10 Most Vile Villains From Recent Horror Movies

2. Aunt Gladys - Weapons

Despite not seeing Aunt Gladys (a delightfully depraved Amy Madigan) in all her witchy wonder until an hour into Zach Cregger's monstrous masterpiece Weapons, she is very much insidiously interwoven into the other characters' lives.

Gladys makes brief appearances in the nightmares of schoolteacher Justine Gandy (Julia Garner) and the father of one of the 17 missing children, Archer Graff (Josh Brolin). She hovers like a classic demonic entity on Justine's bedroom ceiling, and terrifies Archer when he suddenly sees her lying on his son's bed with a rictus grin on her frightening face. These jump scare scenes are highly effective, as we don't know who this freakish figure is at this point... until we get to school principal Marcus Miller's (Benedict Wong) chapter. 

Garbed in garish red and purple, a face caked in white makeup and messy red lipstick and adorned with a flaming red wig and oversized glasses, Gladys' outlandish aesthetic evokes a stylistic blend of various Jokers. Her voice is unexpectedly all sweetness and light that neatly dovetails with her casually humming to herself whilst Marcus headbutts his husband to death on her command.

It's only fitting that Alex Lilly (Cary Christopher) heroically breaks Gladys' spell over his parents and the 17 children after the torturous time she put him through. The wicked witch made Alex watch his parents repeatedly stab themselves in the face with forks, then threatened that she "can make them eat each other" if he revealed her presence to anyone. To top it all, Gladys made Alex buy the soup and spoon-feed his parents and the kids.

Despite being memorably torn to pieces by said children, Gladys' wickedness still pervades as Alex's parents remain catatonic and only some of the children are speaking. Plus, she's ruined Campbell's Soup.