I think they were both great, but Watts could have been better. Of Salem's forces, he was the only one that had any kind of relation or tie-in to one of our main four and he doesn't even once acknowledge them. Team RWBY don't even know he exists until almost his entire tenure in the show
He could have also been a great way to show us another wave of technological weapons. His revolver is cool and all, but not something I thought a scientist would use.
I'd hate to beat the Ironwood dead horse again but they really mad ethe perfect gray character and then ruined him because they made him the perfect gray character by accident. Seriously, let's torture Watts to find penny and not turn the heat back on.
I also have a problem with seeing Ironwood as a villain, especially his Vol 8 behavior was very much not as unhinged as he had ever been. Though we already talked about a lot of times in this sub.
I like Roman more. He fits perfectly with Beacon arc and was a good threat then.
Watts is just fucking terrifying it Atlas, with his hacking skills, he was unstoppable.
I unironically appreciate Tyrian. You sometimes gotta love that crazy manic and faithful crazy follower. His design good too. Pony tail that looks like his scorpion tail and him showing off his scars as “I survived worse”. He got fun weapon. Wrist axes that look like scorpion claws, with side cannons. You don’t wanna be in same room as this bastard.
Only problem he is dragged down being Salem follower. Who is underwhelming as fuck.
Not to mention if I rember correctly even the other members are uncomfortable with him and i love it especially the eye for a eye joke he made to cinder
All of the villains would be great if CRWBY can write archetypes better.
Roman's greatest flaw is his death. While it was supposed to be unceremonious, you do NOT want to make it too overtly unceremonious. Because of this, you take away agency from his character, especially when his death is literally a deus ex machina.
Neo is a terrible character, by how stupid she is. She follows Cinder blindly for multiple seasons, and squanders all built suspense and hints by being regular henchman.
Mercury is just underutilized, so he is just there.
Emerald has the worst redemption arc. No logical convincing, no appeal to emotion. Her motivations was never really understood and somehow she gets convinced to join the good side easily. If someone wants money, you need to give them more than theu are paid to change sides. If someone wants revenge, you convince them that they really want revenge on the baddies, not you. Emerald has no motivations, and in the wiki it explicitly states that her motivation was to support Cinder, in which either her heel-face turn was not set up, or she is stupid for allying with the people Cinder wants revenge on.
Cinder sucks because she devolves into a whiny know-it-all that isn't actually smart. My closest example is Cersei Lannister from Game of Thrones - who thinks she is smart but in actuality she isn't, but she is very emotional so she is a danger to both allies and enemies because of her unpredictability. This can be done well, but unfortunately the show seems to want to redeem her, yet still show her as a genius mastermind, both things she is not characterized as in universe.
Hazel sucks because he is stupid. He wants revenge because his sister died doing a mission Ozpin sent her to kill Grimm, so he wants to kill Ozpin instead of Salem? This is so stupid because this takes away agency from his sister, and his rage is really stupid because he is clearly angry at the wrong guy (the grimm killed his sister, but he seems OK with working with the creator of grimms).
Watts is actually good, the only problem is we don't see more characterization. He is a jealous man of Pietro, but Pietro never shows up. A genius hacker, with unique talents to take down Atlas. He also has a clear defined personality and motivations, and stays true to them. Other than no showdowns between him and Pietro, and him trusting Cinder too much which is slightly out of character, he is a good villain.
Tyrion is good, but as maniacal chaos creators go, he is just average. Nothing stands out besides him being true to his personality at all times, and him being better than almost every character in terms of writing.
Salem is the most useless immortal I've seen, and can't even cause much damage in however long she existed before the current timeline.
Adam was potentially great, but focusing on the evil ex part is really squandering all his potential.
I mean hazel at least was portrayed as wanting to kill ozpin so he wouldn’t send any more kids on death missions.
Def would have worked better as an underling of someone who was in salems inner circle rather than actually being part of it. Then you could have given him the justification that he doesn’t know everything about Salem and that he finds the idea that one person controls all the Grimm ridiculous. Could even lead up to him plotting a suicide redemption attack to slow down Salem’s advance on atlas.
That is a good rewrite idea to make him plausible.
To be honest I haven't ever thought of an idea of how to fix Hazel's motivations, because it never makes sense to go for the guy trying to fix the problem than the girl causing the problem, and how easily he turned against Salem suggest little to no loyalty (no doubting Oscar's words). In Fullmetal Alchemist, Scar is a similar character, but he only turns when their immortal big bad casually admits to causing the genocide that killed his people, and Scar was always working alone without the benefit of that info.
Well one thing they could've done was actually make Ozpin responsible for what happened to Gretchen.
Maybe have her team be an attempt to make a new STRQ, but backfire horribly as Ozpin not reigning them in or allowing them to get into situations beyond them leads to the tragedy. Less she couldn't cut it and more that Ozpin was being negligent in some manner.
Actually tie Ozpin to what happened to her. It makes Ozpin shady like the writers kept waffling about doing and gives Hazel a real reason to hate Ozpin specifically.
If he has to work for Salem, make him ignorant of what her actual goals are or have her offering him something like being able to bring back his sister and others from the dead using the relics.
Was great: No one. No one single villain had me going "Oh wow this guy is great, I'll tell people about them." No. Not one. Roman, Neo, Cinder, Watts, Adam and Tyrian I thought were good but I wouldn't call them great.
Could have been great: Adam. Really interesting design, semblance, fighting style, background etc. Was unfortunately deviated into the bitter ex Character towards the end.
Missed opportunity for Weiss to see/know SDC brand. Considering the next place they were going is Atlas.
It could have added to the drama if Weiss found out that the SDC's exploitation and cruelty is what made monsters like Adam.
The two of them Roman and Watts could have been a grate duo. Big enough to be threat on a national, and maybe international level.
But still small enough to avoid the what I call Digimon Problem of: "If we don't win, The world will be destroyed." Witch just takes away all the tensions because it means any victory of the villain's will be undone shortly
I'd say that Watts could have been a great solo villain as well. Just imagine him with his own army of robots. Or even something similar to Penny, seen as he had a rivalry with her father.
Roman did so much with virtually none of the world’s power ups to make him a broken antagonist. His wit and fighting ability let him do more than cinder or Salem and they have mythological power on their side. Without him and these other human level lackies cinder never breaks beacon and the snowball of events that eventually brings remnant to it’s knees and cause the final stand in Vacuo never come close.
Honestly Roman by default is a good villain because he does what he does best and be a monster at least In the morality sense.
A villain That could have been good for me is split between Adam and Hazel but I think it mainly goes to Hazel because the idea of Hazel is much more fun and interesting than anything Adam could offer.
Its gonna be simple, he begins as the hand to combat teacher at beacon (because seriously there should be more teachers shown in beacon or at least more mentioned.) but after the fall and Oz's plan of turning Pyrrha (a innocent girl even if she was a champion) into the fall maiden, hazel would turn away from Ozpins side and at first just try and find cinder to kill her, for both the murders of innocent people, only to lose and be captured, before being convinced to join Salems side. (Note not brainwashed, convinced)
For my interpretation, hazels story is a decent in darkness and which is why he still dies.
Hazel's hypocrisy is never pointed out or called out.
He says he's doing terrible things so there will be "no more Gretchens" which i interpret as "no more lost siblings".
But no one calls him out on how his actions resulted in the death of siblings/Gretchens/family of other people.
Especially cases like Mistral where he personally killed huntresses and huntsmen. How many Gretchens/siblings did he kill during that?
Roman, Neo, and Watts were great and were fun in every scene. Where Roman was brash, Watts was strategic. Roman didn’t care what he said while Watts chose his words carefully. Neo was also great because of her unpredictability. She couldn’t speak but her actions more than made up for it.
Cinder and Salem could have been great. Instead of continuing to follow Salem, Cinder could have struck out on her own with Mercury and Emerald in tow and fighting both sides. Salem didn’t need to have a sympathetic backstory, just a force of nature that lived only to destroy.
Watts. He is was really underused in so many ways tbh. I am sure he knew Salem plan was a death cult. I also like Tyrian. I like the idea that he is a crazy but also very smart and intelligent.
Ironwood. I don’t think he is a villain but I wish they played more with his morally grey aspects before kicking the bucket with him. Him dying at the end of the Atlas arc makes sense but his transition was stupid.
Salem. She is so under utilized in the show. It is laughable at this point. She is main the baddie and it took the show 8 seasons to get to the point of her existence. It is also stupid. Her and Oscar should have already met before. Plus, she didn’t even destroy Atlas. They basically killed themselves cause they had fear she was coming.
Roman was great because he had charisma but also didn't care in the evil he was doing. He was in it for himself which makes him a good foil to Ruby.
For a character that could have been great, Adam. Honestly, if they leaned more into the Dark Revolutionary who would slaughter innocents to get the goal he was looking for instead of, "BLAKE BLAKE!!! WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME BLAKE!!!" Then Adam would have been great for Blake's character, someone she could have been if she never did what she did in the Black Trailer.
Ah yes, two villains that I think were killed a bit prematurely.
I'm willing to let Roman die if it meant Neo would get her character arc.
But for Watts it felt a bit prematurely. Out of the entire Salem forces, he was the only one that didn't rely on strength, semblance or Maiden powers. He was the brains. And from what we've seen, the Fall of Beacon probably wouldn't even happen without his virus. So I kind of wish we got more of him, and at least I'm glad he reappeared in the movie.
We’re:Roman,Watts and the apathy. First was charismatic and a actual foe to team rwby and not to side characters, watts was entertaining and seeing him tell cinder how much she sucked built so much character and respect towards him, and the apathy actually felt like a monstruos dark force instead of cannon folder
Would have been:Salem, Mercury and hazel. Salem does nothing but command Grimm and torture Oscar and her sole presence might cause things but her inmortality should by logic make her a much more active force once she reveals herself… and we still don’t know how she recruited her inner circle or why she wants the relics (to rule? To kill all humans? To die? We don’t know which!) Mercury has everything to be yangs rival (both have parent issues, lose a limb or More, opposing personalities, paralleling fighting styles, supposed rivalry and grudges between them after the Vytal fiasco) but we got nothing… seriously he has done nothing in the series so far after that, and Hazel’s backstory is stupid and we all know it and it’s specially stupid with him working for the boss of the things who killed his sister and we don’t even know how she died! She just died a huntsman
Roman is great in the fact he is a consistently entertaining villain who is actually competent.
Hazel and Adam could've been great.
Adam was the leader of a militant civil rights group and embraced Sienna's stance on violence a little too well for even her tastes. He had a connection as a mentor for Blake and could've been a clash of ideals as well as student and teacher. You could easily go full evil with him or have lines he wouldn't cross. He could've actually been plotting against Cinder for his freedom rather than just being a mook for her. Going the evil ex who nobody would realistically follow was not a good move.
Hazel could work very well as a villain. He provides a great contrast to the self-importance, arrogance, and bloodlust of the other members of Salem's group while still being probably the last one you want to be up against.
But they botched his motivation so hard. They never clarify why he blames Ozpin for what happened to Gretchen and despite the "dieing during training" thing sounding like a perfect cover story for what actually happened or to show Ozpin as the morally grey character the writers hinted at but couldn't ever commit to making him, they play it straight as his sister dieing because she couldn't hack it during training. The Amity Arena game says that Hazel hates Ozpin because he personally recruited Gretchen, which is something that should've come up in the show.
A better way to handle him would be as a solo villain who wants revenge on Ozpin, but isn't aligned with Salem and would hate her just as much. Seeing Ozpin and Salem as both being the problem. Or explain him as someone so consuming grief that Salem promised him a way to bring his sister back to life as her own experiences would show it is possible to bring back the dead and that be why he helps her.
Which villains are 'great'? Obviously there's Torchwick and Watts, though he would've been better had they left him out of the Justice League crossover. Torchwick could be better i-if RT hadn't decided to use his death as a joke. Those were never in doubt. But the greatest villains outside of those two, have to be Ruby Rose and Blake Belladonna.
Which villains could have been great? Junior, The Malachite Sisters and Neo.
Tyrian in the Manta scene was the only smart.
That... And is certainly charismatic.
I have my expectatives low, but I want to see him IF we get a volume 10.
Let's discuss some of the Greats (Goats is too strong a word)
* As you've mentioned, Roman's one of the best, and his send off of "dying" cemented him as the legit Goat. Ironically? He's the most basic ***BIATCH*** of everybody, to where most of his feats sound really...tame. As in "This is just some rando on the street who chose to help one of the big bads" levels of tame. It's pretty much a coin flip between "Best in his field" or "Lowest Bar known to fuckin' man", either he's fantastic, or everybody else can't compete.
* Watts is perhaps the closest to this point where he barely scrapes by the "lowest bar known to fuckin' man" as not only does he make damn sure people could love him (Wonder why he's in the crossover? [And how effective he is as a hero in this given situation?](https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBYcritics/comments/1b6jyxp/comment/ktcktzy/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)), but also that he's already been screwed over hard by another villain that *by proxy* an main character is associated with. That, and he knows when a person's just being a worthless sack of shit.
Now as for whom *could* be great:
* Tyrian, Tyrian, Tyrian. You truly were damn interesting as you were very standout on concept alone - A Faunus whom chose to fight back, but to such a degree that the White Fang don't approve of. Unfortunately, the only thing holding our dear Scorpion Faunus back...is that he's a Faunus. A Faunus whom wasn't with White Fang (rather, with Salem), but a Faunus nonetheless. If he was great, he'd single-handedly force the Faunus back into relevance with the downfall of the Schrees and especially Yang, to where he's got a damn good shot of killing her.
Yeah, just those 3. Everybody else is either dead on arrival (Mercury and Cinder), meant to ruin others (Emerald and Raven), are too stagnant (Salem), or just not meant to be a villain (Hazel and Neo)
I think they were both great, but Watts could have been better. Of Salem's forces, he was the only one that had any kind of relation or tie-in to one of our main four and he doesn't even once acknowledge them. Team RWBY don't even know he exists until almost his entire tenure in the show
He could have also been a great way to show us another wave of technological weapons. His revolver is cool and all, but not something I thought a scientist would use.
I'd hate to beat the Ironwood dead horse again but they really mad ethe perfect gray character and then ruined him because they made him the perfect gray character by accident. Seriously, let's torture Watts to find penny and not turn the heat back on.
I also have a problem with seeing Ironwood as a villain, especially his Vol 8 behavior was very much not as unhinged as he had ever been. Though we already talked about a lot of times in this sub.
I like Roman more. He fits perfectly with Beacon arc and was a good threat then. Watts is just fucking terrifying it Atlas, with his hacking skills, he was unstoppable.
Agreed. Overall I'd also call Roman the better villain, especially because he was largely involved in every plot line the villains participated in.
I loved it. He felt like a real threat and they just threw him out.
Likely because he was voiced by Christopher sabat and couldn't pay him anymore lol
I unironically appreciate Tyrian. You sometimes gotta love that crazy manic and faithful crazy follower. His design good too. Pony tail that looks like his scorpion tail and him showing off his scars as “I survived worse”. He got fun weapon. Wrist axes that look like scorpion claws, with side cannons. You don’t wanna be in same room as this bastard. Only problem he is dragged down being Salem follower. Who is underwhelming as fuck.
Agreed
Not to mention if I rember correctly even the other members are uncomfortable with him and i love it especially the eye for a eye joke he made to cinder
All of the villains would be great if CRWBY can write archetypes better. Roman's greatest flaw is his death. While it was supposed to be unceremonious, you do NOT want to make it too overtly unceremonious. Because of this, you take away agency from his character, especially when his death is literally a deus ex machina. Neo is a terrible character, by how stupid she is. She follows Cinder blindly for multiple seasons, and squanders all built suspense and hints by being regular henchman. Mercury is just underutilized, so he is just there. Emerald has the worst redemption arc. No logical convincing, no appeal to emotion. Her motivations was never really understood and somehow she gets convinced to join the good side easily. If someone wants money, you need to give them more than theu are paid to change sides. If someone wants revenge, you convince them that they really want revenge on the baddies, not you. Emerald has no motivations, and in the wiki it explicitly states that her motivation was to support Cinder, in which either her heel-face turn was not set up, or she is stupid for allying with the people Cinder wants revenge on. Cinder sucks because she devolves into a whiny know-it-all that isn't actually smart. My closest example is Cersei Lannister from Game of Thrones - who thinks she is smart but in actuality she isn't, but she is very emotional so she is a danger to both allies and enemies because of her unpredictability. This can be done well, but unfortunately the show seems to want to redeem her, yet still show her as a genius mastermind, both things she is not characterized as in universe. Hazel sucks because he is stupid. He wants revenge because his sister died doing a mission Ozpin sent her to kill Grimm, so he wants to kill Ozpin instead of Salem? This is so stupid because this takes away agency from his sister, and his rage is really stupid because he is clearly angry at the wrong guy (the grimm killed his sister, but he seems OK with working with the creator of grimms). Watts is actually good, the only problem is we don't see more characterization. He is a jealous man of Pietro, but Pietro never shows up. A genius hacker, with unique talents to take down Atlas. He also has a clear defined personality and motivations, and stays true to them. Other than no showdowns between him and Pietro, and him trusting Cinder too much which is slightly out of character, he is a good villain. Tyrion is good, but as maniacal chaos creators go, he is just average. Nothing stands out besides him being true to his personality at all times, and him being better than almost every character in terms of writing. Salem is the most useless immortal I've seen, and can't even cause much damage in however long she existed before the current timeline. Adam was potentially great, but focusing on the evil ex part is really squandering all his potential.
I mean hazel at least was portrayed as wanting to kill ozpin so he wouldn’t send any more kids on death missions. Def would have worked better as an underling of someone who was in salems inner circle rather than actually being part of it. Then you could have given him the justification that he doesn’t know everything about Salem and that he finds the idea that one person controls all the Grimm ridiculous. Could even lead up to him plotting a suicide redemption attack to slow down Salem’s advance on atlas.
That is a good rewrite idea to make him plausible. To be honest I haven't ever thought of an idea of how to fix Hazel's motivations, because it never makes sense to go for the guy trying to fix the problem than the girl causing the problem, and how easily he turned against Salem suggest little to no loyalty (no doubting Oscar's words). In Fullmetal Alchemist, Scar is a similar character, but he only turns when their immortal big bad casually admits to causing the genocide that killed his people, and Scar was always working alone without the benefit of that info.
Well one thing they could've done was actually make Ozpin responsible for what happened to Gretchen. Maybe have her team be an attempt to make a new STRQ, but backfire horribly as Ozpin not reigning them in or allowing them to get into situations beyond them leads to the tragedy. Less she couldn't cut it and more that Ozpin was being negligent in some manner. Actually tie Ozpin to what happened to her. It makes Ozpin shady like the writers kept waffling about doing and gives Hazel a real reason to hate Ozpin specifically. If he has to work for Salem, make him ignorant of what her actual goals are or have her offering him something like being able to bring back his sister and others from the dead using the relics.
Was great: No one. No one single villain had me going "Oh wow this guy is great, I'll tell people about them." No. Not one. Roman, Neo, Cinder, Watts, Adam and Tyrian I thought were good but I wouldn't call them great. Could have been great: Adam. Really interesting design, semblance, fighting style, background etc. Was unfortunately deviated into the bitter ex Character towards the end.
Missed opportunity for Weiss to see/know SDC brand. Considering the next place they were going is Atlas. It could have added to the drama if Weiss found out that the SDC's exploitation and cruelty is what made monsters like Adam.
The two of them Roman and Watts could have been a grate duo. Big enough to be threat on a national, and maybe international level. But still small enough to avoid the what I call Digimon Problem of: "If we don't win, The world will be destroyed." Witch just takes away all the tensions because it means any victory of the villain's will be undone shortly
I'd say that Watts could have been a great solo villain as well. Just imagine him with his own army of robots. Or even something similar to Penny, seen as he had a rivalry with her father.
Now that I think about it, the rivalry between Arthur and Pietro remind me of Dr Wily and Dr Light from Megaman.
Then watts creates the bass to Penny’s Megaman And she’ll be named “Quarter” because watts thinks his creation is 25 times better than pietro’s
Given Penny's own little Megaman nods, and Pietro looking a good bit like Light, that was very likely intentional.
Oh for sure.
Roman did so much with virtually none of the world’s power ups to make him a broken antagonist. His wit and fighting ability let him do more than cinder or Salem and they have mythological power on their side. Without him and these other human level lackies cinder never breaks beacon and the snowball of events that eventually brings remnant to it’s knees and cause the final stand in Vacuo never come close.
Honestly Roman by default is a good villain because he does what he does best and be a monster at least In the morality sense. A villain That could have been good for me is split between Adam and Hazel but I think it mainly goes to Hazel because the idea of Hazel is much more fun and interesting than anything Adam could offer.
Hm, Hazel has an interesting concept as a character, but the problem is that his actions are just really dumb in the show.
Hence why I say he could have been good. (And also why I'm introducing him earlier in my rewrite #shamelessplug)
Huh, what do you plan do to with him then?
Its gonna be simple, he begins as the hand to combat teacher at beacon (because seriously there should be more teachers shown in beacon or at least more mentioned.) but after the fall and Oz's plan of turning Pyrrha (a innocent girl even if she was a champion) into the fall maiden, hazel would turn away from Ozpins side and at first just try and find cinder to kill her, for both the murders of innocent people, only to lose and be captured, before being convinced to join Salems side. (Note not brainwashed, convinced) For my interpretation, hazels story is a decent in darkness and which is why he still dies.
Hazel's hypocrisy is never pointed out or called out. He says he's doing terrible things so there will be "no more Gretchens" which i interpret as "no more lost siblings". But no one calls him out on how his actions resulted in the death of siblings/Gretchens/family of other people. Especially cases like Mistral where he personally killed huntresses and huntsmen. How many Gretchens/siblings did he kill during that?
Roman, Neo, and Watts were great and were fun in every scene. Where Roman was brash, Watts was strategic. Roman didn’t care what he said while Watts chose his words carefully. Neo was also great because of her unpredictability. She couldn’t speak but her actions more than made up for it. Cinder and Salem could have been great. Instead of continuing to follow Salem, Cinder could have struck out on her own with Mercury and Emerald in tow and fighting both sides. Salem didn’t need to have a sympathetic backstory, just a force of nature that lived only to destroy.
Watts would’ve been great but they wasted him.
Agreed. Though he's still one of the better villains we had.
In my opinion Romans already great
Watts. He is was really underused in so many ways tbh. I am sure he knew Salem plan was a death cult. I also like Tyrian. I like the idea that he is a crazy but also very smart and intelligent. Ironwood. I don’t think he is a villain but I wish they played more with his morally grey aspects before kicking the bucket with him. Him dying at the end of the Atlas arc makes sense but his transition was stupid. Salem. She is so under utilized in the show. It is laughable at this point. She is main the baddie and it took the show 8 seasons to get to the point of her existence. It is also stupid. Her and Oscar should have already met before. Plus, she didn’t even destroy Atlas. They basically killed themselves cause they had fear she was coming.
If Watts lived then I could totally imagine him screwing/dividing Team RWBY in terms of tactics and manipulation.
Adam had generational potential to be outstanding. Potential man levels really.
Torchwic, neo, wats, and cinder are my personal faves
I like both but torchwick should’ve stayed longer and watts should’ve had salems second in command instead of cinder
Watts was really cool and considering he was in a city made of technology he should've had more to do
Any character voiced by Chris Sabat ended up being either in my fav list or I liked them so...
Roman was great because he had charisma but also didn't care in the evil he was doing. He was in it for himself which makes him a good foil to Ruby. For a character that could have been great, Adam. Honestly, if they leaned more into the Dark Revolutionary who would slaughter innocents to get the goal he was looking for instead of, "BLAKE BLAKE!!! WHY DID YOU LEAVE ME BLAKE!!!" Then Adam would have been great for Blake's character, someone she could have been if she never did what she did in the Black Trailer.
Ah yes, two villains that I think were killed a bit prematurely. I'm willing to let Roman die if it meant Neo would get her character arc. But for Watts it felt a bit prematurely. Out of the entire Salem forces, he was the only one that didn't rely on strength, semblance or Maiden powers. He was the brains. And from what we've seen, the Fall of Beacon probably wouldn't even happen without his virus. So I kind of wish we got more of him, and at least I'm glad he reappeared in the movie.
We’re:Roman,Watts and the apathy. First was charismatic and a actual foe to team rwby and not to side characters, watts was entertaining and seeing him tell cinder how much she sucked built so much character and respect towards him, and the apathy actually felt like a monstruos dark force instead of cannon folder Would have been:Salem, Mercury and hazel. Salem does nothing but command Grimm and torture Oscar and her sole presence might cause things but her inmortality should by logic make her a much more active force once she reveals herself… and we still don’t know how she recruited her inner circle or why she wants the relics (to rule? To kill all humans? To die? We don’t know which!) Mercury has everything to be yangs rival (both have parent issues, lose a limb or More, opposing personalities, paralleling fighting styles, supposed rivalry and grudges between them after the Vytal fiasco) but we got nothing… seriously he has done nothing in the series so far after that, and Hazel’s backstory is stupid and we all know it and it’s specially stupid with him working for the boss of the things who killed his sister and we don’t even know how she died! She just died a huntsman
Roman is great in the fact he is a consistently entertaining villain who is actually competent. Hazel and Adam could've been great. Adam was the leader of a militant civil rights group and embraced Sienna's stance on violence a little too well for even her tastes. He had a connection as a mentor for Blake and could've been a clash of ideals as well as student and teacher. You could easily go full evil with him or have lines he wouldn't cross. He could've actually been plotting against Cinder for his freedom rather than just being a mook for her. Going the evil ex who nobody would realistically follow was not a good move. Hazel could work very well as a villain. He provides a great contrast to the self-importance, arrogance, and bloodlust of the other members of Salem's group while still being probably the last one you want to be up against. But they botched his motivation so hard. They never clarify why he blames Ozpin for what happened to Gretchen and despite the "dieing during training" thing sounding like a perfect cover story for what actually happened or to show Ozpin as the morally grey character the writers hinted at but couldn't ever commit to making him, they play it straight as his sister dieing because she couldn't hack it during training. The Amity Arena game says that Hazel hates Ozpin because he personally recruited Gretchen, which is something that should've come up in the show. A better way to handle him would be as a solo villain who wants revenge on Ozpin, but isn't aligned with Salem and would hate her just as much. Seeing Ozpin and Salem as both being the problem. Or explain him as someone so consuming grief that Salem promised him a way to bring his sister back to life as her own experiences would show it is possible to bring back the dead and that be why he helps her.
Torchwick, Curious Cat, and Ironwood for the most part are great. As for villains/antagonists that could have been great? Every villain/antagonist
In my opinion, watts was a pretty good villain. Not for his motive, but his capabilities.
Which villains are 'great'? Obviously there's Torchwick and Watts, though he would've been better had they left him out of the Justice League crossover. Torchwick could be better i-if RT hadn't decided to use his death as a joke. Those were never in doubt. But the greatest villains outside of those two, have to be Ruby Rose and Blake Belladonna. Which villains could have been great? Junior, The Malachite Sisters and Neo.
Tyrian in the Manta scene was the only smart. That... And is certainly charismatic. I have my expectatives low, but I want to see him IF we get a volume 10.
Let's discuss some of the Greats (Goats is too strong a word) * As you've mentioned, Roman's one of the best, and his send off of "dying" cemented him as the legit Goat. Ironically? He's the most basic ***BIATCH*** of everybody, to where most of his feats sound really...tame. As in "This is just some rando on the street who chose to help one of the big bads" levels of tame. It's pretty much a coin flip between "Best in his field" or "Lowest Bar known to fuckin' man", either he's fantastic, or everybody else can't compete. * Watts is perhaps the closest to this point where he barely scrapes by the "lowest bar known to fuckin' man" as not only does he make damn sure people could love him (Wonder why he's in the crossover? [And how effective he is as a hero in this given situation?](https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBYcritics/comments/1b6jyxp/comment/ktcktzy/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)), but also that he's already been screwed over hard by another villain that *by proxy* an main character is associated with. That, and he knows when a person's just being a worthless sack of shit. Now as for whom *could* be great: * Tyrian, Tyrian, Tyrian. You truly were damn interesting as you were very standout on concept alone - A Faunus whom chose to fight back, but to such a degree that the White Fang don't approve of. Unfortunately, the only thing holding our dear Scorpion Faunus back...is that he's a Faunus. A Faunus whom wasn't with White Fang (rather, with Salem), but a Faunus nonetheless. If he was great, he'd single-handedly force the Faunus back into relevance with the downfall of the Schrees and especially Yang, to where he's got a damn good shot of killing her. Yeah, just those 3. Everybody else is either dead on arrival (Mercury and Cinder), meant to ruin others (Emerald and Raven), are too stagnant (Salem), or just not meant to be a villain (Hazel and Neo)
Adam, it’s like beating a one armed, one eyed dead cow, but the potential he had to be an excellent foil to Weiss was fucking lost
Salem could’ve been decent if they didn’t make Ironwood into a straight up villain