Dreamworks Animation is full of great baddies.
We’ve already done a video on how evil these guys can be, but as fun as it can be
to watch a villain do their thing, sometimes you have to look at their endings. While
Dreamworks’ rival, Disney, is known for killing off their villains in some pretty gruesome
ways, it’s actually not as common with Dreamworks villains. Most of their villains
are either reformed, get their comeuppance, are arrested or just have ambiguous endings.
Still, for those rare times where aDreamworks villain is given their ultimate end,
we’re here to rank them from quick and relatively painless to harsh
and brutal even for a bad guy. I’m Kyle with WickedBinge, and
this is Dreamworks Villain Deaths: Gruesome to Most
Gruesome. First off, we’re starting with the more
ambiguous deaths, where we don’t see their death on-screen, but it’s heavily implied
enough that we feel we can make a decent argument for it.
Starting off, we have Tzekel-Kan from “The Road
to El Dorado”. Tzekel-Kan was an ambitious villain, always scheming and very
much bloodthirsty - literally, considering how much he focused on sacrifices. When
Tzekel was tricked into falling into a whirlpool, which sent him into the jungle
outside of El Dorado, he was willing to lead General Cortes to the city of gold as a
means of revenge. However, when they find the entrance to El Dorado blocked, Cortes assumes
that Tzekel was lying to him and takes him away. We never see what happens to
Tzekel but given the time period and the circumstances he was pushed into due to
Miguel and Tulio’s quick save, we can assume that he either lived out the rest of his
days as a slave or in prison. Given how cruel Cortes seemed and how people like him often
saw people like Tzekel as ‘savages’, it’s also possible that he could have just executed
Tzekel as soon as they arrived back in Spain, not seeing a use for him. While all
of these possible ends are pretty harsh and awful, we have to put Tzekel at the bottom of
our list simply due to the ambiguity of his end, and the possibility of him still having
a fairly long (albeit painful and harsh) life. Next is “How to Train Your Dragon” villain
Drago Bludvist. Having control of the Bewilderbeast, also known as the Alpha
Dragon, Draco nearly gains control of all dragons. But, after Toothless defeated the
Bewilderbeast and became the new Alpha, the Bewilderbeast had no choice but to dive
back into the ocean and swim away - with Draco still on it. Hiccup had offered Draco
one last chance to leave peacefully, but Draco had stubbornly refused help and remained
on his Bewilderbeast until the very end. Although his Bewilderbeast successfully made
it to the Hidden World, Drago's ultimate fate remains unknown outside of Grimmel
mentioning his defeat. But given that the Bewilderbeast swam away, we can only assume
that Drago eventually drowned - which can be either a peaceful way to go or a
brutal way to go, depending on who you ask. And, even if he had been able to hang onto
the Bewilderbeast, who’s to say that he didn’t end up getting eaten by a water creature
or another dragon, or even succumbing to hypothermia because of the water? Either
way, even if we don’t see his ultimate fate, this guy probably isn’t coming back anytime soon. Up next is Mrs. Tweety from “Chicken Run”.
For being an old chicken farmer, Mrs. Tweety is pretty durable. We see her get
briefly knocked out by Rocky, climb a string of Christmas lights with an axe in her teeth,
get smacked into a billboard, fall from the chicken’s homemade airplane, and land in a vat
of boiling gravy. And after all that, she’s somehow STILL alive! Or, is she? In her last
scene, we see a door fall on her, and we don’t really see the aftermath. On the one
hand, having a heavy wooden door fall on you seems like the last nail in the coffin that
you’d need to kill off a character. Buuut on the other hand, after everything she had already
survived, seeing Mrs. Tweety actually survive this injury maybe wouldn’t be that
surprising. After all, the door would be heavy but not THAT heavy - not as heavy as something like rock or medal, as we’ll see later on
in this list. Still, if this was indeed the finishing blow, it was a pretty painful way to go
out. So, while we have to keep it on the lower end of the list due to its ambiguity, it does
get a couple bonus ‘gruesome’ points. Finishing up the ambiguous is Dr. Zara from
“Abominable”. Zara's death comes after she triggers an avalanche by accidentally hitting
the mountain with her snowmobile in her attempts to kill Everest. As such, this
could be seen as both a fall death, since the avalanche pushes her snowmobile off the
mountain, and a crush death, given the hundreds of pounds of snow that falls with
her. While you’d naturally assume that no human would survive a situation like this,
you have to remember that Zara’s snowmobile was pretty strong. With it being so fortified,
you have to wonder if maybe she could survive both the fall and the snow’s impact
since she was still strapped inside the snowmobile. However, given the dangerous
and harsh environment she was still in, it’s unlikely that Zara would have made it out
of the mountains alive even if she had survived the fall. We feel that added ambiguity
actually adds to the ‘gruesomeness’ of this potential death. Think about it: When
your choices are either a hard fall, getting crushed by falling snow that came AFTER
a huge fall, or freezing to death in the mountains, it’s hard to decide which of
these awful fates would be the worst. With those out of the way, let’s move onto
the more unique and seemingly ‘painless’ deaths. Unfortunately for the
rest of the villains on this list, we only have two baddies
that fall into this category. Topping this section is the Fairy Godmother
from “Shrek 2”. Being a magic welder with many different spells in her arsenal, it
could have gone MUCH worse for the Fairy Godmother in terms of deaths. Given that
the spell that ultimately destroyed her was also one that she tried to use against Shrek
and Fiona to get rid of them once and for all, you’d be forgiven for thinking that her
end would have been a bit more, well, explosion-y.But instead, Fairy Godmother goes out
not in a blaze of glory, but a blaze of… bubbles. She turns into bubbles. With how quick it
happens and how painless it seems, it’s probably the happiest end that someone
as evil as her could have hoped for. Next is Tai Lung from the Kung Fu Panda
series. Like Fairy Godmother, his end probably could have been a lot more painful had he
not been fighting someone as unconventional as Po. He does get plenty of bruises and
injuries, but what does Tai Lung in is the extremely powerful Wuxi Finger Hold move.
We’re putting this death above Fairy Godmother’s not because it seems more
painful, but because of the fear Tai Lung shows before it happens. Though seemingly
quick and painless, it’s still technically a means of death, even if he’s essentially just
sent to the spirit realm and unable to return. The only thing that could add to the
gruesomeness of this was if someone like Kai did something to his spirit, perhaps even stealing
his chi. But since we don’t see this, we can only speculate. In any case, since the
actual death didn’t seem to be too painful or prolonged, we feel that we have to rank it low.
Hope you’re not afraid of heights. Next is the deaths that were a result of falls from
great heights - a classic when it comes to animated deaths.
First up is Humpty Dumpty from “Puss in Boots”. Out of all the deaths on this list,
Humpty Dumpty’s is probably the most bittersweet, since his death also acts as a
redemption as well as a heroic sacrifice. He chose to die as a way to not only save his
former best friend as well as the town, but as a way to try and make up for everything he
had done. Though he does “have a great fall”, just like the old rhyme said, seeing him
leave behind a golden egg makes this death just a bit less sad. Even so, he was still
cracked like - well, like an egg - and broke on impact. Maybe just a little gruesome to
think about, but we still feel this falls on the lower end of painful and gruesome villain
deaths. Next is General Mandible from “Antz”. For a
little ant, life is pretty tough. There are many things that can kill a bug, from being stepped
on to drowning to even being attacked by bigger bugs. For General Mandible, his end
was not only due to gravity but his own anger and ego. If not for him attacking and
trying to kill Cutter and Z, there’s a good chance he would have lived. But while Z was
lucky enough to survive a fall into water, Mandible instead ended up hitting a thick
root. As if the fall wasn’t bad enough, hitting something that hard and painful would surely
make any viewer wince, and even knowing that it was most likely an instant death
doesn’t quite take away from the brutality factor.Finishing up the falls is Grimmel the
Grisly, from the third Dragons movie. Being a dragon hunter and rider, it’s almost poetic
that Grimmel was killed by falling out of the sky. Like with Mandible, the experience must
have been pretty terrifying for Grimmel, knowing that there was no way out but down.
Maybe that was why he was so desperate to take Hiccup with him, spending most of
the fall focusing on ripping off Hiccup’s armor and fighting with him. Unfortunately,
when he tries to hold onto Hiccup in the hopes that the Light Fury will have to
rescue him as well, he ends up grabbing onto Hiccup’s prosthetic leg. Once Hiccup removes
his fake leg, it’s pretty much game over for Grimmel. It should also be noted that
although he falls into the ocean instead of earth, at that height, it really doesn’t matter
either way. It would have still been deadly and, if by some miracle he DID survive the
fall, his body would still be too broken to attempt swimming and he still would have
died by a mix of intense pain and drowning. With all of that in mind, Grimmel’s death
is definitely the most brutal falling death on this
list. This next short section is another animated
death classic: Here are the Crush Deaths. Getting a MUCH more painful death than his
mother is Prince Charming. In “Shrek the 3rd”, we see that it’s not enough for Charming
to kill Shrek and take over Far Far Away, but he has to do it in front of an audience
as well. Honestly, he’d expect nothing less from an egomaniac like him. Since he had
been planning on stabbing Shrek, you could say that it was karma that Charming got a
death much worse than stabbing. As an extra bit of irony, the stone tower that he was
eventually crushed by was part of the set that he had spent so long putting together.
But hey, on the bright side, at least his death was
‘dramatic’. Finishing up this section is another “Kung Fu
Panda” villain, Shen. Like Charming, Shen’s death falls under being both painful AND
ironic, given that he ends up being crushed by the exact same cannon that he used to try
and hurt and kill Po and the other Furious Five. His death was also his own fault, since
while fighting Po, he was the one who cut the ropes that were holding the wreckage
of his destroyed cannon. Add in the added explosion that came with the cannon falling,
and you have a pretty painful death. What makes this death all the more tragic is
that, by the expression Shen makes when the cannon falls on him, it’s implied that he
not only accepted his death but that maybe he had cut the ropes on purpose rather than on
accident. Of course, he was still trying to kill Po too, but maybe the intent had been
to try and take them both out since he knew that after everything he had done, there
would be no other way to escape punishment. If Shen did indeed choose his death, that level
of acceptance does push the cruelness of it down a bit, but it doesn’t make Death by
Heavy, Explosive Cannon any less painful. Finally, we’ve come to the cruelest deaths
- the most brutal and without a doubt the most painful ends of all for any Dreamworks
villain, as well as the deaths that just so happen to be our top 5!
First, we have Chef and Creek from “Trolls”. Now, you may not even remember this
particular death. In the film proper, we only see Chef getting knocked into her serving
cart after she refuses to accept the peace between Trolls and the Bergens, with Creek
accidentally coming along as a stowaway. But then, in a mid-credits scene, we see them
both get eaten by a hill monster. It’s a fitting fate for a chef who tried to cook and eat
creatures as innocent as the Trolls. Still, getting eaten whole by a creature is still pretty brutal, especially if Chef and Creek
had to live through being digested. Similarly, we have Lord Farquaad’s death
from “Shrek”. When it comes to painful and gruesome deaths, getting eaten by a dragon
is kind of in a league of its own. We’ve already established that getting eaten alive
by ANY creature is already bad, but getting eaten by something as scary as a dragon is
all the more terrifying. Like Chef and Creek, Farquaad also likely had to live through
the disgusting and painful process of being digested - and in a stomach that was likely
much smaller than that of a hill monster’s. But unlike Chef and Creek, whose death was
more of a quick ending gag than anything else, Farquaad’s death just had much more
weight and impact to it, making it all the more memorable. So yeah, just because this
particular instance of someone getting eaten isn’t particularly gorey doesn’t
make it any less gruesome or terrifying. While very much a spectacle, Kai, from the
final “Kung Fu Panda” movie, and his death isn’t exactly your traditional ‘explosion’.
Instead of having to deal with fire or dynamite taking him out, Kai is destroyed after getting
exactly what he wanted: chi. Having the chi of the entire panda village at his disposal,
Po was able to overwhelm Kai with it, and as such, the extreme power and pressure that
Kai felt from the chi attack caused him to disintegrate from existence. Not only was
this painful, but the added pain of being unable to control or stop the flow of chi just
adds to how terrifying this death must have been for Kai. It just goes to show that you
don’t always need a big fire to go out with a bang. Though, as seen with our last too entrees,
a bit of fire certainly doesn’t hurt either. Gallaxhar, from “Monsters VS Aliens”, gets
our silver medal for Most Gruesome Death. When we saw Gallaxhar set his ship to
self-destruct, I think we all knew just how this guy was going to go out. Being at the core
of his ship, he certainly felt that explosion too. You also have to add in the anticipation
of it, and how it must have felt for Gallaxhar being so SO close to escaping his fate,
only to go down with his spaceship in the end.While we can definitely consider it
fiery, painful and gruesome, there is one thing keeping it from the top spot. Though we doubt
that it did much considering that it was caught up in a literal explosion, Gallaxhar
was in his escape pod when the self-destruct was activated. The pod may have just protected
Gallaxhar from the worst of it, even if it still couldn’t completely save him. Though,
you could also argue that being stuck in a pod that could potentially prologue your painful
death isn’t exactly an improvement. Still, when compared to our top spot, we feel that
Gallaxhar still wasn’t quite the worst. Taking the Gold Medal for Most Gruesome
Dreamworks’ Villains Death, we have the dragon that’s appropriately named the Red
Death from the first “How to Train Your Dragon” movie. Though this monster of a
dragon seemed nearly impossible to beat, the Red Death had the same weakness that every
dragon has. When Toothless shoots a ball of fire into her mouth, the Red Death is
completely powerless to stop what comes next. With the firepower that she already had, that
one fireball was able to ignite her internal methane fuel, which naturally caused her
inner ‘gas chambers’ chambers as it were to explode and tear her apart from the inside.
This was all happening while the Red Death was falling, with her wings actually burning
up because of the fire which prevented her from trying to fly towards the ocean to try
and douse the flames. The force of finally hitting the ground was enough to bring
the full explosion outwards. Between the helplessness that the Red Death must have
felt during her death, the prolonged and painful nature of it due the explosion being
internal and needing to properly build up, and the final fiery landing, we can easily say
that this is the most gruesome villain death in all of Dreamworks Animation.
But what do you think? Do you agree, and did we miss any other Dreamworks villain
deaths? Let us know in the comments if you agree with our ranking, and tell us which
series you’d like to see next. Be sure to hit that notification bell so you don’t miss new
episodes of Good-to-Evil featuring your favorite cartoons and videogames; but most
importantly: stay wicked!
