Female Villains

[DuelMark]

So, I think it's been a while since someone brought it up, but after Tri Force Heroes, I think I should bring it up now.
There are very few female villains in the series. Not counting Cia since Hyrule Warriors is a spin-off, we have the following:
Veran and Twinrova in the Oracle series, but they were in the end servants of Ganon.
Hilda of A Link Between Worlds was a well-intentioned extremist, but she was a pawn of Yuga and realized what she almost did and stopped.
The Lady from Tri Force Heroes... well, her evil plan was putting a princess in an ugly catsuit... not exactly a big deal. (I can see why Link hid his true identity) Admittedly, she's the only one who isn't connected in any way with Ganon.

If there's something I think this franchise could use, it's more female villains. After all, there are plenty of iconic female villains in fiction: Catwoman, the Baroness, Maleficent, etc.
Do you think the series could use more female villains? Specifically female villains who have their own agenda that doesn't connect them with Ganon?

 

[Jirohnagi]

I agree with this, the only solo female villain was from TFH and to be frank she sucked, we have twinrova and Veran but as pointed out they are ganons pawns ditto Hilda, i'd quite like to see a good solid female villain

 

[Linkmaster30000]

It'd be nice to see some more female villains that are GOOD. The only really good one was Veran, who turned out to be a subordinate to Twinrova (who, in my opinion, paled extremely in comparison to Onox and Veran). The Lady from TFH did nothing to make me think "Wow, she's a really good villain". Then again, the plot of TFH is a bit weird in the first place.

Come to think of it, there haven't been a lot of female main villains in general. The best female villains that I can think of off-hand are (1) Cackletta in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, (2) Captain Syrup in the first couple of Wario Land game, (3) the Banjo-Kazooie series, (4) Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, and (5) all of the villains except Seifer in Final Fantasy VIII. I suppose you could argue the case for the Metroid series with Mother Brain, Queen Metroid, and Metroid Prime, but I view MB and MP as genderless entities who've shaped into female forms on occasion.

I'm actually surprised there aren't more female masterminds in the Tales series, but all of them I've seen thusfar are just generals in the army of some maniacal man. That seems to be the trend in a lot of games, sadly.

 

[Farore's Chosen]

It'd be nice to see some more female villains that are GOOD. The only really good one was Veran, who turned out to be a subordinate to Twinrova (who, in my opinion, paled extremely in comparison to Onox and Veran). The Lady from TFH did nothing to make me think "Wow, she's a really good villain". Then again, the plot of TFH is a bit weird in the first place.

Come to think of it, there haven't been a lot of female main villains in general. The best female villains that I can think of off-hand are (1) Cackletta in Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga, (2) Captain Syrup in the first couple of Wario Land game, (3) the Banjo-Kazooie series, (4) Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic II: The Sith Lords, and (5) all of the villains except Seifer in Final Fantasy VIII. I suppose you could argue the case for the Metroid series with Mother Brain, Queen Metroid, and Metroid Prime, but I view MB and MP as genderless entities who've shaped into female forms on occasion.

I'm actually surprised there aren't more female masterminds in the Tales series, but all of them I've seen thusfar are just generals in the army of some maniacal man. That seems to be the trend in a lot of games, sadly.

The Dark Queen from Battletoads, but who has seen her in anything other then cutscenes?

Queen Slug-for-a-butt in Earthworm Jim.

Kaos' mother from Swapforce is awesome.

It's not that we don't see female villains in the Zelda series that often, its more like we don't see villains that aren't Ganon that often.

 

[Dio]

Any main villain in Zelda that isn't Ganondorf tends to suck. So I'm not happy with them having any other main villain, because of the high chance of that villain being crap. Bellum, Demise, Malladus and lets face it, even Vaati isn't very good. Majora is probably the only effective main villain who's name isn't Ganondorf.

I would however like to see Twinrova again working alongside the Dorf, maybe have the Gerudo tribe explored more.

 

[Linkmaster30000]

The Dark Queen from Battletoads, but who has seen her in anything other then cutscenes?

Queen Slug-for-a-butt in Earthworm Jim.

Kaos' mother from Swapforce is awesome.

It's not that we don't see female villains in the Zelda series that often, its more like we don't see villains that aren't Ganon that often.

I forgot about the Queen from Earthworm Jim!

But yeah, I was trying to draw from games that I've played. I'm sure there are more out there, but I haven't experienced them yet.

 

[Deleted member 14134]

A good villain/character is a good villain/character regardless of gender or ethnicity. I'd rather Nintendo work on creating good villains that are also strong characters (something we've never seen in Zelda yet).

 

[Farore's Chosen]

Any main villain in Zelda that isn't Ganondorf tends to suck. So I'm not happy with them having any other main villain, because of the high chance of that villain being crap. Bellum, Demise, Malladus and lets face it, even Vaati isn't very good. Majora is probably the only effective main villain who's name isn't Ganondorf.

I would however like to see Twinrova again working alongside the Dorf, maybe have the Gerudo tribe explored more.

Vaati, Zant and Hilda are pretty good.

 

[DJ Twitch]

Much like with the female Link mumbo jumbo, a female villain is a nice thought, but it hardly matters. With how these games present their antagonists, if we want a good one, then something other than gender needs to be taken into consideration. So we got a female villain, okay good, but what if they just copy and paste the same old plot onto her and just have Ganon upstage her at the last minute? Feamle ot not, she's trash, and goes in the bin with Malladus and the like.

One thing you mentioned was their own agenda that didn't involve attempting to make Ganon relevant again, that's important, but that's not all. What else matters? PRESENTATION! We can ave the biggest baddest baddie around, but if we only see 3 or 4 times, who cares? We need someone we can SEE in action, not someone we're always 50 leaps behind. We always remember villains by what we SEE them do, do you think we would have hated Scar if we didn't SEE him pull that cheap shot on Mufasa?

And finally, personality. Let's take a look at all the previous ones... oh wait, you can't tell them apart, because they are all built on that same shine we all know and love "MUAHAHA! I'M SO EVIL!" Let's see some more, definitely some redeeming factors for realism's sake.

So what I'm trying to get at is; A female villain would great, but for impact and memorability, she needs much more than her gender to say for herself.

On a related note, I actually think Lady Maud was perhaps THE best villain so far. Unique and memorable design, overall attitude, her plan was kinda lame, but at least it was something I haven't seen 50 times already. I hope she comes back sometime, with a new plan of course, and shows ol' Grandpadorf how it's done.

 

[TheHerbivoreWaffle]

Any main villain in Zelda that isn't Ganondorf tends to suck.

I'm gonna have to disagree here. Majora, Ghirihim, Vaati, and Zant are all much more interesting than Ganon in my opinion. Ganondorf is one of my least favorite characters, actually, but it's fine if you like him.

More (good) female villains would be cool. I'm all for badass women in Zelda. I actually didn't know Veran was female until seeing this thread, I thought she was a dude. XD

 

[Vanessa28]

I would love to see a good female villain being everything BUT connected to Ganondorf. But on the other hand I do agree with G-King though. Even Cia was in some way tied to Ganondorf because he corrupted her, taking advantage of her affection for Link and jealousy against Zelda. But besides that, she had her own agenda. I would love to see a female villain being like that. Having her own agenda instead and not following Ganondorf like a puppet.