Hundreds of mad scientists have appeared on the big and small screen over the years. These high-IQ humans are normally ambitious but instead of using their brains for constructive endeavors like finding the cure of cancer, they decide to destroy the world, attack a foe or satisfy a personal desire.
While there have been plenty of real-life mad scientists in history, the fictional ones tend to be more interesting since they use extraordinary methods that wouldn't really work in real life. And even though they eventually fall, we can't help but applaud them for trying. Here are the best and worst fictional mad scientists in both TV and movies.
Best: Dr. Julius No
Dr. No was the man who set the standards for future Bond villains when he appeared in the very first Eon Productions Bond film Dr. No. He was a genius with a Napoleon complex and a member of the fictional S.P.E.C.T.R.E organization led by the ever-present supervillain Blofeld.
His experiments in atomic energy made him lose his hands but he had them replaced with bionic ones. The new arms were so strong that they could crash metal. When the American and Soviet governments denied him the chance to work for them, Dr. No accepted 'no' for an answer and decided to break bad by joining S.P.E.C.T.R.E. Sadly, he died by getting boiled in his own reactor.
Worst: Dr. Strangelove
Peter Seller played four different characters in Stanley Kubrick's Dr. Strangelove or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb. That's one talented actor and this is also one lengthy movie title. One of the characters Seller played was the mad scientist called Dr. Strangelove which according to him is the English version of his complicated German name Merkwürdigliebe. Strangelove had the Alien Arm Syndrome which made his arm do the Nazi salute unexpectedly and try to choke him.
When a US general orders a strike on Russia and it becomes evident that Russia will destroy the world, Strangelove comes up with a weird idea and presents it to the president. Build a bunker and put government officials in it together with beautiful women. Everyone else dies but the leaders multiply and fill the earth once again.
Best: Dr. Henry Wu
The Jurassic World scientist managed to take dinosaur DNA and merge it with the DNA of similar extinct mammals, thus creating a new species. Wu impressively creates the new dinosaur species called the Indominus Rex using DNA from over 10 different species.
However, Wu doesn't care whether there are negative effects of his marvelous creations. To him, it' s all about the experiment working. His ambition should also be factored into his awesomeness, given that he only started as a lab technician at Masrani Global Corporation.
Worst: Dr. Henry Jekyll
The Robert Louis Stevenson novel The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde has been adapted more than five times. Most of the films tell the story of Dr. Jekyll who believes that humans have good and bad versions of themselves. After trying out a serum to cure his heart condition he accidentally unleashes the evil side of him.
The serum causes him to transform into the evil Mr. Hyde. He thus finds himself switching between the evil Mr. Hyde who murders and rapes people and the good Dr. Jekyll who has to clean up the mess. The fact that Jekyll creates something he can't control makes him an incompetent scientist.
Best: Doc Brown
Here's a mad scientist who had the crazy hair to go with it. The genius from the Back To The Future trilogy managed to steal plutonium and time-traveled to avoid getting caught. He didn't just time-travel either, he also invented the first-ever time machine. And he built it from a DeLorean sports car.
The Avengers owe this guy a lot. Surprisingly, the character was based on Albert Einstein. It's highly unlikely that the smartest person to ever live would have liked this depiction of him but fans did. After the trilogy, five more animated shows about Doc Brown were made.
Worst: Dr. Arnim Zola
Captain America: Winter Soldier was a brilliant movie and Hydra's Dr. Arnim Zola wasn't necessarily poor at his job. He was just too good in an unrealistic way. A former Nazi, Zola is constantly trying to come up with new, creative ways to murder and exert full control of humans.
Despite being a biochemist, he's also so computer savvy that he manages to upload his consciousness into a complex computer system. And he does this in the '80s. Zola knows too much and he's capable of doing too much as well. But the question is, how?
Best: Davros
The villain from the popular series Doctor Who ranks highly among mad scientists. He is the man who causes headaches to the series protagonist known as The Doctor. Davros is an expert in various fields of science and he also believes that he qualifies to be the ruler of the universe.
He only has a single functioning arm and replaced his real eyes with one cybernetic eye located on his forehead. Davros also possesses only the upper half of the body and it's said that he can die if he stays away from his chair for several minutes. He also created an army of henchmen called the Daleks.
Worst: Dr. Curt Connors
It's funny when you realize that the name of this Pre-MCU Spiderman villain actually signifies his personality. Dr. Curt Connors is actually Dr. 'Cut Corners.' Yes, instead of getting a prosthetic arm, he is cutting corners by trying to get another one to grow. After studying the ability of lizards to regenerate tails and other body parts, he simply injects himself with lizard DNA and hopes that all goes well.
As a result, he turns into a giant monster that resembles a lizard. He thus comes to be known as the villain Lizard. A good scientist would have simply isolated the gene that causes limb generation and used only that. Connors was too unintelligent to think that using the full lizard DNA would make him go full lizard as well.
Best: Victor Frankenstein
The fictional Swiss scientist is the darling of Hollywood. He has appeared in over 30 movies and TV shows, making himself the most popular mad scientist of all time. The character was originally created by novelist Mary Shelley in her 1818 book Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus.
After conducting chemical experiments and studying how to reverse cell decay, Frankenstein manages to create his own monster. The monster constantly goes wrong but the relationship between the two has plenty of twists and turns. Perhaps that's why Hollywood adores him.
Worst: Dr. Frank N. Furter
Finding love can be difficult but if you have the brains, you can create your own lover. Dr. Frank N. Furter from the cult classic musical The Rocky Horror Picture Show decided to create a young handsome man in the lab to act as his lover. He figured that this was a lover he could control.
How wrong he was. The unappreciative young man ends up choosing someone else instead of his creator. But it's all Fuerter's fault, to be honest. Perhaps he should have spent more time in the lab to make sure scenarios like those ones don't happen.