Evil Counterpart / Literature

Book series with their own pages

• Harry Potter
• The Heroes of Olympus

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• Animorphs: David is an evil counterpart to... all of the Animorphs, really. He thinks of himself as a leader and plans on starting his own band of Animorphs (Jake), he can single-handedly execute complex plans that hinge on people acting the way he thinks they will (Marco), he prefers power morphs and enjoys battle more than the heroes (Rachel), he can easily read and exploit others' personalities (Cassie), he has no home of his own due to the war (Tobias), and he takes on the role of an outsider (Ax). His only distinguishing features from the other Animorphs are his selfishness and need for power and control.
• Artemis Fowl: Opal Koboi to the titular character. Both are rather arrogant masterminds who have taken an interest in each other's civilizations (Koboi with humans and science, Artemis with the Fairy world and Magic). Artemis is arrogant but ultimately a good person who comes to value his friends, while Koboi treats nearly everyone as a pawn.
• The Blade of the Flame has Makala for Diran on and off.
• The Black Ice: Cal Moore is the Evil Counterpart to protagonist detective Harry Bosch. Both were illegitimate children who weren't recognized by their rich, successful fathers. Both became LAPD cops. While Bosch eventually forgave his father and became dedicated to justice, Cal Moore turned bitter and became a murderous drug lord.
• Avery Lazar to Lissa Dragomir in Blood Promise. Both are royals, spirit users, and have brought people Back from the Dead. But Lissa actually cares about people. Her shadow-kissed bondmate Rose is also her best friend. In contrast, Avery does not show real emotions. Her shadow-kissed bondmates Reed Lazar (her brother) and Simon (her guardian) are little more than her slaves.
• In The Book of the Dun Cow, the evil Cockatrice almost perfectly resembles The Hero, Chauntecleer the rooster, the only difference being Cockatrice's scaly gray body, tail, and red eyes. This causes Chauntecleer to be mistaken for Cockatrice at least once by his Love Interest Pertelote, although she is later reassured that the two are not the same.
• In Cal Leandros, titular character Cal has Grimm. Both are human/Auphe hybrids, and share the same powers, attitude, and fashion sense. However, where Cal looks entirely human (save for his white skin), Grimm has the red eyes, white hair, and double row of retractable teeth of their Auphe ancestors. Also unlike Cal, who has spent most of his life trying to exterminate the Auphe, Grimm is trying to recreate the race.
• The Chronicles of Ancient Darkness:
  • Renn would like to say she's nothing like Seshru the Viper Mage, but there are undeniable similarities. They are both clever and secretive like their clan totems (raven and viper), have powerful potential in Magecraft and are willing to go against the clans' laws to achieve their goals. Renn's goals are just far less evil and selfish than those of Seshru. In the book that follows Seshru's death, Renn has to resort to lying in order to survive. While doing that, she doesn't fail to note how similar to Seshru's modus operandi that is. Also, while Seshru is older than Renn, they are both the only women Torak feels attraction towards. Since Seshru is Renn's mother, the similarities aren't that surprising.
  • Eostra the Eagle Owl Mage is this to the mad outcast calling himself the Walker who's actually the former Otter Mage Narrander. They are both outwardly cadaverous, refer to themselves in the third person and display mental illness. The constantly irritant Walker can come off as threatening, but he's ultimately harmless as long as he's left alone and will help those who help him. Eostra, in turn, is unquestionably soulless and wants to oppress everyone and everything. The Walker keeps little animals as pets and treats them affectionately, while Eostra has corrupted her eagle owl and a pack of dogs from the final book into monstrous minions she cares nothing about. Both are rather powerful for mages, with the Walker having some kind of a connection with the Hidden People and Eostra being a necromancer. By the end of the series, they are all that's left of the seven Soul Eaters until the Walker kills Eostra.
  • The Crippled Wanderer (alias Tenris the Seal Mage) is revealed to be this to two characters: Torak's late father (his younger brother) and Fin-Kedinn (his childhood friend).
    • Like Torak's father, Tenris was devoted to Magecraft in his childhood, but while Torak's father wanted to learn about the world and help people with his talents, Tenris has always wanted power to dominate others more than anything. These opposing motives were their reasons to join the Healers (the future Soul Eaters). Both of them are also skilled in remaining beneath notice and covering their tracks.
    • Like Fin-Kedinn, Tenris is a highly influential man in his clan and the region they live in, even though they're scarred/injured. While Tenris plays nice with Torak, the boy considers him to be a more friendly and less distant Fin-Kedinn, but he's ultimately proven to be much more heartless and dishonorable than the stoical Raven Clan chief. Both of them have lost a brother, but while Fin-Kedinn takes care of his brother's children and eventually adopts Torak as his foster-son, Tenris tries to kill for power his nephew Torak whose father he indirectly killed.
• Variation in the Coldfire Trilogy. The Undying Prince is presented as a dark twin of one of the two main characters, Gerald Tarrant. However, Tarrant himself is at that point in the series either a Sociopathic Hero or outright Villain Protagonist, depending on interpretation, so the Prince is less his evil counterpart and more his evil-er counterpart.
• Many of Joseph Conrad's novels utilize this trope, most notably Kurtz to Marlow in Heart of Darkness, Gentleman Brown to Jim in Lord Jim, and Mr. Jones to Axel Heyst in Victory.
• Cthulhu Armageddon's John Henry Booth faces two in Peter Goodhill and Alan Ward. Like John, Peter Goodhill is an exiled New Arkham Ranger but one who is solely self-interested and willing to do anything (including capture and sell slaves) to survive. Alan Ward, by contrast, is as devoted as John to saving the human race from extinction but willing to transform humanity into monsters in order to do it.
• Cthulhu Mythos: When August Derleth took H. P. Lovecraft's ideas and ran with them, he posited a group of "good" counterparts of the Great Old Ones called the "Elder Gods." Brian Lumley took this concept even further in his Cthulhu Mythos novels, with appearances by the Elder Gods Kthanid (a good Cthulhu) and Yad-Thaddag (a good Yog-Sothoth).
• In Danganronpa Zero, Yasuke Matsuda is this to Kyouko Kirigiri. Both are brilliant, aloof love interests to their respective protagonists, but Yasuke sacrificed everything — his morals, pride, and life — because he was so dependent on Junko's love. They've never met, but he is what she fears becoming. In the bad ending, Kyouko dies the same way he did.
• Subverted in Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul. When Greg Heffley and his family go on a road trip, they keep running into a family that Greg calls "the Beardos." Not only do the Beardos stay at the same hotels and visit the same attractions as the Heffleys, both families have one mother, one father, and three boys. When the Heffleys visit a water park and the key to their locker goes missing, they think it is number 929, but when the manager unlocks the locker with the master key, the locker is empty and they suspect the Beardos stole their cell phones and credit cards. The subversion comes when Greg finds out that the key was in a pair of his shorts, and the locker was really 292, so the Beardos were just a normal family trying to enjoy their vacation, just like the Heffleys. Played straight in the movie however.
• Discworld examples:
  • Granny Weatherwax's sister Lily, in the novel Witches Abroad. A somewhat ironic example, as Lily considers herself to be the good one, and Granny thinks of herself as an Anti-Villain, being a prime example of Good Is Not Nice. It's played with a bit^note What a shock. since the Theory of Narrative Causality means that any magically inclined siblings on the Disc will eventually form a Good/Evil pair, and the reason Granny is mad at her sister is because she didn't want to be the Good one and was forced into the role when Lily ran away.
  • Lord Hong to Lord Vetinari in the novel Interesting Times. Though the two never meet (and Vetinari may not even be aware of Hong's existence) the uncanny similarities of hyper competence, forward thinking, manipulation and the ability to wield power are made clear. Hong is a younger Vetinari with all the sense of duty channeled into personal ambition. Hong's mistake is that he thinks everyone is like the Agatean people; he doesn't know people and how to push their levers whilst Vetinari is a master of getting people to do what he wants them to do, even though they think they aren't.
  • In general, members of the Assassins' Guild seem to be the evil counterparts of Vimes — he is a gritty Technical Pacifist who fights dirty whereas they are unsurprisingly well-bred hired killers.
  • Angua and her brother Wolfgang in The Fifth Elephant, both are Werewolves who are extremely dangerous as well as very intelligent and charming. Wolfgang, unlike Angua is unashamedly Ax-Crazy and sees humans as just food whilst Angua has learned to coexist with them and has a human lover in Carrot. Angua herself lampshades it at the end saying there's always the chance she might end up like Wolfgang, and makes Carrot promise that he'll kill her if that ever happens.
  • Vimes and Carcer in Night Watch, to the point where the book itself notes that Carcer is an inverted version of Vimes. Both are extremely determined and driven men with similar cynical outlooks on the world, believing that law and order are essentially illusions, but whereas Vimes makes it his life's work to uphold those illusions Carcer does his best to shatter them. Vimes is Commander of the Watch, Carcer specializes in murdering coppers. When cast back in time, both manage to become sergeants and leaders of their respective sides through sheer audacity alone. It's implied that Carcer is what Vimes would have become, had Keel not taken him under his wing as a boy.
  • Going Postal has the contrast between Moist von Lipwig, a deconstruction of the Gentleman Thief (who proves he has a heart), and Manipulative Bastard Con Man Reacher Gilt. Part of Moist's motivation is to prove that he is different than Gilt.
  • Reaper Man has the New Death in contrast with Death/Bill Door. The New Death takes pleasure in taking lives, while Death feels compassion for humanity.
• John Sunlight, the only villain to face Doc Savage more than once in the novels, had many qualities in common with Doc.
  • An even more obvious Evil Counterpart appears in the Doc Savage Annual published by DC Comics. It featured Siegfried, a young man raised by one of Doc's former teachers under the training regime developed by Doc's father. Siegfried and his mentor were in service of the Nazis.
• In the Drenai saga, the order of Warrior Monks called The Thirty have an evil counterpart, The Dark Brotherhood. They rape, torture and sacrifice prisoners, including children, mind-control enemies into killing their friends or committing slow and painful suicide, snuff out people's souls while they're asleep, and cheat by having more than thirty members.
• Piter De Vries from Dune is the Mentat assassin of House Harkonnen, making him the evil counterpart to Thufir Hawat, Mentat Master of Assassins to House Atreides. Thufir uses his abilities mainly to defend the Atreides, while Piter works mainly to destroy the Harkonnens' enemies (enjoying himself in the process).
• In the Ea Cycle Morjin is what Valashu would become if he went to The Dark Side.
• In the Earth's Children Series, protagonist Ayla, a beautiful and all-loving heroine, has a dark counterpart in Attaroa, a beautiful but violent and sadistic misandrist.
• In The Elenium series, Martel is the counterpart to protagonist and Knight in Sour Armor Sparhawk; they were both raised as Pandion Knights and were renowned as the best of their order — equals in combat, intelligence and the use of magic. However, while Sparhawk retained unshakable loyalty to the order and his ruling monarch, Martel grew obsessed with personal power and delved into forbidden magic. He was eventually caught and excommunicated from the order, becoming a mercenary. At the climax of the Elenium they finally duel. Martel loses, and with his dying breaths admits he expected to.
• In The Inheritance Cycle, Murtagh was already a slightly darker version of Eragon before Galbatorix recaptured him and forced him to become a Blood Knight.
  • Nasuada has to keep a close reign on her modus operandi, so that she doesn't turn into Galbatorix.
• The Haunting of Drearcliff Grange School:
  • Protagonist Amy is a telekinetic student at the eponymous Superhero School. During a conflict with the school's opposite number, an Academy of Evil called Draycott's House of Reform, she has an encounter with a Draycott's student who has similar telekinetic abilities but manifests them in different and more violent ways.
  • Near the end of the book it's mentioned that Drearcliff alumna and current superhero Ghost Lantern Girl, whose lantern bestows on her the combined knowledge and abilities of all its previous wielders, has a recurring adversary whose power comes from a cursed artifact that also bestows the abilities of its previous users but in a way that's less symbiotic and more parasitic.
• Marth for Tristam in Heirs of Ash.
• James Bond:
  • In From Russia with Love, Red Grant is this to Bond, but serving the USSR instead of Britain. Like Bond, Grant is an elite government-sponsored assassin and a crack shot, as well as an excellent hand-to-hand fighter and enjoys consuming alcohol regularly. The key difference is that while Bond serves MI6 as both a field agent and assassin, Grant serves SMERSH as not only an assassin, but as a prison executioner. Bond also dislikes killing and often tries to forget the deaths he has caused, but Grant is a sadist who revels in death. While Bond is a womanizer, Grant pays no attention to them unless he has to kill them later. Bond also tries to avoid killing in cold blood, but Grant was a Serial Killer during his teenage years.
  • Roland Marquis is this to Bond in High Time to Kill. Both men are highly skilled professionals in their respective organizations and have a history of womanizing, but Bond is loyal to his government while Marquis had no problem selling out and become its enemy instead.
• John Carter of Mars: Phaidor of the Holy Therns to Dejah Thoris of Helium. Both of them are Martian princesses from prestigious dynasties that fall in love with The Hero John Carter after he saved them on separate occasions. Main difference is that Phaidor belongs to an evil, cannibalistic, supremacist cult while Dejah is a popular political figure interested in restoring their planet and she is very much Happily Married to Carter, something which Phaidor despises immensely.
• R.A. Salvatore feels the need to state that Artemis Entreri is Drizzt's "dark mirror" every time the two meet.
  • This is partially because Artemis himself became obsessed with the concept of them as opposites, to the extent that Jarlaxle faked Drizzt's death and hoped that Artemis would drop it now.
  • Interestingly, Salvatore would later write a far better example of an evil counterpart for Drizzt in the form of King Obould Many-Arrows (not an original character for Salvatore, but he gave him all his real characterization). Like Drizzt, Obould is an exceptional member of an Always Chaotic Evil race that sees the obvious flaws in his native society and rejects them. Unlike Drizzt who chose to run away from drow society and strike out on his own, Obould grabs orc society by the neck and forces a fundamental change in it, waging a brutal war not for the sake of plunder as most orcs do, but to carve out a kingdom where orcs can form a true civilization. What makes this interesting is that Salvatore never points out the parallels between them.
• Les Misérables.
  • While not clear at first, it becomes apparant throughout the book Javert is the Evil Counterpart to Jean Valjean. Both spent most of their early lives in prison (Javert was born to criminals, Valjean was incarcerated as a young man) and as result both gained dark perception of society and display a practically superhuman determination in pursuits of their goals as adults. The difference is, Valjean has his humanity restored when the Bishop shows him mercy and spares him, when Valjean in turn shows Javert mercy at the Barricade it breaks him. Valjean could find God and change his ways, when Javert has to look past his rigid sense of law and order and contenplate the divine, he commits suicide. Both Valjean and Javert also capable of effectively disgusing themselves.
  • Mr. Thenardier and Jean Valjean are both ex-cons who hide their identities behind a facade of respectability (one is an honest politician, the other a thieving innkeeper). Valjean is religious, Thenardier is godless.
  • Mme. Thenardier and Fantine are both mothers but Fantine is dedicated to her one daughter Cosette while Thenardier treats her daughters like pets, who she indulges as kids, but mistreats when they grow older.
  • It's explicitly stated that Courfeyrac is the good counterpart of Tholomyes, the man who abandoned Fantine and Cosette.
• In the climax of The Magicians, it soon becomes clear that the Beast AKA Martin Chatwin is actually this to Quentin Coldwater: both are talented magicians, both used Fillory — either the real place or the book series based on it — as an escape from the miseries of life in the real world, both ended up unintentionally making the lives of their family and friends miserable while pursuing their obsessions. and both are capable of acts of shocking childishness. In other words, the Beast is what could happen if Quentin were to cross the line from Manchild to Psychopathic Manchild.
• Marvel's Spider-Man: Hostile Takeover: Blood Spider is an Ax-Crazy psychopath who believes that he is the real Spider-Man and is willing to kill anyone he is able to in order to prove it, having undergone experimentation to give him similar powers to the Wall-Crawler and a custom-made (and inferior) web-shooter.
• Miss Trunchbull is this to Miss Honey in Matilda.
• Modesty Blaise:
  • The female crime boss in The Xanadu Talisman has a lot of parallels to Modesty in her own crime boss days, but without any Modesty's code of honour or scruples about getting involved in dirty business like Human Trafficking.
  • Hugh Oberon in The Night of Morningstar is described as being like Willie if he'd gone down a wrong path; they have similar skills, but where Willie has confidence, judgement, and respect for his leader, Oberon has conceit, arrogance, and envy.
• In Richard Connell's The Most Dangerous Game Count Zaroff serves this role to Sanger Rainsford.
• In various Michael Moorcock works, Gaynor the Damned (alias, in more technologically "modern" environments, Paul Van Minct) is the (in-universe identified) Chaotic Evil Evil Counterpart to every version of the Eternal Champion.
• In Outlaws Shadow, Robin Hood’s traditional Evil Counterpart Guy of Gisbourne gains a small supporting cast that is likewise for other characters in the mythos: Maid Marian’s is Lady Lillian, Friar Tuck’s is Archbishop Geoffrey Fitzroy, and the Merry Men as a whole have Guy’s Fine Fellow’s of Barnesdale.
• In Please Don't Tell My Parents I Blew Up the Moon (sequel to Please Don't Tell My Parents I'm a Supervillain), retired superhero the Audit thinks that the Inscrutable Machine are deliberately mirroring her daughter and her friends out of jealousy. E-Claire looks enough like Claire that she probably heard variants of "Almost as pretty as Claire Lutra" a lot and her name is an obvious reference, Reviled's name is a reference to Ray Viles, and Bad Penny probably has a minor inventing ability that Penny's much stronger and more public one overshadowed. This is, of course, completely wrong. The real reason that the Inscrutable Machine looks and acts like Penny and her friends is because they are Penny and her friends. It helps that Claire has a minor shapeshifting ability that makes her look just different enough for the trick to work.
• C. Auguste Dupin and Minister D in "The Purloined Letter". Intelligence, cunning, very good at figuring things out, but Dupin helps people, while the Minister exploits them.^note Word of Dante claims they're brothers.
• In the Raffles series, Raffles and Bunny are essentially evil (or at least anti-heroic) criminal counterparts of Holmes and Watson. While Raffles is just as intelligent as Holmes, impatience and ego harm him time and again, while Bunny's almost obsequious devotion and subservience to Raffles' whims stand in stark contrast to Watson being willing to put his foot down with Holmes.
• Shiwan Khan, one of The Shadow's antagonists, had the same ability to "Cloud Men's Minds", and was one of the few villains to appear in more than one novel. In the 1994 film, the Evil Counterpart aspect of the characters was made much more explicit: both were trained by a mystic known as The Tulpu, but whereas Lamont Cranston turned away from evil, Shiwan Khan did not.
• In The Shadowhunter Chronicles:
  • Jonathan Christopher "Sebastian" Morgenstern and Jonathan Christopher "Jace" Herondale. They share the same given and middle name, have blond hair, were raised secretly by Valentine Morgenstern, are considered the best Shadowhunters of their generation, and form relationships with Clary Fairchild. But Sebastian is a villain who actively helps Valentine in his evil plans, while Jace is a hero who wants to but struggles to get out of Valentine's shadow. Sebastian was fed demonic blood before birth, while Jace was fed angelic blood. Sebastian knew that Clary is his sister from the beginning but still wants her all the same, while Jace is not Clary's brother but stops dating her the moment they are (falsely) revealed to be siblings.
  • The Jonathan Shadowhunter of the parallel Earth now known as Edom was this. Described as being a "divider", he apparently had some similarities to Valentine, and when the demons invaded his world in force, most of the Downworlders sided with them against that world's Shadowhunters, leading to the demons being victorious and the whole world being laid waste.
  • Malcolm Fade and Annabel Blackthorn are this to Emma Carstairs and Julian Blackthorn. Both are Star-Crossed Lovers involving a Blackthorn, and both want to do anything to remove that ordeal. Malcolm ends up committing double digit murders to resurrect Annabel, while Emma is nearly tempted to destroy all parabatai bonds in the name of hooking up with Julian. At one point, after seeing Emma nearly die, Julian comments that he sympathizes with Malcolm's plans, noting that he will try to bring back Emma too if she dies, the Clave be damned.
  • Zara Dearborn to Clary Fairchild. Both are children of evil fathers who have too much power on their hands. But Zara is a Daddy's Little Villain who embraces Horace's supremacist views regarding Downworlders, while Clary considers Valentine her Archnemesis Dad and never views Downworlders as beneath her.
• In Jack Schaefer's Shane Stark Wilson serves this role to Shane himself.
• Sherlock Holmes:
  • Sherlock Holmes and Professor Moriarty. Both brilliant men, although Moriarty seems more personable and sociable when Holmes talks about him. While Holmes solves cases as intellectual puzzles, and occasionally to help someone out as in "The Case of the Speckled Band", Moriarty applies his brains to defrauding people.
  • Dr. John H. Watson and Col. Sebastian Moran. Both are former military men and Afghanistan veterans, who act as... well, The Watson, to their respective geniuses on either side of the law.
• The Holmes/Moriarty comparison is taken to its logical extreme in Neil Gaiman's Alternate Universe short story A Study in Emerald, where the reader gradually realizes that in this world the nameless detective who lives at Baker Street and helps the police with cases is Moriarty, and the culprits for the latest case he is investigating are Holmes and Watson. Although the nature of this society is such that Holmes and Watson are still the good guys.
• The Holmes/Moriarty is taken to another logical extreme in Kim Newman's "A Shambles in Belgravia" — later expanded into the book The Hound of the D'Urbervilles — which not only has Moran documenting Moriarty's "cases" as Evil Dr Watson, but also supplies him with an Evil Mrs Hudson (the madam Mrs Halifax), and Evil Baker Street Irregulars (the Conduit Street Comanche — a "tribe of junior beggars, whores, pickpockets and garotters"). And in his spare time, Moriarty breeds wasps, apparently out of sheer malevolence and balancing Holmes's retirement as a beekeeper.
• Un from Shinigami no Ballad, who is counterpart to the main character. Weirdly enough, even though she wields power of destruction, she is consider to be the being of creation, and that even though Momo's appearance are all white, she's actually Un's shadow.
• In the Skulduggery Pleasant series; Caelan has shades of being this to Fletcher. Both are infatuated with Valkyrie, both are vain and good-looking, they're pretty ineffectual despite having access to incredible power, and are very much the outsiders in the group of protagonists, and would both happily live their own lives away from the danger and chaos of saving the world if Valkyrie weren't involved. The main difference between them is that Fletcher is a Technical Pacifist who hates violence, and Caelan, on the other hand has killed dozens of helpless mortal women over imagined slights.
  • A good indicator of this is that, although he's seriously hurt when Valkyrie breaks up with him, Fletcher is able to move past it and get on with his own life, whereas Caelan simply cannot let her go and decides to kill her for "infidelity".
  • This is because, after Character Development takes away Fletcher's cowardice and most of his arrogance, he's pretty well adjusted and normal, whereas Caelan, on the other hand is so batshit insane, he killed his mentor for trying to warn him off his obsession.
• The Song of Achilles: Pyrrhus to his father Achilles, as they both share their supernatural atleticism and power and a desire to become famous. Achilles is somewhat disconnected from human morality, but thanks to Patroclus acting as a Morality Pet and the limited relation to his mother, having been raised among humans, he is still a good person at heart. Pyrrhus, who has no one like Patroclus and was raised by his mother in the underwater caves, is a violent, sociopathic Glory Hound that only cares about satysfying his lust and becoming a hero with praise lavishing on him.
• From A Song of Ice and Fire, Ramsay Bolton is the evil counterpart to Jon Snow, despite the fact that they haven't even met yet.^* "Though an upcoming confrontation between the two has been foreshadowed." Both of them are the noble-born illegitimate sons of powerful Northern lords, but while Jon is one of the most overtly heroic characters in the series and strives to do the right thing, trying to protect people, Ramsay is one of the most depraved monsters in the series who overtly enjoys torturing and mutilating people. Where Jon accepts his illegitimate status and points it out himself when trying to convince his father to allow his trueborn siblings to keep the direwolf pups, Ramsay frequently forces people to refer to him as Lord Bolton's "trueborn heir," refusing to acknowledge his status as a bastard son. Finally, after his brother Robb's death, Jon rejects the chance to be legitimized out of loyalty to his father's gods, duty to the Night's Watch, and he defends his sister's claim on Winterfell. Ramsay, on the other hand, immediately jumps at the chance to be legitimized as a Bolton, pretends he was never anything but that, rejects his duty to his lord and murders his way to become his father’s only heir.
  • The relationships they have with their families is also a dark counterpoint to one another. Jon's father, Ned Stark, loves and raises Jon as one of his sons alongside his trueborn children in his castle and as part of the family, openly acknowledges Jon, and Jon loves his father. In contrast, Ramsay was treated poorly by his father Roose Bolton, disinherited, and was only acknowledged once Roose's trueborn son died. Both Ramsay and Jon were befriended by their trueborn brothers, the heir to their father's House, but Jon sincerely loves Robb and all of his half-brothers and sisters, who love him, while Ramsay is strongly implied to have murdered his brother. Jon was raised side-by-side with Robb as best friends and brothers, mentored together by their father at Winterfell, while Roose kept Ramsay away from his castle.
  • Their fathers Eddard Stark and Roose Bolton have a similar dynamic. Both are stoic Northern Lords perceived as cold, but Ned is actually a kind and honorable family man who loves all of his children, uses his power for good, and helped overthrow his king —- known as the Mad King, a tyrannical ruler —- because he was an insane tyrant. Roose Bolton is a creepy sociopath who abuses his power and rebels against his king to benefit himself, caring about keeping order only for his own sake. Both Ned and Roose strongly follow the old ways of the First Men. For Ned, that means prioritizing the well-being of his subjects and believing that he who passes the sentence must perform the execution; for Roose, that means raping lowborn women on the basis of archaic, outlawed traditions. Ned loves his illegitimate son Jon Snow, openly acknowledges him as his child, and raises Jon in his home castle as part of the family alongside his trueborn children, giving Jon a highborn upbringing. Roose, on the other hand, treats his illegitimate son Ramsay very poorly, leaves Ramsay to his peasant mother, and only gives her money to keep Ramsay away from his home castle, refusing to acknowledge him until he has no other choice.
  • Houses Stark and Bolton could be considered this in general. While the Starks are the ancient rulers of the North, loyal and some of the most decent people in a Crapsack World, the Boltons are villainous traitors who murder Robb Stark and are rewarded with control of the North. The current generation of Stark are skinchangers, meaning they can slip into the bodies of other beings. The Boltons have a tradition of flaying and they sometimes literally wear the skins of those they've flayed.
  • Gregor Clegane aka "The Mountain" is the Evil Counterpart to his younger brother Sandor Clegane aka "The Hound", both are imposing, heavily armored, BFS wielding Blood Knights with the latter being the only person in Westeros who can match the former in strength. However, as cruel and embittered as Sandor is, he's still a damn sight more heroic than his Ax-Crazy woman raping, baby crushing older brother and displays multiple Pet the Dog and Papa Wolf moments to Sansa and Arya making him a Knight in Sour Armor. Bonus points they both seemly die at one point, though it's hinted they both might have survived (albeit one as an armored zombie).
  • Joffrey Baratheon was the Evil Counterpart to Robb Stark being the eldest of their siblings and are Young and in Charge after their fathers were killed (though Robert wasn't actually Joffrey's dad). The way the Robb and Joffrey handle the responsibility differs thanks to their upbringing, with Robb being noble and honor bound and even willing to give his claim to the North to his brother Jon whom he loves, Joffrey, on the other hand, was a malicious Royal Brat who executes people out of pure sadism and is hated by his people while Robb was adored. Both Joffrey and Robb were also assassinated at their respective weddings though while Robb broke his oath to the Freys out of chivalry to Jeyne, Joffrey was killed through a collaboration of the Tyrells and Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish.
  • Cersei Lanniser is the Evil Counterpart to Catelyn Stark (nee Tully) both are the proud Mama Bear matriarch of their respective families who are prone to making rash decisions that often end in failure and are sometimes even cruel to their own loved ones. The difference Catelyn is (or was) a good person who cherishes her family and has no greater ambition beyond them, Cersei on the other hand is power-hungry, and despite loving her children she still sees them as means to an end becoming quite the Evil Queen in the process. Subverted when Catelyn becomes Lady Stoneface who is arguably just as bad as Cersei or maybe even worse.
    • Ironically Jamie becomes the Good Counterpart to Cersei (his sister and lover), as while he shares similar arrogance and cruelty to her Jamie still has some goodness buried deep seen when he killed the Mad King to stop him massacring King's Landing with Wildfire and when he saved Brienne in A Storm of Swords. Unlike Jamie, Cersei has never been humbled nor has she cared for anyone beyond her family.
    • Daenerys Targaryen is also a Good Counterpart to Cersei as they're both exceptionally beautiful women who were placed in an Arranged Marriage (Dany to Khal Drogo, Cersei to Robert Baratheon) against their wishes and went on to become rulers after their husbands died. But Daenerys in contrast to Cersei genuinely cares for innocent people becomes a "breaker of chains" while Cersei treats the smallfolk like dirt and they repay her in kind.
  • The Mad King aka Aerys II Targaryen was the Evil Counterpart to his son Rhaegar Targaryen. While Aerys was a much-hated monarch being tyrannical and sadistic burning people alive to please his own abhorrent fetish and grew insane and paranoid to conspiracies against him, Rhaegar despite being a Targaryen was a much-beloved prince for his compassion and intelligence, to point where he cared more about music and books than bloodshed and conquest. It's telling that while people still despise Aerys long after his death, Rhaegar is still fondly remembered among the Seven Kingdoms.
    • Viserys was also everything his older brother wasn't i.e cruel, vindictive, and power-hungry.
• Sporewiki Fiction Universe The Loron'Kikra serve as this for the Loron. Not that the Loron are particularly good, but at least they aren't demons. Considering what Loron are like, it's parodied since neither versions can decide which one is the "copy cat dumbos."
• The Star Trek: Typhon Pact series presents the Breen Confederacy as an antagonistic counterpart to the United Federation of Planets. Like the Federation, the Breen draw on multiple races and cultures to form their membership, and no race is legally subordinate to another. However, where the Federation celebrates its diversity and the potential for new perspectives, the Breen fear bias to an extreme degree, and insist on hiding their diversity even as they utilize it. Where the Federation is open and bright, the Breen are secretive, closed-off and embrace the shadows.
• Recent Star Wars novels have taken the unfortunate fact that Shira Brie/Lumiya and Mara Jade are the same recycled character concept and chosen to emphasize the fact that Lumiya is Mara Jade's Evil Counterpart. The Legacy of the Force series, for instance, has for the first time confirmed that Shira Brie was part of the same Emperor's Hand program as Mara Jade and equal to her in rank, and, ironically, that if she had been nearby when the 2nd Death Star blew up and been given the task of horribly murdering Luke Skywalker, she could very likely have been the one redeemed by love who ended up marrying Luke instead of being horribly disfigured and eventually killed by him.
  • Within Star Wars Legends there's the somewhat odd variant with Grand Admiral Thrawn, an Expy of Sherlock Holmes, but also an antagonist and therefore technically a villain himself, who has his own Evil Counterpart in Nuso Esva (shift the letters one back.) In the novella Crisis of Faith, it even ends with a threat that though Nuso Esva may be dead, members of his organization survive and will take their revenge, as with Moriarty and his dragon Sebastian Moran.
• In the Titus Crow novels by Brian Lumley, the Elder Gods are the good counterparts for the Great Old Ones. Indeed, it turns out the Cthulhu Mythos is primarily composed of the Elder Races' criminals.
• To Kill a Mockingbird: Bob Ewell is this to Atticus Finch and Boo Radley.
  • Atticus is kind, compassionate man and loving father who tries to steer Jem and Scout away from the racism of Maycomb. Ewell is disgusting racist hick who neglects his family, abuses his children, and pushes his daughter into having a black man's life destroyed.
  • Boo Radley is a recluse who hides from the world, while the world makes nasty rumors about him. Ewell himself starts attacking people after the town labels him public enemy #1 and eventually tries to kill two children, only to be stopped by Boo Radley.
• In Tolkien's Legendarium, every good race has one twisted, corrupted counterpart. Orcs were once elves that were tortured and ruined. The Nazgûl were once men. Trolls are these to Ents. The Balrog is an evil Maia. Gollum used to be a hobbit-like creature. The goblins share the dwarves' capacity for underground living. It's also speculated that the "fell beasts" that the Nazgûl ride could be the Evil Counterpart to the Great Eagles.
  • It works on an individual level too in The Lord of the Rings: Saruman and the Balrog are each counterparts to Gandalf; the Witch-King and the other Nazgûl are counterparts to Aragorn and the other human kings, Gollum is the counterpart of Frodo and Boromir is the counterpart of Faramir. Boromir, while not exactly evil, was more of an Anti-Hero, and his brother Faramir was able to resist the ring.
  • Also inverted: the Fellowship of the Ring was formed to have exactly nine members to parallel the Nazgûl: Nine Walkers vs. Nine Riders.
  • The Silmarillion has Morgoth and Manwë. Manwë is the King of the Valar. Morgoth began as Melkor, the most powerful Vala, but ends up as the Big Bad. Morgoth is also this to Aulë, which is lampshaded; both enjoy creating new things, not always according to the will of Eru. However Aulë created the Dwarves so he could pass his knowledge on, genuinely seemed to love them, and admitted his mistake to Eru Ilúvatar, meaning the Dwarves were given true life. Morgoth's 'creations' are corrupted versions of preexisting beings (such as the Orcs for Elves) who treated as slaves, and Morgoth only pretends to repent when first caught.
• Trapped on Draconica: Zarracka's is Daniar. They are sisters raised together and given equal blessing by Dronor, but Zarracka is vain and self-centered while Daniar is Modest Royalty and selfless.
• In Victoria, neo-Nazi militia leader Captain Halsing is one to John Rumford, The Hero. Both are officers, amateur philosophers and cultured warriors generally, as well as determined and rather ruthless soldiers fighting for the survival of their respective communities and ideas in a nightmarish post-apocalyptic setting.
• Lois McMaster Bujold's Vorkosigan Saga:
  • The Vor Game has the female mercenary Cavilo, who is as short as Miles Vorkosigan is (but more obviously physically attractive) and has a very similar talent for disguise and subterfuge. On the other hand, while Miles is ultimately a very good and loyal person, Cavilo is a psychopath.
  • In Brothers in Arms, Miles Vorkosigan meets his evil clone in a battle of wits and subterfuge. In subsequent novels, however, their relationship becomes something complicated that "evil counterpart" doesn't really encompass.
• Warrior Cats:
  • Scourge is one for Firestar. Both were originally kittypets who ran away to the forest and became leaders. However, Scourge was brutally beaten and then chased off by a young Tigerstar, and went on to be the leader of a large gang in Twolegplace, while Firestar joined ThunderClan and eventually became leader. Their key difference is that Firestar has faith in his warrior ancestors and would die for his Clanmates, while Scourge treats those he rules over as mere pawns to be discarded when they've served their use. To highlight the evil counterpart-ness, Scourge was revealed to be Firestar's half brother.
  • Hawkfrost for Brambleclaw. Both are the sons of Tigerstar, but while Brambleclaw had to fight every step of the way to prove to his Clan that he was different from his father, Hawkfrost's parentage was a secret for a while and he had an easier path. And both are ambitious like their father, but while Brambleclaw is also loyal to his Clan and does not share his father's dark ideals, Hawkfrost devotes himself to following his father's ideals, and ultimately dies when he betrays all the Clans.
    • Hawkfrost and Mothflight also count, as Mothflight devotes herself to serving her Clan as medicine cat rather than become mixed up in Hawkfrost's schemes.
  • Spoilers for Crookedstar's Promise: Mapleshade is one for Spottedleaf. Both were involved in a forbidden relationship, but had to watch as their former loved one moved on from them and took another mate, this time in a relationship permitted by the code. Spottedleaf's love for Firestar was so great that she approved of his choice and cared for his loved ones and descendents like her own as a spirit. Mapleshade, however, was blinded by vengeance, and as a spirit she tried to corrupt and destroy the descendents of her former mate. Suddenly The Last Hope having Mapleshade be Spottedleaf's ultimate opponent makes perfect sense.
    • Mapleshade and Bluestar count as well, both falling in love with a RiverClan warrior, allowing the Clan to believe that a tom in their own Clan was the father, and one (or, in Mapleshade's case, all) of the kits die on the way to their true father's Clan. However, Mapleshade's arrogance led her to believe that no one would object to the half-Clan blood of her "perfect" kits, which led to her exile and the subsequent deaths of her kits, while Bluefur knew the importance of hiding the half-Clan heritage of the kits and willingly, albeit reluctantly, sacrificed them in order to prevent the leadership of Thistleclaw.
  • A mild one, but Firestar and Needletail (who is more antagonistic than villainous). Both learn of Clan traditions and disagree with some of them. But Firestar ultimately respects these traditions (even if he disagrees with parts of the warrior code and tries something different) and works hard to become a loyal warrior and eventual leader of ThunderClan, the Clan that had taken him in; Needletail, however, scoffs at the traditions and helps Darktail and his Kin take over ShadowClan (her birth Clan) by force and overthrow Rowanstar.
• The Wheel of Time has several.
  • Ishamael for Rand. Both are the leaders of their respective side and are extremely strong in the one power. But while Rand believes in doing his duty and saving world, Ishamael became a Nihilist who wants to destroy the pattern because he believes that everything is meaningless, that the dark will inevitably win and that it his purpose to fight for the dark one. He also seems to view his role in the ever repeating pattern to convince the Dragon to submit to this view; during the darkest depths of his psychotic breakdown Rand considers whether his counterpart was in fact right and almost destroys the pattern himself after a bit of Nietzsche Wannabe speechifying of his own
    • In the last book, Demandred gets in on the action, with his persona as Bao the Wyld deliberately crafted as a counterpoint to Rand's as the Dragon Reborn. However, he's still not as good an Evil Counterpart to Rand as Ishamael is, which is fitting since the overarching theme of Demandred's life is that he's always second-best. As the commanding general of the Shadow, however, he may just be Mat's Evil Counterpart, since Mat becomes his opposite number on the side of Light during the Last Battle.
  • Lanfear for Moiraine: Both women assisted Rand and would have killed him if necessary. But while Moiraine just wants him to save the world and oppose the dark one, Lanfear is a Yandere darlfriend who wants him to serve the dark one.
  • Slayer for Perrin: Both have connections with wolves and dream powers. Both of them enjoy killing and they both tried to lead the two rivers villagers against trollocs
  • Taim for Loghain: Both are false dragons who serve Rand reluctantly and both wanted glory. Unlike well-intentioned and fair Loghain, Taim is a Darkfriend, recruited by Forsaken to undermine Rand's effort.
  • Elaida for Egwene: Both are Amyrlins of their respective fractions during the schism and both sought to unite Withe Tower and lead it in the Last Battle. However Elaida is actually an unwitting pawn for the Forsaken, and was chosen due to her arrogance and poor leadership qualities. Egwene, on the other hand, is in control of her fraction and wants to reinegrate separate one, not destroy them.
• In Worm, the Villain Protagonist Skitter realizes that the Slaughterhouse Nine, a team of psychotic superpowered serial killers, are essentially this to her own Noble Demon team, the Undersiders. They rely upon hit and run tactics and pick their battles with utmost care, striking only to cause maximum damage at minimum risk to themselves, and deliberately tailor their tactics to induce as much fear as possible.
  Skitter: The Nine are us on steroids.
• In the Zeroes series, Swarm is one to Mob. They both have the same empathic superpower; but while Mob is one of the protagonists, Swarm uses his ability to drive crowds into murderous frenzies. Mob is frightened by their similarities, as she believes that her power might eventually overwhelm her and make her just like him.

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