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"The Villain Sucks" Song

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Cruella de Vil, Cruella de Vil
If she doesn't scare you, no evil thing will
To see her is to take a sudden...
chill
Cruella, Cruella de Vil
She's like a spider waiting for the
kill
Look out for Cruella de Vil
Roger Radcliffe, 101 Dalmatians

The Villain Sucks Song is differentiated from the Villain Song in that it is not sung by the villain, but about the villain. The Villain Sucks Song basically just describes how the villain is a cruel person in every way, hopefully with lots of witty jabs. This song is sometimes interrupted because the villain is Right Behind Me.

Sometimes also becomes a Insult Backfire, because some villains actually find it flattering, especially if they are a Card-Carrying Villain.

Note the character this song is aimed at doesn't have to be a Pure Evil villain. It can also be sung about a main character who starts off bad, but who is destined to undergo a Heel–Face Turn. Not to be confused with the villain sucking at being a villain, though that might also be the case.

In period pieces, this can overlap with Hail to the Thief. If it's sung to the villain, it could count as "The Reason You Suck" Speech. For the villainous version, see "The Hero Sucks" Song. Compare Warning Song, a song that warns the listener about dangerous things or people. It may also be a Diss Track.


Examples

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    Anime and Manga 

    Comic Strips 
  • In For Better or for Worse, April writes a song called "Germy Wormy Jeremy Jones", about a kid who's been bullying her. It soon becomes a hit with the class until the school principal is forced to step in and ban them from singing it.

    Fan Works 
  • This song serves as one to Discord, being from the POV of someone caught up in his World of Chaos and cursing him.
  • The Dragon and the Butterfly features a reworded version of "We Don't Talk About Bruno" titled "We Don't Talk About Hiccup". It's sung by the Berkians about how Hiccup was the most disliked person in the village and how many of the Vikings are glad he's gone. Much like the original version, the subject of the song isn't actually a bad person; the people singing simply see them that way because they blame them for their troubles.
  • Pony POV Series: Princess Cadence, being the Anthropomorphic Personification of Music, weaponizes this during a fight with General Admiral Makarov, delivering a Magic Music beatdown with it after supercharging herself using the bonds of her team.
  • Total Drama Everything: During the second season, in the third aftermath, the eliminated and non-competing contestants sing a song named after Poison Ivy, singing about how much they want to see her take the Drop of Shame.
  • MuggleNet, a Harry Potter fansite, has several song parodies that fall under this category, including "You're A Mean One, Voldemort", sung to the tune of "You're A Mean One, Mr. Grinch" and "Dolores Umbridge", which is set to the tune of "Cruella De Vil".

    Films — Animated 
  • In the Disney Animated Canon:
    • Peter Pan had "Never Smile at a Crocodile", which was about Tick Tock the Crocodile. Lyrics were written for it, but only the melody made it into the final film (though the song ended up in a Sing-Along Songs video, however). On the other hand, the sequel Return To Never Land has "Here We Go, Another Plan", which starts out praising Captain Hook but ends up mocking him in the last line.
      Who else can think of the perfect crime
      And bumble and fumble it every time
    • The Disney adaptation of The Legend of Sleepy Hollow in The Adventures of Ichabod and Mr. Toad features Bing Crosby's dangerously catchy "The Headless Horseman". Also the rare "Villain Sucks" song to be sung by the villain (maybe).
    • Beauty and the Beast inverts this with "Gaston", a song about how great the villain is. Later in the movie we get a "The Hero Sucks" Song in the form of the "Mob Song", led by Gaston.
    • "Cruella De Vil" from 101 Dalmatians. She apparently doesn't like it very much, given hearing it on the radio in Patch's London Adventure is enough to make her kick her dashboard until it shuts up. Even the live-action version has the song play over the credits, even though there's no in-universe version since Roger got his career changed (again).
    • Robin Hood (1973) has "The Phony King of England", written by Johnny Mercer, of all famous songwriters one otherwise wouldn't associate with Disney. The aforementioned king catches Sir Hiss and the Sheriff of Nottingham singing this song, and chucks a bottle of wine at the latter, just barely missing him — but covering him with the contents. Upon being told the whole village is singing it, he says they'll be singing a different tune from now on. "Double the taxes! Triple the taxes! SQUEEZE EVERY LAST DROP out of those insolent — musical — peasants."
    • Played with in The Little Mermaid with "Poor, Unfortunate Souls", the gist of which is Ursula the Sea Witch, as part of her evil plans, trying to convince the heroine that Ursula's "Repented, seen the light and made a switch". The con is obvious to everyone but a naive, sheltered little princess:
      And I fortunately know a little magic
      It's a talent that I always have possessed;
      And — dear lady, please don't laugh —
      I use it on behalf
      Of the miserable, lonely and depressed... (aside, to her sidekicks) Pathetic!
    • In The Lion King II: Simba's Pride, the song One of Us certainly sounds like this, but the reality is a lot more complicated
    • Pocahontas has "Savages", which consists of the English and the Powhatan natives each singing about how evil and uncivilized the other side is.
    • The Hunchback of Notre Dame opens with "Bells of Notre Dame", most of which is all about just how evil Frollo is and how he's the real monster of the story. It's one long Moral Event Horizon in song form. So much so that the backing vocals borrow "Kyrie eleison" and "Dies irae" from liturgical music. "Lord have mercy" and "Day of wrath" indeed...
    • The first reprise of "The Gospel Truth" in Hercules was one for Hades, although it was very short.
    • Another very short Villain Sucks Song was written for Aladdin but isn't in the final version. Originally, "Arabian Nights", like "The Gospel Truth", had several reprises as different parts of the story were being introduced, and the first one was supposed to set up Jafar as the villain.
    • A song written for (but not used in) Pinocchio, "Monstro the Whale", is about the whale's status as the "undersea public enemy."
    • Winnie the Pooh:
    • Encanto has "We Don't Talk About Bruno" which details the many ways the family's Black Sheep Bruno has ruined the lives of the Madrigals and the town's residents with his predictions. Ultimately a subversion, as Bruno is a genuinely kind person whose Harbinger of Impending Doom powers have given him a bad reputation because everyone else thinks Cassandra Did It.
    • "Knowing What We Know Now" from Wish (2023) is sung by Asha, six of the seven Teens, and Queen Amaya when they find out how cruel and tyrannical King Magnfico really is and try and find a way to defeat him.
  • Pixar's Brave has the Song of Mordu, in which the king and his men sing a song about hunting the demon bear and what to do with his remains.
  • Bartok the Magnificent opens with this. It's not so much The Villain "Sucks" Song as a The Villain is "Damn Scary" Song. And it is not so much a The Villain is "Damn Scary" Song as a subversion, as Baba Yaga turns out to be a red herring and not evil.
  • In FernGully: The Last Rainforest, Batty Koda has his his infamous rap. While he's not exactly singing about Hexxus, he is singing about humans, whose actions kick off the conflict of the story, and he certainly sees them as villainous after all they've done to him.
  • Fantastic Mr. Fox has two. One is taken from the book as a nursery rhyme, the other is sung by Petey during a montage of Fox and the other animals committing a mass theft of Boggis, Bunce, and Bean's storerooms. Bean even berates Petey on the second occasion... for making it up as he goes along.
  • Babes in Toyland's 1997 incarnation has this in Barnaby's Villain Song; the Crooked Candelabra that serves as his backup singers says things that should be taken as insults, but Barnaby just loves being A Crooked Man.
  • An extended version of "Kyle's Mom Is A Bitch"note  from South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut. Kyle's mom appears directly behind Cartman, who's singing the song, towards the end — causing the other children to all gasp in horror. After his grand finale, he looks up to see the children staring at him, and he says, "What?!" He turns around. "Oh, fuck." He proceeds to get a chip installed in him causing him to get zapped every time he swears.
  • "Working So The Count Can Dance" from the 2000 animated film "The Scarecrow'' is all about how the villain, Count Grisham, is a slave-driver who runs his orphanage like a sweatshop.
  • Shark Tale has one regarding Lola.
    "She's dangerous. Superbad. Better watch out or she'll take your cash. She's a Gold Digger."
  • Scooby-Doo! and the Witch's Ghost has the Hex Girls sing a song about the titular antagonist during the end credits.
  • Rugrats Go Wild! has "Big Bad Cat" which is a cross between this and a Villain Song. It's the former from Spike's point of view, while Siri the Clouded Leopard's part makes it the latter.
  • Guillermo del Toro's Pinocchio has Pinocchio rewriting the words of a patriotic song about the fascist dictator Mussolini and turns the song into a complete mockery of the dictator, directly calling him a crybaby and a piece of poop in his face.

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Although aimed at the villains as a whole rather than individually, Muppet Treasure Island opens with Shiver My Timbers, which is this trope for the verses but switches to a straight Villain Song for the chorus.
  • The Muppet Christmas Carol has a The Villain Protagonist Sucks song about Scrooge here. The lyrics are basically about how Scrooge is a cold-hearted, miserly Jerk with a Heart of Jerk who absolutely nobody likes.
  • Speaking of A Christmas Carol, the 1970 musical adaptation, Scrooge, has one of these about the title character, the snarkily ironic "Father Christmas". From the same film, "Thank You Very Much" is about how happy everyone is that he's dead.
    • Later, "Thank You Very Much" is sung in earnest in a Bright Reprise after Scrooge changes his ways and cancels everyone's debt to him. None of the lyrics are changed; the song itself is about how the singer is grateful for an unspecified favor, the only change is the favor that caused the song to be sung. The lyrics of the "Father Christmas" reprise, however, change dramatically.
  • The James Bond series loves these, though it's less "the villain sucks" than "the villain is pretty awesome but dangerous and evil".
    • The title song to Goldfinger. "He loves only gold; he loves only gold; he loves GOOOOOOOOOOOOLD!!!" Why yes. Yes, he does.
    • Likewise, the innuendo-laden Lulu song for The Man with the Golden Gun. "He has a powerful weapon", apparently. "Who will he bang? We shall see..."
    • And the lyrics for Thunderball are less explicit, but appear to be talking about a man who "looks at the world and wants it all", and "strikes like Thunderball". The whole point of that song was that it could be either about Bond or the villain, Emilio Largo.
  • "Dr. Evil", written for Austin Powers by They Might Be Giants, is a parody of this type of song as used in James Bond movies.
    • That medley about Goldmember. "He's got the Midas touch / but he touched it too much / Hey Goldmember!"
  • Somewhat subverted in Dudley Do-Right when "Bread and Butter" by the Newbeats starts up as the main villain, Snidely Whiplash, walks onto a balcony to greet everyone at a party. Hardly threatening stuff.
    • But what if he really does like bread and butter instead of toast and jelly?
  • Subverted in The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford. Nick Cave sings the real-life song "The Ballad of Jesse James", which vilifies Robert Ford and casts James as a martyr. Ford hears the song and is enraged by the bias as well as his own guilt.
  • In Super Mario Bros. (1993), Toad is arrested for singing one about Koopa as a street corner protest.
  • "Rama's Great" in Sita Sings the Blues is a song about how the hero sucks.
  • A Series of Unfortunate Events (2004) has a song called "Scream and Runaway" about Count Olaf in which Lemony Snicket holds up title cards. It says to avoid him and his villainous troupe and can be viewed here.
  • Phantom of the Paradise has The Hell of It playing right as it segues into the closing credits, making the song a rare posthumous example.
  • The Return of Captain Invincible, a superhero rock opera, includes "Evil Midnight" sung by Alan Arkin as Captain Invincible and Christopher Lee as Mister Midnight. It's a duet between hero and villain that manages to be both a Villain Sucks Song and a Villain Song at the same time.
    "Believe me that no mother ever cried for Midnight..."
  • The Russian film adaptation of Peter Pan has a song named "Not counting James Hook" which is sung by pirates. Each pirate relays how he is the most brutal, greedy, filthy, etc. pirate in the world - "not counting James Hook" who is always worse.
  • Miami Connection: the film opens with the ninja villains stealing a shipment of cocaine, then introduces the heroes singing "Against the Ninja," a song about the evil ninjas, which is strange considering that the heroes have not met the ninjas yet and know nothing about them.
  • In the 1939 film of The Wizard of Oz, the Wicked Witch of the East is so despised in Munchkinland that the Munchkins sing a song celebrating her untimely death, "Ding-Dong! The Witch is Dead".
  • The House That Jack Built centers around the titular Jack, an unrepentant serial killer who's murdered over sixty people, recounting some of his murders to Virgil as they explore Hell together. When Jack tries to reach a staircase leading back to Earth at the end of the film, only to fall into the deepest part of Hell, what plays over the credits? "Hit the Road Jack" by Ray Charles.

    Literature 
  • "The Rains of Castamere" from A Song of Ice and Fire is about the last lord of house Reyne (whose seat was the castle of Castamere), who rebelled against House Lannister, and what Tywin Lannister did to him and his house in response. Tywin, needless to say, is fond of the song. He even gets a practical use out of it; when other lords loyal to House Lannister have considered acts of rebellion and such, Tywin has responded by sending a musician to sing "The Rains of Castamere" to those lords. Their capitulation was quite swift.
  • In the Left Behind book series, Buck Williams twists Nicolae Carpathia's self-indulging national anthem "Hail Carpathia" into "Fail Carpathia" and has his wife Chloe sing it.
  • Once per year, the boys in Krabat are allowed to make fun of the miller (their evil master), and do this.
  • In Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Peeves sings a brief one after Voldemort's death.
  • While they're Hate Sinks rather than outright villains, the four bratty kids are on the receiving end of this trope as each meets their comeuppance in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, courtesy of the Oompa-Loompas singing a song about their vices. This is carried over to the many adaptations, albeit with different songs depending on the version. (The 2005 film keeps the closest to the book's lyrics, despite adapting each into a different musical style.)

    Live-Action TV 
  • Arrested Development: In the episode "Altar Egos", the show-within-a-show musical The Trial of Captain Hook:
    You're a crook, Captain Hook!
    Judge, won't you throw the book
    At the pirate?
  • Some of the different sets of lyrics that have accompanied the Blackadder theme tune over the years could be said to fall into this category (the first and the second season specifically). Particularly those from the first series, which claim "he's very bad indeed", and berate him as "you horrid little man".
    • The second season actually has different lyrics in each episode, relevant to the episode (and, on at least one occasion, taking time off from berating Blackadder to poke fun at Lord Melchett instead). The second one is doubly funny because Blackadder ends up fighting and chasing the Bard who sings it.
    • The third and fourth seasons (in the fourth one the latest Edmund Blackadder is less of an outright Villain Protagonist) do without the lyrics altogether and subvert it. Blackadder's Christmas Carol opens with a version about how nice Ebeneezer Blackadder is, and the triumphant ending theme of Blackadder Back and Forth seems quite positive about Blackadder becoming king and possibly going on to rule the world.
  • Castle: Hayley Blue wrote two songs ("Here Kitty Kitty" and "You Crossed My Threshold") insulting people who made her feel angry and uncomfortable; a Loony Fan who violated a restraining order and the man who raped her.
  • "Well, she glides around the globe and she'll flimflam every nation, she's a double-dealing diva with a taste for thievery! Her itinerary's loaded up with moving violations, tell me Where In The World Is Carmen Sandiego" Though this may be more of a The Villain Is Awesome song...
  • Tori from Victorious uses one of these to give Ryder Daniels a Humiliation Conga. She and her friends write "Begging On Your Knees", which details Rynder's way of using girls' love for him to manipulate them and explain how she (and his ex-girlfriends) will have revenge on him. She then sings it in front of the school while her friends force him to remain on stage and take his punishment like a man. While it doesn't mention Ryder by name, in the context it's used, it works as one of these.
  • The main cast of Glee does one of these in the episode "Original Song", called "Loser Like Me" which is an anthem to the underdogs of the school. Sue, who has taken every step imaginable to keep New Directions from succeeding in any way, shape, or form, is in the audience and her face slowly goes from just watching the song to looking like "Wait a minute..." It's a gigantic "Screw you!" for all she's put them through over the course of the show.
    • Season 3 antagonist Sebastian Smythe gets one of these - within minutes of his first appearance! Played with in that the song being sung in this case - "A Boy Like That" from West Side Story - wasn't sung with him in mind for any of the Glee club members in-universe. The school happened to have West Side Story as their musical that year, and the song cuts between Santana singing this song as Anita and Sebastian's conversation with Blaine, providing a sort of musical exposition for the audience to show just what kind of guy we can expect him to turn out to be.
  • On season 4, Santana performed Paula Abdul's Cold Hearted Snake at sketchy Brody as a "The Reason You Suck" Speech.
  • Between the Lions has a musical animated sketch about a villainous character called Silent E who makes vowels say their names, resulting in some words having a silent E at the end. What's worse, though, is that not long after he is carted off to jail, he escapes turning either a cop's pin or cap into a pine or cape respectively and sets out to make more vowels say their names.
  • In 'Allo 'Allo!, Colonel Von Strohm's and Captain Geering are captured by The Resistance and forced to pretend to be British POWs during an inspection. Face to face with General Von Klinkerhoffen (who knows them quite well), they attempt to bolster their paper-thin disguises; Von Strohm affects faux English mannerisms, while Geering resorts to singing, "Hitler has only got one.."
  • Shining Time Station has "Bad Guy" from the episode "Bully For Mr. Conductor".
  • The Mr. Potato Head Show: Queenie begins singing one about Bully-boy McPherson in his episode, and as he realizes that it's not meant to be flattering, his smile fades, and he cuts her off.
  • Last Week Tonight with John Oliver ended its segment on SLAPP suits like this. John and an ensemble of performers essentially invoke Refuge in Audacity and claim that Bob Murray (a Corrupt Corporate Executive who previously filed a SLAPP suit against the show) has done multiple horrible things, including assaulting Nancy Kerrigan For the Evulz, causing both World Wars, being the Zodiac Killer, supplying Bill Cosby with his rape drugs, and not liking Tom Hanks. (The Refuge in Audacity part being that since all the claims are clearly jokes, they aren't grounds for a libel lawsuit.)
  • WandaVision: The Ear Worm that is "__ All Along" is this for Agatha Harkness though it's clear that she's absolutely relishing every evil moment during the number.
  • Season 2 of Luke Cage (2016) features "Family First", a mournful piano song sung by Tilda Johnson about Black Mariah's poisonous influence on those around her, and how Tilda, as Mariah's daughter, has been left to pick up the pieces.

    Music 
  • Jim Croce was fond of these. See "Bad, Bad Leroy Brown", "Ma Baker", and "You Don't Mess Around With Jim."
    • "Leroy Brown" is actually a Double Subversion: it starts out claiming what a badass Leroy is, but ends with his humiliation or, possibly, death.
    • As does "Don't Mess Around with Jim". Fortunately for the song's rhyme scheme, the "protagonist" Willie McCoy is nicknamed Slim.
  • Boney M was just as fond of them and added a peppy disco beat to describing Rasputin's} lecherous life, manipulation of the royal family, and Rasputinian Death as well as describing Ma Barker's life as a criminal ringleader with her sons as henchmen.
  • "Mean Mr. Mustard" by The Beatles. It's about a mean old man... named Mr. Mustard.
  • Ludo's "Love Me Dead", about a Femme Fatale:
    "Love me cancerously
    Like a salt-sore soaked in the sea
    High-maintenance means
    You're a gluttonous queen
    Narcissistic and mean ..."
  • Arlo Guthrie does this to Richard Nixon in the "Presidential Rag." The kindest thing he can find to say about the man is that he was clueless ... maybe:
    You said that you were lied to, well that ain't hard to see,
    Guess you must have been fooled again by your friends across the sea,
    Or maybe you were fooled again by your people here at home,
    'Cause nobody could talk like you and know what's going on.
  • Stephen Lynch has "Little Tiny Moustache", which is this towards a neo-Nazi girl the narrator was involved with.
  • Sabaton's "In The Name Of God" is this with regards to religious terrorists, calling them out as cowards:
    Suicidal, in a trance, a religious army
    Fight without a uniform and hide in a crowd!
    Call it holy, call it just, authorized by Heaven
    Leave your wounded as they die and call it God's will!
  • "Robber Baron" by Voltaire
  • "Der Fuehrer's Face" by Oliver Wallace, as popularized by Spike Jones and Donald Duck. The song is one massive Take That! to Adolf Hitler, with lyrics that mock Nazi ideology and music that lampoons German drinking songs, featuring a raspberry making a rude noise after each "heil!"
  • Cliff Richard's "Devil Woman" which is told from the point of a view of a man jinxed from an encounter with a stray cat with evil eyes, and his discovery that the psychic medium (a Gypsy woman) whose help he sought to break the curse was the one responsible for the curse in the first place.
    She's just a devil woman
    With evil on her mind!
    Beware the devil woman!
    She's gonna get you from behind!
  • "Mr. Blackwell" from the KISS album Music from "The Elder".
  • Grateful Dead jump on the bandwagon with "Dupree's Diamond Blues", where the eponymous Dupree murders a jewelry shopkeeper for a ring, so he can get his girl's "jelly". Gets a death sentence/life imprisonment from a judge who also steals Dupree's girlfriend.
    Many a man's done a terrible thing
    Just to get baby a shiny diamond ring
  • Dory Previn's "Beware of Young Girls" is a scathing attack on Mia Farrow, who stole Previn's husband, from a We Used to Be Friends perspective.
  • Electric Light Orchestra's "Evil Woman".
  • "Powdered Milk Man!" by The Aquabats!
    Oh no, it's the Powdered Milk Man!
    Oh no, from the powdered milk can!
    This super-villain comes a-creepin'
    When you're sleepin'
    And must be stopped any way we can!
  • "Wintersmith" on Steeleye Span's Concept Album Wintersmith, based on the Discworld novel Wintersmith. It's about the Wintersmith.
  • Daryl Hall & John Oates gave us a "Maneater", a song about a beautiful Gold Digger. ("the beauty is there but a beast is in the heart").
  • “Grumpydad” by Devin Millar, is about a boy trying to escape an abusive man who has a domineering daughter. They force children to work at their rock mining company without any breaks.
  • Tom Waits gave us the song "Way Down In The Hole" on his album Franks Wild Years ("ya gotta keep the devil way down in the hole"). You might also know it as the theme song for The Wire.
  • "The Daughter of Evil" from the Evillious Chronicles by mothy. The song is one massive Take That! to the titular tyrant Riliane.
  • There is a song named approximately "Hinckley, You're Bad" (title? singer?) which ends up as a subversion - the singer chides Hinckley for his lousy aim.
  • Breaking Benjamin gives us Had Enough, which is essentially a long "Reason You Suck" Speech towards a tyrant, and a declaration from the narrator of how they'll bring them down.
    You had to have it all
    But have you had enough
    You greedy little bastard
    You will get what you deserve
    When all is said and done
    I will be the one
    To leave you in the misery and hate that you've become
  • Eminem, while usually playing a villain in his own songs, has a few.
    • "Bully" is a humorous Patter Song song describing a typical day for his enemies Benzino and Ja Rule, describing them as drugged-out, jealous, Ambiguously Gay bullies.
    • "Like Home" is an entire song dedicated to Donald Trump, addressing his racism, Twitter addiction, transphobia, awful spray tan, neo-Nazi dabblings and divisiveness. It did not have the intended affect of riling up Trump to respond to him directly, but Eminem did get a visit from the Secret Service from Trump's goons over a different song on the album which described Slim Shady murdering Ivanka.
  • Though the "Colonel Bogey March" was instrumental when it was originally composed during World War I, it found new life during World War II as a distinctly crude Hail to the Thief-style Sound Off about Adolf Hitler and Those Wacky Nazis. For propriety's sake, at the behest of the original composer's widow, the tune had to be whistled instead of sung during its iconic appearance in The Bridge on the River Kwai, making this song an example of both With Lyrics and Forgotten Theme Tune Lyrics at once!
    Hitler has only got one ball
    Göring has two but very small
    Himmler is rather sim'lar
    But poor old Goebbels has no balls at all

    Professional Wrestling 
  • Zig-Zagged with Kurt Angle's WWE song with the crowd going You Suck!! (Thanks to Edge)
    • This became commonplace and was done by the fans even when Angle turned Face, and Angle himself in-universe actually came to feel that it was not only a compliment that the fans got into the act with the song, he more than once encouraged them to do it, including having the song play as part of a promo and exhorting the crowd to sing it at the top of their lungs! He even used it as part of a badass boast:
      "You wanna know what the difference is between me and you? I earned those 'You Suck's!"
    • In a later face turn, Kurt Angle inverted this in a different way, twice. Initially he actually started (usually against heels) starting to point at his opponent saying "You Suck" alongside them and the announcers actually played this as the crowd now respecting Kurt Angle and showing contempt towards his opponent. Interestingly the only face he ever did this against was Rey Mysterio once. Later his theme song was modified to leave out the part where the crowd chanted "You Suck' entirely, though some crowds would still say it at random intervals.
  • John Cena definitely treated Madison Square Garden to one of these at WrestleMania XX when he ridiculed Big Show with some hip-hop rhymes before their U.S. Championship match. The rap even explicitly ended with "Big Show sucks!" - which the crowd then echoed back in unison.
    • Despite Cena himself being a face for most of his career, his overexposure caused many to get sick of him (putting him basically on the same level as a heel to them), and caused them to sing "John Cena Sucks!" to the tune of his theme whenever he came out. Cena himself embraced the chants and even taught the audience on Conan O'Brien's show to sing "John Cena Sucks!" when he was a guest there. Recently, the chants have died down considerably, mainly because Roman Reigns is now in the position of overexposure that Cena once was in and the crowds have come to appreciate Cena's talent over Reigns.
  • Triple H and Shawn Michaels managed to turn the otherwise pretty neutral song "Stand Back" (performed by Vince McMahon at the 1987 Slammy Awards) into a song of this type in their uproarious parody of Vince and his son Shane on an episode of Monday Night Raw in 2006.
  • From Mr. Chainsaw Productions Wrestling: "We are the champions! WE are the champions. No time for Jacobs, cause we are the champions, of the world."
  • Former Nexus and Corre member Heath Slater was given a fan-made song of this sort. I HATE YOU HEATH SLATER!
  • Booker T sings one about Cody Rhodes based off of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer on the December 23, 2011 episode of WWE SmackDown!.
  • Jive Soul Bro was the music for heel manager Wrestling/Slick and was pretty much this. The constant reassurances of "this is the slickster talking to you" were not exactly a good thing.
  • The original version of Cody Rhodes's "Smoke and Mirrors" in WWE fits into this mold. The lyrics describe a vain narcissist far less loved than they believe they are, being prepped for a fall. Considering Cody's gimmick during this period was 'Dashing Cody Rhodes', a vain narcissist convinced of his own good looks, it defintely comes off as the song jeering Cody himself for his heelish ways.

    Puppet Shows 

    Theatre 
  • While "Master of the House" from Les Misérables starts off as a typical Villain Song for Thenardier, it fits neatly into this trope as soon as his wife starts singing.
  • While well-known as a freestanding pop favorite, the song "Mack the Knife" is actually a Villain Sucks Song (or maybe more like an "Anti-Hero is Actually a Really Nasty Dude" Song) from Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill's The Threepenny Opera. It just gets hit really hard by the pop versions changing the mood on top of the translation toning it way down. More recent translations like in the 80s revival of the play with Raúl Juliá preserve more of the sinister German feel, and the original German title "Die Moritat von Mackie Messer" means "The Murder Ballad of Mack the Knife".
  • "Macavity: The Mystery Cat" in the musical Cats.
  • "The Stuff" from Reefer Madness.
  • There's an anti-Captain Hook song in certain versions of Peter Pan. In the original, Hook sings it, making it a straight Villain Song.
  • "The Ballad of Sweeney Todd", from Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street:
    "Attend the tale of Sweeney Todd! His skin was pale and his eye was odd. He shaved the faces of gentlemen who never thereafter were heard of again... Sweeney was smooth, Sweeney was subtle. Sweeney would blink and rats would scuttle..."
    "And what if none of their souls were saved? They went to their maker impeccably shaved...'
    "No one can help - nothing can hide you - isn't that Sweeney there beside you?!"
  • In Titanic, the song "The Blame" consists of Captain Smith, builder Thomas Andrews, and owner J. Bruce Ismay each singing about how one or both of the others is responsible for the ship's sinking. No matter who you think is responsible, this song explains why he sucks.
  • "He Did It" from Curtains has three groups of people singing about how the villain(s) suck(s). Each group thinks the villain(s) is/are somebody different.
  • While not "villains" per se (they don't actually ever appear), the male portion of "Six Months Out of Every Year" from Damn Yankees probably qualifies for its abuse of the title team.
  • "Pore Jud is Daid" in Oklahoma! amounts to Curly making a bunch of thinly-veiled jabs at Jud. Interesting example because it's a duet sung with the villain who doesn't catch the insults. It's a parody of Never Speak Ill of the Dead because Curly is singing about how much everyone would like Jud if only he would kill himself.
    Jud: Pore Jud is daid, pore Jud Fry is daid, he's layin' in a coffin made of wood...
    Curly: Wood...
    Jud: An' folks is feelin' sad, cuz they useter treat him bad, an' now they know their friend is gone fer good.
    Curly: Good.
  • "No One Mourns the Wicked", the beginning of "Thank Goodness", and "March of the Witch Hunters" from Wicked are subversions of this trope, as they describe how horrible the protagonist is, but are composed of perversions/exaggerations of the truth and outright lies.
  • Merrily We Roll Along has "Franklin Shepard Inc", where a lyricist talks about how he works with the composer. He goes on to rail against said composer's money-grubbing and selling out.
  • The opera Regina has the Rain Quartet in act III, in which Horace compares the nourishing rain to the people who "eat all the earth." In the end, Alexandra sings a Dark Reprise, making it more blatant that it refers to the operas Villain Protagonist.
  • Team Rocket in Pokémon Live! combine a more literal version of this with Villain Song in The Best At Being The Worst. "The Hindenburgs of crime" indeed.
  • "Merry Christmas Maggie Thatcher" from Billy Elliot: The Musical. While she does not herself appear, Margaret Thatcher is the nearest thing to a Big Bad in Billy Elliot.
    Merry Christmas, Maggie Thatcher, may God's love be with you.
    We all sing together in one breath:
    Merry Christmas, Maggie Thatcher, we all celebrate today
    Cos it's one day closer to your death.
  • Brett's friends mercilessly tear into Lucy in 13's "Bad Bad News". Does she deserve it? Eh, subjective...
  • Assassins: None of the ballads the Balladeer sings about the assassins are particularly flattering, but "The Ballad of Booth" and John Wilkes Booth is especially biting.
  • Mean Girls: The opening of "Meet The Plastics" sung by Janis and Damian serves as this for the titular clique. It's half them fearing the girls and advising Cady to stay away from them, and half insulting how fake they are.
    • "Apex Predator" plays this straight with all of Janis's portions, warning Janis of how dangerous Regina can be and compares her to a lioness in the wild, hunting its prey, further advising her to stay away, which Cady, of course, doesn't listen to.
  • The rather obscure 1974 musical Jack the Ripper features a merry soft-shoe number about the titular serial killer entitled "Ripper's Going to Get You," with lyrics detailing how scary and evil he is.
  • "The Fabulous One" in Here Lies Love is Ninoy Aquino's political invective against First Lady Imelda Marcos and her lavishly spending the people's money. Projected scenes juxtaposition the opulent life with images of the Filipino people starving.
  • Nerdy Prudes Must Die has Literal Monster, sung by the nerds of Hatchetfield High about how Max Jägerman is a horrible Jerk Jock bully that makes their lives hell. Max then shows up, bullies away the nerds, and then sings his Villain Song... Which is just a Dark Reprise of Literal Monster, since he revels in his status and agrees that the nerds should be afraid of him.

    Video Games 
  • Assassin's Creed: Revelations has a mission in which the Assassin Ezio Auditore must infiltrate a party to prevent the assassination of Prince Suleiman. To do so, he disguises himself as an Italian minstrel (the Goddamned Bats of the two previous games, funnily enough). Then he sings songs ridiculing the villains of the two previous games, Assassin's Creed II and Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood. It includes the Borgias, the Pazzis... and even Duccio, a jerk who insulted Ezio's family.
  • "Lord Laharl's Hymn" from Disgaea. The general declarations of his awfulness are badges of honor to the Card-Carrying Villain overlord rather than insults, however.
    • Same with the "Etna Boogie", which plays it a little more straight. A little.
    • Disgaea 3 gives us "Onwards Mao" which describes the main character as a Mad Scientist.
  • The frighteningly catchy song for villain Nuclear Winter in Freedom Force
    • Nuuucleaaar Wiiinnteeerrr... aaaaAAAAaaa... Turn you land into SNOOOWW!!! He will kill you all for the motherland... aaaAAAAaaa...
  • The ClueFinders 3rd Grade Adventures: The Mystery of Mathra had an unnamed song unofficially titled "The Monkey Song or Do You Believe In Monsters," focusing primarily on how evil Mathra is.
  • The obscure air-racing game Freaky Flyers has "Pilot-X", a song that plays once you've gotten the titular alien's robot down to half its health during the final battle. It's a Musical Pastiche of The B-52s that starts off complimenting him...up until the second verse, which goes on to describe how unfamiliar he is with Earth's gravity and how big of a problem that is for him. By the fourth verse, the song has pivoted to talking about how stressed out he is.
    He's the most stressed out being this world has ever seen!
    (Pilot-X! He's Pilot-X!)
    His hypertension's climbing 'cause he drinks too much caffiene!
    (Pilot-X! He's Pilot-X!)
  • Intercontinental Music Lab made one of these for Dr Robotnik, fittingly titled ''Dr Robotnik''.
  • The theme song for Adventure Time: Hey Ice King, Why'd You Steal Our Garbage? consists of insults against the Ice King (he's "a jerk", "crazy" and a "turbo-nerd"), and has Finn and Jake swear to hunt him down for, well, stealing their garbage.
  • In Sonic Heroes, the song "What I'm Made Of", which is usually seen as Metal Sonic's Villain Song, can also be interpreted as Sonic's Badass Boast to Metal, daring him to come and copy his power and see how it's gonna end up for him.
  • Skullmonkeys: If the player collects every Swirly Q and the three 1970 icons, they are treated to an unlockable scene involving several Skullmonkeys singing a cheerful song about how Klogg is dead, and how glad they are for it.

    Web Original 
  • There is a popular vocoded song called "The Bed Intruder" where the Rapist's victim's brother talks about how they're going to find them.
  • Bad Lip Reading's "Beard With Glue" (based on "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt) is what happens when you cross this trope with Word Salad Lyrics. It's unclear who the song is about, but the singer and the bullfrog both hate them and they have a habit of sneaking off to punch Brazilian orphans.
  • In the Civilization V playthrough on Steam Train, during a speedup, Danny, Ross, and Arin sing one about Augustus Caesar, and repeatably mistake him for Julius Caesar.
  • This song is written to condemn griefers on Minecraft.
  • Dragon Ball Z Abridged has Popo the Genie, though it's less mockery and more abject fear.
  • RWBY:
    • "This Life is Mine", which is basically Weiss calling out her Abusive Dad for his terrible treatment of her, and how he can't control her anymore.
    • "Nevermore" is a duet from the point of view of Blake and Yang as they verbally tear into Adam by taking apart everything he built himself up as in "Lionized" and declare that he'll never be able to hurt them anymore.
    Web Animation 
  • In Bowser's Koopalings, the Koopalings make a diss track called "Big Nose" to diss their spoiled bratty adoptive brother, Bowser Jr.
  • In Helluva Boss, Fizz sings "Two Minutes Notice", which is basically him giving a Cluster F-Bomb to his (former) employer Mammon in song form for being the textbook definition of a crappy employer.
    Western Animation 
  • Animaniacs (2020): Season 2 had the Warners confront Christopher Columbus, at which point they sang a song about him claiming credit for discovering a land that already had millions of people living there, enslaving them, and getting really lost so that he thought he was in India and saying that he didn't really deserve to have a holiday named after him.
  • Codename: Kids Next Door: "Licorice, Licorice" from "Operation L.I.C.O.R.I.C.E.", which doubles as a Villain Song. Performed by Stickybeard and his crew, it tells the story of Black John Licorice, a rival candy pirate, who is described to be a more vicious pirate who'd "do anything for candy, even steal it from his mom".
  • "Kyle's Mom Is A Bitch" from the South Park episode Mr. Hankey the Christmas Poo. It was re-used in the movie (mentioned above).
  • "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" from How the Grinch Stole Christmas! consists entirely of some of the most creative and eloquent insults ever devised possibly in any language. During the song, the singer (Thurl Ravenscroft) calls the Grinch "a mean one", "a monster", "a vile one", "a rotter", "the king of sinful sots", "a crooked jerky jocky", "a foul one" and "a nasty wasty skunk", likens the Grinch to "a bad banana with a greasy, black peel" and "a three-decker sauerkraut and toadstool sandwich with arsenic sauce", calls him "as cuddly as a cactus" and "as charming as an eel", notes they wouldn't touch the Grinch with a 39 1/2 ft. pole, describes him as having termites in his smile, claims he's about as tenderly sweet as a seasick crocodile (even choosing the crocodile over him), calls his brain "full of spiders", his heart "an empty hole", "a dead tomato splotch with moldy purple spots" and "full of unwashed socks", and even describes his soul as having garlic in it, "full of gunk", and "an appalling dump heap overflowing with the most disgraceful assortment of deplorable rubbish imaginable, mangled up in tangled up knots!" At the end of the song, the singer quotes three words best used to describe the Grinch: "stink", "stank", "stunk".
    • Though it should be noted that pretty much every insult in the song is something that the Grinch would take as a compliment.
    • Which is reinforced in the Jim Carrey version, where he makes it a full-fledged Villain Song by singing it himself. As a balance, the soundtrack had a whole new version rapped by Busta Rhymes.
    • The NBC special Grinch: The Musical naturally has it, and not only is it split into two parts for separate scenes, it happens to be primarily sung by Old Max, no less.
    • Copied and parodied in Just Shoot Me!, except it's about Mr. Finch, as he takes measures to ruin the office Christmas party.
    • The song is also parodied in Freakazoid! in the form of "You're a Mean One, Nasty Lobe", a Villain Sucks sung by the narrator about the Lobe while he freely commits various crimes and atrocities.
      • Also from Freakazoid, "Where, did he go / That Invisibo / He's a power-hungry crook / with a Scepter full of juice".
    • Brawl in the Family did this, as well as the actual story. ♪You're a penguin, Dedede...♫
    • CollegeHumor did a version about Donald Trump.
    • The song is played for the end credits of Hawkeye (2021) Episode 5, both because the series takes place on Christmas and because it was used to herald the return of the Kingpin.
  • "Icky Vicky" and "Vicky-Free Summer" from The Fairly OddParents!.
  • "Who's Afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?" from The Three Little Pigs.
  • "Mortimer, Mortimer, Mortimer Mouse" in House of Mouse — was originally a song penned by Mortimer to sing his own praises, but Daisy, Clarabelle, and Minnie reworked the lyrics because as they were, the audience was not buying it.
  • Technically, the torch song Harley Quinn sings in Batman: The Animated Series is a "The Villain Sucks" Song, but because of the nature of her relationship with the Joker, it's also a twisted love song.
  • The Simpsons both plays this straight and parodies it:
    • "You Only Move Twice" parodies it with "Scorpio", which is structured to sound like it's criticizing the titular character but which merely makes him sound like a Benevolent Boss.
    • Tito Puente's slanderous mambo "Senor Burns" in the 7th season premiere.
    • Homer singing a self-praising version of "You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch" as he steals Springfield's Christmas presents (in an attempt to make them see the real meaning of the holiday beyond commercialism).
      • He also writes one about Flanders...but only Homer would see Flanders as the villain, since he's the most kind, decent person in town.
  • Kootie Pie Rap! from Super Mario World
  • On the "old west" episode of Spongebob Squarepants, SpongeBuck's idiot friend leads everyone in town into one about how horrible Dead Eye Plankton is. Dead Eye approves.
    • And predating that, the episode "Dunces and Dragons", Squidly, the royal fool, sings a song to King Krabs to make up for making a bad joke (SpongeBob and Patrick had joined along in the singing), but the song was insulting that King Krabs had ordered Squidly, SpongeBob, and Patrick to be executed.
      Oh, hear me king, for I must sing,
      how you are the greatest at everything,
      like letting a dragon burn down our city,
      a horrible sight that wasn't pretty,
      'twas all your fault and 'tis a pity.
      You were bad, you are to blame,
      now hang your kingly head in shame,
      la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la.
      The king is bad, the king's to blame,
      he hangs his kingly head in shame,
      la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la, la!
  • Not strictly an animation, but a record called "Mousercise" had a tune about The Beagle Boys about how they could never get Uncle Scrooge's money, but they kept on trying anyway.
  • Home Movies has a quite literal example ad-libbed from Walter and Perry. "We hate Fenton, Fenton sucks. We hate Fenton, Fenton so much..."
  • "This Cat Is Coming After You" from the Atomic Betty album, though the singer tends to praise Maximus rather than denounce him.
  • In Thomas & Friends, one group of villains does this to another villain. When Diesel attempts to pull old, worn trucks, and badly fails, all the trucks in the yard start singing a little ditty called "Pop Goes the Diesel", which infuriates him.
  • The opening theme to Angela Anaconda becomes one right at the end ("Shoo-bee-doo-bee-doo-wah-wah/My name is Angela, and you are not/Nanette Manoir is a stuck-up jerkface snot!")
  • The theme song for Pinky and the Brain could be considered one for the villain protagonists.
  • Total Drama World Tour has several:
    • "Her Real Name Isn't Blaineley", about Blaineley ("Here's an open letter to a treasure of a girl, whose behavior on the show always makes me hurl...")
    • "Sisters", about Alejandro ("You think you got me good, okay, maybe you did [...] Sisters, come together now and take him down!")
    • "Boyfriend Kisser", about Gwen ("Boyfriend kisser, I thought she was my friend, but now it's time to dis her...") A borderline example, as her actions fall more under What the Hell, Hero?? than real villainy.
    • "Versus" is an interesting example, as it's primarily two villains (Heather and Alejandro) singing about each other. This makes it both a Villain Song (as it is sung by villains) and a "The Villain Sucks" Song at the same time.
  • "Bad influence" from Jem is an odd one, seeing as the Holograms (minus Kimber) and the Misfits (minus Stormer) sing it as a duet, the latter band using it as a "The Hero Sucks" Song. (It Makes Sense in Context here, as both bands were trying to convince their defecting bandmate that it wasn't a good idea to hang out with the other. And neither was convinced.
  • My Little Pony:
  • Family Guy has numerous examples, but one of the best was "The Fellas at the Freakin' FCC".
    So they sent this little warning, they're prepared to do their worst
    And they stuck it in your mailbox, hoping you could be coerced
    I can think of quite another place they should have stuck it first!
    They may just be neurotic,
    Or possibly psychotic,
    They're the fellas at the freakin' FCC!
  • Madeline and the Bad Hat has an infectiously simple song about the girls' new neighbors' bratty son, Pepito. Once Pepito pulls a Heel–Face Turn, he and the girls sing a version describing how he used to suck.
  • In the Slappy Squirrel Animaniacs short "Frontier Slappy", Daniel Boone's backup singers start by singing his praises, but eventually it devolves into one of these kinds of songs after he crosses the Moral Event Horizon. After taking offense, he fires them.
    "Daniel Boone is a great big jerk, yes a stupid jerk!/ He had another stupid plan that likely wouldn't work!"
  • The Over the Garden Wall episode "Songs of the Dark Lantern" has the Tavern-Keeper sing a creepy little song explaining the Beast's modus operandi.
  • From Futurama, "Robot Hell" could be seen as the Robot Devil's Villain Song, except it's mostly about listing all of Bender's sins and why he deserves to be punished for them. ("Fencing diamonds, fixing cockfights,/Publishing indecent magazines/You'll pay for every crime, knee-deep in electric slime...")
  • In Toad Patrol, Earth Star improvises a particularly scathing one about Orpheus, sung to Orpheus in one of the most memorable moments of the series.
  • When Dr. Eggman is found out not to have his doctorate in the Sonic Boom episode "Mister Eggman", the entire village sings about how they no longer fear him and give him the new nickname "Mr. Eggman", done to the tune of "The Telephone Song". Which Eggman just misses.
    Eggman: Why do you all look like you just finished a musical number?
  • Biker Mice from Mars had an album by Jeff Scott Soto that featured three songs dedicated to describing how nasty one of the villains from the cartoon was.
    • "Rockin' in the Pit", which was about the Pit Boss and his tendency to kidnap and enslave people from the surface.
    • "Look out Below", which was about the main antagonist Lawrence Limburger.
    • "Tunnel Rat", which was about the villain of the same name.
  • Happens in-universe in The Critic. Jay's girlfriend Alice is being pursued by her country singer ex-husband Cyrus. She knows he's a cheating swine, but his singing is her major weakness. Just as he starts to win her over with a song, Jay bursts in with an accordion and sings an obnoxious polka tune about how much of a sleazeball Cyrus is, breaking his spell.
  • The Avenger Penguins episode "Star Struck" has Dolores Divine sing a song to Caractacus P. Doom's lackey Harry Slime where she hurls insults at him and calls him a creep.
  • In almost every episode of A Pup Named Scooby-Doo, the scene where the gang enter a chase sequence with the episode's monster features a song about the monster and how menacing they are.
  • In Central Park:
    • In Season 1 "Episode One", Birdie sings "Heiress to a Fortune", explaining who Bitsy is and she's the villain of the show.
    • In Season 1 finale "A Fish Called Snakehead":
      • Ashley sings "New York Doesn't Like Your Face", where she sings to Bitsy how she's the most disliked person in New York and she needs to improve herself to be likable.
      • Birdie sings a reprise of "Dick Flake" where he reveals Dick is a fake for lying about catching the snakehead.
  • During the Season 1 finale of Steven Universe, Garnet's song "Stronger Than You" can be considered this, since she's addressing Jasper directly as she's singing it, telling her that she has no idea who she's up against.

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Kootie Pie Rap

In "Fire Sale", to warm up her Ice Palace, Kootie Pie Koopa kidnaps Mama Fireplant from Dome City because Mama provides the heat for the city, Mama Fireplant sings a rap song about how bad Kootie Pie is.

How well does it match the trope?

4.67 (3 votes)

Example of:

Main / TheVillainSucksSong

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