Evil Has Standards These Irredeemable Villains Don’t Meet
Queen of Fables: “That dude ratted us out, so I had to kill him. Then everyone saw me kill him, so I had to kill everyone. You’ve gotta end the bloodline and prevent any revenge killings. That’s just Evil 101.”
Harley Quinn (Season 1 episode 7)
Dr. Psycho: “I taught that class at Boston University and it didn’t cover anything that fucked up!”
Villains don’t have many limits. Stealing everything that isn’t nailed down and on fire? They’re ecstatic at the heist. Gunning down cops? They knew the risks. But while many villains are happy to run wild, even they know when something goes too far. Most villains will pull back at that point. Anyone who doesn’t is irredeemable.
An irredeemable villain has no limits, qualms, or regrets. Genocide is a hobby to them. Torturing animals and children is how they get their kicks. Anyone that can destroy planets will likely laugh at the “fireworks”. Heroes don’t hold back against these bastards and other bad guys may take a swing themselves. So who are the Top 5 Irredeemable Villains? Let’s find out.
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#5 Irredeemable Villain: Carnage
Carnage: “What none of them get… is those things didn’t make me what I am. I am made… of them. I am abuse. I am sex and violence. I am the guns and knives and the wickedness of this mean ******* world. You know my name. NOW SCREAM IT!”
Absolute Carnage
Many Irredeemable Villains have a goal they work towards. Conquest, genocide, becoming a reality TV star, but that’s not this one’s style. His name is his goal and he loves it.
Cletus Kasady died minutes after birth and was resurrected as an agent of the dark god Knull. He murdered several members of his family and blamed his father for the crime. Cletus killed his way through America before being arrested and sent to jail.
Cletus’s life changed when his cellmate, Eddie Brock, regained his Symbiote and became Venom. The Symbiote asexually reproduced in the cell and its offspring merged with Cletus, granting him superpowers. He escaped and went on many rampages as Carnage. The Marvel Universe now faces a combo of Michael Myers and Damian Thorn with all of Spider-Man’s superpowers. Enjoy the nightmare fuel, kiddos!
Carnage has mountains of victims. Our exclusive backstory has the horrific highlights.
#4 Reverse Flash
[The Rogues hold a funeral for the Reverse Flash]
Flash #325 (1983)
Weather Wizard: [giving the eulogy] “Rest in peace, Thawne.”
The Rogues: [all blast the casket] “No. You. Will. Not.”
Weather Wizard: “Defeat, we could forgive. All of us know what it’s like to be beaten and vanquished at [Flash’s] feet.”
Captain Boomerang: “All of us know the humiliation of watching his eyes stare at us through the bars of a jail cell.”
Captain Cold: “But the damage you did to the reputation of us all is beyond forgiveness!”
Irredeemable Villains are not invincible. You can often fight them, kill them, or run away. But there are always exceptions. This guy won’t stay dead and you’ll never escape him.
Eobard Thawne was a Flash uberfan living in the 25th century. He copied Barry Allen’s accident to gain his own powers, dreaming of traveling back in time to fight at his idol’s side. Unfortunately, Thawne learned that he would be Flash’s greatest enemy and die at his hands. Thawne went mad and swore that he would be everything that Barry was not. He’d become The Reverse Flash.
Reverse Flash is the pettiest supervillain ever. He used time travel to make Flash’s childhood a living hell. Thawn pushed Barry down stairs, erased his best friend from existence, murdered his mom and got his father arrested for it. You know, classic pranks.
Don’t think Flash was the only victim. Thawne once fell in love with a woman named Rose. He time traveled to kill her fiancé, then killed the men she dated later, and finally, time traveled to her childhood to hurt her. Rose was institutionalized for the rest of her life, confined to a wheelchair and mute after the age of five.
If you’ve got the time, we’ve got the crimes right here in Reverse Flash’s Backstory.
#3 Irredeemable Villain: Overhaul
Overhaul: “Each and every one of your actions kills people. You are a cursed existence.”
My Hero Academia “Lemillion” (Season 4, Episode 11)
Organized crime families like the Yakuza believe there are rules to crime. They forget that there is no honor among thieves and even less for this Irredeemable Villain.
Kai Chisaki was a downtrodden teenager taken in by the Shie Hassaikai yakuza clan. He looked up to the clan’s boss, who had kept the organization going during the rise of superheroes. Chisaki believed that endemic superpowers called Quirks were caused by a disease and wanted to eradicate them, both to quell his germaphobia and repay his debt to The Boss.
Opportunity came knocking when Chisaki learned that The Bosses’ granddaughter, Eri, had the power to rewind time. He put The Boss into a medically-induced coma, took over the Shie Hassaikai, adopted the codename Overhaul, and began experimenting on Eri to create Quirk-destroying bullets.
Overhaul bled Eri to death, used his own Quirk to resurrect her with a fresh supply of blood, then repeated the process multiple times a day for two years. Overhaul verbally abused Eri to keep her compliant, claiming that she was cursed and that anyone he killed died because of her. Oh, and Eri? She was four years old when he started.
Overhaul’s self-named Quirk allows him to disassemble any object he touches and reassemble it in any form he wants. He uses it to heal minions, create spikes from flooring, and can reduce anyone to a bloody mist. Overhaul can also fuse with his minions and use their powers at the cost of turning into a monster. Well, a kaiju. He’s already a monster.
#2 Irredeemable Villain: Hate-Monger
Hate-Monger: “Zola! Is the Cube near completion?”
Super-Villain Team-Up #17
Armin Zola: “Yes, Mein Herr, but why?”
Hate-Monger: “Do not question me! You must only obey!”
Zola: “But I do not understand, Herr Hate-Monger. What do you want?
Hate-Monger: “DO NOT CALL ME BY THAT STUPID PSEUDONYM! You know who I am. [unmasks] Now and forever, I am Adolf Hitler!”
The Red Skull was an early pick for this list, but who is worse: the student or the teacher? This goofy-sounding villain also got a boost from his pedigree as one of our world’s only supervillains.
The year was 1945. Nazi Germany was falling as The Invaders attacked Berlin. Hitler was cornered in his bunker by The Human Torch and burned alive. The Torch didn’t know that mad scientist Arnim Zola was nearby and used a device to transfer Hitler’s mind into a clone body. Zola made several more backup clones and gave Hitler’s spirit the ability to transfer his mind to any of them when he died.
Hitler began a new reign of terror in New York City, disguising himself as The Hate-Monger with purple KKK robes and a hood. He used a “hate-ray” to rile up people’s fear and anger before directing them with his bigoted speeches. The Fantastic Four and Nick Fury fought Hate-Monger, who was eventually gunned down by one of his own bigoted followers.
The Hate-Monger fought Fury and Captain America often, despite always dying. He eventually claimed the Cosmic Cube, a reality warping artifact that he used to become an embodiment of hatred. The newly empowered Hate-Monger tried to spread his influence through the world using Captain America as his host, but Cap’s morals and patriotism overwhelmed Hitler’s will, permanently destroying the mad Fuehrer.
#1 Granny Goodness
Mr. Miracle: “Did Granny ever take you to the mirror?”
Mister Miracle (2017)
Big Barda: “Oh yeah.”
Mr. Miracle: “Me too.”
Barda: “After every corrective surgery. Every skin graft. Every laser removal of whatever she’d done to make us look. And she’d say the same thing.”
Mr. Miracle: “On the outside you’re beautiful…”
Barda: “And on the inside, you’re mine.”
Apokolips is full of monsters, including master torturer Desaad, brutish prince Kalibak, and Darkseid, God of Tyranny. So who deserves this spot the most? Who is the most Irredeemable Villain? Goodness knows.
Granny Goodness runs Apokolips’ orphanage. There, bright young minds are broken down, tortured, mutilated, and brainwashed into becoming obedient servants of Darkseid. Granny personally teaches children that suffering and pain are the best form of love by torturing them while using endearing terms like poppet and lambchop.
The Justice League is aware of Granny Goodness’s actions, but have only prevented her from spreading them to Earth. Raids on Apokolips are doomed to fail because the heroes are outgunned and the victims can’t comprehend that the League is trying to help them. The only one to escape the orphanage is Mister Miracle, superhuman escape artist and Granny’s archnemesis.
Granny Goodness leads the Female Furies, Darkseid’s elite bodyguards. While she’s content to let the dearies fight in her stead, Granny is no slouch herself. Her strength and skills are on par with Wonder Woman’s. Granny is also a shapeshifter, telepath, and wields a Mega-Rod that fires energy blasts.
What villains do you find irredeemable? Are there any worse than these? Tell us in the comments.
Carnage image courtesy of Sony Pictures.
Jared Bounacos has written for Movie Rewind since 2016.
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