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Oct. 18th, 2010 11:15 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
skygiantsOkay, last top five request from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
littledust: Top Five Villainnesses!
5. Kiha, Legend of the First King's Four Gods
I waffled about including Kiha because, you know, despite the fact that she is the reincarnation of a lady who runs around attempting to stab the Messiah and dangling babies off cliffs, Kiha herself doesn't really want to be evil! She spends a lot of time trying to join Team Good! She doesn't actually start trying to destroy the world until after every attempt to become a good guy crashes, burns, and dramatically blows up in her face. But then I remember the conversation that she has after she goes full-on evil with the likewise angsty, conflicted and villainous dude who's in love with her, which goes approximately like this:
KIHA: Ho Gae, I am probably going to ask you to do some kind of evil and murderous stuff to further my world-destroying plans.
HO GAE: Just tell me that you want me with you and I will do anything you ask for! Anything!
KIHA: Uh, okay, Ho Gae, before you decide to team up with me, I want you to be very clear on this: I want your soul; when I have it, I will use it; and when I am done, I will discard it. Any questions?
HO GAE: . . . works for me! :D :D And now makeouts?
KIHA: DENIED.
I could not decide whether to laugh forever, or to fall in love with Kiha, OR BOTH. Look, I mean, when the lady is evil she is the most awesomely honestly evil person ever. And I respect that in a villainness!
4. Wilhelmina Slater, Ugly Betty
Wili is the kind of villainness that you root for as much as you do the good guys, because she is just so fabulous. Also - okay, let's face it, she may be a remorseless scheming backstabber, but she is clearly five million times better at her job than anyone elsein the world of Ugly Betty. I would not trust Wilhelmina to babysit my kid, but I would absolutely trust her to run a magazine! Or save the world, if necessary. Actually I have just realized that the one Ugly Betty fic I want more than anything is fic where Wilhelmina has to organize our ragtag team of heroes to save the world! Before they all go right back to stabbing each other in the back.
(Also every time she gets a sad montage with Marc, my heart totally melts. SO ADORABLE.)
3. Yzma, The Emperor's New Groove
Competence, on the other hand, is . . . maybe not Yzma's strong point. BUT FABULOUSNESS IS. (Also, she is voiced by Eartha Kitt. Eartha Kitt. That says it all right there.) She has excellent taste in trapdoors, potions, headdresses and henchmen; she is ridiculously quotable (why do they even have that lever?); her inner self is . . . an evil kitten.
How could this face not make anyone's top 5 list! Come on now.
2. Maria Laker, Aunt Maria
Aunt Maria is an extremely bizarre and fascinating book by Diana Wynne Jones, and the titular Aunt is flat-out the most terrifying villain OR villainness I have ever encountered. (This image is from the ballet, which I have never seen. BUT SOMEDAY, OH MY GOD. IT IS THE WISH OF MY HEART.) Maria Laker is our protagonist's sweet little teddy-bearish great-aunt, who rules her town with a lace-gloved iron fist of passive-aggressiveness - of course she wouldn't ever dream of asking you to do this for her, she explains, with gentle politeness, and you find yourself doing exactly what she wants. Because she would just be so disappointed if you said no; you would just feel so guilty.
And if that fails, then she'll turn you into a wolf and organize a lot of men with guns, or seal you underground in a living coffin for twenty years and then bulldoze the mound, but it doesn't usually fail. And even after she's turned your brother into a wolf, or bulldozed your son, you'll still have to come have polite social chatter at her tea parties. She would be so disappointed if you didn't.
(Okay, it's possible that one of my reasons for finding her so terrifying is my own personal hatred for awkwardly polite social chatter. But I still maintain that she is objectively extremely scary as well!)
1. Azula, Avatar: The Last Airbender
YOU WILL NEVER RISE FROM THE ASHES OF YOUR SHAME AND HUMILIATION. DO I EVEN NEED TO SAY ANYTHING ELSE.
Your turn! Favorite villainnesses? I know there are many awesome ones I did not have room to name!
littledust: Top Five Villainnesses! 5. Kiha, Legend of the First King's Four Gods
I waffled about including Kiha because, you know, despite the fact that she is the reincarnation of a lady who runs around attempting to stab the Messiah and dangling babies off cliffs, Kiha herself doesn't really want to be evil! She spends a lot of time trying to join Team Good! She doesn't actually start trying to destroy the world until after every attempt to become a good guy crashes, burns, and dramatically blows up in her face. But then I remember the conversation that she has after she goes full-on evil with the likewise angsty, conflicted and villainous dude who's in love with her, which goes approximately like this:
KIHA: Ho Gae, I am probably going to ask you to do some kind of evil and murderous stuff to further my world-destroying plans.
HO GAE: Just tell me that you want me with you and I will do anything you ask for! Anything!
KIHA: Uh, okay, Ho Gae, before you decide to team up with me, I want you to be very clear on this: I want your soul; when I have it, I will use it; and when I am done, I will discard it. Any questions?
HO GAE: . . . works for me! :D :D And now makeouts?
KIHA: DENIED.
I could not decide whether to laugh forever, or to fall in love with Kiha, OR BOTH. Look, I mean, when the lady is evil she is the most awesomely honestly evil person ever. And I respect that in a villainness!
4. Wilhelmina Slater, Ugly Betty
Wili is the kind of villainness that you root for as much as you do the good guys, because she is just so fabulous. Also - okay, let's face it, she may be a remorseless scheming backstabber, but she is clearly five million times better at her job than anyone elsein the world of Ugly Betty. I would not trust Wilhelmina to babysit my kid, but I would absolutely trust her to run a magazine! Or save the world, if necessary. Actually I have just realized that the one Ugly Betty fic I want more than anything is fic where Wilhelmina has to organize our ragtag team of heroes to save the world! Before they all go right back to stabbing each other in the back.
(Also every time she gets a sad montage with Marc, my heart totally melts. SO ADORABLE.)
3. Yzma, The Emperor's New Groove
Competence, on the other hand, is . . . maybe not Yzma's strong point. BUT FABULOUSNESS IS. (Also, she is voiced by Eartha Kitt. Eartha Kitt. That says it all right there.) She has excellent taste in trapdoors, potions, headdresses and henchmen; she is ridiculously quotable (why do they even have that lever?); her inner self is . . . an evil kitten.
How could this face not make anyone's top 5 list! Come on now.
2. Maria Laker, Aunt Maria
Aunt Maria is an extremely bizarre and fascinating book by Diana Wynne Jones, and the titular Aunt is flat-out the most terrifying villain OR villainness I have ever encountered. (This image is from the ballet, which I have never seen. BUT SOMEDAY, OH MY GOD. IT IS THE WISH OF MY HEART.) Maria Laker is our protagonist's sweet little teddy-bearish great-aunt, who rules her town with a lace-gloved iron fist of passive-aggressiveness - of course she wouldn't ever dream of asking you to do this for her, she explains, with gentle politeness, and you find yourself doing exactly what she wants. Because she would just be so disappointed if you said no; you would just feel so guilty.
And if that fails, then she'll turn you into a wolf and organize a lot of men with guns, or seal you underground in a living coffin for twenty years and then bulldoze the mound, but it doesn't usually fail. And even after she's turned your brother into a wolf, or bulldozed your son, you'll still have to come have polite social chatter at her tea parties. She would be so disappointed if you didn't.
(Okay, it's possible that one of my reasons for finding her so terrifying is my own personal hatred for awkwardly polite social chatter. But I still maintain that she is objectively extremely scary as well!)
1. Azula, Avatar: The Last Airbender
YOU WILL NEVER RISE FROM THE ASHES OF YOUR SHAME AND HUMILIATION. DO I EVEN NEED TO SAY ANYTHING ELSE.
Your turn! Favorite villainnesses? I know there are many awesome ones I did not have room to name!
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Date: 2010-10-18 05:30 pm (UTC)However I CANNOT disagree on Azula. I would add some hearts but she would probably BANISH THEM ALL.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-18 05:48 pm (UTC)OR SET THEM ON FIRE. *_____*
no subject
Date: 2010-10-19 03:30 pm (UTC)Really anything that replies to Milton via a YA series about daemons and the arctic and parallel worlds should have my heart FOREVEEER, but I think Pullman got caught up, instead, in replying to CS Lewis, and doing so in the same vaguely patronising and hectoring tone that characterises Lewis at his most unfortunately Sunday-schoolish.
Also, the dude can't write heaven (or ... an earthly paradise, or whatever the place with the creatures on wheels was meant to be). WHICH IS A COMMON AFFLICTION, for reals. But, still.
Also, AZULA. SHE FRIES HEARTS WITH LIGHTNING.
no subject
Date: 2010-10-19 05:29 pm (UTC)Haha, I am trying to think if I have EVER found a believable positive heaven in fiction. Maybe? But if so, it apparently didn't stick with me!
AND WHAT A WAY TO GO IT IS *___*