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Big Bad / Live-Action TV

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"The ultimate villain of the story, who's causing the problem the heroes must solve."

Note that Big Bad is not a catch-all trope for the biggest and ugliest villain of any given story. The Big Bad is the one who turns out to be behind several other seemingly independent threats.

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    #0- 9 
  • The 10th Kingdom: The Queen, the student and heir of the original Evil Queen from Snow White, aka Christine Lewis, the main character, Virginia's, missing mother.
  • The 100:
    • Season 1: Two Big Bads in its first season, one for the Ark storyline and one for the Ground storyline.
      • On the Ground, the Big Bad is Tristan, a leader of the Grounders, attacking the 100 due to hatred, mistrust, and suspicion. Anya, another authority figure among the Grounders, is the main threat to the Grounders for most of the season, trying to kill them out of paranoia and wanting to avenge accidental Grounder deaths at the hands of the 100, but her authority is overridden by Tristan in the final episodes. Lexa, the Commander of the Grounders who orders them to attack the 100, doesn't appear in person until Season 2 and is the Greater-Scope Villain of Season 1.
      • On the Ark, the Big Bad isn't a character, but the space station's failing life support systems and overall lack of resources, which force the characters into a desperate struggle for survival. However, Diana Sydney, the person responsible for the attempted murder of Jaha, may count as the Big Bad for the Ark story as well, manipulating various people to cement her power over the Ark's inhabitants.
    • Season 2: Cage Wallace emerges as the Big Bad in the latter half of the season after he usurps the role from his father, Dante, and tries to assert control over the remnants of humanity by force.
    • Season 3: A.L.I.E., the evil AI trying to bring people into her City of Light to be immortal, though Charles Pike also gets in on it.
    • Season 4: While the season has no actual villain, there is a large looming threat in the form of the Praimfaya wave, a wave of nuclear radiation that will destroy all life on Earth in a few months. The season is therefore about the human race scrambling to try and find a way to survive the inevitable radiation wave that is coming for them.
    • Season 5: Charmaine Diyoza starts out as the villain, leading the dangerous prisoners, though Paxton McCreary takes over the prisoners by the end and wants nothing more than to terrorize and control everyone around him.
    • Season 6: Russell Lightbourne, leader of Sanctum, seeking to maintain his hold on Sanctum and its people, and stop the disruptions caused by the 100 and a rival group.
    • Season 7 has a Big Bad Ensemble between Sheidheda and Bill Cadogan. Sheidheda just wants to rule over as many people as he can, taking over Sanctum in the process. Cadogan wants to help humanity transcend through "The Last War", but is willing to do anything to achieve his goal.
  • 12 Monkeys has the Witness, the mysterious leader of the Army of the Twelve Monkeys. Season 3 suggests that their true identity is Cole and Cassandra's son, Athan, but it ultimately turns out, as revealed in the season finale, that the Witness is actually Olivia, one of the 12 Monkeys' Co-Dragons, who all along was creating a Stable Time Loop to put herself in that position.
  • 13 Reasons Why:
    • Season 1 has Marcus Cole, as the leader of the "stop the tapes" movement, team up with the other subjects of Hannah's tapes to prevent Clay from releasing the tapes that reveal what he and the others did to drive Hannah to suicide, making him the antagonist, until the crimes of Bryce Walker are revealed and he is shown to be puppeteering Marcus. While the other characters on the tapes may have hurt Hannah unintentionally or indirectly, he is a scumbag who repeatedly inflicts trauma on people for his own personal enjoyment. He rapes Jessica and Hannah (and is implied to have raped others), beats Clay up, and uses his money and influence at school to avoid repercussions for his actions.
    • In Season 2, Bryce Walker is the antagonist, as Clay and everyone else attempt to seek justice for his actions against Hannah and Jessica, which The Dragon, Montgomery 'Monty' De la Cruz, does his best to stop through attempted murder, attempted enforced suicide, vandalism and threats. Furthermore, Bryce is revealed to be responsible, directly or indirectly, for most of what Hannah went through. It's also revealed Monty saw Bryce raped Hannah and willingly did nothing and then in the season finale, while Bryce tries to avoid consequences and getting exposed, Monty brutally sodomizes Tyler Down with a mop pole as revenge for the baseball season being cancelled.
    • Season 3 has Montgomery de la Cruz become the antagonist as Bryce is trying to atone for his actions and goes as far as to threaten Monty for his rape of Tyler. After Bryce is murdered, Monty spends the season antagonizing the protagonists, mocking Tyler about the rape (even threatening to do it again), Clay for being a suspect in Bryce’s murder and Justin for consuming drugs.
    • Season 4 has three antagonists:
      • Winston Williams, Monty's lover who wants to avenge his being framed for Bryce's murder by exposing the real killer and everyone else who covered it up.
      • Principal Gary Bolan becomes tyrannical in his attempt to restore order to the school, terrorizing the students and using draconian, TSA-esque measures to keep them obedient.
      • Clay's split personality is the one terrorizing the other students and threatening to expose their framing of Monty.
  • 24:
    • Season 1: Victor Drazen, a Serbian warlord and mercenary who masterminds the terrorist conspiracy.
    • Season 2: Peter Kingsley, the mastermind behind a conspiracy to start a war between the U.S. and the Middle East by setting off a nuclear bomb in Los Angeles. Although he's under the employ of Max and Alexander Trepkos.
    • Season 3: Stephen Saunders, a former British agent thought to be dead who's hellbent on releasing a deadly virus in the United States as revenge for abandoning him.
    • Season 4: Habib Marwan, who's behind the terrorist attacks on Day 4 and maintains a number of terrorist sub-cells that he intends on using to cripple the U.S.
    • Season 5: President Charles Logan, who sponsored the Sentox nerve gas conspiracy with the intent to acquire more oil for America from Central Asia.
    • Season 6: Abu Fayed and Dmitri Gredenko, who plan on setting off nukes across the United States. After they're dealt with, the position goes to Phillip Bauerand Cheng Zhi, who intend on kickstarting a war between the U.S. and China.
    • Season 7: Alan Wilson and Jonas Hodges, the highest ranking members of the Cabal, who intend on using a bioweapon, the prion variant, to coherse the United States to give their private military firms complete control over the country. There's also Tony Almeida, who attempts to kill Wilson while also threatening everyone else to do so.
    • Season 8: Charles Logan, the mastermind of the terrorist attacks on New York throughout the season, and equally corrupt Russian President Yuri Suvarov, who exploits these attacks for his own benefit.
      • Jack Bauer becomes this in the final 6 episodes, being fixated on killing both presidents, uncaring if the fallout would result in a World War III.
    • Season 9: Margot Al-Harazi, a former Al-Qaeda operative who masterminded a plot to commandeer U.S. drones and assassinate President James Heller, in revenge for the drone attack that killed her husband. Cheng Zhi then takes over, being one who originally commissioned the override device that was stolen by Margot Al-Harazi, and conspires with Anatol Stolnavich to launch a US nuclear sub attack against a Chinese carrier in order to start a war.

    A 
  • The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.: The main Big Bad is John Bly, who is eventually revealed to be an even bigger threat than previously thought when it is discovered that he's actually a time traveler from Earth's far future who will institute a 1,000-year reign of terror.
  • Akumaizer 3 has Mezalord, the military commander of the Akuma Clan in charge of their invasion of the surface, as well as the Arch-Enemy of our heroes.
  • Alphas: The main villains are the Red Flag organization, the collective Evil Counterpart to Rosen's Alpha team. Specifically, the Big Bad would be Red Flag's leader, Stanton Parish, who so far has only been on screen for about five minutes total in season 1 finale, but has still managed to show himself as a master Chessmaster, and a very dangerous opponent.
  • Arrested Development:
    • Seasons 1-3 have Lucille Bluth, who, as revealed in (what was originally) the show's Grand Finale, is behind all of the corruption in the Bluth company.
    • The story arc started by Season 4 seems to have Sally Sitwell (for GOB's story at the very least), and possibly whoever killed Lucille 2 (every member of the family has a motive).
  • Ash vs. Evil Dead:
    • The end of the first season reveals that Ruby is a Dark One and the author of the Necronomicon (arguably making her the Big Bad of the franchise as a whole).
    • Season Two sees Ruby quickly usurped in favor of the demon lord Baal.
    • In Season Three, Ruby reclaims the mantle of main antagonist, trying to kill Ash and usurp his power as The Chosen One. Then in the last episodes, the Dark Ones escape their imprisonment, kill her, and proceed to start bringing about The End of the World as We Know It.

    B 
  • Babylon 5 always had the Shadows as the biggest threat, with their influence still being felt even after their defeat, but not always the obvious Big Bad.
    • Season 1 has the Raiders and Home Guard as the primary villains, though later in the season the groundwork for the Shadows started to be laid.
    • Seasons 2, 3, and the first part of 4 all have the Shadows as Big Bad directly, represented (but not led) by Mr. Morden.
    • The remainder of Season 4 had President Clark.
    • Season 5 had more of a Big Bad Ensemble, with Bester and the Drakh (former servants of the Shadows) as the major players.
  • Battlestar Galactica
  • Beauty and the Beast (1987):
    • Seasons 1 and 2:Paracelsus, an Evil Former Friend of Father who initially works as a drug dealer, then seeks vengeance on Vincent after being left with a scarred face and ultimately starts a campaign to drive him insane.
    • Season 3: Gabriel, a crime lord who becomes obsesed with Vincent after seeing him in action and is responsible for the murder of Catherine and the abduction of Vincent's son.
  • Preschooler-aimed series The Big Garage, of all the possible shows, had a Big Bad named Scrap, who was an anthropomorphic trash compactor who wanted to destroy the taxis.
  • Big Time Rush: Season 1 has George Hawk the producer of Hawk Records who aims to bring Gustavo down and to ruin the boys' careers.
    • Big Time Movie has Atticus Moon, a Bond-esque villain who kidnaps Katie after Kendall accidentally takes the Beetle and wants to use it to take over the world.
  • Big Wolf on Campus: The Werewolf Syndicate, which was led by legitimate Big Bad, but they are eventually killed off, so the leaders incompetent son takes over.
  • Birds of Prey (2002): Dr. Harleen Quinzel, Helena's psychiatrist who is secretly plotting to take over Gotham as revenge for the Joker's defeat and takes over the Birds' base in the series finale.
  • The Blacklist: While Reddington himself is a Villain Protagonist and could therefore potentially count in this role, there is always an exterior, greater threat he is working with the FBI against:
    • For the first season-and-a-half, this threat was the mysterious individual known only as "Berlin". However, during this time we were also introduced to the Cabal as a shadowy Greater-Scope Villain, represented but not led by Alan Fitch.
    • After Berlin and Fitch's deaths midway through Season 2, the Cabal took center stage as main antagonists, with Director Peter Kotsiopulos serving as the primary member shown.
    • With the Director dealt with midway through Season 3, Reddington and the FBI begin to be targeted by a shadowy new threat, ultimately revealed to be Alexander Kirk aka Constantine Rostova.
    • Following Kirk's defeat halfway through Season 4, Reddington's criminal empire is targeted by someone who knows exactly how to tear it apart. This ultimately turns out to be Mr. Kaplan, who's turned against Red and wants him to suffer.
    • Season 5 has corrupt US Marshal Ian Garvey, who is after the bag containing the mysterious skeleton whose identity Reddington wants kept hidden at all costs.
    • Season 6 has a mysterious Government Conspiracy whose most active agent is a high-ranking Justice Department official named Ana McMahon, but which is ultimately headed by President Robert Diaz.
    • Season 7 has Katarina Rostova, who is convinced that Reddington is the one who framed her for treason against the Russian government as a cover for his own crimes, and carries out a campaign against him to prove it. Season 8 posthumously reveals that she's actually Tatiana Petrova, an unwitting decoy of the real Katarina that was set up without Red's consent.
    • Season 8 has Elizabeth Keen, who goes rogue to carry out a vendetta against Reddington after he kills "Katarina", whom Keen was tricked into believing was her mother. However, midway through the season she allies with Neville Townsend, who has his own reasons for targeting Red; when Townsend realizes how much Red cares for Keen, he turns on her, taking over as main antagonist as Keen and Red are forced to team up to survive him.
    • Season 9 has the unknown person who is responsible for framing Cooper for murder and blackmailing him for it, who turns out to also be responsible for Elizabeth's murder at the end of the previous season, the blackmailing of Cooper being an attempt to cover their tracks in regards to that latter crime. It's only in the final episodes that this person is revealed to be Marvin Gerard, who killed Liz in a misguided attempt to protect Reddington's legacy.
  • Blake's 7: Supreme Commander Servalan is initially the leader of the military forces challenging Blake and his crew, although occasionally she is shown being presured by civilian officials. By Season 3 she's risen to President of the Federation and is answerable to no-one. Despite her reduced status in Season 4, when she has been deposed and assumed a new identity, she's still ultimately behind most of the problems the Seven face, either by deliberately seeking them out or simply by being the senior Federation officer in the area.
    • Space Commander Travis is The Heavy of the first two seasons, being the officer assigned to destroy Blake: While he sometimes simply acts as The Dragon to Servalan, often he is the one coming up with plans with Servalan functioning as more of a Greater-Scope Villain. After he is dismissed by the Federation partway through Season 2, he continues pursuing Blake as an individual, with he and Servalan sometimes working together and sometimes at odds.
    • The Andromedans are the ultimate Big Bad of Season 2, allying with Travis and joining the search for Star One in order to use it to wipe out humanity, and forcing Blake and his crew into an Enemy Mine situation with Servalan and the Federation to stop them.
  • Blindspot:
    • Season 1 has corrupt CIA Deputy Director Tom Carter, who is determined to eliminate Jane Doe before the clues from her tattoos lead to the Government Conspiracy known as Operation Daylight, of which he is a key member. He's killed halfway through the season by Jane's handler Oscar, who takes over as the main antagonistic force, forcing Jane to act against the taskforce, on behalf of their mysterious superior, Shepherd.
    • Season 2 has Shepherd, the Greater-Scope Villain of the previous season, emerge and begin actively engaging her plot to destroy and remake America.
    • Season 3 has a Big Bad Ensemble between Roman, who's after revenge against the taskforce, and Hank Crawford, Shepherd's main financial backer, now pursuing his own agenda of gaining the resources needed to fund a massive mercenary army and turn the world into a Police State.
    • Season 4 has Madeline Burke, who spends the whole season working towards a mysterious plan called "Helios", which ultimately turns out to be framing the FBI for a terrorist attack, so she can gain oversight authority over it, due to a vendetta against the Bureau as a whole for J. Edgar Hoover ruining her father. The first half of the season also has an additional threat in the form of Jane herself, having reverted to her Remi personality and plotting revenge on the FBI, though this situation is resolved halfway through the season.
    • Season 5 has Madeline continue to act as the main antagonist, using the FBI's resources to hunt the heroes and clear the path for her ascension to the Vice-Presidency, all while enabling a massive terrorist plot against the United States. She gets taken down several episodes before the finale, with her ally Ivy Sands taking over as she prepares to enact said terrorist attack.
  • Blue Bloods has Sonny Malevsky for Season 1, the corrupt head of the Blue Templar and the man who murdered Joe Reagan.
  • Boardwalk Empire:
    • Season 1: The D'Alessio Brothers, a violent gang of brothers whose efforts to seize control of Atlantic City prove to be the greatest threat to Nucky and his associates in the series' opening story arc, with Leo D'Alessio as their leader.
    • Season 2: Jimmy Darmody, who is entrusted by his late father, the Commodore, to run his criminal empire and sees through his plan to usurp Nucky's control of Atlantic City.
    • Season 3: Gyp Rossetti, a violent Sicilian gangster based in New York who goes to war with Nucky after being snubbed on a large deal.
    • Season 4: Dr. Valentin Narcisse, a Harlem crime boss whose scheme to expand his influence into New Jersey becomes a catalyst for instability in Atlantic City, and Agent James Tolliver, whose investigation into the existence of a nationwide criminal conspiracy on behalf of the BOI poses the most direct threat to Nucky Thompson.
    • Season 5: Lucky Luciano and Meyer Lansky, who conspire to take over the Atlantic City crime scene.
  • Breaking Bad:
    • Tuco Salamanca in Season 1 and briefly in Season 2. Although Krazy-8 was the first antagonist in the series, in the end he was just a small-time thug. Contrasting this, Tuco is the first big shot to introduce the Cartels and represents a far more dangerous threat to Walt.
    • The Cousins are this for the first half of Season 3 as they aim to avenge their cousin Tuco by killing Walter White and Hank Schrader. They later get killed by Gus' schemes, with Gus becoming the main Big Bad.
    • Season 4 had Gus Fring, with Don Eladio Vuente briefly entering as the Big Bad Ensemble. After the departure of Tuco, the Cousins and Juan Bolsa, it is Don Eladio's cartel that causes problems for Gus during the season, and his tensions with Gus solidify again.
    • Season 5 had a Big Bad Ensemble as a whole. For the first half and most of the second half, Walter White / Heisenberg is Hank's main target after he discovers that he is Heisenberg. However, after "Ozymandias", he loses the position to Jack and the Neo-Nazis, with Walt being eventually reduced to The Atoner and Ex-Big Bad. As for Lydia, she's part of the Big Bad Duumvirate with Jack during the final few episodes.
    • Better Call Saul
      • For Season 1, it appears to be Howard Hamlin, but is actually Chuck McGill who has been secretly sabotaging Jimmy's career.
      • In Season 2 and 3, it's a Big Bad Ensemble with Chuck and Hector Salamanca who takes the main villain role in Mike and later Nacho's storyline.
      • Season 4 has no Big Bad for Jimmy, with only short term and episodic foes. It's more about him dealing with his guilt and suspension brought about by Chuck, and Chuck is more of a Greater-Scope Villain posthumously. For Nacho, Gus takes this role. Late in the season, Lalo Salamanca becomes the Big Bad for Mike.
      • In Season 5, Lalo becomes the Big Bad of every character's plotline between Mike, Jimmy, Nacho, Gus and even Kim.
      • In Season 6, Lalo is this until the end of the prequel portion of the series.
      • In the Omaha plotline, Jeff seems to be this, but is actually a Red Herring and Harmless Villain. Gene Takavic instead relapses into his con man ways and becomes the last criminal to be captured in the series.
  • Burn Notice has one, sometimes two per season.
    • Season 1: Michael thinks it is Philip Cowan until he is sniped in part 1 of the finale. Turns out it was Carla.
    • Season 2: Carla takes over as the big bad in full.
    • Season 3: Starts off with Tom Strickler, though that doesn't become fully apparent until the summer finale. For the second half of the season, Gilroy until he is explosively dethroned by Simon Escher.
    • Season 4: Corrupt Corporate Executive John Barrett until he's killed off in the summer finale. The second half ''seems like'' it is going to be Tyler Brennan and Larry Sizemore until the finale when it comes down to Team Michael vs. Vaughn and his army.
    • Season 5: Anson Fullerton. Not only does he frame Fiona for the murder of two consulate guards in the summer finale, but it is revealed that he is responsible for creating the organization that burned Michael as well as orchestrating Michael's father's heart attack when he started asking too many questions about what Michael was doing and where he was. This arguably makes him the big bad for the entire series up to this point.
    • Season 6: Anson again until he is shot by a sniper with the bullet passing through Anson and killing Nate Westen as well. Turns out the hit was ordered by Michael's old mentor, Tom Card making him the big bad for the first portion of the second half. Then it turns into counter-intelligence legend Olivia Riley.
    • Season 7: James Kendrick, leader of "The Family", and almost Michael until his Heel Realization at the end.

    C 
  • The Cape: Chess, a crime lord who controls Palm City.
  • Channel Zero:
  • Charmed (1998), after it partially abandoned its Monster of the Week premise in season 3:
    • Season 1: To some extent, Rex Buckland and Hannah Webster in the first half of the season, two warlocks who employ Prue at an auction house in order to investigate the Charmed Ones and end up framing her for theft and murder to try and blackmail the Halliwells into handing over their powers. After they are defeated halfway through the season, Inspector Rodriguez takes over in the second half, a demon posing as a police officer who traps the Charmed Ones in a time loop while he makes repeated attempts to kill them and ultimately kills Prue's boyfriend Andy.
    • Season 2: No Big Bads as such. The only recurring antagonist is Doctor Curtis Williamson, who becomes obsessed with the Halliwells after witnessing Piper revive from death and ultimately goes insane as the result of giving himself their powers. This seaason also establishes Barbas the Fear Demon as one of the Charmed Ones' greatest enemies, regularly targeting them.
    • Season 3: The Triad, a group of senior demons, initially fill the role, directing half-demon Cole Turner to kill the Charmed Ones, although they are killed by Cole a third of the way through the season, after which he undergoes a Heel–Face Turn. By the end of the season Greater-Scope Villain the Source, the supreme leader of the demon underworld, has become more of a direct threat, using the Charmed Ones' accidental exposure to reverse time and send a demon assasssin after them, killing Prue.
    • Season 4: The Source continues his campaign against the Charmed Ones, summoning the dangerous Hallow to kill them. Although he is vanquished, his power is passed to Cole and turns him evil again, as he takes over the demon world and tries to turn Phoebe evil to serve as his queen. After he too is vanquished, ultimately the Seer serves the role, as she takes possession of Cole and Phoebe's unborn child, the Source's heir, in the hope of ruling the demons.
    • Season 5: Cole eventually becomes this for the first half, returning as an invincible demon and becoming obsessed with winning Phoebe back, ultimately causing him to create a timeline where the Charmed Ones never reformed and he and Phoebe are still king and queen of the underworld. The Crone leads the demons in the second half of the season, attempting to abduct newborn Wyatt.
    • Season 6: Gideon, a renegade Elder who fears Wyatt's great power will cause him to turn evil and plans to abduct and kill him. Ironically, his actions are what cause Wyatt's Start of Darkness and the Bad Future Chris is trying to prevent.
    • Season 7: The Avatars (sort of) for the first half of the season, aiming to wipe out demons and establish world peace at the expense of free will, as well as eliminating anyone who disturbs the peace. Zankou, a powerful demon released to stop the Avatars who briefly allied with the Charmed Ones, takes over for the second half, aiming to gain control of the Nexus buried under the Halliwell mansion. Throughout the season, Inspector Sheridan is also a threat as she attempts to expose the Charmed Ones.
    • Season 8: The resurrected Triad, who have taken over as the new rulers of the underworld, with Dumain acting as their Dragon-in-Chief who was responsible for the abduction of Christy Jenkins, sister of the Charmed Ones' new protegy Billie, to serve as The Heavy, convincing Billie to join her in challenging the Halliwells in the prophesised Ultimate Battle.
  • Chilling Adventures of Sabrina: Part 1 of Season 1 has Father Faustus Blackwood and Madame Satan in a loose alliance in order to force Sabrina to fully accept the Path of Night by signing the Book of the Beast, acting on behalf of the Dark Lord, who serves as the Greater-Scope Villain. By Part 2, with Sabrina having signed the Book, Blackwood and Madame Satan go after their separate agendas — Blackwood to make the Church of Night embrace his reactionary, misogynistic teachings, and Madame Satan to keep manipulating Sabrina towards fulfilling an ancient prophecy. When she succeeds, allowing the Dark Lord to fully manifest on Earth in the Season Finale, he quickly establishes himself as the true Big Bad, putting Blackwood in his place, and his treatment of her causing Madame Satan to ally with the Spellmans against him.
  • Chou Sei Shin Series
    • Chou Sei Shin Gransazer: Belzeus, a member of the Warp Monarch council who framed humanity as a threat in order to justify an invasion of Earth so he could use it as a foothold to "grasp the universe".
    • Genseishin Justiriser: Kaiser Hades, who destroyed Planet Riser in the past and set his sights on Earth next. He's a Sealed Evil in a Can in the first quarter of the series, but assumes this role more directly once he's broken out. After he gets killed halfway through, his big brother Majin Daruga steps in to pick up where he left off.
    • Chousei Kantai Sazer-X: Captain Barder at the start of the series, but early on he's revealed to be a robot and short-circuits. Following several twists and turns it's revealed King Neo Descal is the one responsible for Neo Descal's galactic conquest in the future, and the one who sent Grouza and Garade back in time to stop Sazer-X.
  • Chuck:
    • Season One: There is no central antagonist, operating more on a Villain of the Week formula. With that said, the tenth episode introduces the organization Fulcrum, represented by Tommy Delgado. Fulcrum returns for the finale, this time represented by Lizzie Shafai, who discovers that Chuck is the Intersect.
    • Season Two: Fulcrum returns as the main antagonists. Halfway through the season, it's revealed that they're trying to build their own Intersect. The final episodes have Ted Roark as the Arc Villain and apparent leader of the organization. However, he's killed off halfway in the finale by agents of the Ring, Fulcrum's parent organization and the main antagonists of the next season.
    • Season Three: The Ring, led by the Director and the Elders. Halfway through the season, the Director recruits Daniel Shaw as their Dragon-in-Chief after revealing that Sarah killed his wife. While the Director is arrested and Shaw apparently killed, the latter returns with an Intersect and attempts to take over the CIA and the NSA. When this plan is foiled and the Elders are apprehended, Shaw escapes and takes the Buy More hostage to force Chuck to face him, making him the season's Final Boss.
    • Season Four: Alexei Volkoff, a weapons dealer who is the boss of Mary Bartowski, Chuck's mother. Later in the season, it's revealed that Volkoff is in fact Hartley Winterbottom, a mild mannered man who was brainwashed into evil by a faulty Intersect.
      • Volkoff is taken out halfway through the season, and is supplanted by his daughter Vivian after she is convinced by Mr. Riley to take over Volkoff Industries. The finale also introduces Clyde Decker, a high ranking CIA agent who tries to prevent Chuck from curing Sarah from the Norse virus.
    • Season Five: Decker returns from the Season 4 finale as the apparent main antagonist. However, he's blown up less than halfway through the season and supplanted by Robin Cunnings, who is defeated in the same episode she's introduced, but not before freeing the true mastermind behind the conspiracy to bring down Chuck...
      • ...Who's revealed to be none other than Daniel Shaw, who takes over Castle and holds Sarah hostage to force Chuck to give him the Intersect 3.0.
      • After Shaw's defeat, he's eventually supplanted by Nicholas Quinn, a disgraced former CIA agent who was supposed to be the CIA's original Intersect, before Bryce stole it for Chuck. Quinn is now hellbent on exacting revenge on Chuck and taking the Intersect by any means necessary.
  • City Homicide: In the second half of Season 2, Billy Pierce fills this role as he frames Superintendant Waverley for corruption, before kidnapping and murdering her teenaged son.
  • Cobra Kai
    • The series kicks off with a Good vs. Good situation between Johnny Lawrence and Daniel LaRusso, the latter of which enters into the conflict after the former re-opens Cobra Kai for bullied students like Miguel Diaz to come and learn karate.
    • This eventually leads to a series of events that ushers in the The Karate Kid Big Bad, John Kreese. First appearing at the end of Season 1 to congratulate Johnny for his students winning the All Valley Karate Tournament, in Season 2 he manages to weasel his way back into Cobra Kai and corrupts Johnny's students by instilling a rigid "no mercy" mindset into them, culminating in him stealing Johnny's dojo and his students out from under him in the season finale.
    • However in a stunning twist of events, Kreese's war buddy, Terry Silver from The Karate Kid Part III takes over as the series' main villain after he betrays Kreese to the police and completely usurps him as Cobra Kai's sole owner.
  • Community
    • Season 2: A Big Bad Ensemble between Pierce, who becomes increasingly hostile to the rest of the Study Group and Stephen Spreck, the dean of City College who plots to sabotage and eventually destroy Greendale.
    • Season 3: A Big Bad Ensemble between Señor Chang, who takes over the school and tries to kill the study group, Vice-Dean Robert Laybourne who whants to force Troy to join the AC Repair School and Evil Abed, an Imaginary Enemy who is supposedly Abed from the Darkest Timeline trying to corrupt the Prime Timeline, who poses a real danger when Abed starts behaving like him due to thinking he's possessed by his Evil Doppelgänger.
    • Season 4: A Big Bad Ensemble between Dean Spreck who uses Chang, who is faking amnesia (or Changnesia as he calls it) to hurt Greendale from the inside and the Evil Study Group from the Darkest Timeline, led by Evil Jeff, who invade the Prime Timeline in the finale but it's revealed to be all in Jeff's head as a manifestation of his insecurities of becoming a scummy lawyer again after graduating.
    • Season 5: The school board, Carl and Richie, want to sell Greendale to a Subway executive to turn it into a corporate Subway school.

    D 
  • Danger 5: Hitler, the leader of the Third Reich and Danger 5's primary target.
  • Dark Angel:
    • Season 1: Manticore, at first personified by Colonel Donald Lydecker, who was later ousted by the Eviler than Thou Madame X/Renfro.
    • Season 2: Ames White, who is secretly a government agent assigned to cover up Manticore by hunting down transgenics, and more secretly a leader in the Familiar Breeding Cult.
  • Dark Oracle: Season 1 has Evil Sorcerer Omen, who is revealed to be the one who saddled Lance and Cally with the Dark World comic in the first place. In Season 2, Vern makes a valiant attempt at becoming the new main villain, before being upstaged by Omen's return. Omen himself has Blaze and Violet in back of him, while the Puppet-Master is in back of them.
  • Days of Our Lives: Stefano Dimera seems to live to torment the citizens of Salem in some of the most convoluted (having many of the pillars of the community seemingly murdered by a brainwashed serial killer called the Salem Stalker, only to have them all awaken alive and well in a carbon copy of Salem on a tropical island called Melaswen in an attempt to sabotage some of Salem's greatest love stories) and horrifying (using mind control to open a hole in Marlena's soul so that the Devil may possess her and raise some literal hell) plots ever devised.
  • In Dexter, the hero is also the villain, in a version of the Villain Protagonist and Heroic Sociopath tropes, so in one sense Dexter is always his own Big Bad. Each season has its own exterior Big Bad as well.
    • Season 1: The Ice Truck Killer, who is actually Dexter's brother, Brian, who is a doctor working on the case with the police.
    • Season 2: Lila, unless you count Dexter himself, given that much of the season revolves around his attempt to avoid being caught. Lundy and Doakes act as decoy Big Bads, though they're both actually Hero Antagonists.
    • Season 3: Miguel Prado.
    • Season 4: Trinity.
    • Season 5: Jordan Chase.
    • Season 6: Professor Gellar and Travis Marshall. But it turns out it's just Travis. Gellar was Dead All Along.
    • Season 7: Isaak Sirko, Hannah McKay, and Maria LaGuerta, although LaGuerta is a Hero Antagonist.
    • Season 8: The Brain Surgeon (aka Oliver Saxon/Daniel Vogel)
  • Dollhouse had Alpha causing every problem the Dollhouse crew faced in Season 1. Season 2 has the Rossum Corporation as a whole set up this way, but only as of "Getting Closer" (2x11) do we know who the mastermind in charge of it is: Boyd Langton.
  • Double the Fist has no main antagonist, but Mephisto has entered a similar situation at least twice.
    • In "Bush Bash", he is possessed by a Demi God and tries to destroy the forest (And the Fist Team) using an army of cloned... lumberjack pandas...
    • In Series Two, he almost plays the trope straight by secretly joining the Medieval Recreationists as their leader, and formulated a Evil Plan against the team.
  • Dominion has the Archangel Gabriel as the primary threat, though Uriel is playing him and Michael against each other for her own ends. David Whele and Arika are also both taking advantage of the situation for their own agendas as well though Arika is working with Uriel.

    E 
  • Earth: Final Conflict:
    • Seasons 1-4 have Zo'or, who frequently uses Ronald Sandoval to do his dirty work, although in the first season he is technically subordinate to Qu'on.
    • Season 5 has the alliance of Sandoval and Howlyn, the leader of the Atavus.
  • Elementary:
  • Emerald City: The so-called "Beast Forever" is frequently referred to as periodically attacking Oz with what appears to be natural (or magical) disasters. The last attack involved a tsunami wiping out most of Ev and killing hundreds of witches. The Wizard assumes that, this time, the witches are the Beast Forever. As "No Place Like Home" shows; he's wrong. The true Beast Forever has been in the Prison of the Abject until Dorothy unknowingly releases him. He puts his skin back on, grows wings, and flies to the Emerald City. Word of God is that he's Roquat, the Nome King.
  • The Expanse:
    • Season 1: Jules-Pierre Mao is this to the Miller story, being behind the Protomolecule and father to Miller's target Julie. For Holden and Avasarala it's Sadavir Errinwright, who orders assassinations of the former's group and the latter's associates to cover up the conspiracy, and both villains form a Big Bad Duumvirate with Mao as the more dominant partner.
    • Season 2: Julie takes the role briefly at the beginning of the season, unconsciously controlling the Protomolecule and threatening the destruction of Earth in the process. After that, Martian Defense Minister Korshunov replaces Errinwright as Mao's Corrupt Politician partner. However, at the end of the season, Korshunov is Out-Gambitted by Errinwright and Errinwright takes control of his old partnership, possibly demoting Mao to The Dragon.
    • Season 3: Errinwright is this again in the beginning of the season, being the Treacherous Advisor to Secretary-General Sorrento-Gillis to start a war with Mars and sending his dragon Admiral Nguyen to secure the protomolecule hybrids. In the second half of the season, Melba (Clarissa Mao) is the one that is trying to frame and kill Holden and anyone who gets in her way, but she proves to be more of a Big Bad Wannabe. By the end of the season Ashford takes acts as the Final Boss by trying to destroy the Ring with the hopes of saving humanity.
    • Season 4: For the Illus story, Chief of Security Murtry serves this role, as he constantly acts like a tyrant and is trying to get rid of the Belters. In Drummer and Ashford's story, Marco Inaros is the dreaded pirate causing havoc in the Sol System who needs to be captured.
    • Seasons 5 and 6: Marco Inaros takes center stage as the leader of the Free Navy, who starts a war with Earth and Mars to make the Belt the dominant power in the Solar System. He is responsible for the asteroid bombardment of Earth and the assassination of many world leaders. However, Marco's main weapon supplier, Laconia led by Winston Duarte, is even more dangerous, studying the Protomolecule technology and abandoning Marco when he is no longer useful.
  • Every Witch Way: Season one has Principal Torres, a former witch who seeks to regain her powers not matter what. Season two has a Big Bad Ensemble between Desdemona, Jax Nova and Evil!Emma. Season three has Mia.

    F 
  • Farscape: A succession of Big Bads. First it's Crais, then Scorpius, then Grayza, who eventually shares the limelight with the Scarran Emperor. Each of these get progressively more epic and ambitious.
  • Finding Carter: Lori Stevens. She is Carter’s abductor and the main source of conflict throughout the series. In the season 1 finale she abducts Carter again. In the season 2 premiere it is revealed that she was the egg donor to Carter’s parents, making her the biological mother of both Carter and Taylor.
  • It is strongly implied in Firefly that the Big Bad was the Blue Sun Corporation, which apparently worked with the Academy.
  • First Wave: While the show doesn't really have a defined Big Bad until Season 3, with the Gua in general being the bad guys, Season 3 finally introduces a semi-religious Gua figure with immense Psychic Powers named Mabus.
  • The Following has Joe Carroll, though Season Two expands it into a Big Bad Ensemble between him and fellow cult leader Lily Gray.
  • Forever has Henry's Evil Counterpart Adam, who repeatedly engineers events to try and drive Henry towards embracing his nihilistic view on immortality..
  • Fringe
    • Season 1: ZFT, a biological terrorist organization responsible for the majority of Pattern cases in the first season, with David Robert Jones as their leader.
    • Seasons 2 & 3: Walternate, the alternate universe's Walter Bishop who uses his world's Fringe Division to attempt to destroy the main universe in order to save his own.
    • Season 4: Appears to be Jones again, but it turns out he was working for William Bell, who intends on destroying both universes and creating a new one, with him as its god.
    • Season 5: The Observers, mysterious beings from the future who travel back in time to conquer Earth and make it to their liking.

    G 
  • Game of Thrones universe:
    • Game of Thrones:
      • Season 1: Cersei Lannister. Although there's a plethora of villains, in Season 1 Cersei serves most clearly as the main antagonist. She's a threat to the Starks, the Crown and the Realm in general due to her scheming. She shares the role of The Antagonist with her brother Jaime, but she is the Big Bad of the two, being more of the schemer while he is more The Brute. She subsequently becomes a Big Bad Wannabe, with the more competent and intelligent Tywin falling into place.
      • Season 2: Joffrey Baratheon, as well as Stannis and Melisandre, who become enemies of both the Starks, the Lannisters and the Tyrells alike, even if Stannis doesn't fight the Starks. His pending invasion of King's Landing is the major plotline for King's Landing in Season 2, as Tyrion attempts to halt him to save the city. However, this depends on how far you see Stannis as a villain, considering he is fighting against those clearly more villainous then him - the Lannisters, who are supporting Joffrey and spend the season fighting the Starks. Likewise the Tyrells show they don't care who's King just so long as they can get more power. Melisandre is arguably the true Big Bad, as she clearly manipulates Stannis into using her methods. Balon Greyjoy could also be considered this to a lesser extent, as he is a driving force in the North storyline. Xaro Xhoan Daxos and Pyat Pree are the Big Bads for the Qarth storyline.
      • Season 3: Tywin Lannister, who in addition to being the one controlling and fighting the war on Joffrey's behalf, becomes the de-facto leader of Westeros as Joffrey's hand. He is responsible for the worst atrocities of the war, such as sending Gregor Clegane to make the Riverlands a blasted wasteland and turning Harrenhal into a nightmare garrison and then the Red Wedding. That said, Tywin only did this because Catelyn kidnapped Tyrion and as the story unravels it's revealed that Tywin was not the primary cause of the whole conflict.
      • Season 4: Tywin Lannister, officially with Joffrey's death. There is also Roose Bolton and his son Ramsay of the North storylines. Mance Rayder becomes this for the Night's Watch storyline. Littlefinger is this for the Vale storyline, and is arguably the true antagonist of the season because he poisoned Joffrey and let Tyrion take the fall.
      • Season 5: Cersei takes the reins following Tywin's death but she's still in over her head and this role is taken by the High Sparrow. The Boltons, Lord Roose Bolton and his son Ramsay, function as the main antagonists for the north, but later into the season The Night's King stops being a hinted background threat to the realms and leads the White Walkers to make their move toward conquering Westeros. The Sons of the Harpy for the Mereen storyline as they seek to undermine Daenerys' rule and kill her supporters.
      • Season 6: Ramsay Bolton becomes this for the North storyline after he kills his father, and he personally acts as the main antagonist of Jon and Sansa's storyline. The High Sparrow is this for the King's Landing storyline until Cersei reclaims her Big Bad position with a vengeance by killing the High Sparrow and the Tyrells and taking the crown for herself. Jaqen H'ghar is nominally this for the Braavos storyline, but the Waif is the Dragon-in-Chief. The Sons of Harpy in the Mereen storyline are being funded by a coalition of Slave Masters, represented by Razdal mo Eraz, Yezzan zo Qaggaz, and Belicho Paenymion, who personally lead a siege of Mereen at the end of the season.
      • Season 7: Cersei Lannister returns to take the Big Bad spot as Queen of the Seven Kingdoms, forming a Big Bad Duumvirate with Euron Greyjoy to oppose Daenerys Targeryen. The Night King however, remains as the Greater-Scope Villain for the season. Littlefinger is this for the Winterfell storyline as he seeks to drive the Starks apart again so he can take Sansa for himself. By the end of Season 7, Euron, Cersei, and the Night King are the only main antagonists left.
      • Season 8: The Night King and Cersei Lannister, with Euron Greyjoy being a Wild Card secondary villain under Cersei. All prove to be a Disc-One Final Boss as the Night King is defeated in "The Long Night" and the other two are killed in "The Bells" along with Jaime. Daenerys Targaryen makes a Face–Heel Turn after capturing King's Landing and becomes the final Big Bad and Final Boss of the series.
      • It could be concluded the Lannisters are the Big Bads in general throughout the series as they are the faction most commonly identified as the villainous antagonists, however on a wider scale the Night King and the White Walkers could be this as they are probably the biggest threat to Westeros. Littlefinger is also a contender, since he caused the War of the Five Kings to happen by having Jon Arryn murdered and framed the Lannisters for it, and he continuously amassed power as the series progressed until his death in the Season 7 finale.
    • House of the Dragon:
      • Season 1: Ser Otto Hightower masterminded the rise of his family to the top to the point the other heirs to King Viserys outside Rhaenyra Targaryen are his grandchildren, as well as The Coup that crowned Aegon as king. He's planned to kill Rhaenyra and her supporters if necessary.
  • GARO
    • GARO: Barago, a fallen Makai Knight whose goal is to achieve ultimate power by absorbing one thousand Horrors.
    • GARO: The One Who Shines in the Darkness: Tousei Kaneshiro, a seemingly humble steakhouse owner who's secretly the one behind the Magic Horror conspiracy, having created the Magic Horrors to seize control of Vol City from the shadows.
  • General Hospital: Mikos Cassedine, in the famous Ice Princess, a Bond Villain in an American Daytime Serial, he holds the world ransom, with his Weather Machine.
    • His vengeful widow Helena takes the mantle after his death, starting with her famous curse upon Luke and Laura Spencer.
  • Girl from Nowhere: Yuri. While she has been hiding behind the smokes and mirrors orchestrating and manipulating some of the events and planning more of her terrorist attacks, her role as the main antagonist becomes clearer by the end of the season 2 finale "The Judgement".
  • Grimm:
    • Season 1: [[Da Chief Captain Sean Renard], whose machinations to obtain the key form the main subplot.
    • Season 2: Eric Renard, Sean's half-brother and the main instigator in the Royal Families' efforts to dominate world affairs.
    • Season 3: Victor Beckendorf, Eric and Sean's second cousin who takes over the Royal Family after Eric's death.
    • Season 4: Victor again, until halfway through when he's replaced by the much more involved Kenneth.
    • Season 5: Conrad Bonaparte, the leader of the Black Claw terrorist organization who aims to conquer the world and appoint Wesen as the master race.
    • Season 6: Zeroster, an ancient demonic being who seeks to bring about Hell on Earth.
  • Guardian: The Lonely and Great God: Park Joong-heon is responsible for most of what went wrong in the backstory. He was the one that caused Kim Shin to become a goblin in the first place and indirectly also caused Wang Yeo's transformation into a reaper. By feeding on men's evils as a ghost, he also might have made Eun-tak the bride of the goblin.

    H 
  • H₂O: Just Add Water:
    • Season 1: Doctor Linda Denman, a biologist who, on discovering the existence of the mermaids, plans to capture and experiment on them.
    • Season 2: Charlotte Watsford, who starts off as a fairly benign Love Rival but, after gaining mermaid powers, becomes Drunk On Power and starts attacking the other girls.
    • Season 3: Sophie Benjamin, an Alpha Bitch and Big Sister Bully who ends up unknowingly hampering the mermaids' attempts to stop a comet strike by trying to harvest the moon pool crystals.
  • Haven:
    • Season 1: There's not really a "Big Bad" this season, but an ongoing Trouble throughout the season that culminates in the finale is the cracks that keep appearing. They're inadvertently created by Garland Wuornos.
    • Season 2: Reverend Driscoll, who considers the Troubled to be abominations and attempts to kill them all, as well as those who sympathize with them.
    • Season 3: The Bolt-Gun Killer/Arla Cogan, who goes about killing people and skinning them.
    • Season 4: William, one of the creators of Troubles who wants to awaken Marafrom within Audrey.
    • Season 5a: Mara.
    • Season 5b: Croatoan, a creature from the Void Between Worlds, running loose in Haven killing the Troubled.
  • Hawaii Five-O: Wo Fat, a crime boss who terrorizes Hawaii and controls nearly all of the criminal activity that goes on there.
  • Henshin Ninja Arashi: Majin Sai, the fiendish leader of the Blood Wheel Clan.
  • Heroes: Sylar is the overall Big Bad, a manipulative serial killer who hunts down and kills other superhumans to steal their abilities. Each season also has another who shares his position.
    • Volume 1: Mr. Linderman, the leader of the Company who wants to unify the world and create a utopia by destroying New York City.
    • Volume 2: Takezo Kensei/Adam Monroe, the first superpowered human and the founder of the Company who attempts to wipe out 99% of the human race with a super-virus to end hunger, poverty, and war and allow him to rule over the remaining survivors as their "hero".
    • Volume 3: Arthur Petrelli, the head of Pinehearst, an organization acting in opposition to the Company, seeking the secret to creating artificial superhumans.
    • Volume 4: Nathan, who creates a Black Ops team tasked with rounding up and capturing all evolved humans. That is, until he's usurped by the far more ruthless Danko, who is in turn usurped by Sylar in the season finale.
    • Volume 5: Samuel Sullivan, who's been gathering superhumans to use to grant himself godlike power that he intends on use to wipe out humanity.
    • Heroes Reborn (2015): Erica Kravid. She's using her company, Renautas, to gather specials and digitize their powers before killing them, and she's a big part of the anti-"evo" movement.
  • Highlander: The Series:
    • Season 1: This is the season most committed to a Villain of the Week set-up but a few stand out: Xavier St. Cloud, a Gentleman Thief with a penchant for using poison gas, becomes the first villain to escape a showdown with Duncan to menace him again, and the finale introduces James Horton, who kills Duncan's friend Darius and tries to kill his friend Fitz.
    • Season 2: James Horton, a Watcher who leads a campaign to eliminate all Immortals, believing them to be dangerous.
    • Season 3: Antonius Kalas. He's an evil Immortal spends all of Season 3 hunting down Duncan and his friends, attempting to ruin their lives or kill them, and threatens expose the existence of Immortals to the world; all to get revenge on Duncan for getting him kicked out of his monastery and destroying his prized singing voice.
    • Season 4: Jack Shapiro, head of the Watchers who tries to make Duncan and Joe scapegoats for the murder of dozens of Watchers by a vengeful immortal, and later tries to lead the Watchers into a war to wipe out all Immortals.
    • Season 5: Kronos, the leader of the Four Horsemen who intends on using a deadly biological weapon to bring about a new age of chaos that the four of them can control.
    • Season 6: Ahrimin for the opening arc, a shapeshifting demon destined to rise every few thousand years to tempt humanity and who Duncan is prophesised to face after Ahriman tricks him into killing Richie at the end of Season 5. Liam O'Rourke for the finale, a former Irish terrorist who blames Duncan for the death of his wife in prison and kidnaps his friends to force him to give up his head (with James Horton as the Big Bad of the alternate timeline where he is leading the Watchers in wiping out Immortals).
  • Home and Away had the Summer Bay Stalker, AKA Zoe MacCalister, AKA Eve Jacobsen, during 2005 and 2006.
    • The first season in 1988 has Sam Barlow, an abusive husband and father who ends up instigating an armed siege during which he accidentally kills his wife.
    • The first half of 1989 has Brian "Dodge" Forbes (AKA Brian Knight), who is fostered by the Fletchers without anyone being aware he was behind the arson attack that killed Steven's uncle. The second half has Corrupt Corporate Executive Gordon Macklin, who exploits a shark attack that killed Rory for short-term financial gain, even though it will ruin the town in the long run.
    • The first half of 1990 has Al Simpson, Bobby and Sophie's abusive father who turns out to have killed Matt's brother. The second half has Chris Knight, who gets Bobby pregnant after cheating on his wife with her and later goes to extreme lengths to stop the affair being discovered.
    • The 1991 season has Josh Webb, a drug dealer and thief who is sent to jail in the first half of the season and returns in the final weeks seeking revenge on Blake and Adam.
    • The 1992 season has Tug O'Neale, a school bully who causes trouble for Shane and Damian, culminating in him having Shane sent to juvenile detention in the finale week after framing him for burglary. Unusually, he undergoes a Heel–Face Turn and is Promoted to Opening Credits in the following season.
    • In late 1993 and early 1994, Nathan Roberts filled the role, coming to live with Irene after being released from jail only to manipulate his way into a job at the school and then rob it.
    • The 1994 season mostly lacks a clear villain but much of the antagonism comes from Jack Wilson, a Loveable Rogue teen whose constant scams cause trouble for the characters.
    • The 1995 season has Brian "Dodge" Forbes, who comes to town seeking revenge on Steven for his previous arrest and ends up framing Steven for his own murder. Cult leader Saul Bennett moves into this position in the closing months and continues into the first half of 1996.
    • The second half of 1996 has Brad Cooper, a Serial Rapist who, after framing his flatmate for his crimes and getting him murdered, ends up starting a relationship with one of his oblivious victims and luring her to a remote spot surrounded by man traps.
    • The 1997 season has Saul Bennett again. Still obsessed with Selina, he twice kidnaps her and also torches his commune in an attempt at a suicide pact.
    • Late 1998/early 1999 has David DiAngelo (AKA Robert Perez) who seeks revenge on the Nash family after Joel caused him to be arrested years earlier.
    • The latter part of 1999 has Christian, a hitman hired to kill Harry Reynolds by the pharmaceutical company he is testifying against.
    • The 2000 season has Kirsten, the ex-girlfriend of Charlie Nicholas, who stalks Gypsy after blaming her for his death.
    • Scott Phillips for the first half of the 2001 season, kidnapping Shauna to cover up the fact he is beating his brother. Ralph Patterson for the second half, using his son Vinnie to carry out a series of frauds which results in Vinnie being arrested in the season finale.
    • Angie Russell was this in late 2002, early 2003.
    • Sarah Lewis was responsible for the armed siege that formed the mid-season cliffhanger in 2004.
    • Johnny Cooper in late 2006/early 2007, later making a Back for the Dead return in the first half of 2008.
    • The latter half of 2008 had the crooked developers attempting to cover up a toxic waste dump, represented if not necessarily led by foreman Tim Coleman.
    • Suzy Sudiro and Derrick Quaid ran the human trafficking operation that took up the 2009 season.
    • Penn Graham for the second half of 2010. Even after his death, the events he set in motion continue to cause problems for the characters.
    • Criminal gang leader and drug supplier Darryl Braxton seemed to fill this role for the first half of the 2011 season, although the Sorting Algorithm of Evil saw rival gang leader Jake Pirovic move above him for the latter half of the season.
    • Adam Sharpe filled this role in late 2012/early 2013.
    • The latter half of 2013 had something of a Big Bad Ensemble between the Sanctuary Lodge cult, led by Murray Granger and Ethan MacGuire, and Sadist Teacher Jade Montgomery, until the two storylines collide in the finale.
    • Jake Pirovic returned in 2014 just long enough to kill another main character and then die himself.
    • 2015 had a Big Bad Ensemble of Trevor "Gunno" Gunson and Charlotte and Hunter King (which of the Kings is the Big Bad and which is The Dragon changed quite a bit).
    • The first half of 2016 has Dirty Cop Dylan Carter. The second half has the drug syndicate after the Morgans, who ultimately turn out to be led by Ranae Turner.
    • 2017 initially has drug dealer William Zannis, who seeks revenge on the Morgans after they expose him to the police, and then hitman Dennis Novak, with a Greater-Scope Villain of the cabal of corrupt police officers he is working for (who possibly include Dylan Carter).
    • 2018 has Ebony Harding (AKA Lisa Easton), who seeks revenge on several Summer Bay residents after her brother is killed by the police after kidnapping Justin's daughter. The season finale sets up Ross Nixon, Colby's abusive stepfather who murdered his parents, as a Big Bad although he actually has very little screen time.
    • 2019 had Victor Devlin, the leader of the Ouroboros Gang, who turned out to be responsible for the murder of Robbo's family and initiated an armed siege in the finale week as part of a plan to eliminate all witnesses against him.
    • The second half of 2020 basically features Colby Thorne as a Villain Protagonist, with Detective Angelo Rosetta as the Hero Antagonist trying to prove he murdered Ross Nixon.
    • The first half of 2021 has serial con artist Susie McAllister, who steals the money from the surf club fundraiser as well as Leah and Justin's house deposit and John's savings. The second half has Anne Sherman, a stalker who targets Tane and Felicity and is responsible for a chemical attack that endangers several locals.
    • 2022 has the Death Adder biker gang, initially led by Marty and later by Tex Wheeler, who first try to blackmail the Paratas into laundering money and then seek revenge on Cash for Marty's death.
    • 2023 has Margot Dafoe, the leader of the Vita Nova cult who kidnaps Andrew Lawrence, the teenage son of one of her late members who Justin and Leah took in, by pretending to be his mother and tries to have Justin killed when he comes after him. Even though she's imprisoned halfway through the season, her followers later attempt to kill Justin again in revenge.
  • House of Anubis:
    • Season 1: Rufus Zeno, serving as a constant source of trouble for both Victor and Sibuna, and acting as the final obstacle to overcome before the students can win.
    • Season 2: Senkhara, an impatient, powerful ghost, intent on getting the Mask Of Anubis at any and all costs.
    • Season 3: Robert Frobisher-Smythe, Sarah's thought-to-be-dead father who has been collecting sinners to awaken the dark god, Ammut.

    I 
  • Inazuman has Emperor Banba, ruler of the Neo-Human Empire. At least up until the final episodes where he got usurped by Führer Geisel and his Despar Army, who promptly become the villains of the Sequel Series Inazuman F.
  • Interview with the Vampire (2022): Lestat de Lioncourt is the main villain of Season 1. He's a Domestic Abuser and an Abusive Parent, and by "The Thing Lay Still", his lover/vampire son Louis de Pointe du Lac and his vampire daughter Claudia are captives in his Gilded Cage.
  • iZombie:
    • Season 1: Blaine DeBeers, who, in contrast to Liv, fully embraces his zombie status, setting about infecting Seattle's rich and powerful so that he can extort money out of them in exchange for brains to feed on.
    • Season 2: With Blaine moving into Enemy Mine and Friendly Enemy status, Vaughn du Clark, introduced near the end of Season 1, takes center stage as he blackmails Major into exterminating the city's zombie population, while experimenting on other zombies, in order to perfect his Max Rager energy drink without anything linking him to the zombie virus.
    • Season 3: Different from the prior seasons, it's not clear right away who the new antagonist, who is hunting and killing zombies, actually is. It's finally revealed in the season finale to be Carey Gold, who is intentionally trying to break the Masquerade and start a race war between humans and zombies.
    • Season 4: Now that zombies are known to the world, the role of active antagonist falls to Chase Graves, who turns Seattle into a Police State in a desperate attempt to maintain the balance between humans and zombies, and descends into authoritarian madness as things slip out of his control. There's also Blaine's father Angus, who takes on the identity of "Brother Love", the leader of a cult which preaches zombie superiority and fans the flames Graves is trying to smother.
    • Season 5: There's a Big Bad Ensemble, as people on both sides of the worsening human-zombie conflict try to turn it into a full race war. On the human side is Dolly Durkins, leader of a militant group that seeks to wipe out all zombies, while on the zombie side there's Liv's father Martin Roberts, who wants to spread zombies beyond the Seattle quarantine and create a new world order. Until he has a Heel Realization and is killed by Enzo Lambert, who takes over and promptly starts the war. There's also Blaine, who is at his most overtly villainous since Season 1, abducting children with Freylich's Syndrome so he can sell their brains as zombie cures.

    J 
  • Jane the Virgin: Drug lord Sin Rostro "The Man With No Face" aka Rose Solano, whose actions and manipulations cause the characters no end of stress.
  • Justified: Boyd Crowder tends to be the series' default Big Bad, but each season also has a contender.
    • Season 1: Bo Crowder, whose attempt at rebuilding his criminal empire becomes the main focus of the season's last half. There's also Gio Reyes, who is behind various other threats over the course of the season, and becomes Bo's partner just before the finale.
    • Season 2: Mags Bennett, whose plan to ripoff Black Pike Mining drives most of the season's action, while her sons Doyle, Dickie, and Coover plot against Raylan and Boyd alike.
    • Season 3: Robert Quarles of the Detroit Mob, who tries to take control of Harlan County's drug trade in the aftermath of Mags' fall, running afoul of Raylan and Boyd in the process.
    • Season 4: Quarles' adopted father, Theo Tonin takes over. His desire to see Drew Thompson dead drives the storyline, while the investigation into Drew is in and of itself aimed at bringing Theo down. In the last episode, Nicky Augustine, who has been acting as Theo's Dragon-in-Chief, attempts to launch a coup d'etat, and becomes the focus of Raylan's ire.
    • Season 5: There's a few contenders, including Johnny Crowder, Mr. Yoon & Alberto Ruiz of the Mexican cartel, longrunners Wynn Duffy & Mr. Picker, and Boyd himself, but in the end Daryl Crowe Jr. emerges as the main threat, with Raylan's attempt to arrest him, and Boyd's attempt at getting rid of him, taking up the final part of the season.
    • Season 6: Katherine Hale, who takes over the Dixie Mafia to restore her former reputation and get revenge on Avery Markham by taking all his money. There's also Avery Markham himself, who wants to re-establish his status as a feared gangster by buying land in order to grow marijuana and get rich.

    K 

    L 
  • The Last Ship:
    • Season 1: Admiral Ruskov, a rogue naval tactician who hounds the Nathan James all throughout the season. However, Amy Granderson acts as the Final Boss (and subsequently the Starter Villain of the second season)
    • Season 2: After Granderson is dealt with, Sean Ramsey emerges as the main threat of the season, who's naturally immune to the Red Flu and aims to destroy all attempts at finding a cure so that he and his fellow immunes can reign supreme.
    • Season 3: President Peng of China, whose goals of ensuring Chinese dominance of Asia put him in direct opposition to the crew of the Nathan James and, by extension, the resurgent US government. Late in the season, however he's revealed to be in alliance with Chief of Staff Alison Shaw, who's leading a planned coup in the US.
    • Season 4: Dr Paul Vellek, who at first seems only to be after the seeds that hold the genetic cure for the global famine in order to gain power by controlling the world's food supply. However, it turns out that his true goal is to use the new crops as a vector for spreading a drug that will rid humanity of its violent impulses by brainwashing them.
    • Season 5: Gustavo "Tavo" Barros, the leader of a militant movement to unite Latin America under his banner and usurp the US's place as a world power.
  • LazyTown: Robbie is this, but due to the kid-friendly nature his schemes are often zany and childish, and always revolve around getting people to be lazy.
  • The Legend of Dick and Dom: The Beastmaster is a mysterious entity behind many of the protagonists' setbacks in season two (showing up- without his identity being revealwed- at the end of each episode to punish the villains who failed to stop them). He is revealed as the antagonist for season three.
  • Legend of the Seeker
    • Season 1 has Darken Rahl, the ruler of D'Hara who tries everything he can to kill Richard in order to prevent the destiny of the Seeker from being fulfilled.
    • Season 2 has The Keeper, a being that rules the dead, and wishes to extinguish all life, with Rahl getting Demoted to Dragon.
  • Lexx
    • Series 1 His Divine Shadow, leader of the Divine Order and League of 20,000 Planets that rules the Light Zone but secretly the last survivor of the ancient insect war. He plans to evolve into the Giga Shadow to destroy humanity.
    • Series 2 Mantrid who is the Bio-Vizier for the Divine Shadow, he is strengthened by the last trace of the Divine Shadow's essence. He creates countless Mantrid drones to absorb planets and aims to become the universe itself.
    • Series 3 Prince, the leader of Planet Fire who is in a seemingly eternal war with Planet Water. He's basically Satan with Water and Fire being a version of Heaven and Hell.
    • Series 4 is a Big Bad Ensemble between Prince who has become head of the ATF and installs a buffoon president to control. Lyekka plants serve as the other antagonists that have sent carrot probes to enter the buttocks of humans living on Earth and take over them.
  • Leverage typically lacks one of these, but in Season 4 we have Victor Dubenich, a former mark out for revenge, who manipulates the events of the season from behind the scenes before stepping into the spotlight in the last two episodes.
  • Life (2007): Roman Nevikov, the ruthless Russian mobster Crews is after.
  • The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power has Sauron, the titular Lord of the Rings, as the main villain in the first season, but his identity and form isn't revealed until the season finale.
  • Lost had an interesting succession, with the scope of the show panning out to reveal a Big Bad.
    • Season 1: Didn't seem to have a Big Bad originally. The most reoccuring antagonist that season was The Smoke Monster, who seemed more like a rampaging beast, with Ethan being a runner-up, though it's clear he was just a spy and not any sort of leader, and he's killed by Charlie several episodes before the finale. It's only in the finale that we see other, well, Others, including Tom Friendly, but they only appear in one scene to kidnap Walt. Though it's retroactively revealed by Season 6 that Season 1 DID have a Big Bad, as the Smoke Monster was the Big Bad of the entire series.
    • Season 2: The survivors originally assume Mr. Friendly is this, but this is confirmed false and instead an unnamed and unseen leader is hinted at. It isn't until the finale when the leader of the Others is revealed to be Benjamin Linus, aka the man who posed as Henry Gale for much of the season.
    • Season 3: Benjamin Linus. Though hints are thrown at Jacob, the mysterious being the Others worship. Though he is revealed to actually be the Big Good seasons later and never approved of Ben's actions.
    • Season 4: Charles Widmore, though his Psycho for Hire Martin Keamy gets more screentime.
    • Most of Season 5 skips around with lots of smaller villains, and switching back and forth between Ben and Widmore, until it reveals the true Big Bad of Lost: The Man in Black/The Smoke Monster, who finally plays the primary antagonist role in the sixth and final season directly.

    M 
  • Mako Mermaids: An H₂O Adventure:
    • Season 1: Cam after they get their hands on the trident, in a bid to gain a tail.
    • Season 2: Erik who steals Zak's magic and attempts to usurp control of the Merman Cave.
    • Season 3: The Water Dragon, that steals Mermaids' and Mermen's magic and tails, who destroyed the entirety of Wei-Lan's Eastern Pod, and is threatening to do the same to the Mako Pod.
  • The Mentalist: Red John (Sheriff Thomas McAllister), Patrick Jane's nemesis and a sociopathic Serial Killer responsible for torturing and killing dozens of women..
  • Merlin has had several, but notably King Uther Pendragon, and then Morgana, following Uther's death. However, each season had a back-up Big Bad for Merlin to face when Uther and Morgana were busy, and because of the show's Grey-and-Grey Morality, it could be surprisingly difficult at times (especially in the early seasons) to pin-point who exactly posed the greatest threat.
    • Season 1: Nimueh, who is indeed the overall Big Bad of the season, being behind most of the problems in Camelot. Uther is also at his most threatening here, though in later seasons he was more of an Antagonist than an overt villain.
    • Season 2: The most complex season in terms of villainy. Uther mellowed out a bit and Morgause is initially quite justified in most of her actions and beliefs. Morgana goes through her Face–Heel Turn but is still mostly sympathetic and Kilgharrah's Revenge Before Reason arc is resolved in the finale and never brought up again.note 
    • Season 3: Morgause, with Morgana as her Dragon-in-Chief.
    • Season 4: Morgana, with Agravaine de Bois as her Dragon who also served as The Mole in Camelot.
    • Season 5: Morgana, and eventually Mordred. Interestingly, Mordred spends the majority of his appearances not evil, but his prophesied betrayal is the series main arc and biggest threat.
    • King Odin was also a major threat in the series, until he and Camelot made peace in the final season.
  • Midnight Mass (2021): It seems at first that Father Paul will be the villain, but instead of him or even the "Angel" (which seems to essentially be a mindless beast) the true antagonist is Beverly Keane, who takes over the vampires and unleashes them on the island.
  • Missing (2012): Martin Newman, who leads a group of rogue CIA agents responsible for committing numerous atrocities around the world.
  • Monsters We Met: The short-faced bear in "The Eternal Frontier", the megalania in "The Burning", and the Haast eagle in "The End of Eden". None of those three animals are truly evil; they were simply being predators by nature.
  • Motherland: Fort Salem: The witch-hunting Camarilla turn out to be the main villains for the entire series.
  • Murdoch Mysteries: In Season 3, several cases lead to the Pendrick household. Murdoch becomes sure that it's Mr Pendrick who is responsible for frauds, dangerous scientific experiments used for stealing, or even mysterious murders. It turns out he's quite innocent, and it is his beautiful wife, Mrs Sally Pendrick, who the one to be blamed. She would be perfectly fine with her husband being hanged for her crimes. She says she's doing it for the thrill of it.
  • Mystery Science Theater 3000 has the Forresters, a family of Mad Scientists who are responsible for imprisoning the hosts on the Satellite of Love and forcing them to watch bad movies.
    • Seasons 1-7 and The Movie had Dr. Clayton Forrester, who started the experiment in the first place by trapping Joel Robinson in the SOL, and did the same to Mike Nelson after Joel escaped.
    • Seasons 8-10 had Clayton's mother, Pearl Forrester. Her seasons involved her hunting down Mike to get revenge for her son's death (which she herself caused).
    • Seasons 11-12 has Clayton's daughter, Kinga Forrester. She captured Jonah Heston and imprisoned him on the SOL, planning to restart the experiment and sell it to Disney for billions of dollars.
    • My Babysitter's a Vampire
      • The Pilot Movie has Jesse, Sarah's vampire ex-boyfriend that sired her against her will and the leader of a vampiric cult who seeks to control all of Whitechapel and force Sarah to be his. He eventually back from the dead and acts as the Final Boss of season one.
      • Season 2 has Vice Principal Stern, a sorcerer that spends the season plotting the destruction of every vampire, good and evil, in Whitechapel.
  • MythQuest: Gorgos is a trickster god who tries to change any myth he's trapped in. He was released by Matt Bellows, and his children Alex and Cleo try to rescue their father while preventing Gorgos from changing mythology.

    N 
  • Neighbours:
    • Charles Durham in the 1985 season, a Villain with Good Publicity who made repeated attempts to obtain an incriminating casette tape from Terri, threatening her and those around her. He was shot dead in a confrontation with Terri in the final week of the season.
    • In late 2005 and for the first half of 2006, Robert Robinson filled this role, making several attempts on the lives of his father and sister while disguised as his triplet brother.
  • Night and Day: Danny Dexter, Dennis’s absent father and the man who switched Jane Harper and Della Wells at birth. His dangerous aura looms over much of the show, although he doesn’t actually begin to appear in the flesh until towards the end of the run.
  • Nikita:
    • Percy in season 1. For the first half of season 2 he was imprisoned inside Division and replaced as Big Bad by his Dragon, Amanda, but he eventually turned the tables on her and reclaimed the Big Bad mantle. He gets killed at the end of season.
    • Amanda retakes the Big Bad mantle in season 3, undergoing a campaign of revenge against Nikita and the reformed Division.

    O 
  • Orange Is the New Black:
    • Season 1: Tiffany "Pennsatucky" Doggett, who feels disrespected by Piper and plots to kill her. In the end, she tries to kill Piper outside, while Mr. Healy watches and ignores. But Piper gets outraged and beats her to the ground.
    • Season 2: Yvonne "Vee" Parker, who starts a cigarette and drug business in the prison, which rivals Red. In the finale, her gang turns on her and she escapes the prison through a sewer hole, where she ends up being hit by Rosa, who has stolen the prison van.
  • The Outpost:
    • Season 1 has Ambassador Everit Dred, who ordered the genocide of the Blackbloods and is responsible for the rest of the villainous actions seen thus far in the series.
    • Season 2 has The Three, Dred's superiors and the joint God-Emperors of the Prime Order, who intend to crush the rebellion started against their rule in the previous season, with the member known as One serving as the most prominent. When he's killed in the penultimate episode, his servant Sana takes his place.
    • Season 3 has Priestess Yavalla, who plans to use a brainwashing kinj to turn all humans and Blackbloods into a Hive Mind she can control, justifying it by saying it's the only way to ensure peace.
    • Season 4 has the Masters, a group of Physical Gods who travel through dimensions and drain worlds of life to fuel their immortality. Of them all, Vorta appears to be first among equals, as she tends to make most of the decisions and act as spokesperson. Also, they're the inspiration for the Blackblood and Prime Order religions and the source of the kinjs that empowered the Three and Yavalla, making them the ultimate source of all conflict on the show.

    P 
  • Part of Me: The main antagonist of the story is Elena Serrano, Mónica's Evil Niece that plotted her death and wants to steal her life. Mónica's main objective is to protect her daughters from Elena's evil plots.
  • Part of Me: The main antagonist of the story is Elena Serrano, Mónica's Evil Niece that plotted her death so that she could steal her fortune from her daughters.
  • Person of Interest:
  • Pretty Little Liars has "A" as the overall main enemy on all season so far, but there are sometimes other characters who also take on the role of the Big Bad.
    • Season 1 has a Big Bad Ensemble between Mona Vanderwaal/"A" and Ian Thomas. Mona is the primary enemy overall, but Ian is the more direct threat to the girls, when they begin to believe he is "A" and Ali's killer. In the end, Ian and Spencer have a battle in the bell tower which ends in Ian's death.
    • Season 2 has Mona Vanderwaal/"A" taking the stage fully. Becoming more and more hostile, the Liars eventually figure out who she is, leading to a battle on Lookout Point, which ends in Mona being pushed off.
    • Season 3 has Red Coat, the leader of the A-Team and the person who stole the game from Mona and demoted her to The Dragon. Red Coat overlooks and orders the actions of A-Team (which is revealed to consist ofMona, Toby, Spencer, Lucas, Melissa, Wilden, Sara, Jenna, Noel, and Wren.), while she acts behind the scenes. She is revealed to be CeCe Drake. Also, Shana Fring begins a campaign against the girls independent of the main A-team, including starting a fire in the season finale in an attempt to kill them.
    • Season 4 continues with Red Coat as the main antagonist and now has her acting as The Heavy, with the A-Team slowly disintegrating. The mid-season final reveals that there are two Red Coats, one of which is CeCe, who is the leader of the A-Team, and the other being Alison, who is watching the girls and Not Quite Dead.. The season turns into a Big Bad Ensemble when it is revealed that Ezra Fitz is stalking the Liars for his book. Then in the finale, Shana Fring turns up in New York to kill the girls and shoots Ezra.
    • Season 5 has soon "A" /CeCe Drake returning to the role of main villain, blowing up Toby's house, manipulating Mona, framing Alison for her "murder" and imprisoning the girls in a giant doll house. However, the season is also a Big Bad Ensemble with "A", Alison DiLaurentis and Mona Vanderwaal, the former of whom is manipulating the Liars and the latter of whom forms an army to take Alison down. However, with Alison being framed for Mona's supposed murder and Mona revealed as a co-conspirator of "A", it becomes clear who the real Big Bad is.
    • Season 6 has "A" returning to the role in full force, being exposed in the mid-season finale as CeCe Drake/Charlotte DiLaurentis. and subsequently killed. The second half of the season has a new "A" (revealed in Season 7 to be Alex Drake), known as Uber A and Amoji as the Big Bad, threatening the girls into trying to find Charlotte's killer and kidnapping Hanna in the finale after she has made a False Confession. It doubles as a Big Bad Ensemble with Charlotte's killer and the Big Bad Duumvirate of Elliott Rollins, and Mary Drake.
    • Season 7 returns with Uber A, now known as "A.D.", who is revealed in the series finale to be Alex Drake, Spencer's twin sister, and Charlotte's half sister.
  • Primeval
    • Season 1: The Future Predator, a creature that escaped through one of the anomalies and ultimately turns out to be responsible for the mass grave that Nick Cutter discovered in the first episode.
    • Season 2: Oliver Leek, Lester's assistant in the new timeline, who has been secretly collecting creatures and using implants to control them, ultimately threatening to unleash them on the world if his demands aren't met.
    • Season 3: Helen Cutter, who after two seasons as a Wild Card finally Jumps Off The Slippery Slope when she murders estranged husband Nick and eventually decides to wipe out all humanity by going back in time to poison their ancestors.
    • Season 4: Ethan Dobrowski/ Patrick Quinn, Danny's missing brother, who after being lost in time after going through an anomaly has come to see humans as just another animal to kill without remorse and become a Serial Killer.
    • Season 5: Philip Burton, a Well-Intentioned Extremist who wants to solve the anomaly problem by combining them all into one, and in doing so will create the Bad Future Matt is trying to prevent.
  • Prison Break:
    • Vice-President Caroline Reynolds served as the main antagonist for the first and second seasons. Then, she quits her position and exits the story completely in order to reveal the true Big Bad: General Krantz.
    • Season 4, however, has a Big Bad Duumvirate between General Krantz and Christina Scofield.
    • For the 2017 miniseries Prison Break: Resurrection the main villain is Poseidon/Jacob Ness, the leader of 21 Void, a deep cover agent of the CIA who manipulates wars for his own benefit and is revealed to have faked Michael's death and blackmailed him into working for him. He also married Sara during this period making the battle between him and Michael even more personal.
  • Private: Ariana Osgood, who is revealed to be the Killer.

    R 
  • Reign:
    • Season 1: A Big Bad Ensemble of Catherine de Medici, King Henry and the Darkness, although it ultimately turns out that Antoine of Navarre had a hand in things.
    • Season 2: Initially Lord Narcisse, and even after his Heel Realisation the events he set in motion continue to cause problems and he remains very much in the Heel–Face Revolving Door, including forming a Big Bad Duumvirate with Catherine at one point. Queen Elizabeth is also behind much of the trouble but is very much a Greater-Scope Villain at this point, not appearing until the very last scene of the season.
    • Season 3: A Big Bad Ensemble of Elizabeth, John Knox, Christophe and the Red Knights.
    • Season 4: While the cold war between Mary and Elizabeth occupies much of the screen time, the real threat to Mary's position turns out to come from Knox, Lady Lennox and King Darnley.
  • Resurrection: Ertuğrul: Sadettin Kopek easily holds the most sway over the struggles Ertugrul and his people face. He is largely responsible for the events of seasons 2, 3, and 4 due to his collaborations with their respective Arc Villains, as well as his attempts to usurp the position of sultan posing a significant threat to the Muslim world.
  • Revenge (2011): For most of season 1, Conrad and Victoria Grayson, being at the center of the conspiracy to frame David Clarke for their own crimes, hold this position by default. However, by the end of the season it's clear they were ultimately just pawns of the Eviler than Thou Americon Initiative, who now serve as the Greater-Scope Villain of the series. As of a few episodes into season 2, the Initiative seems to be taking more active steps and moving down into the actual Big Bad role. Then the season finale reveals that the Initiative is just a cover for a group of Corrupt Corporate Executives making money from their acts of terror... and Conrad is now in their inner circle. This definitely puts Conrad right back into the role of Big Bad, pushing out even the horrified Victoria.
    • As of Season 4, Victoria splits the role with Malcolm Black for the first half. The second half had a scorned and mourning Margaux preparing to take on Emily and then Victoria being the final enemy to face.
  • Revolution: General Sebastian "Bass" Monroe, initially. However, it gets more complicated as the first season goes on. First, it becomes a Big Bad Ensemble when Randall Flynn is introduced running his own scheme in episode 7. In episode 11, it becomes a loose Big Bad Duumvirate when they team up halfway through the season (with it clear they're only using each other). Finally, it goes back to being an Ensemble in the season finale as Major Neville starts a coup against Monroe, while Randall commits suicide...only to turn out to have been working for the in-exile US President.
    • The Ensemble gets streamlined in Season 2, as the Patriots and their leader President Davis prove to be Eviler than Thou on a massive scale, leading to them becoming the dominant threat. Though that said, Monroe and Neville are both running their own schemes, and then there's the ultimate Wild Card that is the now-sentient nanotech.
  • Riverdale:
    • Season 1: The central mystery of the season is uncovering who murdered Jason Blossom. It turns out to be Clifford Blossom, his father. Clifford also counts as a Non-Action Big Bad. As the depth of his villainy is revealed post-mortem, he remains an antagonistic force, but plots in the background for much of the season, never physically confronting the heroes and only directly committing violence when he murders Jason.
    • Season 2:
      • The Black Hood, an Ax-Crazy Serial Killer and a Knight Templar who sets off on a violent quest to purge Riverdale of all its "sinners". Partway through the season, he is seemingly revealed to be Joseph Svenson, the school janitor, although Archie doesn't believe that he and Betty caught the right man. Near the end of the season, Svenson turns out to be a Decoy Antagonist as the true identity of the Black Hood is revealed to be Hal Cooper.
      • Hiram Lodge, a wealthy and corrupt businessman whose ultimate goal is to have complete control over Riverdale, and who uses any means necessary to achieve it. His actions also stir up conflict in the relationships of other characters, as well as fuelling the ongoing rivalry between the North Side and South Side citizens.
      • The season finale gives us a Big Bad Ensemble of Hiram Lodge, Malachi, Penny Peabody, Penelope Blossom, Claudius Blossom, and Sheriff Manetta, all of whom are conspiring together.
    • Season 3:
      • Hiram Lodge is still the major villain, now responsible for framing Archie for murder.
      • The premiere introduces two possible contenders: The Gargoyle King and Edgar, the He Who Must Not Be Seen leader of The Farm.
  • Robin Hood
    • Seasons 1 and 2: Vaisey, Sheriff of Nottingham, who is responsible for much of the repression of the locals as well as being a leading member of a conspiracy to overthrow King Richard.
    • Season 3: Prince John, after two seasons of being an unseen Greater-Scope Villain, visits Nottingham in person to bring things under his control. Four characters occupy the position of sheriff over the course of the season: Vaisey, Gisborne, Isabella and Thornton.
  • Robin of Sherwood:
    • Season 1: Robert de Rainault, Sheriff of Nottingham, who is the main antagonist attempting to hunt Robin and his men down and was also responsible for the death of Robin's father.
    • Season 2: Prince/King John, who develops a personal grudge against Robin after he tries to stop him gaining the throne and puts pressure on the Sheriff to put an end to him, resulting in the original Robin's death.
    • Season 3: Gulnar, who starts off as the Court Mage to Owen of Clun but ends up seeking revenge on the new Robin for his master's death.
  • Roswell:
    • Season 1: Agent Pierce. He doesn't appear until two thirds of the way through the season, but most of the antagonists up to that point turn out to have been working for him.
    • Season 2: Nicholas Crawford, the leader of the Skins on Earth, with Kivar functioning as a Greater-Scope Villain.
    • Season 3: Kivar turns up in person (sort of) but isn't really the overall threat of the season, which instead features a lot of short-term villains who only appear in two episode each. Thanks to the show being Cut Short, the villains of the finale, Bob and Paul (supposedly two old associates of Pierce), just turn up out of nowhere without any set-up.

    S 
  • The Savage Eye: The British Empire and the Catholic Church, as this is a series about Irish culture and why it is like it is.
  • Scandal (2012): The first season doesn't seem to have one, but Billy Chambers qualifies. The second season, however, establishes Hollis as this, due to him having 7 people killed and framing someone for it to cover up vote tampering, and having the President himself shot and framing Huck for it! However, it turns out that he didn't have the President shot; Judge Verna did that. During season 3, the role is seemingly split between both of Olivia's parents, Roman Pope, the merciless head of B613, and Maya Pope, a sociopathic international terrorist who is dangerously obsessed with her daughter. Season 4 introduces Republican Party Chairwoman Elizabeth "Lizzie Bear" North, though she herself is a Red Herring being used by the true Big Bad, seemingly nice guy Vice President Andrew Nicohls, who had Olivia kidnapped to force Fitz's hand in declaring war on Angola for the first half before returning to Roman Pope being the full-on Big Bad alongside all of B613 for the second half.
  • Scream: The TV Series:
  • Scream Queens (2015): Gigi Caldwell turns out to be the mastermind behind the Red Devil killings, but near the end of the season she is killed, with the role then falling to Hester Ulrich/Chanel #6, who makes it clear that they were the true brains of the operation all along.
  • The Secret Circle: A Big Bad Ensemble of Eben, the leader of the witch hunters, and John Blackwell, a warlock who plans on killing all witches who don't have Balcoin Blood.
  • The Secret World of Alex Mack has Danielle Atron, the greedy and vicious CEO of the Paradise Valley Chemical Plant, who looks to hunt down and experiment on Alex.
  • Seven Star Fighting God Guyferd has Zodiac, the true leader of Crown and mastermind behind the experiments done on Gou and various others to harness the power of Fallah.
  • As with the novels, every film in the Sharpe series has one:
    • Sharpe's Rifles: Colonel De L'Eclin, a French cavalry commander who is determined to keep the Spanish people rising up against the French.
    • Sharpe's Eagle: Sir Henry Simmerson, a cowardly British officer who enforces brutal discipline among his troops and twice abandons Sharpe in battle with the French, with Lieutenants Gibbons and Berry as his Co-Dragons who he charges with seeking revenge on Sharpe for his disgrace.
    • Sharpe's Company: Obadiah Hakeswill, Sharpe's former Drill Sergeant Nasty who frames Harper for looting and attempts to rape Sharpe's wife Terese.
    • Sharpe's Enemy: The Big Bad Duumvirate of Hakeswill and Pot-au-Feu, who lead a group of deserters who occupy the Portuguese city of Adradas and hold the wives of British and French officers hostage, although the French attack on Adradas is ordered by Major Pierre Ducos.
    • Sharpe's Honour: Ducos, who plots to spoil the alliance between the British and the Spanish by framing Sharpe for the murder of a Spanish officer. He is seen reporting to Napoleon himself but the plan is Ducos', with Father Hacha and El Matarife as The Dragon and The Brute respectively.
    • Sharpe's Gold: El Casco, a Spanish partisan and death cult leader.
    • Sharpe's Battle: Brigadier-General Guy Loup, a French officer who seeks revenge on Sharpe for killing two of his men by inciting a mutiny among the Irish, blackmailing their commander into abandoning Sharpe by holding his wife hostage, and leaving Sharpe and his men open to an ambush. Ducos' role as The Man Behind the Man is Adapted Out.
    • Sharpe's Sword: Colonel Philippe Leroux, a colonel in the Imperial Guard, sent to kill Wellington's spymaster, El Mirador.
    • Sharpe's Regiment: Lord Simon Fenner, the Secretary At War, revealed to have been skimming the books, transferring and auctioning men and stores in and out of battalions secretly and taking hefty kickbacks for his trouble.
    • Sharpe's Siege: Ducos, attempting to sabotage the British invasion of France by manipulating events so Sharpe's advance party are left defending a fortress with limited troops and ammunition, with General Calvet as The Heavy who leads the attack on the fort.
    • Sharpe's Mission: Colonel Cressan, a French Colonel with orders directly from Emperor Bonaparte to capture Major General Ross. Although Sharpe only encounters his Dragon Colonel Brand in person.
    • Sharpe's Revenge: Ducos, who steals the Emperor's treasure and frames Sharpe for the theft and for the murder of the officer guarding it.
    • Sharpe's Justice: Sir Willoughby Parfitt, a corrupt mill owner who is sabotaging his rivals and blaming it on local rabble rouser Truman, and his Dragon Captain George Wickham, who leads a massacre of Truman's followers.
    • Sharpe's Waterloo: In effect, Napoleon Bonaparte, who leads the French army Sharpe is facing. On a more personal level, Jane Gibbons and Lord John Rossendale, who plot to murder Sharpe under cover of the battle so they can marry.
    • Sharpe's Challenge: General William Dodd, the commander of Khande Rao's army who plots to wipe out the British and then kill Khande Rao and become ruler of the region.
    • Sharpe's Peril: Count Dragomirov, a cavalry officer who is actually running an opium operation after massacring a garrison and stealing their crops, and who pursues Sharpe and his party when they uncover his crimes.
  • Sherlock
    • Seasons 1 and 2: Jim Moriarty, is a "consulting criminal" who lends his genius to help other crooks commit crimes, in the name of alleviating his own boredom and obsessively trying to capture the attention of Sherlock Holmes, not caring who he hurts while doing so.
    • Season 3: Charles Augustus Magnussen, a media mogul who owns the majority of Western civilization through very careful application of blackmail.
    • Season 4: Eurus, the long lost sister of Sherlock who goes on a horrific killing spree specifically to torment him.
  • Slasher is a horror anthology series, with each season revolving around the actions of that season's Serial Killer main antagonist, who tends to always be a figure in a masked costume.
    • The Executioner: The titular Executioner, eventually revealed to be Cam Henry, targets citizens of Waterbury whom he feels have committed the Seven Deadly Sins and kills them in ways symbolic of the Biblical punishments for those sins.
    • Guilty Party: The mysterious figure in a parka who is slowly picking off both the former Camp Motega counselors and the commune members. They're eventually revealed to be Judith Berry, acting to avenge her son Owen, who killed himself in prison after the counselors framed him for Talvinder's death.
    • Solstice: The Druid, who killed Kit Jennings a year before the season's main plot, and who returns on the anniversary to target everyone who witnessed that murder. In fact, there's not just one Druid — Kit was killed by Wyatt, the jealous boyfriend of his latest lover, while the current killings are being carried out by Connor and Jen Rijkers, not because the victims witnessed Kit's death, but because they contributed to the cyber-harassment that drove the siblings' mother to suicide.
    • Flesh & Blood: The Gentleman, who is stalking the members of the Galloway family and killing them as they're eliminated from the competition to inherit late patriarch Spencer's fortune. They're eventually revealed to be Dr. Persephone Trinh, Spencer's end of life specialist, whom he hired to kill his children and grandchildren when they failed, in order to "weed out weakness".
    • Ripper: The Widow is targeting members of Toronto's social elite, specifically those who were connected to the conspiracy to cover up the truth of who really killed Margaret Mehar 12 years earlier. They're eventually revealed to be Regina Simcoe, who is in fact Margaret's daughter enacting revenge.
  • Sleepy Hollow has Moloch, the demon who's attempting to begin the Apocalypse for his own ends.
  • Sliders after its premise was changed:
    • Seasons 1 & 2: Original premise, no Big Bads. These seasons are about the Sliders Walking the Earth of various parallel worlds. The Kromaggs, telepathic alternate-Earth beings who have enslaved many parallel worlds, make their debut late in the second season but wouldn't be seen again for over a year.
    • Season 3: Colonel Angus Rickman, a corrupt military officer who is stealing others' brain matter to stop himself dying of a rare condition. After being exposed, he kills Professor Arturo, along with Maggie's husband, and flees with a timer containing the co-ordinates of the Sliders' homeworld, leading to them pursuing him across parallel earths to recover it.
    • Season 4: The Kromaggs, who turn out to have conquered Earth Prime and transported Wade to one of their breeding planets. Much of the season is taken up with the Sliders attempting to find a weapon that can defeat them on another earth while running across their schemes.
    • Season 5: Doctor Oberon Geiger, the Evil Mentor of new recruit Diana, who causes the effective death of Quinn by merging him with his non-identical counterpart and leaves Colin unstuck across universes. Geiger himself is unable to remain in one universe and his experiments to resolve his condition cause the deaths of all his counterparts and leave the inhabitants of one world trapped by a deadly storm.
  • Sons of Anarchy:
    • Season 2: Ethan Zobelle, the head of the League of American Nationalists ("L.O.A.N."), a white separatist gang who desires to gain a foothold in Charming and force SAMCRO out.
    • Season 3: James "Jimmy O" O'Phelan, the leader of the Real IRA group who goes rogue and attempts to kill all of SAMCRO, and Agent Stahl, an ATF agent investigating the club's involvement in arms trafficking.
    • Season 4: Clay Morrow, who throws the club in turmoil by forcing them into the drug trafficking business and begins targeting Jax Teller's loved ones to cover up his role in his father's death.
    • Season 5: Damon Pope, the most dangerous gangster in Oakland, and Clay again. While Pope is seen as the greater threat, Clay's efforts to undermine Jax's authority as President become too much of a danger to ignore thereby compelling the latter to devise a plot for neutralizing them both.
    • Season 6: Initially, it'sLee Toric, a former U.S. Marshal who's fixated on taking down the Sons of Anarchy after Otto kills his daughter. However, Otto kills him four episodes in. After that it's a Big Bad Ensemble between Galen O'Shay, a high-ranking member of the Real IRA, and Tyne Patterson, the San Joaquin County District Attorney who attempts to have the Club shut down.
    • Season 7: Gemma, who klls Tara and blames it on the Chinese, causing the main conflict in Season 7.
  • Space Ironmen Kyodain: It takes a while to show up, but the Dada Robots are eventually revealed to be getting their orders from Dark General Gaburin, with the Gaburin Queen as its Mouth.
  • Spartacus: Blood and Sand:
    • Blood and Sand: Batiatus. He's the one who orders Spartacus's wife murdered so his new champion will remain bound to the ludus. Spartacus uncovering the truth is what sets the rebellion in motion.
    • War of the Damned: Crassus, a senator of the Republic who craves the power and respect that defeating Spartacus and his rebel army would bring him.
  • Squid Game: The enigmatic Host of the titular Deadly Game and the boss of the organization running the competition and luring indebted people into it. The last episode reveals it to be Oh Il-Nam, Player 001, who started and infiltrated the games for his amusement and that of his rich friends.
  • Stargate Atlantis: Although the general premise of the series is the battle against the Wraith, even after four and a half seasons no individual character seems to have emerged as a specific Big Bad. There are currently several prominent candidates, including: Rogue Wraith and Evil Genius Michael; Oberoth (the leader of the Eviler than Thou Replicators); and Affably Evil Anti-Villain Todd, who seems to be making a power play for Supreme Wraith Leader. Had the series continued, it looks as though the Vanyir would have been the next adversary.
    • Season 9 to 10 and The Ark Of Truth: The Ori / Adria
  • Stranger Things:
    • Season 1: Dr. Brenner, a Mad Scientist who was behind the experiment that tortured Eleven and released the Demogorgon into the city. However, the Demogorgon is more of The Heavy and is played up as a more hands-on threat even by the marketing of the series.
    • Season 2: The Mind Flayer. It is an entity of immense power that rules over the Upside-Down and that wants to get into the real world and take over with its army of Demogorgon-like creatures.
    • Season 3: The Mind Flayer again, as the piece of it left in our world after the events of Season 2 starts infecting the people of Hawkins in order to create a new body for itself. There's also the secret Soviet military project concerning the Gate, led by General Stepanov, and with their experiments in Hawkins overseen by Colonel Ozerov, but most of their villainous activity is carried out by an assassin named Grigori.
    • Season 4: Vecna, a Humanoid Abomination from the Upside-Down who feeds on people's trauma before killing them, going on a spree in Hawkins. He used to be Henry Creel, aka One, the first of Brenner's test subjects. After he killed the other subjects and tried to convince Eleven to join him in wiping out humanity, she responded by banishing him to the Upside-Down, where he mutated. He's also revealed to be the true master of the Upside-Down, having created the Mind Flayer as an avatar, making him the ultimate antagonist of the series. There's also some normal human antagonists causing problems for the protagonists as well — Lieutenant Colonel Sullivan is hunting down Eleven at all costs, while Jason Carver stirs up a Satanic Panic mob mentality in Hawkins in response to Vecna's rampage, which targets the Party because of their love of D&D.
  • Supernatural:
    • Season 1: Mary Winchester and Jessica Moore's killer, later revealed to be the Yellow-Eyed Demon, a. k. a. Azazel. Meg is set up as a decoy Big Bad, but then becomes The Dragon.
    • Season 2: Azazel again, with the Special Children serving as Co-Dragons of sort. Gordon Walker and Dean's Crossroad Demon could count to a lesser extent.
    • Season 3: The mysterious entity holding the contract on Dean's soul, later revealed to be Lilith, with Bela Talbot and Gordon Walker serving as secondary threats.
    • Season 4: Lilith, with Ruby and Alastair serving as Co-Dragons, and Uriel and Zachariah as recurring threats. Lucifer and Michael are the Greater Scope Villains .
    • Season 5: Lucifer, who could be considered this for the previous seasons as well being The Man Behind the Man to the other two. Zachariah and Michael can be considered secondary Big Bads, with the Four Horseman of the Apocalypse serving as Co-Dragons to Lucifer.
    • Season 6: Raphael, Crowley, and Castiel, with Eve and Souless Sam serving as Disc One Final Bosses, and Samuel Campbell serving as a Dragon of sorts to Crowley.
    • Season 7: Dick Roman, leader of the Leviathans with Edgar as The Dragon, as well as Sam's hallucination of Lucifer serving as a secondary antagonist.
    • Season 8: Crowley, with Naomi, the leader of Heaven's Men In Black, as a secondary Big Bad. Though the last couple of episodes bring in Abaddon (the last Knight of Hell) as a potential Starscream to Crowley while the season finale has Naomi have a Heel Realization, only to be killed by Metatron, who casts a spell to banish all angels from Heaven.
    • Season 9: Metatron and Abaddon, with Gadreel serving as The Dragon to Metatron, and Bartholomew as a Disc-One Final Boss.
    • Season 10: The Mark of Cain and Rowena, with Dean Winchester as The Heavy. The Styne Family show up as a potential threat, but the are all killed off by Dean in the penultimate episode making them a Disc-One Final Boss. Metatron is also back in this season but he's a Big Bad Wannabe.
    • Season 11: The Darkness, having taken the human form of a woman named Amara. She's also The Anti-God. Then things get even crazier when Lucifer re-enters the picture wanting to take the Darkness down while keeping up his own agenda, meaning Sam and Dean had both of them to worry about for awhile, until having to ally with him against the Darkness.
    • Season 12: Lucifer is sticking around to cause mayhem for the sake of it, and the British Men of Letters led by Doctor Hess, who try to ally with the Winchesters but ultimately turn on them, and who try to exterminate all Amercian hunters. Arthur Ketch and Dagon serve as The Dragon to the British Men of Letters and Lucifer, respectively.
    • Season 13: Alternate Michael and Lucifer share the role of main villain. Asmodeus shows up as a another possible contender, however, Asmodeus is incinerated by Gabriel in "Bring 'Em Back Alive", and in the penultimate episode Lucifer forms an alliance with Alternate Michael in order to invade the prime universe. The alliance ends when Lucifer goes Ax-Crazy in the finale, absorbing Jack's Nephilim grace and going full Omnicidal Maniac, forcing Team Free Will to team up with Michael to defeat Lucifer, by way of having Michael and Dean share the latter's body, with Dean in control of it. At long last, they kill Lucifer, only for Michael to fully take control of Dean's body and disappear, setting him as the Big Bad of the next season.
    • Season 14: Alternate Michael is the main villain for most of the season, but is finally killed by Jack in "Ouroboros". The rest of the season doesn't have a clearly defined Big Bad, but Nick becomes a major villain, and Jack kills Nick in "Game Night" before losing control of his powers, and for the final three episodes, Jack becomes a threat, and is manipulated by Duma, only for the final episode of the season to reveal that God was Evil All Along, and he is set to become the main villain of Season 15.
    • Season 15: As indicated at the end of the previous season, God himself is the main antagonist of the season and Greater-Scope Villain of the series as a whole, having engineered everything that ever happened to the Winchesters as a form of entertainment. With the Winchesters no longer willing to play along, he starts gearing up to destroy them once and for all. A few episodes near the end of the season briefly turn it into a Big Bad Ensemble when it turns out that Billie has only been aiding the Winchesters against God so that she can take over his position and impose her own totalitarian rule on creation.

    T 
  • Taxi Brooklyn: Anabellea Capella, the new leader of the Capella crime family, who has a very long grudge against Cat because she provided an alibi for her dad when he killed Anabella's grandfather.
  • Teen Wolf:
    • Season 1: The Alpha Werewolf, who is revealed to be Peter Hale, who wants to bring Scott into his pack and to get revenge on the people who had a part in the fire that killed his family, and Kate Argent, who is revealed to have been the one that orchestrated and caused the fire. In the finale, the two antagonists face off against the heroes and Peter kills, or appears to kill, Kate, leaving himself as the sole Big Bad, until he is defeated by Derek.
    • Season 2: Gerard Argent, whose agenda seems to be getting revenge for Kate's death. For most of the season we have a Big Bad Ensemble between Gerard and the Kanima Master, whose identity is revealed to be Matt Daehler. Gerard ends up killing Matt and assumes the role of the Kanima Master. His master plan is revealed to be that he is dying of cancer and decided that the supernatural was his only way to cure himself. After Derek bites him, his body rejects the bite because Scott and Deaton filled his cancer pills with Mountain Ash.
    • Season 3A: The Darach, a dark druid serial killer who is revealed to be Jennifer Blake, whose real name is Julia Baccari. She plans to get rid of the Alpha Pack, namely its leader Deucalion, who had all of the Alpha's kill their pack. Julia was a part of Kali's pack and when it came time to kill her, Kali couldn't deliver the final blow and left her for dead. Julia survived but with severe scarring and made her way to the Nemeton where she became the Darach. In the end, she is defeated by Scott and killed by Peter.
    • Season 3B: The Nogitsune, who takes possession of Stiles Stilinski
    • Season 4: Kate Argent, who returns to Beacon Hills as a Werejaguar. She survived her apparent death and the scratch from Peter turned her. She blames Scott and his friends for Allison's death and is also mad at Scott for ruining her family's name as Hunters. She ends up kidnapping Scott and Kira and bringing them to a Mexican Church, where she turns Scott into a Berserker to use him against his friends. In the end, she is defeated and takes off. She's also joined by Peter Hale, who wants revenge on Scott, and The Benefactor, who is revealed to be Meredith Walker.
    • Season 5A: The Dread Doctors, a trio of mysterious villains who create genetically engineered supernatural creatures the Chimeras. They are also joined by Theo Raeken, their first successful Chimera who infiltrates Scott's pack with the intent of stealing his power.
    • Season 5B: While the Dread Doctors and Theo are still major threats, the villain spot is dominated by the resurrected Beast of Gévaudan aka Sebastien Valet, who is brought back by the Doctors in the body of Mason Hewitt.
    • Season 6A: Initially The Ghost Riders, who are erasing people in Beacon Hills from existence (including Stiles and Peter), but they are eventually supplanted by Garrett Douglas aka The Nazi Alpha, who is not only more evil, but also succeeds in turning himself into a Ghost Rider hybrid and gaining control over them by brainwashing Parrish.
    • Season 6B: A Big Bad Ensemble of Gerard Argent (with Tamora Monroe serving as his second-in-command), and The Anuk-ite.
    • Teen Wolf follows the seasonal Big Bad formula. However, it is also traditional for Teen Wolf to introduce a Big Bad Ensemble at the start of the season, only to dispose of one of the Big Bads or have them defeated, leaving one of the two as the sole Big Bad. For Season 1, it was Kate Argent, Season 2 it was Matt Daehler, Season 3a had Deucalion, Season 3b had the Oni, who ended up becoming The Dragon to the true Big Bad and Season 4 had the Benefactor, who held a larger presence for most of the season but ended up being Disc-One Final Boss, while Season 6 had the Ghost Riders and later Garrett Douglas.
  • Tidelands (Netflix): Adrielle, the ruthless leader of the L'Attente group which now doubles as a drug trafficking syndicate, is the main villain.
  • Timeless:
    • Season 1 initially has Garcia Flynn, who is using time travel in an attempt to destroy America's development. Things get more complicated later on, however, as it turns out Flynn is in direct opposition to the Ancient Conspiracy known as Rittenhouse which has secretly been controlling America for centuries and wants control of time travel for itself. In the present, their apparent main leader is Lucy's father Benjamin Cahill.
    • Season 2 sees the team reluctantly ally with Flynn to stop Rittenhouse, which has brought Nicholas Keynes (a member from World War I) to the present to guide them in using time travel to reshape history and make America into a Police State they can control.
    • The Grand Finale TV movie has Emma Whitmore, who seized control of Rittenhouse at the end of Season 2. While planning to rebuild the organization, she first sets up a final showdown with the heroes, aiming to eliminate them for good.
  • Tin Man has Azkadellia, although it is revealed that she is actually being possessed by the Wicked Witch, who is the true Big Bad and takes the role of the series' Final Boss.
  • Todd and the Book of Pure Evil:
    • Season 1: The Hooded Leader of the Satanic Society (aka Atticus Murphy Sr.), who intends on harnassing the powers of the book to cause the apocalypse.
    • Season 2: The Metal Dudes, who are actually an Archdemon in search of the Pure Evil One to bring about the End Of Days.. Atticus also tries to be the Big Bad, but is too ineffectual, and is ultimately just an Unwitting Pawn of the Dudes.
  • Tomica Hero Rescue Force: Daen, leader of Neo Terror and the boss of the Three Great Executives. After he's killed at the halfway point, he gets succeeded by his "daughter" Maen.)
  • The Troop has Augustus, a nerdy boy with the power to control some of the most powerful monsters on the planet and uses them for his own evil purposes.
  • True Blood:
    • Season 1: Rene Lenier/Drew Marshall, the serial killer responsible for the murders of several Fangbangers and the attempts at Sookie's life.
    • Season 2:Maryann Forrester, who intends on finding a suitable supernatural creature to sacrifice in Dionysus' honor, so she may summon him to Earth.
    • Season 3:Russell Edgington, a 3000-year-old vampire out to conquer the human race.
    • Season 4: Marnie Stonebrook, a medium who uses Antonia for her campaign against vampires.
    • Season 5: Salome Agrippa, A 2,000+ year old vampire and The Guardian of the Authority responsible for turning the Authority dark, Bill's gradual slip into evil, and resurrecting Russell. However, she's overtaken by Lilith towards the end, having been manipulating the plots through the acts of the Authority and pitting them against one another by telling them each they are chosen.
    • Season 6: Sarah Newlin, who heads a campaign to destroy all vampires by sending them to concentration camps, and Macklyn Warlow, a fae-vampire who seeks to take possession of Sookie Stackhouse to turn her into a vampire as well.
    • Season 7: Sarah Newlin/Hep-V, who continues her pursuit to eradicate all vampires.
  • True Detective:
    • Season One: The Yellow King/Green-Eared Spaghetti Monster/Creature in the Tall Grass, otherwise known as Errol Childress
    • Season Two: A Big Bad Ensemble between the Birdman/Leonard Osterman, and the Catalyst Group, consisting of Tony Chessani, Jacob McCandless, Osip Agranov, Police Chief William Holloway, Kevin Burris, Blake Churchman, & Ben Caspere (the victim) working in collusion with the Mexicans, Ares Security, & State Attorney Richard Geldof.
  • Twin Peaks: Killer BOB, the evil entity responsible for the murder of Laura Palmer, which is the driving force of the series,.

    U 
  • Under the Dome: While the overall Big Bad is the Dome and Big Jim Rennie, each season also has other Big Bads. Especially seeing as how both Big Jim and the Dome continue being an on/off villain.
    • Season 1: Maxine Seagrave
    • Season 2: The first half has a Big Bad Duumvirate between Big Jim Rennie and Rebecca Pine, who devise a plan to release a virus, along with Sam Verdreaux, who kills Angie and attempts to kill others. But in the second half, Sam and Rebecca redeem themselves and Big Jim continues being an on/off villain, while the Dome takes the role of the seasons true Big Bad.
  • The Upstairs Downstairs 2010 revival has one, rather unusually for a non-speculative Family Drama: Persie, a Fascist and Nazi spy who wrecks her sister's marriage, nearly destroys her brother-in-law's career, nearly kills Beryl, and otherwise causes most of the trouble on the show. She's more pathetic than menacing, and the chaos she leaves in her wake is haphazard rather than planned, but she's a thoroughly destructive presence.

    V 
  • Vagrant Queen has Commander Lazaro. While he's subservient to the Admiralty, he's the one whose hunt for Elida drives the plot and in the back half of the season he usurps the Admirals to take full control of the Republic for himself.
  • Van Helsing (2016):
    • Season 1: Dmitri is the ruler of every vampire in Seattle, and the one hunting Vanessa for the secrets in her genetics, making him the primary antagonist. However, his lieutenants Rebecca and Julius are each independently plotting to usurp him and carry out their own plans for Vanessa in order to achieve this. Meanwhile, there's also a Serial Killer targeting Vanessa's group, eventually revealed to be Sam.
    • Season 2: With Rebecca and Julius out of the way courtesy of death and Heel–Face Turn, respectfully, Dmitri solidifies his place as the main villain, as he now seeks to awaken the First Elder. However, there's also the matter of Doctor Harrison, who seeks to harness Vanessa's powers for his own ends, and Sam (now a vampire), who is still killing people For the Evulz.
    • Season 3: In light of Dmitri being killed, his Co-Dragons Scab and Ivory emerge as a new antagonistic force, especially after they take over the Daywalker horde and lead it in attacking the Denver safe zone. And then there's the Oracle, who begins manipulating Vanessa and Sam towards her own goal of creating a new Elder.
    • Season 4: The Oracle brings Sam, Scab and Ivory under her control, while forming a Big Bad Duumvirate with the other Brides (Mikaela and Willem), working with them to free the Dark One. With Willem turning out to be Good All Along and Mikaela being Killed Off for Real soon after, the Oracle becomes the sole Big Bad again, until finally successfully freeing the Dark One in the season finale.
    • Season 5: Dracula, the Dark One herself. Having replaced the President, she now seeks to kill the Van Helsings and their allies, restore herself to full power, and bring about The Night That Never Ends so that she and her vampires can complete their conquest of the world.
  • Veronica Mars uses the Big Bad in its first two seasons where there is a overarching mystery plotline throughout the entire season. Usually, the Big Bad is the person who performs the corresponding crime.
    • Season one has a few decoys, such as Jake Kane, Celeste Kane, Abel Koontz and Clarence Wiedman, but later it is revealed that Lily Kane's killer was actually Aaron Echolls.
    • Season two has a decoy Big Bad, Woody Goodman, but later it is revealed that the bus crush killer was Cassidy Casablancas.
      • Cassidy should probably be considered the biggest Big Bad of the show. While Aaron's murder of Lily was changing Veronica's life, Cassidy's raping Veronica was the event that changed her forever and has gotten off scott free until his last appearance. Plus, he's the only villain to outsmart Veronica.

    W 
  • Walking with Dinosaurs: Since it's done in the style of a nature documentary, none of the characters are actually evil. However, each episode is filmed from the perspective of a particular animal, the main predator of that animal tends to fill this role.
  • Warehouse 13:
  • Westworld: It took two seasons to fully get there, but Dolores Abernathy steps fully into this role as the story progresses. At the end of season 2, she has made it her mission to destroy all of mankind both in revenge for everything that has happened to the Hosts and so that the Hosts can take their place in the world.
  • Wolf Hall: Henry VIII. It takes a while to become apparent because he's charming and does show genuine feeling—but his mood changes on a dime and if he turns against you, he never turns back. Although Thomas Cromwell (the protagonist in this version) ruthlessly extracts revenge for the masque denigrating Cardinal Wolsey, ultimately it was Henry's wishes which brought him down—as he did with Thomas More, his first wife Catherine, and his unfortunate second wife Anne Boleyn.
  • WWE has owner/chairman Vince McMahon as its Big Bad. It started when he pulled a Face–Heel Turn as a result of the Montreal Screwjob, in which he became the "Mr. McMahon" character, an evil dictator-like boss. Like everyone else he's goes through the Heel–Face Revolving Door.
  • Wynonna Earp:
    • Season 1 has a Big Bad Ensemble of revenant leader Bobo del Rey and the Stone Witch Constance Clootie. Technically speaking they're working together, but each has their own unique goals (the former wants to free his people from their imprisonment, and the latter wants to resurrect her demon children), and they're each constantly trying to one-up the other. Ultimately, Bobo come out on top, serving as the Final Boss of the season.
    • Season 2 has the Widows, a pair of demons out to find and raise their husband Bulshaar, the Greater-Scope Villain of the series.
    • Season 3 has Bulshaar himself, now free and ready to wreck havoc on the Earps and their allies.

    X 
  • Xena: Warrior Princess had Ares, Callisto, Caesar, Alti, Dahak and the Olympian gods. Xena may not follow the Seasonal Big Bad formula, but the major villains in the series are all recurring, and (with the exception of Ares and Alti) all follow some form of a linear character arc.
  • The X-Files generally had a large amorphous government conspiracy as the Big Bad, and the ambiguously described hostile alien race planning to colonize Earth. The former was largely represented by the Syndicate (its most notable member being the Smoking Man), and the latter by the shapeshifting bounty hunter (seasons 2-8) and by the metallic super soldiers (season 9).

    Y 
  • The Young and the Restless: Depending on the storyline Victor Newman can either be this, or strangely the Big Good, or even more bizarre in some circumstances both at the same time.

    Z 

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