The most scary literary villains in books/ films

[Lampros]

I'll start...Miss Trunchbull. Still scared when I read the book or watch the films as a 35yo!

Any Dickensian villain is a masterclass in malevolence.

David Copperfield's aunt is a force of nature!

George Harvey from Lovely Bones. I find people who haven't got any remorse very scary.

Very true- I'd forgotten about her!

Apologies if this has already been posted but another of mine is judge Frollo from both book and film. Terrifying!!!

Misery! Her death was brutal!

Jane Murdstone is easily as nasty as her dreadful brother. Then there's Rosa Dartle who has been scaring the ever-living whatnot out of me since I saw her onscreen in a BBC adaptation of of David Copperfield when I was nine or so. She's not monstrous or terrifying in any conventional sense (in fact the actress who plays her in that adaptation is quite pretty) but she blazes with bitterness and hate. I wouldn't want to be in the same room as her for long, let alone the same household.

Definitely Miss Slighcarp in the Wolves of Willoughby chase and the White Witch in the Narnia books.

Bumping this thread to ask whether anyone other than me thinks about literary villain face-offs and who would win.

For example, Nurse Ratched would beat Bill Sikes as she'd have him lobotomised.

(Dark, I know)

Annie Wilkes would beat Jack Torrance because she’d have had him tied to a bed and footless before he got chance to pick up an axe.

Sixty odd years later I still remember how scared I was of Magwitch in the BBC adaptation of Great Expectations. Jumping out in that graveyard, the bugger!

Mrs.Reed.
F*cking Janice Beattie (iykyk).
Kyra Collins's mother (Mrs. Collins) in "The Sixth Sense" movie.

There seems to be a theme going on here, for me...

@TomPinch how about the Head Witch Vs Voldemort? I think HW with her laser eyes.

David Tennant as Kilgrave in Jessica Jones. Remorseless and inventively psychopathic.

I saw a touring production of Chitty Chitty earlier this year, with a one know person playing the part, and they really dumbed it down.

@Silverbirchleaf what’s a ‘one know’ person? I realise it might be a typo but I can’t work it out.

Well known.

The Demon Headmaster - not exactly literary but remember being terrified of him as a child.

Tricky.

I consulted with DD who said Voldemort because he wouldn't have been silly enough to get himself get poisoned with mousemaker or he'd have just turned himself back.

I was going to say that it would mean a full-on Witches v Death Eaters war, but the truth is that as they'd all be Slytherins they'd come to terms for their mutual advantage.

Daleks, the bastards.

Dracula in the Bram Stoker novel. Mr. Brooks played by Kevin Costner.

Currently watching Emmerdale and going to say John Sugden is a terrible villain. Complete wet lettuce but he’s about the kill off Mack so I hate him for that.

Norman, from Rose Madder by Stephen King

Interesting. I only read this recently and I found her both admirable and terrifying. Do you think her character comes across differently nowadays as opposed to how it was intended when it was written?

Yes! Pure psychotic evilness.

We saw the play and she was elegantly terrifying! She got a standing ovation and no wonder