Anti-Villain/Anime


 * Haku in Naruto was more of a sympathetic Punch Clock Villain than a true evil menace. turns out to be this as well, revealed post-mortem; coincidentally, he was paired with, another character who could be considered an anti-villain.
 * He's also a variation. Unlike most other Anti Villains, who feel that they can be sympathized and want to redeem themselves,  knows that he can't be redeemed and doesn't want to be sympathized to begin with. But his sympathetic backstory and why he does what he had to do put him square into this trope.
 * Lucy from Elfen Lied is another good example. A mass murdering lunatic that ended like that due to the years of endless torment finally made her snap (Though she may also have a genetic inborn drive to Kill All Humans due to her status as a Diclonius).
 * While the "heroes" are definitely anti-heroes, the "villain" Kougaji of Saiyuki definitely fulfills this role. He's loyal, responsible, idealistic, kind, and generous, even saving his enemies' little pet dragon from dying of thirst. The only reason he's a "bad guy" is because he's being blackmailed into it. His henchmen are similarly anti-villainous.
 * Greed and his chimera henchmen in Fullmetal Alchemist..
 * Scar also fills this role to those who don't believe him an Anti-Hero.
 * Most of the people Scar kills are shown to be unrepentant war criminals or mooks belonging to the government that had them commit genocide alongside the war criminals, and a pair killed during a major BSOD during the genocidal war. Even Scar himself admits that he doesn't deserve redemption.
 * Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood gives us Isaac the Ice Alchemist. He goes out trying to kill King Bradley due to his disgust over the Ishvalan Massacre. And considering what's revealed later in the series, if he had shown up later on, he probably would've been allied with the heroes.
 * Among the Homunculi, Gluttony and the aforementioned Greed are the best examples, while Sloth's a pretty good example of a Punch Clock Villain.
 * Although the other four are undeniably cruel, all of them have some sympathetic quality or another: Actually calling any of these four an Anti-Villain is a stretch, however.
 * In the 2003 anime version, . The exceptions in this case are  : the former,   and the latter
 * Psiren the cat burgular from the filler episodes is also an example of one. Well, she's supposed to be one anyway and is supposed to be portrayed as a cross between this and a Magnificent Bastard, but the fandom would disagree.
 * Fate from Season 1, the Wolkenritter from Season 2, and Zest from Season 3 of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha. Their "villainous" goals range from wanting to see their mother smile to saving an innocent Ill Girl from certain death to uncovering the truth behind the deaths of their comrades. All of them fall under the Worthy Opponent type, doing things like holding back to not kill people, and going out of their way to make sure their opponent is okay after she's been attacked by a third party. Scenes of them not in battle portray them as genuinely kind characters that deeply care for their wards and those around them. Almost all of them join the heroes' side after being befriended by Nanoha or her cohorts. In fact, a good portion of Nanoha's current cast is made up of former anti-villains.
 * Though the manga's still on hiatus, Fuuma from X 1999 appears to be one of these, and may, in fact, be the only character in the series with any idea of what's really going on, and often strongly hints that the reason he does everything he does is to force Kamui into realizing his true wish, which is the only way that the future can be altered. The anime series and The Movie turn him into much more of an outright villain.
 * The same can be said of the Dragons of Earth in general, with some of its members not being very villainous at all. The series intended to blur the line between hero and villain.
 * Suzaku Kururugi from Code Geass is pretty much this trope incarnate. Despite working for The Empire, he is, in some ways, more 'heroic' than the show's protagonist.
 * In fact, nearly all of the show's "villains" fit this trope. The aforementioned Suzaku is actively working to reform Brittania from the inside, most of the Knights of the Round are affable Punchclock Villains, Gottwald's sympathetic backstory mostly makes up for his misdeeds in the service of the empire, the only completely evil villains were Psycho for Hire Luciano Bradley, Emperor Charles zi Britannia, and V.V.
 * Schneizel's kind of an odd case, perhaps showing the difference between being Affably Evil and an Anti-Villain. He's pretty nice for a villain and Cornelia's comment when  could be read as Word of God calling him an anti-villain, but his Utopia Justifies the Means plan is certainly more evil and selfish than Lelouch's is and isn't much better than his father's plan.
 * Not to mention that Schneizel is perfectly willing to throw his minions away, especially during the Damocles arc, when he attempts to abandon Nunnally and the entire personnel of the rigged-to-explode station to save his own skin. Lelouch, in contrast, tries to make people follow him out of their own free will, even former enemies who regularly battled against him before.
 * Except, of course, when he doesn't. He doesn't seem to have that much of a problem tampering with people's wills to get what he wants.
 * Well, he outright refused, by Word of God, to use his Geass to make people his slaves until crossing the Despair Event Horizon...
 * Ashram from Record of Lodoss War starts out as one of King Beld's two Dragons, and his first defining scene is the brutal massacre of a keep the heroes are staying at for the night. However, the second series in particular shows him doing everything he does to improve the life of the people of Marmo, so they no longer have to rely on war and pillaging as their only means of survival. He even gains the loyalty of a priest of the God of War, who was awed by his display of all the traits that make a true, honorable knight and defender of the weak.
 * The Pokémon Special manga has two of these, and they aren't played for laughs. Giovanni is the first, as he eventually only wants to find his son, and, of all people,
 * N is like this in the Black and White arc of Special, even more so than in the games.
 * The Ghost in the Shell franchise seems to like antivillains quite a bit.
 * The Puppet Master from the film is a Well-Intentioned Extremist who only wants the same rights extended to AI  as humans.
 * from Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex is a young hacker who wants to expose the government coverup of a cure for "cyberbrain sclerosis", an degenerative mental disorder that afflicts some people who have had their brains cyberized.
 * Kuze in the second season of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex. He tries to assassinate the prime minister, is part of a terrorist group, and  But it turns out that he only did it because he seemed to be the only one who really cared about the desperate situation of the millions of homeless refugees in east Asia, and tried to do at least something about it. Having a very tragic backstory only helps solidify his place as this.
 * Don't forget that, initially,
 * Lordgenome and the Anti Spirals from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann. One is a Fallen Hero who wants to protect mankind from an alien race of Knights Templar. The other is a race of Knights Templar who wants to prevent the universe from ending.
 * To be fair, both get their fair share of punch the mecha moments.
 * The Anti-Spiral gets a Rape The Woobie moment in Lagann-Hen.
 * Chouji Suitengu from Speed Grapher. Sure, he is a Well-Intentioned Extremist out to wreck the Japanese government/economy and can be extremely cruel, but he does genuinely care about his henchmen (who he rescued from physical and mental torture dealt by rich people) and has a soft spot for children.
 * That, and he simply believed the world would be better off without money, since it was monetary greed that gave him and his sister the horrible life they have.
 * Chao Lingshen from Mahou Sensei Negima will not hurt anyone except The Hero himself. Her motive is to end The Masquerade, which Negi and the rest of the protagonists can't really find any problem with. Negi's only really fighting her because he'll get turned into an ermine otherwise. He actually angsts quite a bit about this, but eventually realizes that if she had a reason for revealing The Masquerade that would justify his being turned into an ermine, she'd have told him already.
 * Also, Evangeline, who started out as a full villain, but Heel Face Turned early on and is now more of an Anti-Hero than anything. Of course, it's later revealed that, even in her depowered form, Eva is still extremely dangerous and could have kicked Negi's ass easily if she had been serious, so she may have been an Anti-Villain from the beginning. Later on, it's implied that a lot of Eva's Uber-Evil reputation is greatly exaggerated, and that what evil she did do was in response to being an outcast in society.
 * Recently, even Fate is being pushed into this corner. His latest heinous act? There are also a number of hints that he's an Artificial Human that may have limited autonomy, being programmed to follow the orders of his master. Actually, there's only really been one evil bad guy so far, the infamous Psycho Lesbian stalker.
 * Even his "evil plan" turns out to be somewhat sympathetic..
 * Magic Knight Rayearth, in both its major arcs. The Power Trio is told that High Priest Zagato kidnapped Princess Emeraude, causing untold damage to the magical world of Cephiro, so the Knights must defeat him. It turns out, . Of course, since he actively wants to kill the "Girls from Another World" and sends minions (or takes it upon himself) to do so, he's more of a Designated Villain.
 * And in the second season, Eagle Vision, commander of the Autozam invasion force, is a pretty good guy. He's only invading because his home world is dying, and becoming Pillar would help him save it. This puts him at odds with the Knights (but especially Hikaru) and he always fights all-out, even if he has to apologize afterwards.
 * The other antagonists in the second part are generally like that too. Tatra wants to become Pillar so she can give her people a bigger place to live (Chizeta is a very small place), her sister Tarta tags along to keep her on a (loose) leash, and Aska's view of the whole Pillar gig is very child-like (well, she is a child after all). In the anime, even Nova is given sympathetic reasons for why she is who she is, thus leaving Debonair as the only truly evil villain.
 * At least half of the twelve Gold Saints in Saint Seiya are like this during the Sanctuary Arc. Only two of them are actual villains, one of them is dead , another is Brainwashed and Crazy , another is retired , and the Big Bad is suffering from a bad case of Split Personality Takeover. The rest are honestly trying to protect Athena's Sanctuary from what they believe to be evil foes or actually do help the Five-Man Band directly . For the most part, once they realize Seiya & Co. are fighting on behalf of Athena, they immediately turn to their side; those who continue to fight do it only because they want to test the heroes' mettle.
 * Some of the Ansgard saints fit the bill as well; especially Thor, Siegfried, Mime, and, maybe, Sid . The only one without any likeable qualities was Alberich, and the rest are more selfish or cynical without reaching Complete Monster extremes.
 * In One Piece, there are characters such as Vice-Admiral Garp (who was willing to let Luffy get off scot free until he was ordered to go after him), Koby and Helmeppo (who are both friends with the Straw-hats when off-duty), Admiral Aokiji (who helped Robin escape from the Buster Call on Ohara and managed to get a bunch of the Straw Hats' allies off the hook for helping in the attack against Enies Lobby), Commodore Smoker (who refused to take the credit for defeating the villain that Luffy defeated) and Ensign Tashigi (held off enemies while Luffy was kicking said villain's ass). Then again, considering that they are Marines and the protagonists are pirates, you could argue that the above fall more into Hero Antagonist territory.
 * Bartholomew Kuma. He's actually one of, working as one of the Seven Warlords of the Sea for unknown reasons. His  was actually him saving them.
 * Dracule Mihawk. After his duel with Zoro, he spares him so that Zoro will become stronger and challenge him. As of Chapter 597,
 * A case can be made for Magellan and Hannyabal. Despite all the Satanic Nazi undertones, the fact remains that they are in charge of Impel Down, the prison where all of the world's most dangerous criminals are locked away, and they take their job very seriously.
 * The G8 filler arc has Commander Johnathan, who, other than being a very cunning Magnificent Bastard, seems like a pretty cool guy, and is just doing his job in trying to keep a bunch of pirates from escaping his base. He even gets in a bit of semi-friendly banter with Luffy on a couple of occasions.
 * Gundam:
 * In Mobile Suit Gundam, Char Aznable has been one for a lot of fans. Okay, he's on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge not even sparing people who consider him their friend, but he is just so awesome! Oh, and he is mostly on the bad guys' side.
 * Garma Zabi definitely fits the bill, what with only taking necessary measures to capture the Federation Mobile Suit and being concerned with the safety of Earth Federation civilians. In fact, he even mentions to his crew not to destroy the mountains just for a quick military strategy. Anti-Villain indeed.
 * Garma's older brother Dozle deserves a mention, too. In spite of serving the country that instigated the war, he is probably the most likable Zabi. He cares about his soldiers, and would sacrifice his own life making the last stand alone in Solomon to get the surviving Zeon soldiers and his family to safety.
 * G Gundam has a lot of possible border cases but  is surely one of them.
 * Gundam Wing has Treize Kushrenada, who wants to unite the world and bring peace to it by giving it a war so spectacular and horrible that the people will cringe at the thought of another one. To do so, he's willing to go to any ends, such as manipulating people, assassinating political opponets, and launching vast conquests. But he's also one of the most noble characters in the series, who acknowledges full well his atrocities, and remembers the name of every single person who died because of him as a memorial to them. He even intends to die in what he perceives to be the final battle as atonement.
 * Gundam SEED and, especially, Gundam SEED Destiny has it's share depending on how much you rely on Word of God about who are the heroes and villains in the latter.
 * Gundam 00 has several, mostly due to the fact that the protagonists' goals (uniting the world as one) conflict with a variety of not-evil interests in the current politics. The most notable is Colonel Sergei Smirnov, who's generally regarded as the most honorable, moral, and downright nice person in the entire series. It's considered telling that he's the only antagonist character thus far that hasn't wound up in the Titans homage organization A-LAWS (though Kati Mannequin only joined at his request because someone needed to keep an eye on such a secretive and powerful organization. Also, loser ace Patrick only joined because he's got a crush on Kati, despite her telling him not to do so).
 * Technically, the Necessarily Evil Celestial Being would be the Anti Villains, with Sergei and his allies being Anti Heroes at worst (and even that's a stretch. After all, CB are the terrorists in this show (and self-admitted, too), while Sergei and the others work for the government (flawed as it may be).
 * Depending on perspective, nearly every character in the first season, with a few exceptions, could be considered an Anti-Villain to the other factions.
 * The roles of "Hero" and "Villain" have become much more clearly defined in the second season with A-LAWS (Kati and Partick excluded) gleefully Jumping Off the Slippery Slope in order to destroy Celestial Being and maintain a stranglehold on world affairs. (Except for, you know, Graham 'I live to fight' Aker, who has spared the good guys as often as he has tried to kill them.)
 * Gundam AGE has Zeheart Galette in the second generation. During his infiltration mission as a New Transfer Student, he forms genuine friendships with the people around him, especially future Gundam pilot Asemu Asuno. He's deeply troubled by Asemu's determination to be a soldier because he doesn't want a kind-hearted person to end up like him, and tries several times to persuade him not to be a Gundam pilot for that reason (and because Asemu's presence on the battlefield interferes with Zeheart's judgment)..
 * Noir's Big Bad, Altena, is a very sympathetic villain; she is shown to genuinely love The Rival, Chloe, as well as having a Dark and Troubled Past involving orphanhood and rape. Somehow, this makes her more creepy.
 * It's the way she's extremely sincere about her ideals. Sincere enough to be perfectly willing to sacrifice everything that she cares about to fulfill them. Human life seems to have zero value for her, and that includes her own.
 * And then there's the one shot-character Nazarov. It seems like it'd be hard to sympathize with a man who executed a genocide. But then you see how he treats the poor villagers, how he treats the heroes, how he treats his cat, and . Yeah.
 * Reina and Deep Snow in Rave Master.
 * Every villain from Slayers is either this or a Card-Carrying Villain. Sometimes both.
 * Starrk, from Bleach, is Captain Kyoraku Shunsui's barely Evil Counterpart. His list of evil acts include snatching Orihime away from Ichigo and returning her to Las Noches' fifth tower, and lazily fighting against Kyoraku. He never actually hurts Orihime and flat-out says that he's only doing this because Aizen ordered him to, and offered to pretend-fight Kyoraku because he's just that damn lazy. Pretty much the only reason this guy is evil is because he's an arrancar who works for Aizen.
 * His status as an Anti-Villain is finally driven home when his motivation is revealed. He fights for Aizen out of gratitude to him for ending his loneliness, but even then, doesn't ever want to fight seriously. Then, when he finally does decide to get serious, his motivation for doing so is Lilynette pointing out that fighting for real is the only possible way to stop more of his True Companions from dying.
 * Also from the Espada, Tia Harribel. Cool, calm, and collected, and the only reason she's fighting is loyalty to Aizen. The only time she shows any emotion is when her subordinates get incinerated by the Commander-General. Aside from her appearance and shark motif, she's almost a copy of Starrk. Hell, Starrk has done more villainous things than Harribel.
 * Not entirely true, Starrk will not kill unless he has no choice and offers mercy to the vizards, while Harribel immediately decided to bisect Hitsugaya and speak of his pitiful defeat as he explodes into blood. In the manga, she is just another killing machine - all her characterisation belongs to the anime, and even so, she is a ruthless, if honorable, fighter.
 * Harribel doesn't have the sympathetic backstory though. What makes Starrk's case so strong is that he is fighting for the same reason Ichigo is, for his friends.
 * Actually, she does - she also fights for her friends. It's just not shown in the manga, but is detailed in the anime. Though for her, it's more about giving her women protection in a world such as Hueco Mundo, where it's dog-eat-dog (and it's especially bad for female Hollows).
 * Once you accept that just being on the other side doesn't actually make someone evil, very few of the Arrancar really count. After all, they can't exactly fight on Soul Society's side (since their entire point is to murder Hollow and Arrancar) and Aizen's goal is too vague most of the time for anyone to morally object to it. Think about it. Most Arrancar just attack enemy soldiers, which definitely doesn't make them evil, because that's how war works. For example, most of Barragan's Fraccion were indistinguishable in attitude from Shinigami. Even the Seventh Espada, Zommari, only wanted to finish off injured enemy invader Rukia - which is bad but not exactly puppy-eating evil.
 * From the Shinigami, there's Tousen, who
 * From the Bount Filler arc, Koga Go only sticks with the Bounts because of his loyalty to Kariya, loyalty that ends up backfiring on him when Kariya turns on him. And Maki Ichinose only wants to avenge his former captain, who was killed, and eventually undergoes a bit of a Heel Face Turn.
 * Folken Fanel from The Vision of Escaflowne. Long, long before, he's set up as a compassionate, thoughtful man who only performs ruthless acts and atrocities for the Empire because he believes they'll eventually lead to a greater good.
 * In Eureka Seven, Dominic hardly qualifies as a real villain at all straight from the start. He sides against Gekkostate, but he's generally a fairly nice and even harmless guy. Similarly,   are some of the nicest, most loving people Renton meets in the entire series. Unfortunately, their connections to the military   make them enemies of the protagonists.   also moves toward being an Anti-Villain as the series goes on and we discover more of   true personality and tragic past.
 * In Game X Rush, it's difficult to see  as 100% villains, as they not only possess concrete alibis but really don't want to hurt anyone at all. Love Makes You Crazy, though.
 * Most villains in Detective Conan are Sympathetic Murderers, but the case of the person born Seiji Asou worth some special mention. After narrowly escaping being killed with his family because he was hospitalized in Tokyo, he was adopted by his father's friend, Asai, and
 * Pretty much any incarnation of Pluto from any Astro Boy series.
 * Toward the Terra features Keith Anyan, who is almost as much a secondary protagonist as an antagonist. The ending hinges on
 * Pretty much any non-Maniwani villain in Katanagatari, and even then, you could include the Maniwa Insect Squad. Their motivations earn some sympathy, even if they did betray Togame, most especially Tsuruga Meisai and her turning that shrine she's in into a refuge and using the swords she got to protect its residents.
 * Oddly enough, Starscream from Transformers Armada. He's made a Proud Warrior Race Guy, has plenty of moral conflicts, . Very anti-villainous.
 * The eponymous character from Shinryaku! Ika Musume is a Villain Protagonist squid girl who hates humanity and plans to take over the world because they pollute the sea. Considering she's the only squid person around, we can assume that, although she never actually says so, she lost quite a few loved ones. Played with because she's completely ineffectual, doesn't know anything about humanity, and has no idea how to reach that goal or what to do if she actually reached it.
 * At least two members of the Anti-SOS Brigade are this trope. I say "at least" because, though Fujiwara is probably the most traditionally evil character in the series, his ultimate goals are actually pretty noble, due to Fridge Logic, and Kuyou's motivations are completely unknown at this point. The ones who are pretty surely Anti Villains, however, are Kyouko, who prefers not to use violent means to achieve her goal (which, if realized, would make the world more stable, though less interesting), and Sasaki, who wants nothing whatsoever to do with the supernatural, and is only involved in the plot because the aforementioned Anti-SOS Brigade just will not leave her alone.
 * In Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's,  as it's implied that they tried many other things before their current plan, so it's not that they didn't try other options, it's that the other options simply didn't work.
 * Mikuni of  The Money of Soul and Possibility Control is a strong and wealthy man who felt that he could used the midas money to help Japan by buying all of Japan's debt. He was kind to Kimiminaro and wanted to mentor him. He has a different philosophy to money than Kiminaro. However,
 * The Black Lotus organization of the Justice/Vengeance chapters of Franken Fran are out to destroy the world!  Their leader is also very much concerned about his minion's well-being.
 * Enpi-chan in the re-make of Dororon Enma-kun is the older sister of the main character, and is the one who helped bring demons into the human world to cause mischief. But she's only doing so with the vague goal of making the world a more fun and sexy place, and more often than not, ends up in an Enemy Mine situation with the heroes when her minions go against that goal.
 * Koga the Wolf Demon is treated as The Rival in Inuyasha, constantly arguing and bickering with the eponymous Half-Human Hybrid over various topics, including his own desire to wed Kagome and kill Naraku for the death of his whole tribe, and most of the lesser wolves that followed them. The group seems to have forgotten that Koga, before Kagome helped save his tribe from the Birds of Paradise, once slaughtered an entire nameless village just to feed his wolves and kidnapped Kagome in the first place because he intended to use her ability to see Shikon shards to his own ends.
 * Kagura is a good example of this trope, wanting her independence from Naraku, having a tendency to Pet the Dog, especially when it's Kohaku, and.
 * Sesshomaru oscillates between this and Anti-Hero while slowly but eventually defrosting throughout the series.
 * In the US and Japanese versions of Ultimate Teacher, Ganpachi falls to this, as his goal was to get the school back in shape (though exactly how good of a teacher he would have been is another matter), and most of his methods in the start were crushing to his opponents but not violent.
 * In the US and Japanese versions of Ultimate Teacher, Ganpachi falls to this, as his goal was to get the school back in shape (though exactly how good of a teacher he would have been is another matter), and most of his methods in the start were crushing to his opponents but not violent.