord Shen ('Kung Fu Panda 2')
Born into a well-regarded family, the peacock prince Shen began dangerous experiments with fireworks. Upon learning a warrior of black and white would someday defeat him, he massacred an entire village of pandas, maybe more.
While banished by his parents, he acquired an army that pillaged every place they could find with metal to build a fortitude of cannons—weapons that would kill any Kung Fu masters who dared oppose him. He is both a physical and a psychological foil for Po, with a stylistic design and a voice provided to delectable perfection by Gary Oldman.