Goku Black/Zamasu best villains in Dragon Ball since _____?

[Anime Kitten]

1. Garlic Jr. (anime arc)

I'm curious as to why

Sorry for the late response, I never got a notification. Anyway, first off, he's immortal. Second, his plan was to control everyone on Earth, leaving no one in the way of his other (unknown?) goals. He only failed because Gohan, Piccolo, and Krillin got lucky and "survived" the Mist. Korin, Yajirobe, and Maron were irrelevant anyway. So, that's why I think he was the best villain.

[emperior]

I would wait for the end of the arc to rank him, but I'm liking Black/Zamasu more and more each episode.
My favorite are still Cell, Freezer and Buu in this order. I enjoyed Cell's and Buu's tactics to get stronger. If Black continues to be as good as he's been so far, he might get in my top 3 no doubt.

[Faisal Shourov]

Black is way better than Buu.

[FoolsGil]

I don't really care about Black. But Zamasu, he's the most complex character this series ever had. Especially if he's killed in the future, but reformed in the past. It would be one hell of a twist.

[Doctor.]

I don't really care about Black. But Zamasu, he's the most complex character this series ever had. Especially if he's killed in the future, but reformed in the past. It would be one hell of a twist.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Zamasu is still pretty generic as it stands and his character development has been very linear.

[ekrolo2]

The best since Baby. These two and Baby are the only guys who have an actual reason to act the way they do unlike everyone else who's just evil because evil.

[Kakarotto92]

Nah, I think Cell and Buu are better so far, because of how they ran through the entire cast, not to mention their humor. Zamasu and Black are certainly the villains whose ideologies are a bit more forefront and philosophical, but that doesn't make them better yet.

Sometimes just having a pure evil character who kills without reason or conscience can be just as entertaining as a complex character.

This!

I hate this preconceived notion that a villain needs to have complex, deep, gritty or sympathetic motivations or backstory in order to be considered a "good villain".

Villains with more simple and selfish motivations and goals can be just as (if not more) interesting and entertaining. They also aren't any less realistic, specially when you think about human history and society (both modern and pre-modern): power-hungry warlords and emperors, greedy capitalists, gangsters, mafia families, sadistic psychopaths who take pleasure (sometimes erotic) from watching human or animal suffering, the list goes on and on. Do any of these real life villains have any complex or deep philosophical motivations/reasons to be as they are? No, most of them are either straight up mentally ill or just lack ethics and emphaty. On the other hand, some of the best villains in fiction are just nihlistic lunatics who want to spread chaos and watch the world burn.

Then you have examples like Naruto, which despite Kishimoto's efforts to make his major villains (specially during Part II/Shippuden) these complex, philosophical and sympathetic ambigous characters, in the end they all turned out mediocre and boring villains after a while (with the exception of Nagato). At some point Naruto didn't even had villains anymore, just antagonists with a different worldview from the protagonist. This isn't necessarly bad, but the way Kishimoto executed it left much to be desired, to the point that, his more simple and standard villains like Orochimaru and most Akatsuki members ended up being much more effective and entertaining as villans than Obito, Madara or Kaguya (which in the end were all just bad rehashes of Nagato/Pain).

Give me Freeza, Piccolo Daimao, Cell or Buu any day over Shippuden's major villains.

TL;DR: Just because something tries to be deep and complex doesn't automatically mean it's better.

[Doctor.]

I hate this preconceived notion that a villain needs to have complex, deep, gritty or sympathetic motivations or backstory in order to be considered a "good villain".

But that's exactly what he needs. A villain can be entertaining, but if he doesn't have a good motivation and a compelling background, then he isn't "good", he's just "entertaining". Sure, this doesn't mean that every villain needed to be some good guy turned bad, they could have been evil from the start, but Dragon Ball villains lack depth regardless.

Also, you're right that just because you TRY to be deep and complex, that doesn't make a good villain, but just because you TRY to have a deep and complex villain doesn't mean that he'll actually turn out to BE one.

[ekrolo2]

Nah, I think Cell and Buu are better so far, because of how they ran through the entire cast, not to mention their humor. Zamasu and Black are certainly the villains whose ideologies are a bit more forefront and philosophical, but that doesn't make them better yet.

Sometimes just having a pure evil character who kills without reason or conscience can be just as entertaining as a complex character.

This!

I hate this preconceived notion that a villain needs to have complex, deep, gritty or sympathetic motivations or backstory in order to be considered a "good villain".

Villains with more simple and selfish motivations and goals can be just as (if not more) interesting and entertaining. They also aren't any less realistic, specially when you think about human history and society (both modern and pre-modern): power-hungry warlords and emperors, greedy capitalists, gangsters, mafia families, sadistic psychopaths who take pleasure (sometimes erotic) from watching human or animal suffering, the list goes on and on. Do any of these real life villains have any complex or deep philosophical motivations/reasons to be as they are? No, most of them are either straight up mentally ill or just lack ethics and emphaty. On the other hand, some of the best villains in fiction are just nihlistic lunatics who want to spread chaos and watch the world burn.

Then you have examples like Naruto, which despite Kishimoto's efforts to make his major villains (specially during Part II/Shippuden) these complex, philosophical and sympathetic ambigous characters, in the end they all turned out mediocre and boring villains after a while (with the exception of Nagato). At some point Naruto didn't even had villains anymore, just antagonists with a different worldview from the protagonist. This isn't necessarly bad, but the way Kishimoto executed it left much to be desired, to the point that, his more simple and standard villains like Orochimaru and most Akatsuki members ended up being much more effective and entertaining as villans than Obito, Madara or Kaguya (which in the end were all just bad rehashes of Nagato/Pain).

Give me Freeza, Piccolo Daimao, Cell or Buu any day over Shippuden's major villains.

TL;DR: Just because something tries to be deep and complex doesn't automatically mean it's better.

The problem is that 95% of Dragon Ball villains ARE nothing but evil purely for the sake of evil and that would be fine if they at least had an interesting personality to back it up but they don't. Piccolo Daimao is an arrogant asshole who enjoys to kill people because he thinks he's top dog, that's the same as Freeza which is the same as Vegeta which is the same as Piccolo Jr which is the same as Cell which is the same as Super Boo which is the same as Super 17 which is the same as most of the Shadow Dragons.

The only guys who stick out are Baby, Black, Fat Boo and Beerus. Don't even get me started on the movie bad guys cause a lot of them have even LESS going on than the main ones. As Doctor said, just because something is entertaining doesn't make it good. I can find the Cell arc entertaining but if you ask me quality wise what I think of it, I'll call it what it is: a gargantuan piece of shit. But you're also right that just because something tries to be deep and complex doesn't make it automatically better either.

Ultimately it all comes down to execution, but given how Super is Regression/Stagnation: The Show, I'll fucking take something that breaks from the general shit tier that is the villain roster of the DB franchise even if it doesn't go down in the history of anime as the greatest thing ever. Just the fact they're trying shows that there is someone involved in this thing with the beginning of an inkling of a fucking clue.

[Lord Beerus]

A bit early to call now, but I'd say so far that Black and Zamasu have the best villain protagonists since at least Freeza. I mean, they actually have a legitimate reason for being for doing the horrible shit that they do beyond "for the evulz" like 99% of the rest of Dragon Ball's rouges gallery.

[ConfusedPhantom]

Too early to tell. I will say, however, that I like that Black actually brings back tension to the series after so long, and the mystery between Zamasu and Black is pretty fun to go through so far. Their approach on them is different from what we've gotten in awhile. So, hopefully, it keeps up to the end of the story arc.

[RedRibbonSoldier#42]

A bit early to call now, but I'd say so far that Black and Zamasu have the best villain protagonists since at least Freeza. I mean, they actually have a legitimate reason for being for doing the horrible shit that they do beyond "for the evulz" like 99% of the rest of Dragon Ball's rouges gallery.

I like villains who do things for the "evulz". Villains who have "good intentions" or "deep" character development can come off as pretentious and hypocritical, and then you don't feel what you're supposed too. Or even worse, they're not very fun. Depressed or righteous monologues are tough to sit through if they feel forced or cliche. Examples of great "evulz" characters are DIO, Freeza, Blackbeard(so far), and non-anime people like Darth Sidious. Since they lack any realistic or relateable motivations they have to rely on being interesting in the moment. If done wrong then they are just hollow goofballs, so I think it is not right to say these types of characters are generic or require less skill.

(Of course, there's more than one winning formula for good villains and plenty of the introspective types that are awesome too. (Meruem). Then the key is to have them say something actually relevant, which is also not easy. The only type that never works for me is the OP mastermind (Aizen, Ywach, Madara))

[Miracles]

I never liked Cell & Boo as villains....

Seriously?
Cell and Boo were true villains who just enjoyed themselves causing terror.
Cell even told Trunks his goal is not something base like conquest but to enjoy himself and see the terror on humans faces.
Who here remembers that epic line of Gotenks buu telling Mytic Gohan that he had obtained this power "for the sole purpose of killing you." lol.
A real villain is evil just because.

[Cipher]

I'm going to go ahead and say that, "I must kill all mortals because they fight" is also not the most nuanced motivation of all time.

Zamasu is one step away from a cartoonishly evil villain the moment Goku and company arrive.

[Low Tone G]

In my view, Piccolo Daimaio was the best villain, Vegeta was the close second and Frieza on the same level like Vegeta.

Right now, I'm just curious as whether Black has a backstory, at least... Because we still don't know enough about him excluding that he "works" for Zamas and looks like Goku...

I need to know his true identity to judge him as a good villain!

[fadeddreams5]

Frieza, Cell, Buu, and Black/Zamasu are so distinctive, it's hard to say which is my favorite. It's still to early too call with Black and Zamasu though.

[EXBadguy]

I think it's too soon. But I like Black a lot, as there hasn't been a villain like him since Frieza and Cell(my all time favorite DB villain). One thing Black has in common with Frieza and Cell is motivation.

Quick off topic question to the spanish speaking fans, do you guys call Goku Black "Goku Negro"?(NAE-gro, not...well you know). Just curious.

[Faisal Shourov]

I don't really care about Black. But Zamasu, he's the most complex character this series ever had. Especially if he's killed in the future, but reformed in the past. It would be one hell of a twist.

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. Zamasu is still pretty generic as it stands and his character development has been very linear.

Did you see the NEP of episode 58? He actually gets shit done instead of delivering dialogues for 7 episodes. If Zamasu is linear than Buu is utter garbage

[Bullza]

In my view, Piccolo Daimaio was the best villain

Really? I've always thought out of all the main villains and even some of the side villains that he worst of the lot by far. He just seems so very boring and generic. Just an evil demon.

It doesnt help that he wasn't a villain for that long and he didn't particularly do all that much that was memorable. He just kinda showed up, became young, quickly took over Earth and then was beaten straight away.

[emi_b7]

Quick off topic question to the spanish speaking fans, do you guys call Goku Black "Goku Negro"?(NAE-gro, not...well you know). Just curious.

I haven't talked DBS with a lot of people but I've never seen anybody call him like that. The spanish subs I've seen also call him Black. I'm talking about the Latin American fans/subs/webpages btw, not sure about Spanish folks.
It's the same with SSB, we don't call it "Azul", just Blue.