Big Bad Wannabes in live-action movies.
- In Army of Frankensteins, Dr. Terrence Finski, the Mad Scientist who ripped out Alan's eye and is trying to make his own Frankensteins, would be a credible threat if it weren't for the fact that the time travel kills him twenty minutes in and the Frankensteins and Confederates take over.
- The nihilists from The Big Lebowski. Their kidnapping of Bunny turns out to be faked, and nothing ever comes of their threat to castrate the Dude. They send The Big Lebowski "his wife's toe" in an envelope to convince him, and the audience, that Bunny really was kidnapped, but it turns out the girlfriend of one of them actually cut off her own toe for this purpose. When things actually come down to a fight (which they were trying to avoid), Walter dispatches each of them in under a minute. It looks for a moment like they've proven not-so-harmless by killing Donny, it turns out that they didn't get off a single shot, and Donny just happened to have a sudden heart attack while they were threatening him. The only actual damage they do is set the Dude's car on fire.
- In Charlie's Angels (2019), Alexander Brock appears to be the guy behind everything, using Bosley and Hodak to power up Calisto and gain huge profits. When the pair make it clear they plan to use the tech as a weapon, Brock's reaction has Elena literally laughing at how Brock honestly doesn't get he has never been in control of this.Elena: Oh, my God...Brock: Excuse me, you work for me! All of you work for me!Elena: You dumbass...Brock: What?!Elena: You idiot. They're stealing Calisto from you!
- DJ Bobby's attempts at being the Disco Godfather in DISCO (2017) fall flat, whether it is threatening Vince or flirting with Emily, his wife Henrietta being the much more intimidating of the two. Granted, threatening Vince seems to work in his favor, but he finds it mildly exhausting and he still answers to Henrietta, eventually being shot to death by Vince in his own club.
- The Godfather:
- Moe Greene is certainly a renowned mobster in Las Vegas. With his resources, he could very well be a major antagonist to the Corleones. Unfortunately for him, his own behavior coupled with stupidity gives Michael a huge advantage against him, making his removal quite easy.
- Don Fanucci in Part II. He is very feared and acts ruthless, but is a Paper Tiger who has no real muscle and resorts to police threats to enforce his demands. After Vito tests him by only paying half of his debt, he decides Fanucci is no threat and kills him.
- Tommy DeVito from GoodFellas. Despite all his violence and bravado, he's still an unintelligent, small-time thug who will inevitably be killed for his irrationality, making him less of a threat and more of a violent bully. After the Lufthansa heist, he's beaten by Jimmy Conway, the true Big Bad of the movie.
- Godzilla:
- Jiro and Torohata in Godzilla vs Mothra are the villains of the film's first half, being a pair of crooked businessmen who want to exploit Mothra's egg for profit. But once Godzilla enters the story, they're reduced to a footnote who are ultimately killed by a combination of greed, infighting and Godzilla passing by their building and unintentionally destroying it.
- Biomajor from Godzilla vs. Biollante are an American corporation that try to get ahold of Godzilla's Cells for their own nefarious purposes, and later resort to holding Japan ransom for the cells by threatening to release Godzilla from a volcano. They might have been a good Big Bad contender for the film if they weren't also competing with another corporation whose best agent kills all of their agents to get the cells for his bosses. By the time Godzilla is released, they cease to factor in the film any further.
- The Yakuza in Godzilla vs. Spacegodzilla try to be a gigantic threat by taking control of Godzilla using Project T, but are ultimately nowhere near as big of a threat as they think they are, can't maintain control of Godzilla for more than a few minutes, are taken down by three men (with Miki providing a little help using her telekinesis), and pale in comparison to Spacegodzilla as threats. Spacegodzilla kills the ring leader and destroys their base without even realizing it.
- Winter of Hellraiser: Deader. He is utterly convinced that with his cult of undead followers, he will be unstoppable. He is proven very, very wrong when the real Big Bad of the series, Pinhead, finally makes the scene and rips him asunder.Winter: You cannot harm me.Pinhead: Oh you're not the first person to say that. And you won't be the last.
- The Vogons in The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005) first introduce themselves in a quite attention grabbing way by destroying Earth itself for the sake of making way for a hyperspace bypass and later very nearly kill Arthur and Ford by having them Thrown Out the Airlock before then eventually getting hired to capture Zaphod when he kidnaps himself and steals the Heart of Gold starship, seemingly establishing themselves as a truly dangerous threat. But at the end of the day, they ultimately end up spending a sizable portion of the film relegated to the background while the heroes are busy on unrelated adventures. And the few times they do get directly involved in the narrative after their destruction of Earth largely showcase them as being rather incompetent at truly being that big of a threat due to having bad enough marksmanship to make a stormtrooper look competent. And while they do manage to become temporarily threatening once more on their home planet by almost managing to kill Trillian, they only manage to achieve this by virtue of Trillian being tied up and at the mercy of a dangerous local giant carnivore that they customarily feed their prisoners to before then letting her go after receiving an official order for her release in time. And finally, despite ultimately proving the collective Final Boss of the film, not only are they at that point showing up long after a comparatively worse threat then themselves has already been neutralized, but their aim remains so hilariously bad that they only manage to temporarily down Marvin the paranoid android by sheer dumb luck. And to add insult to injury, Marvin ultimately doesn't even end up permanently shut down from the shot, allowing him to subsequently defeat them all in one go by blasting them with the Point of View Gun and causing them all to come down with a case of his own crippling cynical depression.
- Hostage: Although juvenile delinquent Dennis Kelly tries to play up how badass and "in charge" he is, it's clear as soon as shit goes south that his alleged henchman, Mars, is the real threat in the group and he's just a kid who's scared shitless by the hostage situation he tried to do.
- In the Loop: The masterminds behind the war are the PM and the President. Their respective enforcers, Malcolm and Linton see themselves as superior to each other.
- Jack the Giant Slayer: Lord Roderick is first introduced as an incredibly ambitious man already in an Arranged Marriage with Princess Isabelle that hopes to usurp the throne of Cloister from King Brahmwell. And when the time comes for the journey to be made up the beanstalk to the sky based kingdom of the giants to rescue Isabelle, he opportunistically tags alongside Jack, Elmont, and the other knights that go on the journey under the hopes that he can use the magical crown of the legendary King Erik to place the giants under his control and use them as an army with which to take over Cloister as the new king. But while he does manage to successfully get ahold of the crown and use it to temporarily appoint himself leader of the giants, his decision to reveal his treachery to the heroes prior to getting back down from the giants' realm and subsequent overconfidence in his own power as the commander of the giants' forces lead to him getting easily killed by Elmont when the latter confronts him before he has the chance to try to go after Jack and Isabelle and the all-important crown getting snatched away from him prior to his death by the giants' leader Fallon, who swiftly proves the true Big Bad of the film and serves as the Final Boss.
- James Bond:
- Goldfinger gives us Mr. Ling, a Chinese nuclear weapons whiz on loan to the titular villain's operation. Ling acts like a superior to Goldfinger in their interactions reminding him of deadlines and receiving progress reports from him, as the "on-paper" aim of Goldfinger's scheme is to destabilize the West's economy to benefit the Communist countries. He realizes he's being gamed perhaps half a second before Goldfinger puts a round through his heart.
- You Only Live Twice: SPECTRE is working on behalf of an unnamed country (strongly implied to be Red China) to instigate World War III between the superpowers. When the two emissaries from the unnamed country remind Blofeld who is paying him for his Evil Plan, Blofeld in turn explicitly reminds them of who's actually in charge when they balk at his demands for more money by tossing off one of his minions into a piranha-infested pool just for not following his orders. In essence, he showed the two emissaries of what he's capable of if they cross him.
- The Man with the Golden Gun: Hai Fat imagines that he is in charge or at least part of a Big Bad Duumvirate with Francisco Scaramanga in their plot to steal the Solex device. Scaramanga proves him spectacularly wrong.
- GoldenEye: General Ourumov views himself as "the next Iron Man of Russia" in M's words and is collaborating with Janus/ex-MI6 agent Alec Trevelyan to further his political ambitions. In reality, he's at best Janus's Number Two and at worst a glorified (and expendable) henchman.
- Casino Royale (2006): Le Chiffre is introduced as a financier for criminal gangs like Al Qaeda and the Lord's Resistance Army. Despite this, a risky bet causing him to lose the money reveals that he's just a well-paid Smug Snake, as shown when he is left squirming from two terrorists threatening him if he fails to get the money back. After losing to Bond in a high-stakes poker game, he's reduced to a desperate state and decides to just torture Bond to get the money. When 007 refuses, he totally loses it and decides to kill him in a fit of anger. Then Mr. White, tired of Le Chiffre's repeated failures, suddenly bursts in and clips him with half an hour of the film still left to go.
- Quantum of Solace: General Medrano views himself as Dominic Greene's equal, but Greene basically tells him off that he'll be a puppet dictator once he's installed as Bolivia's president and will have him killed if he balks. Medrano is seriously annoyed but reluctantly concedes.
- Last of the Dogmen: Sears, the leader of the convicts, is a dangerous and ruthless fugitive who has a stash of hidden loot that the police are desperate to recover. He's killed during an encounter with the Dog Soldiers less than 1/4th of the way into the film.
- MonsterVerse:
- Kong: Skull Island: Preston Packard. While a genuine threat to the human cast and even to Kong at one point, he's basically a pebble compared to Ramarak, the film's true antagonist. As soon as Ramarak awakens, Packard quickly loses control of the situation and is swiftly dealt with by Kong.
- Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019): The eco-terrorists Alan Jonah and Emma Russell think themselves the ones in charge when they unleash "Monster Zero" in their plan to awaken the Titans and restore the damage to the Earth's environment that humans have caused. Unfortunately for them, Monster Zero, a.k.a. King Ghidorah, is far more powerful and dangerous than they expected. Furthermore, Ghidorah turns out to be an alien and has no interest in helping the planet, but rather wants to cause far more destruction than humans themselves are capable of to make the planet more to his liking.
- Godzilla vs. Kong: Apex Cybernetics and its CEO Walter Simmons wish to be the ones that conquer the Titans to insure humanity becomes the dominant species on Earth, conspiring to manipulate Godzilla into killing millions of people so that the world will think Apex justified for killing him. But their own technology backfires as they uplinked King Ghidorah's mind to MechaGodzilla and thus are killed off by their own creation. Maia Simmons and her own army of men on the other hand are swiftly eaten or crushed to death by Kong and Hellhawks.
- Edwin of Predators; he might be a serial killer who conceals his true nature from everyone else in the group and believes that he has a bond with the Predators, but as soon as he exposes his true nature, he's taken down by Royce and used to bait a trap for the Predators hunting them.
- Vizzini from The Princess Bride claims to be an Evil Genius and is set up as the Big Bad when he kidnaps Buttercup, but the Man in Black kills him by tricking him into drinking poison about a minute into their first confrontation to make way for the film's true Big Bad, Prince Humperdinck, who arranged the kidnapping in the first place.
- Scream VI: In a first for the franchise, there's actually two different factions of Ghostface killers, though the first one — a pair of film fanatics seeking to finish the job started by Richie in the previous film — doesn't last past the opening sequence, as they're killed by the main Ghostfaces of the movie, Richie's family, who are utterly dismissive of them and make quick use of their resources for their own plans.
- Rayna Boyanov of Spy is clearly this. She actually starts off seeming a cool and competent leader who can order an underling killed for a simple mistake. However, as things work against her, she becomes more frantic and wild and is completely in over her head. That's proven when she attempts to sell a nuclear warhead only to be double-crossed by another dealer who makes it clear her choice of a guy to sell to was an idiot and he's more capable and Rayna would be dead if not for Susan, who was only keeping her alive to find the nuke itself.
- Admiral Marcus from Star Trek Into Darkness is most certainly a dangerous threat with powerful connections, and proves this when his starship the Vengeance easily incapacitates the Enterprise. This, however, forces Kirk to team up with John Harrison- AKA Khan Noonien Singh- to infiltrate his ship. He easily folds when Harrison gets his hands on him, leaving the Vengeance in the hands of Harrison, and Marcus nothing more than a tiny blip on a radar whose head gets crushed by Khan.
- Star Wars:
- The Trade Federation and Separatist leaders are this in the prequel trilogy. They think their war is the main event and they'll be in charge after the dust settles, but it's all just a long game by Palpatine to take over as Emperor. They only realize their mistake when Palpatine sends Darth Vader to slaughter them all after they've outlived their usefulness.
- Linked to this are Darth Maul and Count Dooku, who both think they'll be Palpatine's apprentice, ruling the galaxy side-by-side with him. In reality, they're nothing more than pawns whom Palpatine is using to control the Separatists and prepare his real right-hand man Darth Vader. Maul eventually figured this out during Star Wars: The Clone Wars and, since no-one knew he was still alive after his defeat on Naboo, decided to try and build his own army and base to menace the galaxy personally. Sadly for him, Palpatine realized that his former apprentice could very well destroy all his work and so chose to deal with the matter personally. While Maul escaped with his life, Palpatine made certain he would be in no position to endanger his plans, at least not before he became The Emperor.
- Kylo Ren and Supreme Leader Snoke have an interesting relationship with this. Kylo Ren starts out as The Dragon anyway, and he's certainly some kind of Super Loser villain wannabe but not even a contestant for Big Bad. Snoke seems to be solidly in the Big Bad position as Palpatine's Expy. Then in The Last Jedi, Snoke is turned into the wannabe when he fails to control Kylo and gets killed by him. Kylo takes his place and becomes the brief equivalent of Big Bad for the last scenes of the film; his position is not contested, at least not so he couldn't handle it, though he continues to kind of suck at it. Then in The Rise of Skywalker, Palpatine returns and eventually reveals that he was The Man Behind the Man for both Snoke and Kylo, leaving them both in the dust in the race for being the Big Bad. Kylo tries to root him out to eliminate the competition, but besides being overwhelmingly stronger in the Force, Palpatine is revealed to have a bigger fleet than he does, and at least some of Kylo's own supporters would follow the former Emperor rather than the unstable new Supreme Leader.
- Orson Krennic in Rogue One. While he's the main antagonist, in that he tends to be the one who's most involved, his motivation is to rise in the Imperial ranks above long-term rival Tarkin... but since Tarkin is in the movie that takes place immediately afterward and Krennic is not, it's not surprising that most of the movie consists of him failing to do so. Even underscored by directing decisions — like most high-ranking Imperial villains, he has a cape, but unlike Darth Vader, that cape is shown responding very realistically to inconvenient winds and so on, making him appear less impressive. Both Tarkin and Vader also physically tower over Krennic to show who's really in charge.
- Buckingham in The Three Musketeers (2011). He humiliates the Musketeers, counts on Milady de Winter's allegiance, believes his war machine to be invincible and all but states to Cardinal Richelieu that France would have no chance against England in case of war. However Milady is just spying on him and promptly defects upon learning that the Musketeers are en route to London, he's the first villain to be taken out by the Musketeers and they even steal his invincible machine. Subverted in the end where Buckingham has not taken the theft lightly and assembled a large fleet of airships and a naval force to take vengeance upon the Musketeers.
- Tombstone: County Sheriff John Behan acts like he runs the town, but both the Cowboys and the Earps treat him like a nuisance at best and a non-entity at worst.
- Ike Clanton is technically Curly Bill's Number One, and talks a big game, but folds like a cheap suit whenever violence is offered.
- Transformers: Dark of the Moon reduces Megatron to this thanks to some Villain Decay. After having part of his head blasted off by Optimus Prime in the last movie, he spends most of his screentime recovering and stays out of the action as much as possible. While he’s nominally in a Big Bad Duumvirate with Sentinel Prime, the latter is more powerful than him and quickly takes leadership of the Decepticons from him. This works in the good guys' favor as some choice words from Carly motivates Megatron to attack Sentinel and try to reclaim his spot as the Big Bad, giving Optimus the opportunity to finish them both off.
- TRON has the human villain, Ed Dillinger. As the creator of the MCP, one would initially get the impression that he's the superior or at least equal partner of the AI, but he fell into the classic trap of making the program smarter than he is, so by the time the film actually opens the MCP treats him as an annoying pet that he only keeps around because he needs someone capable of interacting with actual humans for his schemes.
- Dr. Hoenneger from The Wolfman (2010) (from a certain perspective, as he may have genuinely believed that Lawrence was just crazy and his treatment is relatively in line with psychiatric treatments of the time).
