You either die a hero, or...
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00:00Harvey Dent said it best, you either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself
00:05become the villain.
00:06Movies are full not only of villains who go through their own redemption arc and wind
00:10up as heroes, but also the exact opposite, heroes who make Dent's words ring true
00:16by breaking bad and taking a complete 180 U-turn on their good guy stance in a sequel.
00:22I'm Ewan, this is WhatCulture, and here are 10 movies where the hero turns evil in
00:27the sequel.
00:2910.
00:30Bucky Barnes – Captain America, The Winter Soldier
00:33Best friends back in 1940s Brooklyn, Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers were inseparable and
00:39were with each other till the end of the line, even after one had been captured, had his
00:44mind completely corrupted, and was sent back into the world to kill the other.
00:49As a member of the Howling Commandos, Bucky was a war hero and one of Captain America's
00:54greatest allies.
00:55As the Winter Soldier, however, he was one of the most ruthless and successful assassins
01:00the world had ever seen, so elusive and so impeccably skilled in what he did that most
01:06of the intelligence community didn't even believe he existed.
01:10Bucky ultimately came good again, but that initial reveal didn't lose any of its shock
01:14value and it made the transition from page to screen.
01:179.
01:18John Connor – Terminator Genisys
01:21For four previous movies, John Connor was the hero of the Terminator franchise and his
01:26life needed to be protected.
01:28The fifth film in the franchise, however, followed a different timeline in which he
01:33was caught by Skynet.
01:35The villainous AI, personified in this case by a barely-there Matt Smith, essentially
01:40killed John Connor's conscience and took over his body, sending humanity's greatest
01:46hero back in time as a T-3000.
01:49What better way to stop those meddling heroes from getting in the way of an evil plan than
01:53by literally sending the best of them back as an enemy?
01:56Thanks to Genisys underperforming both critically and commercially, Dark Fate followed several
02:01years later and, in killing John Connor, essentially retconned anything that happened in Rise of
02:06the Machines, Salvation or Genisys.
02:09Still, 2014 had that brief window where humanity's greatest hero became its strongest adversary,
02:16a moment I need blissfully terminating.
02:198.
02:20President Coin – The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part 2
02:24When the Districts rebelled against President Snow's rule over them from the Capitol,
02:28it was Katniss Everdeen that was the initial spark.
02:32She shared the Night Lock with Peter, preventing Snow from having his Hunger Games winner,
02:36and she fought as the Mockingjay, the focal point of the whole rebellion, to bring an
02:41end to Snow's regime.
02:42That's not to say that she did it alone, though, or even that she was in charge.
02:47There were teams of people around her to help, from Haymitch to Prim, Gale and more, and
02:51of course, in Mockingjay Part 1, there was Alma Coin, who acted as general of the rebellion.
02:58Without Coin, there would have arguably been no District 13, and the revolt would have
03:02been crushed before it even started.
03:04Under her leadership, the revolution was successful and Capitol finally fell, where she would
03:09then take the role of President from Snow in Part 2.
03:12Her first act?
03:13Punish the Capitol by forcing their children to compete in a Hunger Games of their own.
03:18So she learned absolutely nothing and in just one conversation, proved herself to be no
03:22better than Snow.
03:237.
03:24Koba – Dawn of the Planet of the Apes
03:26Caesar led the Apes' fight against human oppression in the excellent rebooted Planet
03:31of the Apes films, and next to him all the way was Koba, who didn't cheer when the
03:36abused ape was able to drop his tormentor from the Golden Gate Bridge at the end of
03:39the first movie.
03:42Flash forward 10 years later though, and while Caesar was happy to live alongside humans
03:46so long as they didn't bother and torture all the apes, Koba's hatred still raged.
03:52He wanted every human to die, and this disagreement in ideology ultimately drove the two brothers
03:58in arms apart.
04:00Not only did Koba manipulate the other apes, he appeared to kill Caesar, using the leader's
04:05death to bring about a bloody war with the humans.
04:08He became a ruthless leader who was followed out of fear more so than respect and loyalty,
04:14and as a direct result of his actions, killed many, many apes.
04:19Ironically, Koba claimed that Caesar loved humans more than apes, and yet he was the
04:23one who outright murdered his own kind in some kind of power display.
04:286.
04:29Thorin Oakenshield – The Hobbit – The Battle of the Five Armies
04:33One of the biggest downgrades of the Hobbit trilogy was going from Aragorn to Thorin Oakenshield,
04:39who just wasn't all that compelling to follow.
04:42Thorin's struggles as a protagonist were compounded further by his more villainous
04:47turn in the final entry in the trilogy.
04:49Once Thorin and company took Erebor back from Smaug, and after the people of Laketown paid
04:53the price for the dragon's disturbance, the new king under the mountain grew greedy.
04:58He coveted the Arkenstone, and with that came a certain kind of paranoia, and something
05:04of a sickness too.
05:05He became just as protective of his gold as the dragon before him.
05:09He had struck a bargain with Bard too, and he owed the people of Laketown fair recompense.
05:14But instead of paying what was rightfully owed, Thorin locked himself in the mountain
05:19and gave himself one more enemy on the battlefield in the lead up to his ultimate death.
05:255.
05:26Jean Grey – X-Men The Last Stand
05:29Okay, so putting it out there, X2 X-Men United is still one of the better combat movies we've
05:35gotten, and it ended on a bittersweet note with the seeming death of Jean Grey, who sacrificed
05:40herself to protect the X-Men as they made their getaway from Alkali Lake.
05:44We then got a glimpse of the phoenix rising from the lake at the end of the movie, promising
05:49one of the most iconic X-Men storylines would be explored in the sequel, the Dark Phoenix
05:54Saga.
05:55And explore it it did, but really amazingly, in X-Men The Last Stand, which saw Famke Janssen's
06:02Omega-level mutant being taken over by the dark side of her personality and joining up
06:07with Magneto.
06:08She smoked Cyclops and Professor X along the way to a final confrontation with Wolverine,
06:13who then reluctantly kills her to prevent the phoenix from harming anyone else.
06:174.
06:18Letty – Fast & Furious 6
06:202009's Fast & Furious is arguably the most forgettable entry in the series, but it is
06:26important for a few key reasons.
06:29Mainly as it saw the return of Vin Diesel to the franchise for the first time since
06:33the debut entry, but also because it placed Paul Walker's Brian firmly in the Toretto
06:38family and all the corona-sipping barbecues that entails.
06:42More dramatically though, Fast & Furious also killed off Michelle Rodriguez's Letty, Dom's
06:47wife.
06:49after tracking Braga, leading Brian and Dom to rekindle their unlikely friendship and
06:54avenge her.
06:55Letty stayed dead for Fast 5, but was mysteriously resurrected as an amnesiac mercenary in Furious
07:006 after an ending tease in the previous film.
07:03The new villain of the sequel, Owen Shaw, played by Luke Evans, had taken in Letty after
07:08she survived the explosion from Fast & Furious, using her talents as part of his anti-familia
07:13team.
07:14Letty eventually breaks out of her funk and gets back with Dom, who then also went briefly
07:19evil in F8.
07:213.
07:22Optimus Prime – Transformers The Last Knight
07:25The absolute madness that is Transformers The Last Knight gifted us with lots of great
07:30stuff.
07:31Cogman, prestigious actor Anthony Hopkins getting absolutely obliterated by a giant
07:36robot, Transformers being in World War 2, and it also led to a surprise flipping of
07:42roles for Optimus Prime.
07:43After the ending of Age of Extinction, Prime travels to Cybertron and encounters Quintessa,
07:49who transforms him into evil Optimus, aka Nemesis Prime.
07:53Bumblebee ends up coming to blows with his former Autobot commander, only for Prime to
07:58get the upper hand and nearly kill him.
08:00Bumblebee then manages to speak to Optimus in his original, non-radio voice, which snaps
08:05him out of the brainwashing and turns him into the lovable Autobot we all know and love.
08:112.
08:12Wanda Maximoff – Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
08:15Technically, Wanda Maximoff's introduction in the MCU was as a villain after being recruited
08:21by Ultron, but she soon switched sides to the Avengers.
08:25You could have made the argument that Wanda was the villain of WandaVision, as she imprisoned
08:29countless people within her hex just to live out her fantasy to avoid dealing with her
08:33grief.
08:34But when the hex came down and she was forced to say goodbye to Vision, again, and the children
08:39she manifested, that's when she truly began to manipulate and utilize her powers as the
08:44Scarlet Witch.
08:45Wanda's villainous turn in the Multiverse of Madness was one fueled by grief and loss,
08:50and the fact that she would do absolutely anything to be with the children she knew
08:53existed in another universe.
08:55The Scarlet Witch seemed to have been shown the error of her ways by America Chavez, so
08:59if she does return, there's currently no telling on whose side she'll actually be.
09:051.
09:06Anakin Skywalker – Star Wars Episode III – Revenge of the Sith
09:10There was one story that the Star Wars prequels were produced to tell, and that was the transition
09:15of Anakin Skywalker to Darth Vader.
09:18Forget Jar Jar – actually, don't forget Jar Jar, I love him, sincerely – the Jedi
09:22Council, and even Obi-Wan Kenobi, this was literally the story of a hero's turn to
09:28evil.
09:29In the original Star Wars trilogy, Darth Vader immediately announced himself as a villain
09:32for the ages, but there was so much more hidden underneath the mask.
09:37Hints and breadcrumbs were dropped for a new trilogy of movies to pick up on two decades
09:41later.
09:42Now, there are several moments throughout Revenge of the Sith that you could accredit
09:45the exact moment Anakin began his spiral towards the dark side, but even the face of the prequel
09:50trilogy's criticisms were all put to screen incredibly well.
09:54And those were 10 Movie Heroes Who Turned Evil In The Sequel.
09:58How do you feel about these villainous turns?
10:00Love them?
10:01Loathe them?
10:02Shout out your thoughts down in the comments section below, and don't forget to drop
10:04a like if you enjoyed it and subscribe if you're new.
10:07Either way, I've been Ewan, you've been watching WildCulture, and I will hopefully
10:11see you next time… as a villain.