1. The Joker
2. Mr. Burns
3. Dr. Doom4. The Kingpin - Another of Marvel's great "noble" villains. He represents the insidious pervasive evil of crime in the Daredevil books and was made a real interesting threat starting with Frank Miller's run, both more dangerous and more human. Netflix's Marvel series seemed to get weaker as they went on but Vincent D'Onofrio did an amazing job realizing a larger than life character who seems tricky to do on the screen.
5. Harry Powell6. Dr. Girlfriend - To me, Dr. Girlfriend gets a slight edge over the Monarch. Perhaps it is because the characters play so well off of each other. They are both quite different in their approaches to villainy but love each other for those differences. Dr. Girlfriend is practical and constantly has to suffer fools. She loves the Monarch for his passion towards villainy but also has to deal with the tomfoolery that goes along with it. If villainy is the arts in Venture Bros, then Dr. Girlfriend is constantly playing the role of producer, trying to get weirdos to make peace and fight her way to the top to get the job done and done right.
https://www.youtube.com/v/2_qpMoWzlBU7. The Monarch
8. Hans Landa9. Walter White - Hoping for more votes for this one. Was Walter a good man who was simply corrupted or was he twisted by personal impotence and jealousy for years and only now acting on it. Near the end of season two, he takes his first step from merely being a criminal to being a villain (an act or inaction that horrifies even him) and things only get more worse from there until he makes a decision at the end of season four that puts him in "monster" status. Bryan Cranston is fantastic and has yet to top this role (that said, I actually believe Better Call Saul is the better show overall so far. Fewer plot cul-de-sacs)
https://www.youtube.com/v/HV9zDdFWI9Q10. Yoshikage Kira
I didn't expect anyone to vote for him, but he is a really fun villain. And a bit of an oddity in many ways as he is an atypical villain for a shonen series like this. Most villains are super powerhouses who basically sit and wait for the heroes to challenge them or search for ways to increase their powers. Kira just wants to be left alone and live a boring life. The catch is that he is also a serial killer who will murder anyone who finds out his secret. Heck, his first appearance is a farce of him trying to hid the hand of one of his victims and getting into tight situations and we follow him. Many villains of this type also avoid fighting the hero they overpower because they aren't worth their time or something, sending henchmen to do it. This is sort of the same except he is really just trying to hide because he knows while his powers give him some one-on-one advantages, they need to be used carefully and getting caught will mean his end sooner or later. He also gets an incredibly satisfying comeuppance by the series end.
Warning, this motherfucker licks sauce off a corpses hand in a very sexual manner. Nasty.
https://www.youtube.com/v/VkfMVVDDBM011. Hisoka
This villain is a bit problematic. His deal is that he seems to be sexually turned on by battle and spends a lot of the series wanting to fight two 12 year olds so... ew. Other than that, he is a great villain. He's a long line of villains who is on no one's side but his own but he's also fun in that some of the time he is clearly just lying at times not to gain an advantage but because he likes messing with people. While the show has never really shown him getting defeated in battle, he is, on rare occasion, humiliated, which makes for a fun scene.
https://www.youtube.com/v/8PvGFPYnJXoAlso Hisoka gets the best facial expressions.
12. Bill Cipher13. The Riddler - The Riddler is a great, fun villain. Any plans he has are almost purely to prove how smart he is. He's willing to steal, kill and do a number of crazy things just to show off. Plus, if the writer is good, it creates some great puzzles for the heroes to deal with, which is nice.
https://www.youtube.com/v/EAlfr7wsqcM14. Charlie Meadows
Barton Fink thinks his plays make heroes of the common man but by the end of the film, he learns he doesn't understand the "common man" at all.
15. Johan Liebert
Blissfully nihilistic, Johan is a super brilliant murderer who becomes a secret messiah to other killers, using them to spread pain and suffering and eventually deciding to "kill himself" by erasing any trace of his existence... including anyone who knows about him. Years ago, there were plans to make a Monster TV series with the BBC. I still hope that happens, assuming the show runner is good. Few villains are able to extinguish all hope as well as he. And when he does it he feels... nothing.
https://www.youtube.com/v/jnpFuwSe2Bc16. Doctor Octopus
Another classic comic book villain. Green Goblin my be Spider-Man's arch-enemy but Octopus is his best one, and the most fun. He's visually a lot of fun and his powers, though simple, can be done in a variety of ways. Plus, he's got the classic mad scientist thing going, which I prefer to "evil businessman".
17. Anton Chigurh18. Aku - Another villain who does what I love: can be both funny and scary in equal measure.
https://www.youtube.com/v/t7N67hn0TlA19. Lorne Malvo - Fargo is a great "Coens remix" series and have killed it with their villains. Their Anton Chigurh meets human toxicity is a great character.
https://www.youtube.com/v/-D5RQNdp5X420. Mayor Richard Wilkins - My favourite Buffy villain. Polite and thoughtful guy who happens to be evil AF.
https://www.youtube.com/v/RYTm8nORY2s21. GLaDOS - Portal has great puzzles but it is her narration that makes the game as good as it is. I feel like some good will has been killed for it through meme-fication but it remains a wonderful game.
https://www.youtube.com/v/Y6ljFaKRTrI22. Judge Doom23. Kefka - I never cared much for Sephiroth. Always struck me as trying too hard to be handsome and cool. I prefer Kefka's sadism and scheming that leads him to become a supergod.
https://www.youtube.com/v/5AUUyKhrngM24. Mojo Jojo
https://www.youtube.com/v/y4qNWPPlYE425. Lt. Tsurumi - From Golden Kamuy, which chalk full of great characters. There are no shortage of charismatic villains but with Tsurumi we see why: He really listens to people under him and works to understand them. So much so that it seems like most of his men have literal crushes on him (note to Tsurumi: stop sending the guy who is into being scolded by you on missions). In the episode where he meets the guy who steals bodies and sews skins into suits, he doesn't blackmail him or threaten him into joining, he instead expresses enthusiasm and makes him put on a human skin fashion show (which is much funnier and less dark than it sounds, somehow). We flashback to one of the few men to turn on him and we get to see why he joined him in the first place and very much buy it. Can't wait for season three to start.
Also, I would watch an entire Tsurumi sitcom...
https://www.youtube.com/v/MP4zryHHUy4