Top 10 Best Avatar: The Last Airbender Villains

Villains from Avatar: The Last Airbender who make life difficult for Aang and his friends. This includes characters who were bad at one point and later turned good.

The Top Ten

Princess Azula

Princess Azula is a fictional character and antagonist of Nickelodeon's animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender. She is voiced by Grey DeLisle Griffin. Azula is a firebending prodigy and the younger sister of Prince Zuko, known for her cunning and ruthless personality.... read more

Azula was the perfect villain. She was cunning, ruthless, scary, inspiring, slinky, skilled, and absolutely awesome. I loved how, instead of her going down dramatically for closure, they made her fall apart. We felt for her - her relationships with her friends, her mother, and everyone else trying to help her. Her feeling betrayed and losing trust in everything, eventually snapping, despite her being a villain, was intense. The way she said and did everything just gives you chills, and she's only fourteen! THAT'S how you construct a villain, people.

I love Azula as a villain. Seriously, even though Ozai is inarguably the big bad guy of the whole series, somehow his 14-year-old daughter manages to be ten times as menacing as he could ever be. And while she is clearly a horrible, evil person, she is also a very human character. This is best shown on Ember Island when she states that "My own mother thought I was a monster. She was right, but it still hurt." I love this line because it perfectly sums Azula up as a character who is pure evil yet insecure at the same time.
Fire Lord Ozai

The big, badass villain was built up big time and didn't fail to be a truly evil person.
Prince Zuko

Prince Zuko is a fictional character in Nickelodeon's animated television series Avatar: The Last Airbender. Zuko is a master firebender and the older brother of Azula. He is the son of Firelord Ozai and Princess Ursa.
Zuko's character arc centers on his journey to reclaim his honor. Initially... read more

People always say, "Zuko was never the villain," and I always get mad at that. No, he was the villain all the way up to The Day of Black Sun. Now, "villain" doesn't have to mean "bad guy". It just means he was the antagonist to the protagonist. Zuko wasn't a bad guy - he was conflicted and sad and just wanted to get back what he lost - but he was still the enemy of the main character nonetheless.

I adore Zuko! Even from the very beginning, I could see that he was really just a damaged soul. The way he grows and changes really shows that people aren't always good or evil. Or, that people are not doomed to be only good or evil because of their ancestors. I think that reflects real life better because being bad doesn't mean one cannot change for the better.
Combustion Man

Please... that's Sparky Sparky Boom Man you're talking about.

Sparky Sparky Boom Man.
Long Feng

Voiced by Clancy Brown.
Hama

She's a sympathetic character. Her story and bloodbending are some of the darkest aspects of the show. It's chilling how she found such satisfaction in unlocking this twisted power within an innocent girl.

She invented the dark art of bloodbending, giving her the ability to control others.

Voiced by Tress MacNeille.
Admiral Zhao

Voiced by Jason Isaacs.
The Dai Li

Voiced by Phil LaMarr and Gary Cole.
Fire Lord Sozin

Sozin should be ranked way higher. His story is interesting, and he started it all, impacting the benders for 100 years.

Voiced by Ron Perlman.
Koh the Face Stealer

Koh is hands down the creepiest character on the show. He steals people's faces.