12 Movies Where The Hero Became A Villain

7. The Lord Of The Rings

The Hero

Anyone who watched The Hobbit first would have met Saruman the White in his heroic guise, as head of the White Council and leader of the wizards who opposed Sauron in his first rise to power.

He might be a prickly, principled man who refuses to ratify the dwarves mission to Lonely Mountain, but he is by no means a villain. He even turns up to rescue Gandalf from the Necromancer and the Nine and never pulls a punch.

But Then...

In The Fellowship Of The Ring, Saruman appears to still be Gandalf's ally and the leader of the White Council, but it is revealed that he has been studying Dark Magic and developed a yearning for the One Ring himself. He allies with Sauron - partly planning to turn on him and seize power for Isengard - and imprisons Gandalf before turning Isengard into a barracks to breed his Uruk-hai army.