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The only man you'll call "Grand Moff" and still be intimidated by. Not to be confused with Steven Moffat.

Teatime's mind was like a fractured mirror: all beautiful facets and rainbows but, ultimately, also something that was broken.
— Terry Pratchett, Hogfather

The Evil Genius is a standard character in The Evil Army. They're usually rather high-ranked, commonly below The Dragon but above the Quirky Miniboss Squad. They are almost exclusively male except in fiction that either has an unusually high female ratio or a female motif for its villains. The Evil Genius is obviously intelligent, and is the one in charge of the Wave Motion Gun or shipping the nukes into the country or resurrecting the Ancient Superweapon or what have you. This character is usually the one that will demonstrate to the Big Bad how to use a particular Mac Guffin. They're usually a Mad Scientist, a military tactician, a specialist in a particular field (such as computers or electronics), or has ties to The Government (or a combination), so they're in the best position to deliver the goodies to the Evil Overlord. In medieval fantasy settings, this role is often played by an evil strategist, rogue/spymaster, or a dark wizard (provided they aren't also the Big Bad).

Prone to being Bad Boss'd when the ridiculously circuitous plan inevitably fails or if they are no longer needed and viewed as a liability.

The Evil Genius is part of the Five Bad Band dynamic, the Evil Counterpart to The Smart Guy. An Evil Genius who is also the Big Bad will frequently be The Chessmaster and maybe even a Magnificent Bastard. They can also show up as members of Quirky Miniboss Squads, but then are usually made significantly less effective by virtue of their quirkiness.

Not to be confused with the Diabolical Mastermind simulation game Evil Genius, which has its own page. Nor the books by Catherine Jinks, which involve a School For Scheming aimed at creating these.

Examples

Anime

Comic Books
  • The Cyborg Superman builds all of the technology used by the Sinestro Corps, including the Manhunter robots who recharge yellow rings and the space station they used as a base.
  • Darth Maladi from Star Wars Legacy is both a Sith alchemist and the head of Sith Intelligence. She's generally portrayed as one of the most cunning Sith characters in the comic, but seems to enjoy her schemes and experiments more for their own sake than from the hope of doing anything constructive with them.

Mythology

Webcomics
  • Girl Genius is crawling with them. Even some protagonists, on a few occasions.

Film
  • A very frequent minion type in the James Bond series.
    • Dent to Dr. No
    • Kronsteen to Klebb
    • Ling to Goldfinger
    • Kutze to Largo
    • Osato and later Metz to Blofeld
    • Hai Fat to Scaramanga
    • Mortner to Zorin
    • Boris to Trevelyan
    • Gupta to Carver
    • Arkov to Renard
    • Popov to Graves
    • There are occasional subversions: Whitaker, Khan, Kananga, Drax, Kristatos, and Le Chiffre were all the "main brains" in their operations as well as the leaders, and Sanchez had what is nearly a parody of one named Joe Butcher. Stromberg has four, all of whom he kills early in the film to cover his tracks.
  • Jumba Jookiba from Lilo And Stitch likes to call himself this, although both the "evil" and "genius" parts are debatable to a certain extent.
    • He actually is a genius; when Spike made him 99% stupid, the remaining 1% was still enough to cook up all sorts of weird gizmos.
      • And he was even smarter as an "evil genius child prodigy!" (As in, a de-aged Jumba was able to do things with a computer adult Jumba couldn't).
  • Theo in the first Die Hard fills the role to some extent, though Hans Gruber himself is without a doubt an evil genius in his own right.
  • Grand Moff Tarkin from Star Wars could count, as he has the Death Star, is a strategist with his own doctrine, and is below The Dragon Darth Vader
  • The Doctor in GI Joe The Rise of Cobra. At the end of the film, he reveals he is the Big Bad, Cobra Commander

Videogame

Western Animation

Web Original

Five Bad BandVillainsThe Brute