When it comes to Disney villains, some are clearly a little brighter than others. There are the bumbling fools (who are, admittedly, more likely to be sidekicks than full-on bad guys), the classic evil queens, the magic users, the shapeshifters, and a whole host of sort-of-evil people who just have terrible forward planning.
In fact, being able to create a truly functional evil plan and actually see it through seems to be one of the biggest hurdles for Disney villains, most of which manage plans that are half-baked and fall apart the first moment a hero comes striding through. Some, of course, are actually pretty solid (even if the villains never win in the end), but which are the best... and which should have been left on the drawing board?
Queen of Hearts (Alice In Wonderland)
The Queen of Hearts is clearly the villain with the worst plan in the wonderful world of Disney, because she actually has no plan! There seems to be no intention to her actions, she isn't trying to kill anyone, trick anyone, marry anyone, take over any kingdoms, or otherwise effect any kind of nefarious change. Instead, she's just a bizarre golf enthusiast with a penchant for cherry tarts and beheadings, and Alice happens to get in her way.
Cruella DeVil (101 Dalmations)
Cruella may be one of the most evil villains (because she is driven by a desire to literally murder puppies, which is essentially the benchmark for evil), but she's not necessarily the smartest. For one thing, she hires two of the most incompetent goons she can find as her assistants, and seems utterly unconcerned that they have seemingly no experience in holding, trapping, killing, or skinning dogs. Pure evil of dog-murder aside, is she not concerned that an amateur butcher will ruin the furs? Not to mention the fact that she is clearly obscenely wealthy - so why would she bother kidnapping the litter of an old school friend instead of just buying pet store pups, when that just seems like a great way to get caught?
Ursula (The Little Mermaid)
Plenty of Disney fans have pointed out that Ursula, sea-witch extraordinaire, has some issues with her master plan. Front and center is the fact that she steals Ariel's voice, but forgets that she can write (because she signs her name to the contract), and that she is a stunningly beautiful, kind, sweet woman (and the prince has already seen her face). Thankfully, Ariel also seems to forget that she can write, but she is still able to use her womanly wiles to get Eric on-side and take Ursula down.
Ursula also seems to be making things far more complicated than she needs to. She is a witch who can literally expand to the size of a building, but she couldn't possibly take on Triton without a complex series of contracts. And it's never mentioned what she intends to do once Triton is turned into a sea-slug-polyp-thing - rule? With his army of loyal followers and enormous family after her? It just doesn't seem thought through.
The Evil Queen (Snow White)
The Evil Queen seemed to have things fairly well figured out in the beginning - hire an experienced murderer and pay him to kill her rival. However, things obviously went badly, and that begs a lot of questions... including why, if she had an evil lair full of poison-making ingredients, she didn't just poison Snow White in the castle, where she has access to all her food? And why would she make the poison one that has a 'first kiss' antidote? And really, why use poison at all? Snow White is a relatively helpless girl baking pies alone in the woods, and the Evil Queen is a shapeshifting witch. It seems like she didn't need to do much persuading, here, she could have just strolled in with a bow and arrow and shot her.
Mother Gothel (Tangled)
Mother Gothel is one of the few Disney villains who actually manages to succeed for a period of time, before the hero takes her down, which puts her fairly high on the list. However, her ability to keep a small child locked in a tower doesn't mean that she has the greatest long-term plan. While Rapunzel's hair can keep Gothel young for centuries, it's never explained how that is going to work with Rapunzel's own aging. Clearly, Gothel's 'flower' ages at the usual rate, so presumably, Gothel's plan has a serious expiry date. Perhaps she assumes that her hair will make Rapunzel immortal, but it seems that she hasn't been planning as far ahead as one would expect from a centuries-old witch.
Lady Tremaine (Cinderella)
Lady Tremaine manages to carry out her evil plan for a while - using Cinderella as a maid, and working to further the prospects of her own daughters. Her manipulation of them to destroy Cinderella's gown is masterful, and her cunning is fairly impressive, compared to many.
However, like several others, Lady Tremaine's plan falls down for one simple reason - she is blind to how awful her daughters really are. There was simply no way that the Prince was going to fall madly in love with her awful children, or that he would stop searching for Cinderella if she just locked her stepdaughter up for long enough.
Gaston (Beauty And The Beast)
Gaston is a fairly simple villain, and a hunter through and through. He may be an odious human, but his 'evil plan' seems to stretch about as far as a hunting lodge and a wife for most of the movie. And this is something easily achievable for a man like Gaston, who has women fawning all over him. Things only go wrong when he decides to obsess over Belle, and attack the Beast - but even then, his plans should have worked. He blackmails the right people, chooses the right victim, and Belle proves throughout the film that she will do anything to save her father, so he's got her pegged, too. And assuming that the best hunter in the area could take down a beast in an empty castle with the help of an entire village of armed people makes sense, too - he just underestimated Prince Adam in the end.
Yzma (Emperor's New Groove)
Onto the villains who actually managed to create workable plans - and carry them out, at least for a time. Yzma, despite her initial desire to shapeshift Kuzco and smash him with a hammer, has a solid plan: poison the unloved Emperor, take over the kingdom. She does it, too, even if she needs Kronk to finish the job when he mistakes extract of llama for poison. Still, Yzma manages to effectively get rid of the Emperor, take over the kingdom, and rule for a while - something most Disney villains don't even get close to. And at the end of the day, her only failing was relying on Kronk.
Jafar (Aladdin)
Again, Jafar actually succeeded in his plan - although not for long. From the start, he showed that he had thought things through more than most Disney villains: he found the cave, but didn't rush in himself, he made sure to send someone else in case things went wrong. He carefully found Aladdin, plotted to manipulate him, and was able to see through his disguise (eventually). He actually did become Sultan, enslaved the royal family, and got the genie he wanted. It may not have ended well, but all the planning was in place.
Scar (The Lion King)
There is no doubt that Scar had the most impressively intelligent plan, and one that actually led to him ruling Pride Rock for years (long enough for Simba to change from a cub into a powerful and full-grown lion). He was able to overthrow the King, convince everyone that Mufasa's death was a horrible accident, and take out Simba too (or so he thought). His plan was seemingly foolproof, and Simba only survived through sheer luck - the hyenas were on board to kill him, he just happened to fall into a thorn patch where they couldn't follow. And had Scar been a good ruler, he would have managed to keep control of Pride Rock his entire life, as Simba only returned because Nala had to range so far away to hunt. Scar, for all his faults (and there are plenty), was the smartest and most successful of the Disney bad guys, by a long shot.