Adaptational Villainy / Western Animation

Adaptational Villainy in Western Animation.

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• Adventure Time: This live-action promo for the show depicts Mannish Man the Minotaur fighting on the side of the villains, despite not having done anything villainous up to that point.
• Animaniacs (2020): Chicken Boo, of all characters, receives a case of this in the revival. The Episode 5 segment "Good Warner Hunting" reveals that he was so jealous over not being invited to the revival that he hunted, stuffed and mounted the rest of the non-returning cast on various walls. Thankfully, the end of the segment reveals everyone to be alive and well, and they chase Boo down.
• Arcane: In the established lore of League of Legends, Jinx was a mischievous prankster who, while destructive towards property, was considered an annoying nuisance at worst whose crimes usually didn't involve people dying. The show portrays her as a ruthless follower of Silco who has no problem gruesomely killing Enforcers (including making them think they are rescuing someone when they are headed straight to their deaths), guns down several Firelights, and later maliciously kidnaps Caitlyn and tries to get Vi to kill her. To be fair, her video game counterpart is not really against killing people because she does considers people blood-filled buildings, but she never shows any sadistic pleasure in killing people like Arcane Jinx does. Additionally, Jinx also engages in several evil acts her video game counterpart would never do, such as torture and pretending to be a child in danger to drag several enforcers of Piltover to a trap.
• From Around the World in Eighty Days we have Fix. Where in the original novel Fix was a Scotland Yard detective who chased Phileas Fogg because he believed him guilty of bank robbery, here he's a thug hired by the malicious Lord Maze to stop Fogg from going around the world in 80 days so Fogg could marry Lord Maze's niece.
• Blood of Zeus
  • Hera is a complicated case, she's far from a benevolent Goddess in Classical Mythology being the embodiment of Woman Scorned as she dispenses Misplaced Retribution on the innocent women Zeus slept with and gave Hercules quite the Trauma Conga Line, before he saved her life. In the show however, Hera is the Big Bad proper as she tries to use the Giants to conquer Mount Olympus and kill Zeus, something she'd never do in the Greek Myths. Compounding issues further is that Zeus gets a much more positive portrayal, making Hera's Murder the Hypotenuse to Electra in front of Zeus and later tyranny even more disproportionately cruel and insane.
  • Ares much like in DC Comics and God of War, gets a villainous portrayal as he helps his mother Hera control the Giants to take over Olympus, now in the Myths Ares is still an asshole but he wasn't that evil. Ares even almost kills his brother Apollo by dumping him in the ocean, something his Mythical counterpart (who actually cared about his family) wouldn't do. Besides Ares this also applies to all the other Gods who sided with Hera and the Giants in the Final Battle, which includes the normally non-violent Aphrodite and Demeter. Averted when the Giants turn against Hera's side as all the Gods and heroes come together to defeat them.
• Captain N: The Game Master:
  • Alucard is a mole and ends up turning on the main characters, including Simon Belmont, in favor of his father, Dracula. In the Castlevania video games, Alucard's firmly on the side of the good guys, hates Dracula, and is one of the Belmont clan's main allies in the series.
  • Also, King Hippo is a thug who works for Mother Brain in the cartoon, where he's an Anti-Villain at best in Punch-Out!!, hardly as mean as Mac's other opponents. He even offers to take Mac out to lunch!
• In Carmen Sandiego, when Carmen is temporarily brainwashed into working for VILE again, she becomes a lot more ruthless towards her opponents. She's willing to kill them by any means, something her original counterpart would never do. Since she's subjected to Adaptational Heroism in this series, it really stands out.
• Castlevania:
  • Hector in his debut game Castlevania: Curse of Darkness is The Hero, once a Forgemaster of Dracula he became a Defector from Decadence and escaped back to humanity before Isaac tracked him down and killed his wife, sparking Hector's Roaring Rampage of Revenge. In the show Hector is a much less heroic character, as he is depicted as Misanthrope Supreme due to childhood abuse, who suggests they cull mankind putting humans in People Farms as an alternative to Kill All Humans. While he does betray Dracula in this version... he betrays him for The Starscream Carmilla and becomes her team's Forgemaster (albeit very unwillingly). Ironically his counterpart from the game Isaac gets the reverse treatment going from a one-note asshole psychopath to compelling and sympathetic Anti-Villain. Averted in Season 4 where Hector manages to redeem himself and helps bring down Carmilla.
  • Carmilla is a villain in the Castlevania games (as well her original book) but the games make it clear she has Undying Loyalty to Dracula and she has a few Pet the Dog moments in Castlevania: Judgment and in Castlevania: Lords of Shadow. Meanwhile in the show, Carmilla is jumping at the chance to betray Dracula and proves to a power hungry Manipulative Bitch whose cruelty makes other vampires look positively nice in comparison. Taken even further in Season 4, where it’s made clear Carmilla is even worse than Dracula, as she plans to conquer the world and kill anyone who stands in her way, for no good reason beyond being a power mad Psychopathic Womanchild who “wants everything”. She doesn’t even bow out with dignity, attempting a Taking You with Me to Isaac when she realises she can’t win.
  • The Church gets this a great deal. In the games they are a background faction who are somewhat estranged with the Belmont clan but still aid them in the defeat of Dracula throughout the series right up to Castlevania: Aria of Sorrow. Sypha and her descendant Yoko are explicitly holy agents of the Church. In the show they are a Corrupt Church who disown and hunt down their former allies the Belmont clan, persecute the Speakers whom Sypha is part of and this version are the ones who burn Lisa, Dracula's wife at the stake triggering the show's events.
  • Saint Germain in Castlevania: Curse of Darkness is a Hero Antagonist being a time traveler who crosses Hector’s path but is an enemy of the villain Zead who’s Death in disguise. In Season 4 of the show Germain does a Face–Heel Turn, helping The Alchemist aka Death try and trigger the apocalypse under the promise of seeing the woman he loves again. Although Germain does perform a last minute Heroic Sacrifice, saving Trevor’s life.
  • Death in the games is a Affably Evil Recurring Boss who’s a faithful servant of Dracula. In the show Death is a manipulative monster who fuses the souls of Dracula and his wife Lisa into the Rebis (a homunculus) with intention of kicking starting the apocalypse. If that wasn’t enough Death even threatens to kill a pregnant Sypha just to spite Trevor.
• In the Color Classics short "Greedy Humpty Dumpty", the title character goes from being a neutral figure to a greedy tyrant who orders his servants and subjects to build his castle walls high enough to reach the sun, which he has become convinced is made of gold.
• In the book Cranberry Christmas, Cyrus Grape is a curmudgeonly old man who refuses to let anyone skate on his pond, but gets his comeuppance when Mr. Whiskers finds a deed that proves the lake is actually on his property. In the animated special, Cyrus is a much more active antagonist, sneaking around and messing up Mr. Whiskers's house in order to keep Mr. Whiskers from finding that deed (whereas in the book he had no idea it existed).
• Morrigan in the Darkstalkers cartoon. In the games, she is just having fun with no regard for the rest of the cast, in the show, she's Pyron's minion. The series finale implies she becomes closer to how she is in the games if a Season 2 ever came. Also, Anakaris, Bishamon, and to some extent Demitri were victims of this.
• Not only, as shown in the Animated Films page, has Disney done this to several characters in their adoptive works, they've even done this to their own characters as well. While Scrooge McDuck is somewhat of a Jerk with a Heart of Gold in most of his appearances (particularly DuckTales (1987) and Mickey's Christmas Carol), in the Mickey Mouse Works adaptation of Around the World in Eighty Days, he plays the main villain, determined to prevent Mickey and Goofy from gaining the inheritance necessary to save the orphanage, even going so far as to sabotage the boat taking them back to London to ensure they don't make it time.
• Speaking of DuckTales (1987), the reboot has several examples:
  • Doofus Drake in the original series was as goofy as his name implied, but still well-meaning at the end of the day. The 2017 version, according to his parents, was as kind-hearted as the original until inheriting his grandmother's fortune. Not only has he become corrupted by greed, but he's creepy and psychotic, sniffing Louie's hair, making his parents his unwilling butlers, and "keeping" Louie when he tried to run away, with plans to torture him with Noodle Implements. He gets worse in his third appearance, where he sends guests who displease him to be stung by angry bees, tries to have Louie beaten up for supposedly ruining his birthday party, and kidnaps Goldie to enslave her as his new grandmother, to the point of keeping her in a glass case.
  • In the 1987 episode "The Curse of Castle McDuck", the Hound was just an Angry Guard Dog covered in glowing paint as part of a "Scooby-Doo" Hoax, that became a Big Friendly Dog once Scrooge fed it some sausages. In the 2017 episode "The Secret(s) of Castle McDuck!", it's an actual Hell Hound summoned by one of the McDuck ancestors, and never becomes friendly towards the Ducks.
  • In-Universe, this happens to Darkwing Duck in the episode "The Duck Knight Returns!". In the original Show Within a Show, Darkwing was The Cape, while the movie reboot turns him into an edgy Anti-Hero who "fights darkness with more darkness", a change that doesn't go over well with resident Darkwing fan Launchpad.
  • In the original, Tootsie the Triceratops was the friendly pet of Bubba the cave-duck. In the reboot, she is extremely aggressive and territorial that she attempts to trample everyone in her presence, and she has no relationship with Bubba since they are from different time periods.
  • The reboot also does this to Gandra Dee. She is introduced working as a spy for Mark Beaks before seemingly pulling a Heel–Face Turn, then in her second appearance she turns out to be an agent of F.O.W.L. However, she pulls a permanent Heel–Face Turn towards the end of the show.
  • Rhinokey of The Wuzzles has gone from a good-natured prankster to a gigantic, aggressive monster that attacks the heroes. Butterbear, who was originally the nicest of the Wuzzles, also received the same treatment, although she ultimately becomes allies with Della for freeing her from her cocoon.
  • May and June were good guys in the comics and Legend of the Three Caballeros, but here they had been raised by F.O.W.L. so grew up villainous, not knowing any better until meeting the heroes and their progenitor April, finding out the true meaning of family, and making a Heel–Face Turn. April does not count as this because she's Webby.
• In Egyxos Thoth is portrayed as loyal follower of the villain Exaton. When the original mythological figure he's based upon was always portrayed as a benevolent figure.
• Green Eggs and Ham (2019):
  • The goat in the original book was only someone that Sam-I-Am would beg the other person (named Guy-Am-I in the Netflix series) to try the titular dish with. In this series, he is a vicious bounty hunter out to capture the Chickeraffe from Sam and Guy, by any means necessary.
  • Sam-I-Am as well. His vow to return the Chickeraffe to its natural habitat was actually a cover-up, as he originally was going to sell the animal to the Big Bad, Snerz, for his animal collection. However, he decides against it in the end.
• Hades wasn't the only guy to fall victim to this in Hercules: The Animated Series. In the ongoing series, King Midas — of all people — was made into a would-be Evil Overlord. (Albeit not a very good one and one who repents at the end, but still...)
  • Hecate is portrayed as an evil goddess who is even worse than Hades, planning to kill Hades and take over the Underworld. In mythology, Hecate was a Dark Is Not Evil goddess — besides having strong protective aspects, she assisted Demeter in finding the abducted Persephone and took pity on a slave who had foiled Hera's attempt to prevent Heracles' birth (and had been transformed into a polecat). While she lived in the Underworld, she had no intention of overthrowing Hades and became a close friend of Persephone in particular.
• The incarnation of Cobra Commander in G.I. Joe: Resolute is Darker and Edgier and much more ruthless than the Cobra Commander in G.I. Joe: Sigma 6 and his other previous incarnations.
• Cousin Mel in Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer. In the original song, she only has a brief mention as playing cards with Grandpa after Grandma's death, and doesn't seem particularly malicious. In the animated special, she is the Big Bad.
• Pinocchio is a villain the two episodes he appears in The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy where he's trying to Become a Real Boy by eating the flesh of one. (But he's Affably Evil.)
• Invincible (2021):
  • Nolan aka Omni-Man gets a massive dose of this in the finale. Yes in the comic he killed the Guardians of Globe, destroyed a city while fighting Mark and initially intended to enslave Earth for Viltrum too — but he was still deeply reluctant to betray his family and the world he spent so much time on. Ironically in the comic Nolan was still saving innocent lives as a superhero right up until one of Guardians of the Globe The Immortal attacks him in revenge and Nolan takes him down in front of Mark, forcing Nolan to drop the act and reveal his true intentions. In the show Nolan’s Tragic Villain nature is offset by his brutality and cruelty being dialed up as once Debbie learns the truth and leaves him, he immediately starts murdering people and while fighting Mark, Nolan (unlike the comic) purposely kills civilians his son vainly tries to save. The show’s Nolan even puts Mark in the path of a speeding train just so all the passengers can get gorily torn apart all over him, something comic Nolan didn’t do (and would never do) to his son. He does ultimately regret hurting Mark, but much more after the fact than his comic counterpart.
  • According to Angstrom Levy, various alternate universe versions of Debbie Grayson end up selling out humanity and join in with her son and husband in slaughtering humanity which is why he has no problems harming her, something that the comics never touch on.
• In what could be called the villainous equivalent of the Iron Patriot in Iron Man 3, Ivanhoe: The King's Knight features the role of the Black Knight as a disguise of villains Prince John and his champion Brian de Bois-Guilbert in contrast to the novel where it was the disguise of the heroic King Richard I.
• Jackie Chan Adventures: In legend, the Monkey King, Sun Wukong, was a mischevious prankster, not the psychopath he's presented as in the series.
• Jellystone!:
  • The Banana Splits are once again antagonists, but this time they're a lighthearted group of petty criminals instead of bloodthirsty Hostile Animatronics like the live-action film.
  • Interestingly, the Hostile Animatronics trope is instead applied to The Cattanooga Cats, turning them into a robotic band that enforces Happiness Is Mandatory in their chintzy pizzeria.
  • While in the original he was a morally gray Jerkass Genie, The Great Gazoo is now a Manipulative Bastard from a video game that can use unwitting players to unfold chaos and destruction in the real world.
• Tublat the gorilla from Tarzan by Edgar Rice Burroughs. In Disney's The Legend of Tarzan, his character is merged rather confusingly with another, Kerchak. Since Disney decided to make their version of Kerchak (who is ironically more similar to Burroughs's Tublat in personality) more sympathetic, as a consequence they ended up making their version of Tublat more sinister, like the novel's Kerchak.
  • Similarly, Professor Phineas T. Philander went from Professor Porter's absent minded friend and colleague in the books to his rival and Smug Snake in the animated series.
• In the Funny Animal adaptation The Legends of Treasure Island Long John Silver is a more straight up Laughably Evil villain and mostly void of the sympathetic Affably Evil facets of his novel counterpart (and most other variations of). Perhaps most notably, his fatherly role with Jim is completely gone and for the most part, he would love nothing better than to just send the boy down the plank, or worse.
• In The Little Prince, the yellow snake, while he represents death, is not necessarily a villain, and may even be ultimately helpful. While the narrator sees him as evil, the Little Prince himself does not, and it is left open as a possibility that the snake, by biting him, did help the Prince return to his asteroid. In the 2010 animated TV series adaptation, the Snake is an unambiguously evil, even demonic Eldritch Abomination who travels around the galaxy corrupting planets by tempting their rulers to give in to their basest desires, while the book didn't really have a true villain.
• The Looney Tunes Show: Cecil Turtle is a lot more antagonistic than he ever was in his original appearances on Looney Tunes. In "Customer Service" he deliberately torments Bugs by messing with his cable service, and in "Shell Game" he entangles Bugs and Porky in an insurance fraud scheme, and when they catch him in the act he holds Bugs and Porky at gunpoint.
• Lost in Oz: Princess Langwidere in Ozma of Oz, while not particularly heroic, doesn't pose much harm to anyone and agrees to help the heroes save the Royal Family of Ev. Here she is the main antagonist, who deposes Glinda, assumes control of Oz, and starts hoarding the land's magic for herself. This version is depicted as the evil aunt of West, most likely based loosely on the Wicked Witch of the East.
• While the original toyline really had no clear moral alignment to speak of, the Madballs cartoon by Nelvana had the second series Madballs (Wolf Breath, Bruise Brother, Fist Face, Splitting Headache, Swine Sucker, Lock Lips, Snake Bait, and Freaky Fullback) become a group of evil balls known as the Badballs to oppose the heroic Madballs (Screamin' Meemie, Freakella, Dusty Dustbrain, Skullface, Hornhead, Aargh, and Slobulus). It's particularly jarring because the comic book series by Marvel Comics portrayed all the Madballs as being good.
• In the TV show Mega Man (Ruby-Spears), Proto Man is one of the major villains. In the games, while he did work for Dr. Wily briefly, he had a Heel–Face Turn and became an ally to Mega Man, if a distant one.
• Mummies Alive!:
  • Anubis is a villain in the show, when he was actually a good god in Egyptian Mythology who guarded and protected the dead. Set is also seen with Anubis, while Set disowned him in the myths for siding with Horus. Other gods and goddesses, like Bastet and Bes, appear as villainous Monsters of the Week when they were not evil figures in mythology.
  • Ammit, on the other hand, is portrayed as a pet of the Big Bad. In Egyptian mythology she was a neutral enforcer of order and punisher of evil, although this quality made her feared by the ancient Egyptians.
• My Little Pony: Equestria Girls:
  • My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic's Snips' and Snails' human counterparts in My Little Pony: Equestria Girls are a lot more antagonistic than them.
  • As is Filthy Rich's human counterpart in My Little Pony: Equestria Girls – Legend of Everfree. In the show he is a rich businessman who is noble, generous, and even comes down hard on his daughter when he catches her being a Rich Bitch. In this he's acts like a despicable greedy scoundrel, even in spite of not doing anything "villainous" outside of reclaiming land from someone who can't pay for it, and even his giving her an extra week to pay her bills is treated as villainous gloating rather than anything else. In all likelihood it's done intentionally to trick you into not expecting the real villain of the episode to be Gloriosa Daisy after she gets corrupted into a monster by Equestrian magic.
• The Old Man of the Mountain: The short is based after a pre-existing song, where the Old Man isn't quite so villainous as in the cartoon.
• Captain Hook of Peter Pan, while usually depicted as a Laughably Evil and relatively mild villain (particularly in the Disney adaptation), is genuinely sinister in Peter Pan & the Pirates. Despite a Freudian Excuse and occasional sympathetic moments, this version of Hook was by far the darkest portrayal of the character until the one from the 2003 live-action version.
• In the explicitly non-canon Phineas and Ferb: Star Wars, Darth Vader of all people gets this when he kills an Imperial Officer vie Psychic Strangle for bringing him a hoagie instead of the socks he wanted. Vader is a Bad Boss and The Dreaded in canon, but even he wouldn't execute an Officer over something so trivial.

Vader: I find your lack of socks disturbing.

• In the classic two-reel 1936 Popeye short Popeye the Sailor Meets Sindbad the Sailor, Sinbad is a villain, portrayed by Bluto.
• In the original Rainbow Brite Stormy is an ally of Rainbow's, even if she is grouchy. In the 2014 miniseries she is her Evil Former Friend who later undergoes a Heel–Face Turn.
• In The Ren & Stimpy Show, Ren wasn't exactly the nicest guy around, but he did have a softer side^note However, this was only because of Executive Meddling on Nickelodeon's part. Even then, it wasn't consistent.. In Ren & Stimpy "Adult Party Cartoon", however, his worst qualities became more prominent, his Hidden Heart of Gold was seriously played down, and he sunk to depths never explored by his older counterpart.
• Saban's Adventures of the Little Mermaid, an adaptation of The Little Mermaid fairy tale that draws heavily from the Disney version, also makes the Sea-Witch, Hedwig, a villain out for power. The prince's betrothed, Cecily, is also an antagonist, but unlike in the Disney version, they're not the same person.
• While Sea Rogue from TUGS was a friend of the Star Tugs who was forced against his will to steal cargo for pirates or they'd sink his uncle, in the Frankenslation, Salty's Lighthouse, he became a villain who liked to steal cargo.
• In Scooby-Doo! Mystery Incorporated, Mudsy is a Monster of the Week and a disgruntled out-of-work actor who turned on his mystery-solving team. In his original appearances during his own show, he was harmless and much more friendly. This is a Justified Trope in that it is All Just a Dream and there is no "real" Mudsy in-universe.
• While She-Ra and the Princesses of Power generally goes in the other direction, Light Hope turns out to be pursuing their own agenda, and far more dangerous than the Horde.
• Brainy in The Smurfs (1981) episode "King Smurf" became the titular character, whereas in the original comic book version he was a contender for the role of the village leader who was outvoted in favor of the Smurf who would become King Smurf. Also counts as a Composite Character, since Brainy and King Smurf were not the same person in the original comic book story.
• Sonic the Hedgehog:
  • In the games, Dr. Robotnik is villainous, but with a highly affable and clownish demeanor, and in some cases leans into Anti-Villain territory. Robotnik of Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM) however, is a monstrous (and far less humorous) dictator that not only has taken over most of the planet but thrives almost lustfully on having any remaining civilians painfully roboticized.
  • In Sonic Boom, Shadow is a lone-wolf villain who antagonizes Sonic and friends for no real reason. In the games, while never the friendliest character, Shadow had sympathetic qualities and doubts over the morality of his actions even before his Heel–Face Turn and shows value and trust in his fellow Team Dark members
• South Park: The tendency of adaptations to turn morally ambiguous figures into outright villains is parodied in the episode "Pip," a spoof of Great Expectations. For most of the episode's run time it's a straight, if tongue-in-cheek, adaptation, until the ending, where the book's tragic Jerkass Woobie Miss Havisham is randomly revealed to be a Mad Scientist who schemes to transplant her mind into her daughter Estella's body to be young and pretty again, has the power to vomit acid, and commands a troop of murderous robot monkeys.
• Star Wars Rebels: A rare case of internal adaptational villainy: In the Star Wars Legends continuity, Rukh, one of Grand Admiral Thrawn's Noghri bodyguards, undergoes a Heel–Face Turn once Leia and the Republic reveal the Empire's treachery in enslaving the Noghri people. Rukh himself even assassinates Thrawn on the bridge of his Star Destroyer, and is a loyal and honorable protector for Leia and her family from then on. However in the new canon established when Disney purchased the rights and wiped away the old Expanded Universe, Rukh is a devoted and loyal assassin, and no mention is made of the Empire enslaving the Noghri.
• Strawberry Shortcake:
  • Raisin Cane from the 1980s comics series was more of an Anti-Villain who wanted to be friends with Strawberry, but was torn between her and her loyalties to Sour Grapes and the Purple Pieman. Her Berry Bitty Adventures incarnation changes her into a smug and catty restaurant critic who willingly works with Purple Pieman and doesn’t view Strawberry as a friend at all.
  • Raspberry Tart is usually a friend of Strawberry in most incarnations; in the 2021 series Strawberry Shortcake: Berry in the Big City however, she is changed into an Alpha Bitch and Strawberry's Sitcom Arch-Nemesis who is jealous of her business. Later inverted as Raspberry undergoes Character Development and grows fonder of Strawberry.
• The Street Fighter animated series made Zangief into one of M. Bison's lackeys, despite the fact that Zangief actually opposed Shadaloo in the games.
• Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles:
  • While the original comic book incarnation of Karai has interests that occasionally pit her against the turtles, she is unambiguously their ally. This has changed in the 2003 and 2012 cartoon adaptations, where she has been made into the Shredder's daughter and subordinate. While she will at times fight alongside the turtles, her divided loyalties result in periods where she is wholeheartedly against them. That said, ultimately both pull a Heel–Face Turn, with 2012 Karai even becoming an ally midway through the series after the reveal of Hamato Yoshi/Splinter being her true father is done.
  • The 1980s cartoon is notable for being the only version to portray the character of Leatherhead as truly villainous, as opposed to all other versions where he is an ally of the Turtles, and any time he fights them in those continuities is because of him being either Not Himself or manipulated into doing it by another antagonist.
  • Irma in the 1987 series is April's dorky, boy crazed friend who worked with the turtles. In the 2012 series, she's actually a Kraang in a customized robotic suit who was The Mole, faking her friendship with April to find the Turtles' lair.
  • In other continuities, the Rat King was a lonely man who had the ability to control rats and wanted to be left alone. In the 1987 series, he sought to take over the city for his rat friends. 2003's Rat King only attacked the Turtles when they invaded his territory. 2012's Rat King, on the other hand, started out a Smug Snake scientist who faked concern for his colleague getting mutated so that he could create a serum to give him psychic powers. After becoming the Rat King, he sent his rats to attack New York and mind-controlled Splinter to attack the Turtles. Also, despite claiming to share his earlier incarnations' love for rats, he has no qualms with experimenting on them or sacrificing them in a fight.
  • In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze and the 1987 series, Rahzar was a villain, but otherwise a very unintelligent one and cared for his partner, Tokka. The 2012 version, formerly the mutant Dog Pound (aka Chris Bradford), he's intelligent and a willing servant of the Shredder who takes pleasure at harming others and doesn't have a single concern for any of his teammates.
  • 2003's Mozar was a Triceraton who believed Even Evil Has Standards, while his Mirage version existed in text only. 2012's Mozar is one of the Big Bad Ensemble in Season 4 of 2012's Turtles, violent and willing to destroy his minions and planets to retrieve a black hole generator.
  • Shredder himself is an interesting case. While he was by no means a nice guy in the Mirage comic, his sole crime was the murder of Hamato Yoshi, something he did to avenge his own brother's death, and the only reason the Turtles went after him was to avenge Yoshi's death in Splinter's name; essentially, the conflict was closer to Grey-and-Gray Morality, with Shredder being the villain only because he was a dick compared to the more noble, sympathetic Turtles. In all the adaptations, he was made somewhat more villainous to give the Turtles better reasons to go after him, typically by giving him ambitions to Take Over the World. The 2k3 incarnation, aka the Utrom Shredder, didn't even have a personal connection to Yoshi outside of killing him, and was instead an alien more interested in more material ambitions until his hatred of the Turtles grew to the point that he became an Omnicidal Maniac and tried to destroy the entire multiverse just to get rid of them. The Nickelodeon cartoon gets closer to the comic by having him focused on revenge again, but still keeps him the villain by having him follow Revenge Before Reason.
  • Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles sees its Gender Flipped version of Casey Jones start off as a member of the Foot, before doing a Heel–Face Turn.
• Thomas & Friends:
  • In The Railway Series, Diesel only returned to Sodor once in the individual story "Thomas and the Evil Diesel" where he redeemed himself and was given good word to come back. In the Thomas and Friends series, Diesel made recurring returns to Sodor and eventually became a permanent resident, though he ultimately proved as nasty as before, usually acting as the key antagonistic engine and pulling cruel pranks. Similarly to the novel version though, he is given some sympathetic moments.
  • Reversed for Bulgy, a bus who disliked railways and tried to steal customers from the trains through lying that he accepted rail tickets. In the books, he is punished by being converted into a henhouse. While this is followed in his first appearance in the TV series, he is later repaired, changed into a vegetable stand, and softens towards the other characters. However, in the CGI series, he reverts to the anti-rail bus that he once was.
• Thunder Cats 2011:
  • Pumyra receives this treatment. In the 1980s series, she was one of three survivors who joined the ThunderCats, understood healing medicine, and was otherwise loyal to her teammates. In the 2011 series, she joined Mumm-Ra to exact revenge on Lion-O, admittedly for poor reasons.
  • In addition, Mumm-Ra is portrayed as a much more malevolent character than he was in the original series. In the former, his actions merely amounted to attacking the ThunderCats from time to time. But in the new series, the first thing he does is cross the Moral Event Horizon by murdering Lion-O's father while disguised as Panthro. And he only gets MUCH worse from there. Also, in the original he had one redeeming quality in the form of his genuine love for his pet dog Ma-Mutt. In the new series, Ma-Mutt has been adapted out, so Mumm-Ra is pretty much irredeemable.
• Tintin: In the comic strip album Cigars of the Pharaoh, when Tintin drives two people to the insane asylum, the evil fakir switches the doctor's letter for a forged one that tells the personnel to lock Tintin up instead. In the Ellipse-Nelvana animated version, the doctor himself is revealed to be one of the masked villain councilmen and is implied to have written the "bad" letter himself.
• Transformers: Animated:
  • The original Blackarachnia from Beast Wars was really a Maximal reprogrammed into a Predacon and eventually did a Heel–Face Turn because of her love for Beast!Silverbolt and Elita One from The Transformers was an Autobot through and through. Animated fused the two into a character that, while she has a Dark and Troubled Past, is willingly a member of the Decepticons.
  • Sentinel Prime in the comics was one of Optimus' main allies and mentor. Here, he's a Jerkass, a racist, and a Dirty Coward.
• Transformers: Cyberverse
  • In the original IDW continuity, Drift defected from the Decepticons and became an Autobot. While in Cyberverse Drift defects much earlier and was much less violent than his comic counterpart, he's ultimately revealed to be a Fake Defector who tries to murder Hot Rod in the season 3 premiere.
  • Sky Byte was more of a noble Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain in Transformers: Robots in Disguise who eventually defected from the Decepticons. In Cyberverse he's a proud member of the team and has ended several civilizations in his attempts to kill Jetfire. That said, even though his morality never changes he ultimately is one of the Decepticon leadership to agree to the Autobot peace treaty.
• Wabbit: A Looney Tunes Production did this to Michigan J. Frog, where he is revealed to be the Diabolical Mastermind behind the terminator robot that tried to kill Bugs Bunny in the episode "Misjudgment Day".
• Downplayed with Cornelia from W.I.T.C.H.. In the cartoon she's presented as more of a straight Alpha Bitch than the Lovable Alpha Bitch she is in the comics. She's ruder and generally more aggressive. In the comics she is a Bully Hunter but in the cartoon, prior to her Character Development, she was a bully herself.
• YooHoo & Friends: As a part of the 2012 dub changing a lot of the plot around, all of the YooHoos were formerly Corrupt Corporate Executives who were forcibly turned into animals as a way to atone for their crimes against the environment. In the original Korean version, they were just heroic eco-warriors.

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