18 Upcoming Villains Who Will Be More Interesting Than The Heroes

18. Shere Khan - Jungle Book: Origins

The Hero: The famous young jungle-dweller, Mowgli, a feral boy who fancies himself a real animal.

The Villain: The unofficial ruler of the jungle, the fearsome tiger Shere Khan, who will be brought to life through motion-capture by Benedict Cumberbatch.

Why The Villain Will Be More Interesting: After so many adaptations, Mowgli has become familiar, uninteresting. In a movie full of famous actors playing jungle animals through motion capture, the lone human of the bunch isn’t exactly interesting.

Rather, having one of the most popular actors around playing the animal villain is far more exciting. Cumberbatch’s Smaug was one of the few redeeming features of the entire Hobbit trilogy so having him pick up where he left off almost necessitates that the character will be fascinating.

Beyond that, this is a character who ultimately hates and fears Mowgli because he is a human. Mowgli’s goals in life are simply to exist but it’s clear that Shere Khan is taking much more drastic measures to survive. He’s scared of what Mowgli will become and exploring that could give him incredible depth while justifying his villainous actions.