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"Your breath reeks!" "At least I have a face!"
Evil Versus Evil in western animation.


  • American Dad!: Stan Smith against Roger Smith. About half of the show's episodes revolve around these two fighting for their own selfish purposes to the point where their conflict has become cliché. Fortunately, it's all Played for Laughs. Stan wins in most of these conflicts due to being the main protagonist but writers do let Roger get away with a couple of victories.
    • When a conflict with Roger doesn't involve Stan due to Stan taking part in an unrelated plot pointing an episode, it is Hayley who usually takes his place turning the conflict into Hayley against Roger. While Hayley is less of a jerk than Stan is, she has committed some crimes in the show with one of her conflicts with Roger involving making fake ID's.
  • Avatar: The Last Airbender:
    • The purpose for Zhao's existence was to make Prince Zuko a villain you can cheer for. This was expanded for season two, with Zuko moving further into Anti-Hero territory and the new main villain, his younger sister Princess Azula, overshadowing him in every possible category.
    • Ba Sing Se vs. the Fire Nation in Season 2. Touted as the Earth Kingdom's last great bastion against the Fire Nation's invasion, it is in fact a city with a puppet king and evil shadow government that practices brainwashing. The shadow government's leader, Long Feng, comes into face-to-face conflict with Azula near the end of the season following a joint alliance with her. Azula wins, even recruiting his Dai Li agents to serve the Fire Nation.
  • In Batman: The Animated Series, the villains of Gotham City hold a very, very delicate balance between them all. The memorable Bad Guy Bar episode "Almost Got 'Im" features such villains as the Joker, Two-Face, Poison Ivy, the Penguin, and Killer Croc playing poker, all looking like they might kill each other at any moment- and at the end it's revealed that Harley Quinn has Catwoman tied up ready to be fed into a food processor. Two-Face and Poison Ivy have an interesting rivalry, as they used to date before Harvey Dent became Two-Face. One episode shows that as district attorney, Dent had wanted to develop a park into housing, and Ivy pretended to take a romantic interest in him so she could kill him by poisoning him. This leads to a Crowning Moment of Funny, when Harvey says half of him wants to strangle her and the other half wants to hit her with a truck. Ivy then explains to the others "We used to date." Joker and Penguin immediately nod and say "Aha!" in understanding.
  • In Biker Mice from Mars, The Plutarkians sent several agents to Earth to steal its resources to ship back to their planet. Each agent gets his/her city to exploit, however Limburger and Napoleon Brie, who hated each other since school, tried several times to take the other's city.
  • Codename: Kids Next Door:
    • "Operation L.I.C.O.R.I.C.E." tells the story of Stickybeard's rivalry with Black John Licorice. When Heinrich Von Marzipan turns up missing from the Kids Next Door Arctic Prison, Numbuh Five has to join forces with Stickybeard to find him. Heinrich has swallowed a magic seed that Black John needs to become human again after a curse was placed upon him and his crew that causes them to come to life at night as black licorice skeletons, then be reduced to piles of licorice bones during the day.
  • Danger Mouse: In "Penfold Transformed," new villain Dr. Augustus Crumhorn kidnaps Penfold and places a robot lookalike with DM. Baron Greenback, whom Crumhorn called "a fat and feckless fool," counters with Stiletto infiltrating DM's headquarters in a Penfold suit.
  • Most episodes of Dan Vs. are about Dan, a selfish, temperamental, paranoid, violent, sociopathic criminal, trying to get revenge on a foe who is equally or even more evil.
  • The Vulture Squadron compete against each other when the General offers a 30-day furlough to whoever captures Yankee Doodle Pigeon in the episode "Fur Out Furlough."
  • Dungeons & Dragons (1983)
    • Tiamat and Venger hate each other so much that they tend to fight, completely forgetting about the children. In the infamous "Dragon's Graveyard" episode, the children seek Tiamat's help in trying to kill Venger.
    • Another example from the same series was where the kids were outclassed by an evil wizard. Presto tells Venger what the wizard is up to... cue Venger marching in to deliver a beatdown and the kids running.
  • Evil Con Carne: The rivalry between Hector and Estroy. Also, when Hector decided to unite all villains and found the League of Destruction, all villain factions fought among themselves for control of the league. By the time Cod Commando, The Hero assigned to finish the league, arrived at their headquarters, the League of Destruction had already destroyed itself.
  • Stewie vs. Penelope in Family Guy. Stewie used to be very evil in the first few seasons, but has mellowed out a lot and is more of a jerk than an evil bastard. He meets Penelope, a baby girl his age who has done her acts of killing people and having a mass amount of weapons of her own. Stewie likes Penelope at first and wants to be with her, but even he starts to have his doubts, getting tired of killing people everyday and would rather take over the world. He fights her to the death when she goes to kill Brian because Stewie wouldn't do it.
  • Two episodes of Filmation's Ghostbusters featured a villain named Big Evil, who tried to usurp Prime Evil's status as the Big Bad of that series. Both episodes invoked the Enemy Mine trope by having Prime Evil asking for help from the heroes.
  • Gargoyles. Oh dear God do they ever. How many times has Xanatos been betrayed or outright attacked by someone more evil than he is? And then there's Macbeth, who frequently fights against Demona.
  • Gravity Falls
    • In "Northwest Mansion Mystery": The lumberjack ghost, who is perfectly willing to hurt innocent bystanders in his quest for vengeance, vs. the Northwest family, snobs who treat their daughter like crap and is fully willing to let innocents die just to preserve their own dignity.
    • Time Baby vs. Bill Cipher. Time Baby runs a dystopian future like a dictatorship and Bill Cipher is a malevolent god of chaos.
  • Harley Quinn (2019): While she wants to be the baddest villain in Gotham, Harley fights and takes down other villains most of the time, such as Joker, Queen of Fables, and the Injustice League. This causes Batgirl to think Harley is an Anti-Hero, which Harley vehemently denies. At first, anyways. Harley does get a little more heroic as time goes on, but she's still a bad person.
  • Conversed in an episode of Hey Arnold!. Sid suggested that he and his friends just watch two bullies, Wolfgang and Ludwig, duke it out over Gerald Field and when they're both dead they can reclaim it. This makes the example more Jerkass vs. Jerkass though, and when they try out the plan, the bullies just force the younger kids to play football to decide a winner rather than get their hands dirty. In the end, the bullies find they like each other, leaving the gang worse off than before.
  • As a Villain Protagonist, Invader Zim inevitably finds himself in this situation, once against a group of Planet Looters attempting to steal Earth, once against another Irken seeking to cause The End of the World as We Know It before he could (which also required an Enemy Mine situation), and once against a crazed, overzealous mall security guard who imprisoned workers and customers for petty reasons and later added them to his army of zombies.
  • In the Grand Finale of Jackie Chan Adventures, Drago (with all eight demon chi) and Shen Du (with all his talismans) both viciously fight for the Earth right before they both get banished to the Demon Netherworld.
  • Lucius Heinous VII against the Weavils in Jimmy Two-Shoes certainly qualifies. Also Lucius vs. the Rodeo Clowns in "Heinous vs Clown". A number of episodes also have Lucius in some kind of conflict with his more sadistic employee Heloise or his own even eviler father Lucius VI.
  • Justice League Unlimited:
    • The second to last episode "Alive!" had this. The Secret Society Grodd had created had been taken over by Luthor. However with Luthor taking much more of the cut than Grodd did and Luthor himself seemingly descending into insanity as well as not giving Tala much attention, she decided to bring back Grodd from Luthor's imprisonment along with a good number of the rest of the society who also had an ax to grind with Luthor. Luthor won in the end. And then Darkseid came along.....
    • A power struggle on Apokolips after Darkseid's death leads to an Enemy Civil War with Granny Goodness leading one side and Virman Vundabar on the other. J'onn declines to get involved in it when requested (to help a kidnapee) because it's ultimately better if both sides are focused on fighting each other rather than bothering anyone else. Flash gets involved anyway, though.
  • The Legend of Korra:
    • As of Episode 9, we have Amon vs. Tarrlok. Amon wins.
    • Book 2 has Unalaq vs. Varrick. Unalaq wins by virtue of releasing Vaatu, but he never manages to lay a single finger on Varrick despite having wanted him tried. Varrick however, did not like Unalaq and figured he was up to no good, but his own true goal was to make money from the conflict, and bring the war to the entire world; indeed, despite being finally arrested by the heroes, Varrick not only escapes their grasp and survives the Book 2 finale, but is still living the high life as an inventor in Book 3.
    • Book 3 has Zaheer and the Red Lotus vs. Earth Queen Hou-Ting and her regime. Zaheer defeats and kills her with absolute ease.
    • Indirectly in Book 4, when Zaheer, having heard about Kuvira, helps Korra deal with her psychological issues so she can once again access her Avatar powers.
  • Looney Tunes: The short What Makes Daffy Duck involves Elmer Fudd competing with a hungry fox to have Daffy Duck for dinner. Tensions between the two come to a head just before duck season is closed and fox season is opened, leading Elmer to angrily pursue the fox.
  • In the episode "Frenemies" from My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Lord Tirek, Queen Chrysalis and even Cozy Glow decide that a temporary partnership is the best option for them. None of them want to be subordinate to another, and while they found their success upon working together to be enlightening, they feel that a long-standing partnership would make them susceptible to the Power of Friendship, something that fills them with hatred. It's later played straighter when they all turn on Grogar, who turns out to be Discord in disguise.
  • The Powerpuff Girls (1998) formed an Enemy Mine with Mojo Jojo to combat an alien force. He was determined to prove he was the most evil.
  • Rocky and Bullwinkle: during the Kirwood Derby arc, Boris Badenov fought Fearless Leader for the Derby. When the narrator asked who would win the fight, they both turned to the camera and shouted, "What does it matter?! We're both bad guys!" The narrator admits they're right.
  • A three-way version: Professor Pericles vs. Mr. E (his former owner) vs. Mayor Jones in Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated. Though Mr. E is more morally ambiguous than the other two, making this more an example of Black-and-Gray Morality. By the end of the series, it turns out they were being manipulated by a Greater-Scope Villain.
  • South Park:
    • "Cat Orgy" has Cartman and Shelley going at each other, though later they team up and be Villain Protagonists for the episode.
    • Eric Cartman vs. Saddam Hussein. Eric Cartman vs. Scott Tenorman. Eric Cartman vs. Osama bin Laden. The Coon vs. Professor Chaos. Celebrities vs. ginger kids in "200/201" (and they eventually team up).
  • The Spectacular Spider-Man, another Greg Weisman show, as well. The series begins with Tombstone having firm control of New York's criminal underworld, but then he has to defend it from the Green Goblin. Then Gobby disappears, but in the next season the "Gangland" arc pits him against Doctor Octopus' Sinister Six on the one hand and returned former crimelord Silvermane on the other, along with his Dragon Hammerhead becoming The Starscream. Spider-Man joins the war and manages to cripple all three organizations, only for The Reveal that the Green Goblin is back, and manipulated events so that he could take over for himself.
  • While in Spider-Man: The Animated Series, a gang war between The Kingpin and Silvio "Silvermane" Manfredi over possession of the Tablet of Time takes place. Kingpin wants it to claim more power and influence for himself, while Silvermane wishes to restore himself back to his prime to take on the former. Kingpin's wife and Silvermane's daughter end up being kidnapped, while Dr. Connors gets caught in the crossfire and is also abducted, and Spider-Man who needs the tablet to cure himself from a disease that could end his life as knows it, has to race to stop both of them.
  • Mr. Krabs vs. Plankton in SpongeBob SquarePants, at least in a few of the episodes made after the first movie. While Plankton has always been a villain, Mr. Krabs started out as simply a greedy money-obsessed boss. Later seasons, however, played up Plankton's sympathetic qualities and Mr. Krabs's greed to such an extent that one would be forgiven for wondering which of them was supposed to be the villain between the two.
  • In Star Wars: The Clone Wars, the Separatists fight the Nightsisters of Dathomir. The Separatists win and wipe out the Nightsisters, causing Asaji Ventress to fight with the Republic.
    • At another point, Count Dooku, Savage Opress, and Asajj Ventress all duel each other at once.
    • Darth Maul allies with Pre Vizsla to stage a coup on Mandalore. After Vizsla is in power, he betrays Maul, who challenges him to a duel and kills him.
    • Darth Sidious gets into a fight with Darth Maul and Savage Opress. Savage ends up dead and Maul ends up captured.
    • In the show’s penultimate episode, Ahsoka is forced to free Maul from prison to use him to distract the now-evil clones from trying to kill her. He engages in a skirmish with the clones in a hallway, reminiscent of Darth Vader’s hallway scene in Rogue One.
  • Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2003):
    • One climactic battle between Shredder and the Turtles is interrupted when Baxter Stockman shows up with a Mini-Mecha to get revenge on his former boss.
    • After Shredder's apparent death in Season 2, a three-way war breaks out between the Foot clan, the Purple Dragon and the Mafia.
    • In Season 5, Shredder finds his organization monitored by Bishop, a menacing, mysterious government agent who previously tried to vivisect the Turtles.
  • Teen Titans (2003) has Slade teaming up with Robin to fight Trigon the Terible (a.k.a. Satan). He had ulterior motives. He is still Slade, but yeah, it was that bad.
  • Total Drama:
  • Transformers
    • This is the Megatron/Starscream relationship. Even more explicit in Transformers: Animated, where Starscream makes his break from Megatron in the first episode.
    • There's also Transformers: Prime: in addition to the Decepticons, the Autobots also find themselves fighting the human group MECH. And on top of that, near the end of the first season, Starscream splits from the 'Cons, like his Animated counterpart. Which is then followed several episodes later by the arrival of Unicron, who's such an epitome of evil that Megatron allies with the Autobots to stop him.
  • Every villain in Wander over Yonder is a Card-Carrying Villain battling each other for control of planets across the universe in the hopes of climbing the leaderboard and obtaining the title of "Greatest in the Galaxy". Notably, Deuteragonist Lord Hater has a recurring rivalry with Emperor Awesome, and in the second season he battles Lord Dominator to stop her from destroying the galaxy because he wants to conquer it.
  • Young Justice (2010):
    • A third Weisman show, the first season mostly follows Evil Is One Big, Happy Family, and even villains outside the Light don't really conflict with it. However, in the second season they team up with the Reach, supposedly as their Dragon collaborators, but it's eventually revealed that they're manipulating these new villains for their own purposes and stymieing their overall plan.
    • The Light's alliance with Apokolips is intended by both parties to end this way, with the two factions working together to conquer the universe before the final war with each other over the complete rule. In Young Justice: Outsiders, Vandal Savage gives the Team coordinates to Granny Goodness's space fortress, so they can stop Apokolips from obtaining the Anti-Life Equation which would give them a powerful advantage over the Light.
  • Zorro: The Chronicles: Don Malapensa wants to become the richest landowner in California. Dona Verdugo wants to place her husband (and by extension herself) in a position of power. Captain Monasterio wants to capture Zorro and continue his rule over Los Angeles unopposed. As the series goes on, the three often butt heads when their schemes interfere with each other's plans. However, they can be persuaded to make (and break) alliances, usually in response to Zorro, their common enemy.


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