Just ran across this on YouTube.

First thought in my mind, was Fonda as Frank in “Once Upon A Time In The West”.
Hank Fonda was always the hero in Westerns, which is why Leoney wanted him as the bad guy.
Lotta great actors, Marvin, Wallache, Boone, Van Cleef, but Fonda as a villain had to be the top, IMHO.
Should’ve given honorable mention to Bruce Dern. Any SOB that shoots Duke in the back, in cold blood, automatically gets a top rating!
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Don't forget Powers Boothe as Curly Bill.

No contest, El Guapo in the 3 Amigos.

They missed Henry Silva.

In a comedy western, I gotta go with James Coburn in "Waterhole #3". I think that was Coburn, anyway - been a long time.

It was.

Gene Hackman in Unforgiven was pretty good.

Bruce Dern "The Cowboys".

Lee Van Cleef was excellent as well.

Tuco (Eli Wallach) was a pretty good villain in ‘The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.’

Not a Western but loosely a Civil War themed movie. Charlie Hunnam’s character in Cold Mountain was a pretty decent villain.

Completely agree - Little Bill Daggot

Also Rod Steiger In “Jubal”.
Great movie, and Steiger plays a real Sonuva Bitch.
One of my favorites, but I stand by Fonda as Frank.
Once Upon a Time is easily in my top 3, and seeing Fonda as the villain, sorta blew me away!
I wonder how Jimmy Stewart would have been as a villain.
Stewart definitely had the acting ability.
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Can you imagine what a villain John Wayne could have been?

I stayed at a Best Western in Myrtle Beach

bleck biker week

Never again

X2

He made for a pretty good villain in the Quick and Dead also.

Richard Boon in Big Jake was pert good.

Walter Mathow was a great villain, in that bullwhip scene.

Tom Berenger as Uncle Jim Vance in Hatfields and McCoys.

Okay, just picking, but the scene they used for Lee Van Cleef, where he uses a stocked SSA to drill the hunchback in the forehead was from “A Few Dollars More” , or am I crazy?
Im pretty sure I’m not!
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no contest , the best was Richard Boone in HOMBRE


Bruce Dern gets the best sniveling villain for many roles

Are you forgetting “Red River”? Tom Dunston was somebody we all feared, not to mention Ethan in “The Searchers”. Duke definitely had the range, but as one of my heroes, well, let’s just say “I love the Man”.
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Jack Palance in "Shane". He's the gold standard for Western movie villains.

RS

Agreed.
Richard Boone played a great villain in John Wayne’s “Big Jake”, too.

I always though Eli Wallach played a great villain in “The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly”, as Tuco.

And of course, Lee Marvin in “The Man Who Shot Liberty Vallance”.

Eli was decent in The Magnificent 7 too

Larry Storch as Texas Jack in the Great Race!


grin

Brian Donlevy as Trampas in the 1946 film The Virginian.

How about Javier Bardem as Anton Chigurh in No Country For Old Men, a Western of sorts?

Evil Roy Slade, he was raised by Buzzards! Can't think of the name of the movie! Played by John Aston or Gomez Adams!

Cicero Grimes in "HOMBRE" is probably tied with Bruce Dern's character in "THE COWBOYS".

Damn...he Was bad!

..... Couldn't recall if that was "Few Dollars More" or "Fistful Of Dollars" but I googled around and it was "A Few Dollars More" where he nails the outlaw in the forehead with that stocked SAA (?). It's a classic; just punch in "For A few Dollars More - Lee Van Cleef's Entrance" on YouTube.

And in "The Tall T" opposite Randolph Scott.

My pick is George Kennedy as Fraser in "Cahill U.S. Marshall"

Yep.

I believe Lee Van Cleef was the baddest villain, in more movies, than any other.
He gets my vote!

I liked the undertaker guy in hell on wheels.

I don't think he's done any real westerns but the English actor Rufus Sewell has done some very good bad guy parts. I think the closest he's come to a western is Armand in the Legend of Zorro.

I agree. No blustering, no threats, no liquor induced "call outs," just a nearly silent, deadly looking mega-menace.

L.W.

Jack F uu k. In Palance. Period

Pretty badass in "The Professionals" too,But Van cleef was in Liberty Valance as well being a thug,, Jack Elam as a Villan should be in there

Bruce Dern was pretty much typecast as a villain. He was good at it but he was a versatile actor. Lots of others did a good job but he was almost always cast as a villain. Leo Gordon was a good villain.

Richard Drysart as Coy Lahood in Clint Eastwood's Palerider.

Hedley Lamarr.

Leo Gordon played a bad guy in a bunch of westerns, both movies and TV Westerns. He played in The Night of The Grizzly and went against good guy, Clint Walker. He had the size and face to pull it off.

Bruce Dern was one of only three men who killed John Wayne. Now, that is a certified villain!

One was a Nip on Iwo Jima.

Lee Marvin as Liberty Valance was my favorite...

henry as frank for a serious villain, and stacy keach as Bad Bob in the life and times of judge roy bean. only a comedy cameo role, but the onion and coffee ...

Hillary ?...

one of the best

Has jack elam ever not played a bad guy?


Blue Duck was kinda scary

Schit....Little Bill weren't even a bad guy!


He was a legitimately elected county official protecting his citizenry from paid hitmen.

He was the one that told John Wayne how to fall when shot. Lifted his shirt to show him the bullet holes as to how he knew.

He did a movie in a prison he had done time in. Actors were free to run around. He had a pair of guards shadow him. He was a bad ass. They remembered him.

Later in life he was a writer. Great guy. Very kind to all

\He was a good guy in Rio Lobo.

He was James Garner's Sidekick in Support Your Local Sheriff.

Pretty sure Lee Van Cleef got something in his eye.

Went to high school with a guy who's divorcee Mom used to be a side piece for Lee Van Cleef when they lived in LA.

Used to pheasant hunt next to her place.

If you said someone other than Jack Palance....you are dumb. And Heady Lamar.

Geoffrey Lewis as Stacey Bridges in High Plains Drifter

Jack Elam was a staple in westerns. He earned himself an Oscar. He was another versatile actor. There were many.

I've read Jack lost that eye at a Cub Scout meeting.

Karl Malden in The Hanging Tree. If you haven't seen it then track it down, it is a great movie. Gary Cooper is a bit of a bad guy but Karl Malden is the real weirdo bad guy in it.

drover

C’mon guys! The Villian!

Gian Volonte as Indio was pretty badass.

THATS HEADLY!!!!!

“How are you going to get back down the hill?”

The saloon keeper in Deadwood must be a candidate.

Swedgin a Villain ?... Naw, Just an intuitive business man...

Mongo

I love watching that show back in the sixties that bad guy and night of the grizzly was an ass ho

Doesn't mind killing anyone who gets in his way. Thrives on it.

Once Upon a Time in the West was Elam's best rough mug scene.

Candygram for Mongo!

LEE MARVIN as Liberty Valance or Jack Palance in Shane.

The Mexican bandits in the "Treasure of the Sierra Madre" deserve a mention. If nothing else they gave us the famous "Badges? We ain't got no badges! We don't need no badges. I don't have to show you any stinkin' badges!"

The scene with the stocked SAA was in a "Few Dollars More".
PJ

I am surprised that no one mentioned Alan Rickman in Quigley. Rickman could play any bad guy, period.

The Snydley Whiplash of the modern era.

Osky

Mickey Rourke as Graff in "The Last Outlaw".

I'll go with Billy Drago. Movie-wise, Pale Rider. He made a good TV villain in "The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr".

Also as Al Capone’s hit man Frank Nitti, in “The Untouchables”

Couple other I really like.
Burke Ives in “The Big Country”.
Not really a villain like his gutless boy, played by Chuck Conners, but a memorable role nonetheless.
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Royal Dano had a long career and was cast as a villain a lot. he was versatile and played good guys as well. He once played Abraham Lincoln.

Gene Hackman in Unforgiven! memtb

"Tuco" Eli Wallach in The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

Jeff Daniels as Frank Griffin

Godless

Of all the actors mentioned thus far, only one has a Primus song named for them. Lee Van Cleef for the win!

Good for sure as a mean cruel ombré, but I think for the pure feeling of evil exuded Bruce Dern may be a backstab or two ahead.

Osky

+1, My first thought was the SOB that killed John Wayne in "The Cowboys". That scene forever labeled Dern as a Bad Guy.