Coco: Ernesto de la Cruz will resort to murder if it means being able to seize his moment.
Frozen (2013): Prince Hans of the Southern Isles turns out to be an evil, manipulative and remorseless fiend who shows no moral qualms regarding his goal to become king of Arendelle, even if he has to resort to murder.
Deconstructed in the Tie-In NovelA Frozen Heart, which reveals Prince Hans's backstory, and how it shaped him into becoming the "frozen-hearted" villain he is today. Though he started out as a decent person who opposed his father's brutal regime, the time he spent as the king's gofer and his brothers' constant bullying made him cynical about love, combined with stubbornly pursuing a nigh-impossible goal of winning his heartless father's respect at all costs. By the end of the story, he's so desensitized that he has no qualms using methods he once hated in order to become the king of Arendelle.
Judge Claude Frollo from The Hunchback of Notre Dame (Disney). He doesn't start out as this, but he ends up focusing so much on Esmeralda that he no longer cares about how the people of Paris perceive him or fears the church and God.
Megamind: Unlike Metro Man, Titan/Tighten has absolutely zero qualms against trying to kill Megamind outright. It's only the first sign of the monster Megamind has created.
The Director from NIMONA (2023). She will do anything, no matter how reprehensible, in order to protect the kingdom from monsters. She voices her resolves right after personally running a sword through Gloreth's last living descendant, Sir Goldenloin—or, at least, someone who took on his form.
"Big" Jack Horner from Puss in Boots: The Last Wish. Nothing will stop him from getting the wish in his POV. Nothing.
Madam Gasket from Robots. She has no qualms to murder Bigweld to solidify her son's rule over Robot City, and she even threatens to hang Ratchet next to his father for hesitating on the plan.
Jenner from The Secretof NIMH. He takes completely insane extremes to make sure the rats hold their post in the thorn bush, refusing to budge even from claims against their survival if they stay. When Mrs. Brisby tries to warn them that NIMH will come for them, he resorts to trying to physically silence her.
Major Henry West from 28 Days Later. He'll do anything to repopulate the country and to prove that there is a future for his men, to the point that he's blinded himself to the possibility that there's no point in repopulation.
Weyland-Yutani. The company wants to control the xenomorph for profit and to increase their wealth/influence. To this end, they sacrifice their own employees, doom an entire squadron of soldier or destroy entire civilizations. One only need look at their agents/executives (Ash, Burke, Bishop...etc).
David from Prometheus and Alien: Covenant. As evidenced by his famous question "How far would you go to get your answers". For David, the answer is however far it takes. He even remarks to Shaw in Prometheus that once his creators aren't around to program him anymore, he'll be "free", which was likely a factor in leading Weyland to his demise.
Colonel Walter E. Kurtz in Apocalypse Now. He gives a monologue to Captain Williard as to why he admires the Vietnamese enemy. He speaks of how, when he was with the US Special Forces, he went on numerous humanitarian aid missions to foster good will towards the common people of Vietnam. When things changed for him was when, during one of these aid missions, the enemy came into the village after they left and massacred everyone; especially disturbing was that they mutilated the arms of the children and threw them into a pile as a trophy, mocking the Americans. At first Kurtz was traumatized, but given time to think about it, he marveled at the genius of tactics like that; the enemy was going to win the war, not because they had a superior military, but because they were willing to do whatever it took to win. If America had that much dedication, he said, as few as 10 divisions could win the war.
Thanos turns out to be this in Avengers: Infinity War. Following the loss of all life on his homeworld due to overpopulation, he becomes capable of doing anything, no matter how monstrous, to prevent other worlds from suffering a similar fate. His pursuit of the Infinity Stones is entirely because being able to do so everywhere at once with the snap of a finger is far more efficient than having to go from world to world. He eventually murders his daughter Gamora to acquire the Soul Stone.
The titular Black Adam (2022). Dwayne Johnson considers a defining trait of the character to be a lack of restraint.
Erik Killmonger from Black Panther (2018). Erik will do anything to get to his goals. Anything. An example is how he handles his two allies: When Klaue is holding Erik's lover hostage, he just shoots them both — his lover because she was unimportant, and Klaue because he was a means to an end. He unflinchingly makes split-second, violent decisions with no remorse, all for the sake of reaching his goal. And, as he says in this section's quote — all the killing and lying he did was so he could reach this point.
Vampire Overlord Eli Damaskinos from BladeII, When asked by a subordinate how many of his people he was willing to sacrifice for his goals, he replies "Everyone." As it turns out, even his own family isn't safe.
Leilah from Bright 2017. Leilah will do anything to get her Wand back so she can resurrect the Dark Lord. This includes murdering innocent civilians, police officers, and even Tikka, her own sister.
Captain Louis Renault from Casablanca. Very little, if anything, checks Capt. Renault's goals or decisions.
Baron Victor Von Frankenstein from The Curseof Frankenstein. Absolutely nothing will stop Frankenstein in his quest to create new life, not societal expectations, the lives of his friends or even his own safety.
Talia al Ghul from The Dark Knight Rises. Kill innocent people, die herself, construct a years-long deception and alternate identity to infiltrate Gotham's elite, seduce the man who killed her father, allow her closest friend and protector to die... nothing is beyond her if it means Gotham is ashes in the end.
Her father, Ra's al Ghul, also qualifies. He stops at nothing to achieve his goal of destroying Gotham City.
Bane, as well. Like Ra's al Ghul before him, Bane allows nothing to stand in the way of the destruction of Gotham.
To say nothing of The Joker.
Joker: You have all these rules, and you think they'll save you. [...] The only sensible way to live in this world is without rules.
Hans Gruber from Die Hard. Looks like nothing can stop him from trying to achieve his goal. If he has to kill someone or sacrifice his own men if that would mean putting his hands on the millions then so be it.
Ma-Ma from Dredd. Willing to obliterate an entire level of Peach Trees with military-grade weapons just to kill a lieutenant she knows will talk if Dredd gets him out.
In Fight Club, Tyler Durden (and eventually the narrator) count.
The Kurgan from Highlander, an ancient Immortal from the Russian steppes who only cares about one thing: claiming the Prize. He will attack any Immortal, anytime and nearly anywhere. The tradition of not fighting onHoly Ground is just about the only law he respects. Apart from that, he is a deranged savage.
The High Evolutionary from Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3. Played for horror. He goes about his quest to 'perfect the galaxy' blissfully untroubled by questions like 'is this ethical', 'how much will this cost', 'is this likely to work', and 'is this on any conceivable level a good and useful idea'. In the end, he's mostly responsible for making the galaxy worse, not better.
In The Hustler (1961), Eddie wants to beat Minnesota Fats at pool and be recognized as the best player ever. But the only way he can do that is to become The Unfettered, no matter what he has to sacrifice along the way.
Interstellar: NASA deliberately seeks out people like this for the mission; people with no connection to Earth or a willingness to make any sacrifice if it means getting the job done. This backfires horribly with Dr. Mann, as it turns out that the reason he's unfettered is because he has no priority higher than keeping himself alive. He proceeds to jeopardize the whole mission by falsifying data and betraying the Endurance crew in a desperate attempt to save his own skin after the planet he was supposed to explore turned out to be inhospitable.
Pick any villain in the James Bond franchise. Many of them are first-rate sociopathic Diabolical Masterminds and/or Corrupt Corporate Executives. They're determined to achieve their Evil Plan by any means necessary, be it murder or kidnapping. In more extreme Omnicidal Maniac cases like Ernst Blofeld, Karl Stromberg, or Hugo Drax, they'll hold the entire world at gunpoint. To them, the ends justify the means in succeeding at their goals, and they'll do anything and everything to get the job done, even if it's underhanded.
Clyde Shelton in Law Abiding Citizen. After his family is murdered and the D.A. cuts an insanely inadequate deal with the culprit, he becomes singularly focused on the goal of not only getting justice, but bringing down the broken, flawed, and corrupt justice system that he believes failed his family.
Faora-Ul from Manof Steel 2013. She remains stoic and glacial even when it comes to annihilate an entire population in order to take a planet away from them.
Denzel Washington in Man on Fire. To save one young girl and get revenge for her kidnapping, he kills dozens of people. He gives no regard to his own life or that of anyone around him. He tortures and kills anyone who has a connection to the kidnapping and kills anyone who gets in the way, at one point blowing up a whole building — possibly with many innocents inside — without any remorse. Finally, he sacrifices himself in a trade for the girl. Admittedly, he was already suicidal, but he used his suicidal feelings to strip himself of all remaining inhibitions.
John Tuld from Margin Call. He is utterly ruthless and committed to a singular vision, even when it becomes clear that the decision (seemingly made over a span of just a few hours) will radically impact his company's reputation on the stock market, if not outright destroy it. It's notable that in his final scene, he's shown casually enjoying a steak dinner after the fire sale and nonchalantly tells Sam that he "feels better" about the whole thing, because it will all be water under the bridge soon enough.
A heroic example is Neo from The Matrix series. In becoming The One, Neo was, effectively, Choice Incarnate, able to do what he wanted in the Matrix. Being the One and being Neo were different things, however. While the Architect was able to limit the choices of his predecessors, it was Neo's specific love for Trinity that allowed him to Take a Third Option throughout the series and not constrain himself fully to what the Matrix, its machine denizens, or even the humans of Zion wanted or expected him to do — even at the risk of genocide of the human race if he were to fail.
Solomon Lane from Mission: Impossible – Fallout. Through Sanity Slippage, there is nothing Lane isn't willing to do to achieve his goals, even if those goals are just hurting Ethan. He's even perfectly happy to trade his own life to do so.
The antagonist Kurt Hendricks from Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol is willing to go to any lengths to ignite a global nuclear war for the sake of "peace." This includes destroying the Kremlin in Russia to make off with the nuclear launch codes and putting the blame on the IMF, kidnapping the family of a nuclear code expert so he would cooperate with their schemes before dying when he was no longer useful, and even jumping out of the top floor of a vehicle assembly factory and mortally wounding himself to keep the launch control device from Hunt's hands.
Louis Bloom from Nightcrawler. Lou is willing to cross any lines necessary to ensure he gets the best footage and allows his business to take off.
Anton Chigurh: (About to kill a fellow hit man) Let me ask you something. If the rule you followed, brought you to this, of what use was the rule?
The One: The former interdimensional law enforcer Gabriel Yulaw has devoted himself to becoming the One by killing all alternate versions of himself and gaining power through their energies. He isn't bothered by the fact that there's more than one hundred of them, what kind of collateral damage he causes (like fighting and killing his former friend Roedecker), or that it's not even sure if he actually becomes the most powerful being in existence or causes the entire multiverse's destruction if he kills Gabe, the last version of himself. He's that single-minded in his goal. Once he's imprisoned in a Prison Dimension, he merely decides to become the one most powerful fighter around.His fighting style (Xing Yi Quan) even reflects this trope; he prefers attacking with straightforward punches even when there's plenty of room around. This proves to be his undoing against the Baguazhang style his Good Counterpart Gabe utilizes.
Yulaw: The shortest distance between two points will always be a straight line.
Robert Angier in The Prestige will do anything to destroy Alfred Borden and expose the secret for his "Transported Man" trick, from shooting Borden's fingers off, to throwing his fortune at lightning experiments, to framing Borden for murder. At first, it seems to be retribution for Borden accidentally killing Angier's wife, but it eventually goes way beyond that:
Olivia (his mistress): It won't bring your wife back.
Angier: I don't care about my wife. I care about his secret.
Interestingly played in that Mal defeats the Operative by fettering him: showing the man the recording from Miranda broke his conviction and put him up against a moral objection he couldn't overcome.
Alejandro Gillick from the Film/Sicario duology. Doesn't care who gets hurt as long as Fausto is out of commission. His hatred and vengefulness has twisted him into a monster who doesn't care who he hurts as long as he gets what he wants.
Sodom and Gomorrah: It's made clear that Queen Bera and other Sodomites see no limits placed on gaining pleasure. Whether it be killing people, incest or whatever else, anything goes in their eyes.
The Green Goblin from Spiderman No Way Home. What ultimately makes him as dangerous as he is. No matter what the situation is, he gives his all and shows absolutely zero restraint, and his belief that he is above human morality coupled with his open disgust for weakness means that there does not seem to be a single line he's averse to crossing.
Qui-Gon Jinn is the Old Master kind of unfettered: 'I do what I must.' Without remorse, without regret. Not coincidentally, many Star Wars fans consider Qui-Gon to be a good movie example of a Gray Jedi — that is to say, a Force-user that doesn't necessarily believe in the Light/Dark duality of the Force. The fact that he serves the Jedi as opposed to the Sith is inconsequential.
Interestingly enough, true Gray Jedi make use of both Force abilities. Since they aren't restricted to one teaching or another, this potentially could grant mastery and insight into the Force, beyond any normal Jedi or Sith. However, it is rare to encounter such individuals, since they're an extremely reclusive faction.
Mandalorians are especially feared for this trope alone. Other than the Sith, the Mandalorians were another of the Jedi's greatest rival organizations. However, in the more recent lore, most Mandalorian clans were purged to near-extinction. Though this makes them even less common than the Sith, a few surviving clans managed to escape.
The Sith are always The Unfettered, to contrast the Jedi being The Fettered.
The Code of the Sith: Peace is a Lie, there is only Passion. Through Passion, I gain Strength. Through Strength, I gain Power. Through Power, I gain Victory. Through Victory, My Chains are Broken. The Force shall free me.
The Dark Side itself is very often misunderstood in this way. Yes, it can be and has been used for evil purposes, but at its core, it is merely a direct and destructive power. But abusing it comes at a cost of both sanity and grim deformation.
Many typical Bounty Hunters (most famously Boba Fett and Cad Bane) are as unfettered as one can get in this universe. Since they can be bought off (most of the time), it's rare to see these types fully invested in their employer. This can spell big trouble for anyone willing to cross them, friend or foe.
Grand Moff Tarkin, in spades. He criticizes the Jedi for being The Fettered in a time of war. He takes this viewpoint further in his service to the Empire, blowing up a planet just to set an example.
In Taken we have the father (who happens to be a Combat Pragmatist) to boot) who will go to any length, including torture and shooting his friend's wife, in a frighteningly unhesitating fashion, to get his daughter back.
Sentinel Prime in Transformers: Dark of the Moon is revealed to be one of these. Over the course of the film and the events preceding it, he betrays the Autobots who trusted and followed him, makes a pact with Megatron, brutally murders Ironhide, attempts to enslave the human race, murders countless innocent people, and nearly kills Optimus, to whom he had been a mentor and father figure. All of which proves that there was no depth that Sentinel was unwilling to sink to for the sake of restoring Cybertron and returning to a time where he was revered as a god.
Mattie Ross in both versions of True Grit, but played harder in the new adaptation. Offputting because she's just a teenage girl, but she is utterly obsessed with killing Tom Chaney.
"H," an interrogator who specializes in Cold-Blooded Torture, in Unthinkable. After he is set to work on a terrorist who claims to have planted nuclear bombs in several American cities, at several points he tells his handlers that it is important that his subject believe that he "has no limits." As it turns out, he really doesn't.
Keyser Soze from The Usual Suspects. Nothing can stop him once he decides he's going to do something. Nothing.
Söze looks over the faces of his family. Then he showed these men of will what will really was.
Terence Fletcher from Whiplash. : There is no low Fletcher will avert from to succeed, as he is even willing enough to use the suicide of a former pupil to fabricate a sob story to motivate his students, knowing that his destructive behavior may have been a factor to his students demise.
In The Wolverine, none of Shingen’s evil acts really faze him. Not once does he take a step back and think that maybe, just maybe, trying to murder your daughter is a bit evil.
and see for yourself.