10 Movie Heroes Who Turned Evil In The Sequel

Harvey Dent said it best, you either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself

become the villain. Movies are full not only of villains who go through their own redemption arc and wind

up as heroes, but also the exact opposite. Heroes who make Dent's words ring true by breaking bad and taking a complete 180 U-turn

on their good guy stance in a sequel. I'm Ewan, this is WhatCulture, and here are 10 Movies Where The Hero Turns Evil In The Sequel

10. Bucky Barnes, Captain America, The Winter Soldier Best friends back in 1940s Brooklyn, Bucky Barnes and Steve Rogers were inseparable and were with each other till the end of the line

even after one had been captured, had his mind completely corrupted, and was sent back into the world to kill the other

As a member of the Howling Commandos, Bucky was a war hero, one of Captain America's greatest allies

As the Winter Soldier, however, he was one of the most ruthless and successful assassins the world had ever seen, so elusive and so impeccably skilled in what he did that most of the intelligence community didn't even believe he existed

Bucky ultimately came good again, but that initial reveal didn't lose any of its shock value and it made the transition from the page to screen

9. John Connor – Terminator Genisys For four previous movies, John Connor was the hero of the Terminator franchise, and his life needed to be protected

The fifth film in the franchise, however, followed a different timeline in which he was caught by Skynet

The villainous AI, personified in this case by a barely-there Matt Smith

essentially killed John Connor's conscience and took over his body, sending humanity's greatest hero back in time as a T-3000

What better way to stop those meddling heroes from getting in the way of an evil plan than

by literally sending the best of them back as an enemy? Thanks to Genesis underperforming both critically and commercially, Dark Fate followed several

years later and in killing John Connor, essentially retconned anything that happened in Rise of

the Machines, Salvation or Genesis. Still, 2014 had that brief window where humanity's greatest hero became its strongest adversary

A moment I need blissfully terminating. 8. President Coin – The Hunger Games Mockingjay Part 2

When the districts rebelled against President Snow's rule over them from the capital, it

was Katniss Everdeen that was the initial spark She shared the nightlock with Peter preventing Snow from having his Hunger Games winner and she fought as the Mockingjay the focal point of the whole rebellion

to bring an end to Snow's regime. That's not to say that she did it alone, though, or even that she was in charge

There were teams of people around her to help, from Hamish to Prim, Gale, and more

and of course, in Mockingjay Part 1, there was Alma Coyne, who acted as General of the Rebellion

Without coin, there would have arguably been no District 13, and the revolt would have been crushed before it even started

Under her leadership, the revolution was successful, and capital finally fell, where she would then take the role of president from Snow in part two

Her first act punished the capital by forcing their children to compete in a Hunger Games of their own

So she learned absolutely nothing, and in just one conversation, proved herself to be no better than Snow

Number seven, Cobra, Dawn of the Planet of the Apes. Caesar led the apes' fight against human oppression in the excellent rebooted Planet of the Apes films

and next to him all the way was Coba, who didn't cheer when the abused ape was able to drop his tormentor from the Golden Gate Bridge at the end of the first movie

It's like, one of the best bits about it. Flash forward 10 years later though, and while Caesar was happy to live alongside humans so long as they didn't bother and, you know, torture all the apes

Coba's hatred still raged. He wanted every human to die, and this disagreement in ideology ultimately drove the two brothers in arms apart

Not only did Coba manipulate the other apes, he appeared to kill Caesar, using the leader's death to bring about a bloody war with the humans

He became a ruthless leader who was followed out of fear more so than respect and loyalty, and as a direct result of his actions, killed many, many apes

Ironically, Cobra claimed that Caesar loved humans more than apes, and yet he was the one who outright murdered his own kind in some kind of power display

6. Thorin Oakenshield The Hobbit, The Battle of the Five Armies One of the biggest downgrades of the Hobbit trilogy was going from Aragorn to Thorin Oakenshield, who just wasn't all that compelling to follow

Thorin's struggles as a protagonist were compounded further by his more villainous turn in the final entry in the trilogy

Once Thorin and company took Erebor back from Smorg, and after the people of Lake Town paid the price for the dragon's disturbance

the new king under the mountain grew greedy. He coveted the Arkenstone and with that came a certain kind of paranoia and something of a sickness too He became just as protective of his gold as the dragon before him He had struck a bargain with Bard too and he owed the people of Lake Town fair recompense

But instead of paying what was rightfully owed, Thorin locked himself in the mountain and gave

himself one more enemy on the battlefield in the lead up to his ultimate death

Number 5. Jean Grey, X-Men The Last Stand. Okay, so putting it out there, X2 X-Men United is still

are the better combat movies we've gotten, and it ended on a bittersweet note with the seeming death

of Jean Grey, who sacrificed herself to protect the X-Men as they made their getaway from Alkali

Lake. We then got a glimpse of the Phoenix rising from the lake at the end of the movie, promising

one of the most iconic X-Men storylines would be explored in the sequel, the Dark Phoenix Saga

And explored it did, but really amazingly, in X-Men The Last Stand, which saw Famke Jansen's

Omega-level mutant being taken over by the dark side of her personality and joining up with Magneto

She smoked Cyclops and Professor X along the way to a final confrontation with Wolverine

who then reluctantly kills her to prevent the Phoenix from harming anyone else

4. Letty Fast and Furious 6 2009's Fast and Furious is arguably the most forgettable entry in the series

but it is important for a few key reasons, mainly as it saw the return of Vin Diesel to the franchise

for the first time since the debut entry, but also because it placed Paul Walker's Brian firmly

in the Toretto family and all the Corona-sipping barbecues that entails. More dramatically though

Fast and Furious also killed off Michelle Rodriguez's Letty, Dom's wife. Letty dies in an explosion

after tracking Braga, leading Brian and Dom to rekindle their unlikely friendship and avenger

Letty stayed dead for Fast 5, but was mysteriously resurrected as an amnesiac mercenary in Furious

6 after an ending tease in the previous film. The new villain of the sequel, Owen Shaw, played by

Luke Evans, had taken in Letty after she survived the explosion from Fast and Furious, using her

talents as part of his anti-familia team. Letty eventually breaks out of her funk and gets back

with Dom, who then also went briefly evil in F8. 3. Optimus Prime

Transformers The Last Knight The absolute madness that is Transformers The Last Knight gifted us

with lots of great stuff. Cogman, prestigious actor Anthony Hopkins getting absolutely obliterated by a giant robot Transformers being in World War II and it also led to a surprise flipping of roles for Optimus Prime After the ending of Age of Extinction Prime travels to Cybertron and encounters Quintessa

who transforms him into Evil Optimus, aka Nemesis Prime. Bumblebee ends up coming to blows with his former Autobot commander

only for Prime to get the upper hand and nearly kill him. Bumblebee then manages to speak to Optimus in his original non-radio voice

which snaps him out of the brainwashing and turns him into the lovable Autobot we all know and love

2. Wanda Maximoff Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness Technically, Wanda Maximoff's introduction to the MCU was as a villain after being recruited by Ultron

but she soon switched sides to the Avengers. You could have made the argument that Wanda was the villain of WandaVision

as she imprisoned countless people within her ex just to live out her fantasy to avoid dealing with her grief

But when the Hex came down and she was forced to say goodbye to Vision, again, and the children she manifested, that's when she truly began to manipulate and utilize her powers as the Scarlet Witch

Wanda's villainous turn in the Multiverse of Madness was one fueled by grief and loss, and the fact that she would do absolutely anything to be with the children she knew existed in another universe

The Scarlet Witch seemed to have been shown the error of her ways by America Chavez, so if she does return, there's currently no telling on whose side she'll actually be

1. Anakin Skywalker Star Wars Episode 3 Revenge of the Sith There was one story that the Star Wars prequels were produced to tell, and that was the transition of Anakin Skywalker to Darth Vader

Forget Jar Jar, actually don't forget Jar Jar, I love him sincerely, the Jedi Council, and even Obi-Wan Kenobi

this was literally the story of a hero's turn to evil. In the original Star Wars trilogy, Darth Vader immediately announced himself as a villain for the ages

but there was so much more hidden underneath the mask. Hints and breadcrumbs were dropped for a new trilogy of movies to pick up on two decades later

Now, there are several moments throughout Revenge of the Sith that you could accredit the exact moment Anakin began his spiral towards the dark side

but even the fakes of the prequel trilogy's criticisms, they were all put to screen incredibly well

And those were 10 movie heroes who turned evil in the sequel

How do you feel about these villainous turns? Love them? Loathe them? Shout out your thoughts down in the comments section below

and don't forget to drop the video a like if you enjoyed it, and subscribe if you're new. Either way, I've been Ewan, you've been watching WarCulture, and I will hopefully see you next time as a villain