- Avengers: Infinite Wars (Marvel Cinematic Universe & Star Wars): It would appear that Wanda Maximoff is at least considered this for the Avengers by the Jedi Council, as Wanda's powers are very close to the powers of the Force and she has spent some time learning the powers of the Dark Side while trapped on Dathomir until she was reunited with the rest of the team. However, while members like Mace Windu expresses some concern, others such as Obi-Wan Kenobi and Plo Koon recognise that Wanda and the Avengers are not Jedi and aren't as much at risk of the Dark Side as they are, and it's unfair to judge Wanda by their standards just because her powers are different.
- Demon's Games
(Angel & The Hunger Games): Alma Coin is this for District Thirteen; while Angel and Illyria are officially in charge of the District, Coin is basically third-in-command due to her magical abilities, often encouraging a more ruthless approach even if she defers to Angel's recommendations until part-way through the war. - The Mountain and the Wolf (A Song of Ice and Fire & Warhammer Fantasy): The Wolf is proudly and unapologetically an asshole, who's only tolerated by Daenerys because she has more important things to worry about and because he's useful when not actually interacting with her court (mostly because he has a ship).
- He even manages to interrupt Jon and Grey Worm arguing over the fate of the Lannister prisoners by starting to butcher them himself, causing Grey Worm to declare Daenerys will decide their fate.
- Seven (Battlestar Galactica (2003) & Stargate SG-1): It is established that the Fives are basically this to the other Cylon models; when the Ones initially proposed the plan to wipe out humanity, the Fives were the only ones of the other models who voted in his favour, requiring the Ones to hack the Cylon datastream and manipulate the others until they agreed with his scheme.
- The Wisdom Seeker (Harry Potter & The Twilight Saga): In keeping with her status as the 'ruthless' Cullen in canon, Rosalie is the only Cullen who is considered for Slytherin (Alice, Edward and Emmett are automatically sorted to Gryffindor and Jasper is considered for Ravenclaw), but Harry assures Rosalie that just having those traits doesn’t make her a bad person.
- Sonic the Hedgehog & My Hero Academia: The Hedgehog & The Deku: Both Bakugou and Monoma serve as this for Class 1A and 1B, respectively. Bakugou's aggressive and downright hostile behavior to Izuku and Sonic causes Eggman to want to recruit him.
- Twilight Storm (Doctor Who & The Twilight Saga): Caius is basically this when the Doctor, Bella and the Cullens meet the Volturi, as Aro is more Affably Evil and the Doctor and Bella know that Marcus can be better than this based on their experience with his counterpart in the alternate timeline Bella witnessed in "Time's Ashes"), but Caius acts as though humans like Bella and (he believes) the Doctor are only of value as food or new vampires.
- In All Assorted Animorphs AUs, the chapter "What if they were all from different A Us a la Into the Spider-Verse?" features various alternate Animorphs being pulled into the timeline of the main series; Cassie is from book canon, Jake is from #11 (the trip to the Amazon rainforest), Marco is from #41 (the dark future where Earth was conquered), Rachel is from Megamorphs #3 (an alternate timeline where the human race is more technologically limited and keeps slaves), Ax is from Megamorphs #4 (a reality where the Animorphs never came together and Ax had to escape the Dome Ship on his own), and Tobias is from the TV show. It initially appears that the alternate Ax takes this role as the one most indifferent to humanity's fate so long as the Yeerks are stopped, but it turns out that Marco is a Controller, infested by none other than Edriss 562.
- In Did I Make the Most of Loving You?, in as much as the twelve ‘time travellers’ are a team (and discounting Cavil who caused this situation for his own ends), Tom Zarek is this, as the other eleven are committed to changing things to be better for humans and Cylons where Zarek is only interested in making things better if he’s the one in charge.
- Fantasia Crisis: Helga Sinclair of Atlantis: The Lost Empire is initially dismissed by most of her ‘teammates’ when they learn about her role in the near-destruction of Atlantis, but Simba- essentially the team’s leader- is still willing to treat Helga as an ally as he acknowledges that there is a part of her that wants to be better, with the others eventually accepting her again.
- Vow of Nudity: One story involves Haara having to team up with Fiora, a graverobbing witch who tried to sacrifice her to demons...and who knows the ritual to escape from the abyssal realm.
- Left Behind: Furlow is this to Rohvu's new crew (Crichton, Chiana, Rohvu's Pilot, the last of the Xarai, and a couple of OC Sebacceans), as she only helps them to try and get access to Crichton's wormhole knowledge and repeatedly makes it clear that she has her own agenda.
- Five Nights at Candy's:
- Blank can be qualified as such, but only for the main five animatronics (six or seven if you count Old Candy and RAT). His kill animations are some of the most violent, and he smashes the window in the office. Follows this in the sequel.
- Forgotten Candy, from the upcoming fourth installment, seems to be this for the Candy the Cat line of animatronics. The trailers show him stalking around the location in a creepy way, and the secret cutscene in the first game's remaster imply that he drives his creator insane.
- Fallout: Equestria - Project Horizons (Fallout & My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic) has the Ax-Crazy berserker Rampage and the tormented Rogue Drone Lacunae.
- Daphne Greengrass and the Boy Who Lived: Loosely applies to Daphne Greengrass. While Daphne is never ‘evil’ even before she officially becomes Harry's friend, she notes more than once that her Slytherin heritage means she’s better suited for scheming on occasions where her Gryffindor friends can’t find a more direct way to do things. For example, while both Daphne and Harry would like to give the Weasleys money while staying with them the summer before second year, Harry can’t think of a way that wouldn’t offend their pride, whereas Daphne offers to pay for Ginny’s school supplies for first year as a form of ‘rent’ for letting her stay in Ginny’s room during her visit. This trait of Daphne's also leads to her being more willing to at least suggest a more ruthless course of action in later situations. She is fully supportive of Lupin and Sirius's intentions to kill Peter and is just as dumbfounded when Harry disagrees, and she suggests outright killing Augustus Rookwood- Voldemort's past source in the Department of Mysteries- while he's in Azkaban to ensure he can't tell Voldemort anything about the Department; the idea is only dismissed because only Dumbledore could probably break into Azkaban and he wouldn't kill someone in cold blood. Also, after she sees her father killed in front of her during the Battle of Hogwarts, she switches to using the Killing Curse herself.
- Lucius Malfoy ends up working for Hermione Granger in The Parselmouth of Gryffindor. That does not mean he has any sort of moral compass — he's just obeying because Voldemort is out of the picture and she has got enough on him to send him to Azkaban if he disobeys.
- In A Thing of Vikings, Dagur and his clan are vassals of King Mac Bethad of Alba, and are specifically noted to work as the King's shock troops even though not even Mac Bethad likes them. Dagur continues this theme when he shows up; he is prone to violence and disrespect, and no doubt would have violated Sacred Hospitality multiple times within minutes of his ship making port if not for the tight leash Elinor kept him under. On top of that, it is public knowledge that he murdered his own father in cold-blood to take over as chief. The only reasons why nobody has retaliated for that crime being that he is loyal to Mac Bethad, and his tribe is loyal to him for his ruthlessness and violence.
- The Dragon King:
- Unlike his son Snotlout, who has doubts about being chief and the mistreatment of his cousin, his father Spitelout is, well spiteful. When he, Snotlout, Stoick and Astrid are rescued by Hiccup, Spitelout is the only one who stays antagonistic against Hiccup all the way through, claiming that he's leading them into a trap the entire time.
- Marva is an out and proud fan of Drago, so much so that she is insubordinate and rebellious to all of her father's decisions. When she volunteers for dragon training, she refuses to cooperate and listen to Hiccup, going on about how Drago's "beat the dog till it stops barking" approach to dragon training is superior and nearly gets everyone killed when she tries taming a wild Screaming Death this way. This reaches its apex when she betrays all of the clans and joins up with Drago.
- Love, doubt and super cute babies!:
- Deconstructed with Bakugou. Since the start of the school year, he already wasn't generally appreciated by his classmates for his horrible personality, which has Momo and Kirishima doing damage control to keep the entirety of 1-B from believing they are the same, and have concerns about how the rest of the school sees them. This only worsens after he publicly attacks Izuku in the cafeteria, with even Kirishima coming to regard Bakugo as nothing more than a bully, and everyone hating that his only visible punishment was getting suspended (unaware of Nedzu's concerns about the League of Villains killing him, or worse, recruiting him and the subsequent consequences). This becomes a problem during the Final Exams, where the teachers want to test how Bakugo can handle his teamwork... but even before the match begins, his classmates have already concluded that he will not cooperate, and that however is unlucky enough to have him as a partner is probably better off abandoning him while he does a Leeroy Jenkins.
- It finally starts to come to a head at the mall, where Bakugo finds himself abducted by the League of Villains to not only be recruited, but to prove himself by killing his helpless classmates. This, combined with everything else — the forced lectures from Nedzu, his mother's uncharacteristic depression, etc. — finally causes a Jerkass Realization that Izuku has always been right about him acting more like a villain than a hero. While afterwards his classmates genuinely believe he was never interested in joining the League of Villains, they still call him out for acting so villainous at the Sports Festival that he appeared the perfect recruit.
- After her meeting with Nedzu where he lays out that he crushed Izuku's dream to keep the HPSC an ally for the oncoming conflicts he foresees, Momo realizes that most of the concerns and unsavory rumors about the organization are most likely true, making her question why he would want such unreliable allies in the first place.
- Deconstructed with Bakugou. Since the start of the school year, he already wasn't generally appreciated by his classmates for his horrible personality, which has Momo and Kirishima doing damage control to keep the entirety of 1-B from believing they are the same, and have concerns about how the rest of the school sees them. This only worsens after he publicly attacks Izuku in the cafeteria, with even Kirishima coming to regard Bakugo as nothing more than a bully, and everyone hating that his only visible punishment was getting suspended (unaware of Nedzu's concerns about the League of Villains killing him, or worse, recruiting him and the subsequent consequences). This becomes a problem during the Final Exams, where the teachers want to test how Bakugo can handle his teamwork... but even before the match begins, his classmates have already concluded that he will not cooperate, and that however is unlucky enough to have him as a partner is probably better off abandoning him while he does a Leeroy Jenkins.
- This Bites!: The New World Masons' leaders are generally decent, or at least benevolent, individuals who genuinely believe in their mission statement of creating a better, freer world without the World Government. The exception being Rob Lucci, who's an amoral Professional Killer who doesn't care much for the Masons' ideals and only follows them out of personal respect for the Masons themselves, and who Cross only recruited because he would rather have CP9 working for the Masons than let them return to working for the Government.
- Pedestal: Ike first met the protagonists by attacking the narrator and ferociously declaring that he would rip them to shreds. After joining the party, he still plans to murder Namnar after a certain period of time, and after years of working with Des and Carlita, still comes very close to attacking them. Eventually, Ike morphs into a Sour Supporter.
- Old West: Rattlesnake Jake is hired by Sheriff Rango to help in protecting the town of Mud against the initially unknown threat. The notorious Grim Reaper wouldn't otherwise care for the job if he hadn't been lately between jobs, and he makes it clear from the start that no-one should come between him and his targets. While Jake honors his contract and gradually shows his softer side to Grace Glossy and her son, he remains more volatile and homicidal than the rest of the heroes.
- Coeur Al'Aran:
- A Rabbit Among Wolves: Yuma is a downplayed example. He's far more eager to get his hands dirty, and does scoff at the idea of helping humans. However, he remains mostly loyal toward Jaune's ideas despite his disagreements.
- Arc Royale: The alternate Jaune's from across the multiverse who have been summoned to Salem's side in the war are mostly benevolent, and they only stay with the villains due to Doppelgänger Gets Same Sentiment or, in "Revolutionary" Jaune's case, having no other options. The Jaune iteration dubbed "Null", however, is a ruthless and remorseless killer who slaughters almost anyone in his way, whether they be ally or enemy; he personally loathes Team RWBY because their counterparts in his universe got his mother killed, and he's far more desperate than any of the other villain-aligned Jaune's are to be the last iteration standing and claim the Gods' reality-rewriting prize so that he can fix his universe.
- The whole point of Wilhuff Tarkin, Hero of the Rebellion; Tarkin is still a manipulative sociopath and a human-centric speciesist, if a very pragmatic one, and only joined the fight against the Empire because he has learned the truth about the Emperor and he's appalled at him causing a galactic-scale war and the death of billions just to satisfy his ambitions and fulfill a vendetta on the Jedi, who had very good reasons to be paranoid against the Sith.
- What Might Have Been: Jasper joins the rebellion not out of any belief towards the Crystal Gems ethos or the sanctity of the Earth, but out of loyalty to her diamond. Because of this, she has a bad habit of trying to enforce Homeworld's rules when around something that contradicts it, like insulting Amethyst's off-color physiology or wanting Garnet to unfuse, only for Rose to scold her for it.
- Exaggerated in the Doctor Who fanfic Gemini where the Villain Protagonist - Ax-Crazy Serial-Killer Killer Captain June Harper - is in charge of the team rather than any of the Hero Protagonists. Deconstructed in that the Hero Protagonists are on the run from the universe's various law enforcement agencies for the fact that they are aiding and abetting a super-powered serial killer.
Unsorted
- Dungeon Keeper Ami has Jadeite as both a straight example, and as something of an inversion. As part of his Shades of Grey theme, he learns empathy and gains a more uplifting world outlook due to Mercury's influence. Regardless, he is by far the most straightforward, pragmatic, and blunt of Ami's advisors in regards to her goals and resorts to dubious methods at times if the situation warrants it.
- Mana Ryougi is this to The Emiya Clan. She, like her mother, had a very skewed morality, but unlike her mother, she mostly works as a contract assassin, trading blood for money with few restrictions. The others have mixed feelings about her. Kiri and Aleksi have issues with her lack of loyalty to any particular cause and her willingness to interfere with them if she is paid to. On the other hand, Touma idolizes and respects her for her efficiency, iron will, and dedication to standards that she hammered into him when she trained him as an assassin. Everyone else is somewhere in between.
- In That Epic Plan Beyond Birthday is this for the Kira Taskforce-at least in theory. In practice he's Light's Dragon.
- The drawbacks of this approach are highlighted in the My Hero Academia story ''Love, doubt and super cute babies!"
- Bakugo is not generally appreciated by his classmates for his horrible personality, and Momo and Kirishima have had to do a lot of damage control to keep the entirety of 1-B from believing they are the same and have concerns about how the rest of the school sees them. Hence him only being suspended for attacking Izuku is not taken favorably, unaware of Nedzu's concerns about the League of Villains killing him, or worse, recruiting him and the subsequent consequences.
- This becomes a problem during the Final Exams, where the teachers want to test how Bakugo can handle his teamwork, but even before the match begins his classmates have already concluded that he will not cooperate, and it is best to abandon him while he does a Leeroy Jenkins.
Momo: Not necessarily Utsushimi-san! If all attempts of reasoning with Bakugou fail, then making it to the exit by yourself, in the hope that your ‘partner’ distracts your opponent for long enough, might be a viable option. Aizawa Sensei never specified whether we’ll be graded individually or as a group. Even if the former is the case you should still be safe this way!
Recovery Girl: Now dear, that is a big assumption to make! Especially considering that this goes against the spirit of the exercise! You children are supposed to work together and not throw each other to the wolves!
Momo: I’m trying to be realistic! Are we supposed to go down with our partners if they adamantly refuse to cooperate? As Heroes our duty is to save lives and inspire the population, not protecting the fragile egos of our colleagues from the consequences of their actions!
Utsushimi: So, ditch the jerk and hope for the best if you can’t get through his thick skull it is? Not the plan I was hoping for, but at this point I’ll take it! - After her meeting with Nedzu where he lays out that he crushed Izuku's dream to keep the HPSC an ally for the oncoming conflicts he foresees, Momo realizes that most of the concerns and unsavory rumors about the organization are most likely true, making her question why he would want such unreliable allies in the first place.
- Bakugo is not generally appreciated by his classmates for his horrible personality, and Momo and Kirishima have had to do a lot of damage control to keep the entirety of 1-B from believing they are the same and have concerns about how the rest of the school sees them. Hence him only being suspended for attacking Izuku is not taken favorably, unaware of Nedzu's concerns about the League of Villains killing him, or worse, recruiting him and the subsequent consequences.
- In the fanfic The Misadventures of Cell and Frieza, the eponymous duo become this in order to defeat Majin Buu. However, this is mainly because they want to destroy the Earth and the Z-fighters themselves.
- Sailor Moon Abridged: Sailor Mars was originally a slightly bitchy Shinto priestess/Action Girl. Now she's an Ax-Crazy Goth Emo Teen Satanist. She makes no bones about her various attempts to kill Serena and regularly alludes to mass (offscreen) sacrifice of her temple's patrons. During her off-duty hours she regularly abuses drugs, gets off on enemy attacks and fantasizes about dying horribly and spending eternity in hell. And the viewers went wild.
- Slightly Altered has Azurai, who only helps Buwaro friends find their missing family members because Buwaro's his adoptive son. While he's nowhere near as bad as his canon self, he's still done some truly horrible things like murdering Buwaro's parents, hence why the kid's adopted in the first place.
- Stallions of Harmony Verse has Sunset Shimmer being this towards Twilight Sparkle and Moondancer. When they got themselves into trouble, she was going to shift all the blame on herself, because everypony will blame her anyway. Twilight objects to that idea and reassures her that they are in this together.
- TDWT Reducks Redux: Duncan for Team Victory in the fic's version of Total Drama World Tour. Whereas all the other five members are known for being kind and caring people (Lindsay, DJ, Bridgette, and to a lesser extent, Harold and Leshawna), Duncan is an out-and-out jerkass who antagonizes most of his teammates (especially Harold).
- Averted in the fic Things Skippy the Dwarf can't do in the dungeon, the other party members won't let Skippy use this as an excuse to do evil things.I was not placed in charge of the prisoners so that I could slaughter them and "the paladin wouldn’t get his hands dirty."
- In The Universiad, the Office of Special Resources is viewed as this In-Universe by some of the Forum's members or its allies who disapprove of The Unfettered extents to which they are willing to go to protect and advance the Forum.
- The Team mage in Wardens not only could care less about his fellow wardens and often sits back and lets them struggle...he actively murders other soldiers on a whim or turns them into bombs regardless of if they were dying or not. A very literal Blood Knight if you will.
- A Brighter Dark: Hans and his band of criminals are this for all of Nohr. Even when using them, Garon shows absolute contempt for their methods, and afterward gives Corrin his full blessing to kill Hans should they ever cross paths again now that he's no longer necessary to his plans.
- In Blood Man Luffy both Gin and Alvida are former members of far more ruthless pirate crews than the Straw Hats and it frequently shows. Gin immediately threatens to shoot Tashigi when she's taken hostage (though given his torture at marine hands, it's not surprising) and while Sanji only incapacitates Wapol's men, Alvida kills the ones she fights. To a lesser extent, Alvida's reasoning for wanting Robin as a crew member qualifies as well. While some don't want Robin to join due to how dangerous she is, Alvida's happy to have her on board because she's dangerous and thus useful. On the flip side, both Gin and Alvida are the most loyal to Luffy in the sense they don't question his orders and don't tolerate insubordination from others. When Sanji jokingly suggest replacing Luffy with a cactus, both remark that inciting mutiny is punishable by death.
- Deconstructed and lampshaded in The Beginning of the End when, after hearing that Xander and Willow have been planning to Rape, Pillage, and Burn Sunnydale and Take Over the World for over a decade, Faith wonders why she's the evil one (even discounting Xander's and Willow's plans, Spike and Anya have done far worse than she has). Buffy responds that she tried to kill Angel, but Xander says that's a plus so it breaks even with Faith trying to kill him. Buffy's rebuttal that Faith tried to kill her is ignored on the basis that almost everyone present has tried that, and one of the ones who didn't at least threatened to.
- In Strange Days, Edgeworth is just as heroic as Phoenix (now, anyway), but it falls to him to be the token cynic of their pack. This is why Edgeworth stayed a prosecutor in canon: protecting the innocent is all well and good, but somebody has to actually catch the bad guys.The young Omega had approached him and Wright in Europe, had asked them (well specifically Miles, the Omega) to foster her in America while starting out on her law career. (…) Wright, ever the optimist, had agreed to take on Athena without a second thought or reason to check Athena's motives.
No, that job was left to Miles. - With This Ring: The Renegade protagonist specifically thinks of himself as this to the Young Justice team. Not that he actually considers himself to be evil, because he doesn't believe in objective evil, but his ruthless pragmatism, willingness to kill, ubiquitous Trolling of friends and foes, and generally Good Is Not Nice attitude definitely put him at odds with the idealistic teenage superheroes-in-training.
