Overstaying their welcome: the five moments legendary villains should have died
There’s an old saying that proclaims heroes are only as good as their villains, which is one that’s been taken a touch too literally by far too many studios and franchises over the years.
While there’s nothing wrong with a hero surviving until the credits roll and returning for more in sequels, sometimes a movie stumbles upon an antagonist who becomes so popular and/or iconic that death is merely an obstacle that can quickly be rewritten.
Sometimes it makes sense, sometimes it doesn’t, but it’s always blatant when it’s being done for the sake of it. Bad guys don’t have to die in the end, but neither do they have to be resurrected with such reckless abandon simply to tug at the nostalgic heartstrings or wink at the audience.
The following five bad guys were each given the perfect moment to bid farewell forever, but for a number of reasons—money tends to rear its head more often than not—every single one of them made a substandard comeback. Or two. Or three.
The five times villains should have died:
5. Michael Myers
While the only reason David Gordon Green’s Halloween sequel trilogy existed was to wring every last penny out of its iconic antagonist, the director’s smartest move was discarding everything that had happened after the end of John Carpenter’s classic original.
Horror is by far the worst genre in cinema for refusing to let popular characters die and stay dead, but Halloween H20: 20 Years Later was the perfect moment to send Michael Myers into the sunset for good. It was an anniversary that brought back Jamie Lee Curtis’ Laurie Strode, who finally draws a line under the saga when she decapitates her arch-nemesis to conclude the story.
Of course, because the film made a lot of money, four years later, Resurrection arrived and opened with the dire reveal that Laurie actually hadn’t killed him at all, but a paramedic Michael had switched clothes with. It was an eye-roller and a sign that Halloween was never going to end.
4. Freddy Krueger
Much like the aforementioned Myers and Friday the 13th figurehead Jason Voorhees, Freddy Krueger had been brought back far too many times, but at least A Nightmare on Elm Street has been laying dormant for almost a decade and a half after the ill-advised and thoroughly tedious remake.
Although it was hinted in the final moments of the third instalment, Dream Warriors, that Freddy hadn’t been vanquished for good, having his remains purified and laying him to rest was a solid enough way to draw things to a close, especially when the law of diminishing returns had already started to set in.
Naturally, the fourth entry, The Dream Master, was released the very next year. How was Freddy brought back from the dead? By way of a dog pissing fire at a junkyard, which causes the ground to open up and reanimate the razor-gloved fiend’s corpse, obviously.
3. T-1000
The combination of James Cameron, Robert Patrick, and cutting-edge CGI gifted Terminator 2: Judgment Day with one of blockbuster cinema’s most memorable and iconic villains, which should have been that.
The heroes vanquish the liquid metal cyborg, putting an end to an all-timer of a sequel. And yet, because nostalgia must be ladled on as thick as humanly possible, the atrocious Genisys brought back the T-1000 for the sake of a set piece that only reminded audiences of how far the franchise had fallen.
Lee Byung-hun fills in for Patrick as the shapeshifting Terminator, which serves no other purpose than letting everybody know Terminator 2 was a vastly superior movie. Even the people who made Genisys admitted it was crap, which says it all.
2. Agent Smith
Hugo Weaving’s cold, calculating, and malicious villain made an excellent foil for Keanu Reeves‘ Neo in the Wachowskis’ game-changing sci-fi spectacular, and maybe he should have stayed dead after The Matrix.
He’s brought back in Reloaded by assuming the body of a crew member and survives right through to the climactic action scene of Revolutions, where he definitely should have stayed dead.
The Matrix Resurrections was nothing if not ambitious for its meta-commentary on reboots, remakes, and cash-grab sequels, but it wasn’t as smart as it thought it was. It’s clear from the second he appears Jonathan Groff is Smith, and by the end, he’s basically a terrible Weaving impression.
1. Emperor Palpatine
What else could it possibly be? There are no three words capable of sending a shiver down the spine of Star Wars supporters everywhere that could ever hope to hold a candle to “Somehow, Palpatine returned.”
The nefarious head of the Empire was killed off at the end of Return of the Jedi, but he was obligated to serve as the overarching big bad of The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, and Revenge of the Sith because his rise to power in the prequels was so intertwined with Anakin Skywalker’s story.
There was no mention of Palpatine in either The Force Awakens or The Last Jedi, but because Disney shit the bed when Rian Johnson’s film turned out to be so contentious, he was brought back to be the primary antagonist for the third trilogy in a row for reasons that made absolutely no sense.
