Disney Villains Who Actually Had a Good Point

Every villain is the hero of their own story. While it would be a bit much to say that all Disney villains are entirely innocent of crimes, some of them at the very least deserve the benefit of the doubt…

Captain Hook from ‘Peter Pan’

Poor Captain Hook is pretty entitled to hate Peter Pan. After all, Peter cut off his hand and fed it to a crocodile who literally pursues Hook every agonizing second if every day, reminding him of his own mortality and impending death. Hook should be forgiven a little dynamite here and there.

Hades from ‘Hercules’

Zeus, king of the gods, assigned every god it their role in Greek mythology. You can understand why Hades would be mad that all the other gods get to live on Mount Olympus, and he’s stuck watching over the underworld for eternity.

When Hades makes a deal, he keeps it: Meg gets hurt, and Hercules gets his strength back. When Hercules makes a deal (that he’ll stay in the underworld forever) he immediately breaks it and punches Hades in the face. That’s just not cool. 

Jafar from ‘Aladdin’

In fairness to Jafar, his boss, the Sultan, is an idiot who spends all his time playing with toys. With such an incompetent ruler, it makes sense that Agrabah must look to the royal vizier to make all the important decisions, so logically Jafar realizes that he needs more power to actually make all the necessary decisions to rule the kingdom.

The Hyenas from ‘The Lion King’

In the ‘Lion King’ circle of life, lions are the rulers and are allowed to eat whatever they want, but hyenas are “slobbering mangy stupid poachers” for wanting equality. They’re not bad guys; their motivation is not wanting to be hungry and not wanting to live inside an active volcano.