10 Movie Franchises Where The Villain Became A Hero

While we’re always supposed to root for the hero to win the day, it can’t be denied some villains are so cool they're hard to resist. Hans Gruber might be a thief and a cold-blooded killer, but damn is he still likeable. Darth Vader beats Luke Skywalker in the badass department by a wide margin, and if fans had a choice most would prefer to hang out with Loki instead of Thor.

Some of them become so popular the studio decides to promote them to hero for a sequel, with predictably mixed results. For some, this is a natural progression since the character might have been seeking redemption in the first place. For others, it’s a little forced, and their sudden change of heart never quite sits right with fans.

It can still be a fun experiment in playing with audiences expectations, and here are ten examples of movies that gave their villains a second chance.

The Predator is a merciless, near unkillable hunter from another planet, and he’s really good at what he does. Unfortunately for us, that’s killing human beings and skinning them. Not cool. Arnie and Danny Glover showed him the error of his ways in the first two movies before the ultimate fanboy dream came true with Alien Vs Predator.

In the case of that movie the tagline “Whoever wins, we lose” was true in more ways than one, and so we have three wimpy Predators getting their asses handed to them by some aliens. The last surviving Predator teams up with a human survivor, and they have a series of blandly executed adventures while trying to escape a pyramid filled with beasties.

AVP isn’t the turkey it’s made out to be, but it’s hardly great either. Turning it into a weird buddy cop movie halfway through doesn’t help, because nobody wants to see the ultimate hunter being chummy with a whiny Ellen Ripley wannabe; a Ripley-off, if you will.