Maybe these bad guys aren’t as bad as you thought.
There is no shortage of this bang out of character.
From Superman to Buffy Summers, they all make sacrifices for the greater good.
The Empire Strikes Back / X-Men
Instead, they are a victim of circumstance or simply misunderstood.
While some manage to scrape together a redemption arc, it often comes at a very high personal cost.
These are the antagonists that are totally misunderstood.
But Anakin never fit the Jedi mold.
He was passionate, impulsive, and ruled by emotion in a way the Jedi Order discouraged.
He wanted to do good, but he wanted to do it his way.
20th Century Fox
As a result, the cracks started early.
So he slaughtered them all.
It was the first real glimpse of the darkness inside him.
AMC
Then came Padme, who was everything to him.
When he began having visions of her dying, he became desperate.
The Jedi told him to let go, but Palpatine offered a way to save her.
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That was all Anakin needed to hear.
He didnt turn to the Dark Side out of malice.
He did it because he thought he was protecting the person he loved most.
X-Men: Days of Future Past / 20th Century Fox
By the time he realized the cost, it was too late.
Padme was dead, his body was broken, and Anakin Skywalker was gone.
He was a brilliant but underappreciated man whose potential had been wasted.
When he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, something inside him snapped.
But it didnt take long for his reasons to change.
That moment changed everything.
It wasnt just about survival anymore, it was about control.
He started making decisions not because he had to, but because he wanted to.
Every line he crossed became easier than the last.
Most tragically, his partnership with Jesse went from necessity to manipulation.
He poisoned a child, let Jane die, and orchestrated several deaths with calculated precision.
By the time he told his wife that, I did it for me.
I liked it, there was no Walter White left, only Heisenberg.
But that was never part of the original plan.
He made Daniel LaRussos life miserable, and when he lost the All-Valley Tournament, it felt like justice.
Raised by a cruel stepfather who belittled him at every turn, Johnny found an escape in karate.
Under John Kreeses guidance, he learned discipline, strength, and control.
But he also learned the wrong lessons.
Kreese taught him that mercy was weakness and that striking first was the only way to survive.
Johnny followed those teachings because he had to.
Thats why losing to Daniel wasnt just a tournament loss, it shattered his entire sense of self.
So it made sense that, decades later, Johnny was drinking his way through life.
But when he reopened Cobra Kai, he saw a chance to do things differently.
His journey wasnt easy.
He made mistakes and struggled to break free from the toxic mindset that was drilled into him.
Eventually, Johnny proved something most villains dont get to: Its never too late to change.
The horror of it shaped and hardened him.
When he discovered his mutant abilities, the world feared him all over again.
For Erik, history was doomed to repeat itself.
That belief turned him into a revolutionary whose cause demanded blood.
He saw violence as a necessary preemptive strike to ensure mutants survived.
His methods were extreme, but his reasoning was heartbreakingly understandable.
Magneto became a villain because he refused to believe in humanitys capacity for change.
But in his most vulnerable moments, he wanted to believe that he couldve perhaps been something else.
