A common view that drives me crazy

[DrCosmic]

The idea that having multiple villains ruins a superhero film and that it's always or nearly-always better to just have one villain.

Sure, it's possible for a movie with multiple villains to feel overly-crowded and with some less developed but it's also very possible for a film with just one to feel like an overly-simple story and missed opportunity. Multiple villains can and have worked and the real problem when they don't is usually the tone of the film in general.

It just seems real strange when fans hope for having just one villain in each film when it's likely that a series will only last three or four films so we would end up having really few of the characters and story potential adapted.

I think misunderstanding comes from a combination of people meaning to say that having too many main villains in one movie (ASM2, Batman Forever) ruins the movie and the fact that when multiple villains are done right, it leaves some villains to be minor villains who may have been major in some way in the comics, see ensuing discussion about Two-Face and Shocker.

I think it's worth the cost to have supporting villains who will never be the main villain even if they've been so in comics. But that also ties into a reason why many of these properties would be better served by television.

 

[LaughterLives]

The problem with that scene is that it amounts to nothing other than Rachel making him ride away screaming like a girl. As much as I liked how Scarecrow was set up I have a hard time imagining his end any worse than that when he finally got into his true element.

^exactly!
It was a comical slap in the face.

 

[The Joker]

Nolan is the only one who has made multiple villains work.

 

[AVEITWITHJAMON]

Nolan is the only one who has made multiple villains work.

 

[NealKenneth]

That's just plain daft in my opinion, there has been a lot of superhero films that have had multiple villains and worked fine without Nolan.

 

[Weather Witch]

Multiple villains can definately work as long as they both fit the story and have a well defined role within that story. X2 for example balanced Stryker and Magneto very well, but then X3 really screwed over Phoenix and focused on Magneto again. Usually it boils down to: is this character here for nostalgia, fan service and trailer shots (Amazing Spider-Man 2 I am looking at you) or does the character really have a place in this movie?

 

[metaphysician]

Nolan is the only one who has made multiple villains work.

Winter Soldier.

 

[The Joker]

Ehhh.

 

[Batmannerism]

Winter Soldier.

Yeah. I think that's fair.

You've got Pierce, Bucky and Rumlow - although the real villain is Pierce. Bucky certainly is a villain for most of the film, although he's kind of a Terminator-like villain (not a lot of personality) and Rumlow (and Jasper Sitwell ) are definitely supporting players.

Personally I feel that Nolan has been the most successful in terms of making the best use of mulitple villains as major characters in a single film - that being TDK with the Joker and Two-Face being well-developed and engaging ( I still feel Eckhart doesn't get enough props for his performance) the mob (Maroni , Lao and the others) being relegated to supporting players.

In Batman Begins we have the League of Shadows/Ra's Al Ghul, the Scarecrow and Falconi. I kind of see Ra's being analogous to Pierce (as the mastermind) with the others in supporting roles. I feel like the Winter Soldier does at least as good a job with its group of bad guys.

I'm really trying hard to think of other multiple-villain films that really worked.....it's not easy !

I suppose Matthew Vaughn did pretty well with the Hellfire club in X-Men First Class. Clearly Shaw was the main villain, but Emma Frost was pretty decent in a supporting role and the other club members were reasonably menacing.

 

[LaughterLives]

I think Eckhart gets more props than he deserves...but thats me.

 

[That9neGuy]

The only movies where multiple villains really worked for me were X-2 and Winter Soldier.