Top 5 Disney Villains

I've decided to attempt this. After a quarter of a century watching and re-watching Disney films I am now prepared to present my five favorite Disney villains and heroines in two separate blog posts (it's too long if it's all one). I imagine I could possibly offend some people by leaving their favorite villains off of my list. I also imagine I will offend fewer folks for my choices in heroines. And before anyone hangs me for potentially listing a non-princess, I very clearly wrote heroine and refuse to be constrained by the extremely fluid definition of a Disney princess. Please note that I am not ranking these characters because to do so would only make it more difficult for me, so they shall be collectively a top five.

MATT FIFE'S FAVORITE DISNEY VILLAINS

Scar

Not only is Scar voiced by Jeremy Irons, but he is the only Disney villain to commit murder on screen. Not only murder, but a fascinating compound of fratricide, regicide, and coup d'etat all rolled into one heartless action. Not stopping there, he convinces Simba that he is the guilty party, which guilt leads Simba to run away leaving the door open for Scar to take complete and uncontested control of the Pride Lands. Really a brilliant villain. His only real mistake (aside from cold-blooded and calculated murder) was lacking the logistical skills to give his reign longevity. If he had just understood the circle of life better (and you know his and Mufasa's dad taught it to both of them), then Nala would have never had a reason to go looking for help to overthrow the tyrant. The caution here: Know something about running a kingdom before the coup.

Ursula

Voiced by Pat Carroll, whose acting credentials make almost everyone else look inexperienced, Ursula brings the greatest level of sass to the Disney villain table. And in certain versions of the story she's King Triton's sister, which just makes her that much more sinister. She manipulates Ariel in order to get revenge on Triton using a completely legal contract. Sure Triton is the king of the ocean, but he can't just blow up legally binding magical contracts at will. She gets her evil goals by playing within the structure of the game. Not an easy task. If she had demonstrated the same patience in dealing with Ariel as she did with Triton then she'd still be queen. Just think, if she had turned Ariel into a human again, then there would be absolutely nothing Ariel could have done to stop Ursula from reigning supreme.

Gaston

He is so manly. The dude hunts, uses antlers in all of his decorating, and has his own special chair in the tavern. All the ladies love him. Though every last inch of him is covered in hair, it apparently is not enough for Belle who decides to pursue an even hairier individual. Some would argue that he is not really a villain, but he does plot to have Belle's father thrown into an insane asylum so that he can have leverage in marriage negotiations with Belle, and then when he finds out there is another suitor who happens to live in that old castle out in the woods that no one has bothered to check on in the past decade despite it being owned by like a 12 year old kid within living memory, he proceeds to knife him. While he may not be as intelligent or devious as the other villains, he, for the first time in Disney history, challenged the concept of the outward/inward beauty connection while at the same time initiating one of my favorite Disney songs ever, "Kill the Beast."

Jafar

You look at him and think, "With facial hair like that he must be evil." And he is. Manipulative in the extreme, lacking a moral compass, willing to unscrupulously use magic to achieve his goals, and full of hilarious one-liners (Perhaps you'd like to see how ssss-snake-like I can beee!!!), Jafar is such a successful villain that they made a sequel and entitled it The Return of Jafar. From vizier, to sultan, to sorcerer, to genie, this tall gangle-creature probably continues to haunt the dark corners of my mind. I'm willing to bet that many a fear of snakes has been instigated by watching Aladdin. Unlike Gaston, who makes some pretense of wooing Belle, Jafar just up and enslaves Jasmine. His great failing was his lust for power, but that's also what makes him so effective leading up to the fatal "Make me an all powerful genie" wish. He is so deceptive himself and so calculating and manipulative that he immediately smells a (street) rat when Prince Ali shows up on the scene. When he was trying to warn the Sultan about Prince Ali he was actually doing his job. Hopefully no one wishes him free anytime soon.

Maleficent

What do you do when you don't receive an invite to the social engagement of the year? I bet you don't magically appear and curse a baby to die, do you? I didn't think so. In my opinion no list of Disney villains is complete without Maleficent. She is expert in the use of dark magic, can turn into a very terrifying dragon, and took gardening classes from Satan himself. And her back up plan to counter the weakening of her original curse (death to eternal slumber with the option of release) is to capture Phillip and keep him prisoner until he's wicked old and then let him kiss Aurora. Could she go ahead and kill everyone in the kingdom while they are asleep? Yes. Does she? No, because for her it's not about ruling the kingdom or getting even. She just wants everyone to be miserable and suffer because she felt insulted. Why kill a girl when you can force her to marry her true love with a 70-year age difference? Genius. If she had hired more reliable minions, and if the good fairies hadn't cheated on the whole flying sword thing, then she would have been completely successful.

In closing on this list of villains, I would like to point something out. These Disney villains, with the possible exception of Scar, are not the true ruthless characters in these movies. Let's violently shift these hierarchies to reveal some of the underlying brokenness of the Disney moral compass. It's the "heroes" that truly hold darkness in their souls. Aladdin manipulates and enslaves Jafar, Eric impales Ursula with a ship, Phillip stabs Maleficent to death with a magic sword, Beast lets Gaston fall to his death, and Simba turns his back as Scar is brutally torn apart by hyenas. And the list goes on and on with examples of Disney hero-to-villain cruelty. If they really wanted to uphold the law then they should have subdued the individual and made them stand trial before a jury of their peers. Instead they resort to street justice, demonstrating that they are far from civilized, instead sinking oftentimes to the level or below the level of the villain in question.