Every Mainline Pokemon Game Villain, Ranked From Least To Most Evil

With great power comes great responsibility. Pokemon are an extremely great power, and there are plenty of villains out there with no responsibility. Across the franchise, plenty of Pokemon villains have had crack-pot schemes in need of foiling by a ten-year-old kid. Thankfully, one is always on hand to save the day, and none of them ever succeed.

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Not all evil schemes are created equal, though. As the franchise has continued to expand, so too have the baddies' plans. From stealing and selling Pokemon, all the way to creating a brand-new universe, some villains dream far grander than others.

Updated November 29, 2024 by Blaise Santi: It's been two years since the release of Pokemon Scarlet & Violet, the 9th generation of the best-selling franchise. With every installment of the series, new characters reveal themselves to be some of the most nefarious antagonists players have ever fought.

Before Game Freak changes things up again by announcing the 10th generation games, let's take a look back at some more of the notorious characters who have threatened the stability of the world of Pokemon in the mainline series of games, ranked from the least evil to most evil.

13 N

Simply A Misguided Friend To Pokemon

Technically, N qualifies as an antagonist in Pokemon Black & White, despite appearing as a rival to the player for most of the game. However, it's later revealed that N is the so-called "king" of Team Plasma, whose dreams of segregating humans and Pokemon result in his pursuit of Reshiram/Zekrom, though by the end of the game he comes to a more nuanced understanding of what Pokemon want.

Really, the bad guy here is Ghetsis, N's father who manipulated him as part of his schemes to rule the world. In his appearances in Black 2 & White 2, N is more of a proper ally to the player in stopping Ghetsis from taking control of Kyurem. He's definitely not a bad guy, just an empathetic soul whose love for Pokemon drives him to briefly side with the wrong team.

12 Guzma

This Boss Doesn't Have All The Power

In a simpler Pokemon game, Guzma might be a proper antagonist, as the leader of Team Skull. However, like N, he's merely just a pawn for Lusamine, capturing Yungoos across the Alola region to distract players from the criminal plans of the Aether Foundation. Guzma even accompanies Lusamine into an Ultra Wormhole with the hopes of catching a Nihilego for himself, though he ends up afraid.

As far as villainous team leaders go, Guzma is all bark and no bite, it turns out. He does go through a change of heart throughout both Sun & Moon and its alternate timeline, Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon, though the worst thing about him above all else is just his sour attitude towards the player and his kidnapping shenanigans throughout Alola.

11 Archer

He's Barely A Wannbe Giovanni

After Giovanni is defeated in Red & Blue, Archer becomes the head of Team Rocket. So what does Archer do with this power? Beg Giovanni to return. He does some evil things along the way, like cutting off Slowpoke tails or taking over the radio station, but it's just to convince Giovanni to return and take his place back at the top.

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Archer has never had much imagination for his Pokemon, either. In Gold, Silver & Crystal, he has just three Pokemon, which isn't going to be very effective. A Koffing, a Houndour, and a Houndoom aren't going to be very intimidating to players at such a late stage in the game's story, especially when their levels are only in the low 30s.

10 Lusamine

At Least She Has Room To Grow

Lusamine's evils are more personal than a wish to destroy the world. Her mother's complex pushes her to a dark place while looking for the Ultra Beasts, and she pays the price for it. Additionally, she's one of the only Pokemon villains to repent at the end and become a better person eventually. In fact, in Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon, she was booted out of the main villain role by a far more evil foe.

Lusamine's team during her final battle is a pretty formidable bunch. Interestingly, in this battle, every Pokemon has one of their stats automatically boosted in the battle due to Lusamine's effect after having merged with Nihilego. With five Pokemon at Level 50, Lusamine will be putting a lot of pressure on players at this point in the game.

9 Colress

A Man Of Science On The Wrong Side

Colress is a very interesting character in the canon of the Pokemon franchise. Introduced in Black 2 & White 2, Colress is a researcher hired as the new boss of Team Plasma to uncover the true strengths of Pokemon. As the replacement for Ghetsis, his greatest accomplishment is an invention, the Colress Machine, which is briefly used in the game to awaken a sleeping Crustle.

Colress later shows up in Sun & Moon, his research having led him to study Z-Rings. In Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon, he also aids the player in fusing Necrozma with one of the two box legendaries, based on his experience with Kyurem in the fifth-generation games. Colress is far from nefarious, as his focus is genuinely on scientific research, but by joining Team Plasma, he's at the very least morally dubious.

8 Giovanni

The Most Iconic Criminal In Pokemon History

Giovanni is absolutely an iconic Pokemon villain and is still considered by many to be the gold standard of the franchise. However, when compared to the plots of the villains that came after him, he doesn't seem as bad. When it comes to the look and aura of a villain, Giovanni has it all, but stealing and selling Pokemon looks like a pretty basic plot in the modern era.

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By  Janine Engelbrecht

He's still an extremely evil guy. The problem is, when the rest of the franchise has stories about the world being destroyed, the Pokemon Mafia doesn't seem like that big of a deal anymore. He eventually reaches that level in the Team Rainbow Rocket arc of Ultra Sun & Ultra Moon, but by definition, that is not the same Giovanni who loses to Red in the originals.

7 Rose

He's Pragmatic, But Not So Malicious

Rose is a pretty underwhelming villain for Sword & Shield. What puts him as a less evil villain is that, although misguided, he does what he does for understandable reasons. It's made clear throughout the story that an energy crisis is going to hit the Galar region at some point in the future, and Rose wants to prevent it. The way he does this happens to be absolutely the worst route he could've taken.

Rose's team leaves a lot to be desired. Like Giovanni, he suffers from the weakness of only using a single type (in this case, Steel), although he does a better job covering his weaknesses. Ferrothorn can be a pain to deal with if it's allowed to stick around, and the Gigantamax Copperajah is a challenge if players have already used their Dynamax turns, but other than that, he's not too challenging.

6 Archie & Maxie

Definitely Evil, But Maybe Not Smart

These two Pokemon villains seem to have rather short-sighted plans. For one thing, they steal the wrong colored orb for the Pokemon they're trying to awaken. It surely doesn't take a genius to figure out that the blue Pokemon is controlled by the blue orb, not the red one (and vice versa), but apparently, these two couldn't see it.

On top of that, their misguided fantasies about what having more land/ocean would do for the world are quite dumb. Either there's nowhere for people to live, or everyone dies because there's way less water. What they were doing was very evil, but it's hard to tell how much of that evil was intentional. For people so diametrically opposed, their teams are similarly disappointing.

5 Lysandre

The Thanos Of The Pokemon World

Lysandre is one of the weirder villains in the franchise, with hard-to-understand motivations. He talks about wanting to make a more beautiful world but thinks killing everyone is the way to go about it. Additionally, he's extremely helpful to the player in their efforts to stop him. He has all the tools at his disposal to keep the player away from his plans but chooses not to use any of them.

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By  Alexander James Lindsey

As far as evil goes, killing all the people and Pokemon not aligned with him is among the upper limits of how evil a person can be. What's even weirder, though, is that he discovers the secret to eternal life, and no one seems to care. Sure, people wouldn't use it because death is needed to power it, but at least a couple of people should be a bit curious. At the end of the day, Lysandre is far outshone by his anime counterpart.

4 Necrozma

A Pokemon With Powers Beyond Belief

While Legendary Pokemon do some pretty horrible things, they're rarely acting out of their own willpower. The human villain controls or manipulates them somehow to work for them. This is not the case for Necrozma, who acts entirely of its own free will and seeks destruction. What makes Necrozma so evil is that players get to see Ultra Megalopolis, a world where Necrozma removed all light.

It's perhaps the most terrifying a Pokemon has ever acted in one of the games, subduing and possessing Solgaleo/Lunala at a key point in the story. It's also one of the toughest boss fights in franchise history. It took a long time for a Pokemon to truly be the villain of the story, but it was worth the wait.