10 More Horror Movie Villains Who Actually Won

So a few weeks ago we hit you with a list of movie villains that beat the odds and actually won. I made the (very fair) argument that in most horror movies, the ending sees the villain defeated and the good guys win. Sure, they may be traumatised for life and may have lost a few friends in terrible fashions along the way, but they are alive and the baddie is not and that’s a win in my book.

This isn’t always the case though, and lots of people took issue with my claim that ‘most’ movies end that way. Maybe I was being optimistic, shame on me at a time like this. What we really need is abject pessimism to carry us through. So, in the spirit of that I’m here to give you another ten movie villains that won, defeating and debasing the good guys and crushing the viewers’ hope.

I love being miserable, don’t you? From supernatural, cursed objects to genre-favourite demons there is a huge range of winning villains to choose from. Potentially even more winners than losers, forsaking my former argument. You don’t get anywhere in life by being nice, let’s all start winning like these guys.

It may be an unpopular opinion but I’m not sure that the bad guys of Skeleton Key were actually all that bad. The hoodoo-practising couple were enslaved, kept in servitude and then lynched - but god forbid they save themselves through a bit of dark magic? It is unfortunate of course that a few innocent people got caught up in it, but I struggle to blame them too much for using what tools they had for self-preservation.

That being said, they are meant to be the movie’s bad guys so they still qualify for an entry on this list. Caroline, a hospice worker, is hired to take care of partially paralysed Ben by his wife, Violet. The two live in a plantation house out in New Orleans, only close with their family’s lawyer Luke.

Caroline gets suspicious that Ben’s paralysis has something to do with old hoodoo magic and of course she starts digging, only to get more than she bargained for. In the end she finds that Violet and Luke are actually Cecile and Justify inhabiting their bodies through magic. To keep themselves safe again, Cecile switches into Caroline’s body so that her and Justify (in Luke’s body) can escape again.

They get to carry on living safely in other bodies, and the innocent folks get carted away to an unknown fate. W for hoodoo, L for hospice workers everywhere.