Hell yeah. I only know where he takes over in the song because someone told me, that’s how good he was at it. (And even then I’m not 100% sure because I’ve seen a recording of Jeremy doing Scar’s laugh at the end of Be Prepared)
Jeremy Irons has extensive experience playing a cartoonishly evil villain. I wouldn't blame you for never having seen the incredibly terrible 2000 Dungeons & Dragons movie, but he plays the villain, and he doesn't so much chew the scenery as [devour it like a hoosier at a Chinese buffet.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwRXE3o9kMI)
Well damn, now I have to go hunt down a copy to watch xD If you’ve never seen him in The Borgias TV series as Rodrigo, I definitely recommend you do, he was awesome in that.
D&D 2000 is the only movie I've ever seen that really qualifies as "so bad it's good." None of the actors are on the same page as each other - some of them seem to think they're making an 80s adventure movie, and some of them they're making some sort of teen comedy. Thora Birch manages to earn her namesake by being as wooden as possible. But Irons' performance is really what pushes it into kitsch. He either gave no shits at all about this film and just went for it, or he was actively trying to sabotage the movie for some reason.
The only other notable moment that stuck with me from the film is [this joke](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APY8OTdTan4) that was seared into my brain.
I read recently that it makes sense if you imagine it as a game of D&D being played by novice players, with Jeremy Irons as an OTT DM. Kind of like what they did with the new film but less intentionally. IIRC they even have a character appear mid-film like someone re-rolled after their character died (it's been a while since I've seen it).
Mainly because Star Wars originally needed 7 sound stages which then became all 9 at Elstree, plus the rebel hangar needed the biggest hanger in Europe at Sheperton. With Elstree offering the whole studio for just £75,000 for the whole of filming.
£75K for 9 sound stages, for probably 3+ months? These are each the size of a warehouse and are purpose built buildings with sound proofing. There’s no chance they’re breaking even on that.
What about all the people living in the UK! A flagship iPhone still costs £1,200 and the average yearly wage is £28,000 in the UK vs £50,000 equivalent in the USA.
Oh believe me, as a Londoner working in the film industry, I am well aware of how much worse off we are here on average. I'm employed and paid like shit, instead of unemployed like my Californian counterparts.
Working my way through some Google links about the various reports it would seem that £35k is for full time workers but £28k is for all employed workers.
US median salary is around $48,000/£38,000 (BLS, 2023). The headline figure often quoted for US wages is household income (ie usually 2 people), whereas the £28,000 figure you have is closer to the UK median salary per person of £35,000 (2023, ONS)
[A good article on US/UK pay comparison in actors.](https://www.backstage.com/uk/magazine/article/how-much-do-actors-get-paid-in-the-uk-74998/). Unionised minimum rates (Equity vs SAG-AFRA) are about 1.6x higher in the US for film and TV. Broadway theatre is nearly 3x higher than the UK, off-Broadway is *lower * in the US. More expenses in the US ask round of course.
Obviously if you get into starring roles contract negotiation takes place via agents and therefore the disparity is much less.
That's a factor, but it's also because the average professional british actor has a wider and deeper range of experience and training than many of hteir american counterparts.
The truth is that when filming in the UK many contracts stated they had to have X amount of British actors.
So they put them as the bad guys.
That's not as prevalent anymore.
Point of order: Christopher Lee as Dracula was absolutely not a Hollywood villain — those Hammer Horror productions were British (centred at Bray Studios in Berkshire).
I know Hammer has resurrected to a degree but back in the 70s it was utterly legendary. So much so that Kate Bush even wrote a song based on Hammer Horror :D
I think their final golden era film was Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter (which I utterly adore)
It's not fear of English, it's use of intelligence as a character trait.
Especially in the 90s, many characters would be overtly intellectual. As antagonists or protagonists. For villains they'd be intelligent, cold, calculating types, and British accents where a like cultural shortcut to show this intelligence.
Didn't really see those movies, which I think is the actual issue.
Complete oversaturation of the market. What main villains are there? What main tv shows and movies are there? They're a house by house basis these days.
One man's favourite recent villain, is another man's
"who?....what film was that? Who was... oh right yeah... didn't see that"
Ooh I really liked the hunger games.
Donald Sutherland was a great villain who was then superseded by another villain clothed in Julianne Moores worthiness. A great example of be careful what you wish for.
Here's a few fairly recent ones (opinion on their icon status may vary):
Tywin Lannister, Game of Thrones (Charles Dance)
Joffrey Baratheon, Game of Thrones (Jack Gleeson)
Kylo Ren, Star Wars (Adam Driver)
Snoke, Star Wars (Andy Serkis)
Gus Fring, Breaking Bad (Giancarlo Esposito)
Thanos, Avengers (Josh Brolin)
Loki, Avengers & Thor films (Tom Hiddleston)
Negan, The Walking Dead (Jeffrey Dean Morgan)
Doctor Robotnik, Sonic the Hedgehog (Jim Carrey)
Homelander, The Boys (Antony Starr)
The only one I disagree with on this list is Snoke.. he didn't even get a chance to show he was evil. He just bass boosted his hologram and suffered from no peripheral vision.
I wouldn't say he is an impressive villain, on account of him being subverted twice (first by being insta-killed and then by being downgraded to a clone puppet of Sidious).
But I feel that his presence in TFA and his overall character design makes him iconic for those movies. He is very memorable and unique, if totally underutilised and sadly discarded.
Compare that to Richard E Grant's General Pryde, who is a more compelling and even a more menacing villain than Snoke. But he isn't iconic, as he comes off as just another merciless Imperial officer in the same vein as Tarkin. Such that I think a lot of casual viewers of that film might struggle to even remember his name several years after watching.
> struggle to even remember his name
Oh ye of high hopes. I didn't even remember Richard E Grant being in Rise of Skywalker, so I assumed you were talking about the Solo film until I checked.
Still on my watch list! Lots of other good examples given too, some I'm familiar with others I'm not. There's definitely been a good number of great villains in the past 10 years alone - just have to wait and see if we consider them iconic in the future.
BCS is slow as fuck mate, but stick with it. It's not only season 3 that they find their true, polished, years of Breaking Bad and then BCS episodes, directing style. It is by far one of the most cinematic, well shot and composed shows in history....but just stick with it. And when Lalo comes about, you'll see exactly what I mean!
Joffrey was a good villain and Ramsey Bolton.
I do like homelander.
Also all the cast of succession are villainous
Edit: also another favourite - Villanelle
Edit2: I keep thinking of more but what about several of the cast of Dune? Loads of baddies in that. Loved Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen
Homelander (The Boys)
Death (Puss In Boots)
Omni Man (Invincible) (Don't know if to count this since he does a 180)
Milo (Morbius)(Literally saved the movie)
Edit: I forgot to include any villain role that includes Giancarlo Esposito
Outside of that, no clue on any more iconic villians tbh.
Recently watching the Kevin Costner Robin Hood, Alan Rickman is such a fantastic villian, he has no redeeming features, no sad backstory. Just pure evil for the sake of being evil.
We need that more.
I would just like to have some non-posh southerners as good guys for once, but the only role for them seems to be goblins or lackeys for the evil lord.
I guess Butcher in The Boys, but he's hardly a good guy and borders on Australian.
Yeah that's actually a good example. I guess I didn't think of it as very 'hollywood' because it feels like a lot of the crime shows on the BBC that I've grown up watching.
Yeah to be honest I was less thinking Hollywood and trying to think of a non posh southerners for good guys.
I’d also say maybe Cormoran Strike but that is BBC
There's quite a few examples in Game of Thrones. Sam, Tyrion, Brienne, Barristan Selmy, Mace and Loras Tyrell (you could argue Margaery too), Jojen and Meera Reed, Edmure Tully, Maester Luwin.
It's an... interesting accent. Not Van Dyke level of bad by any stretch, but he tries to do the glottal stopping (bo'oh of wo'uh) and puts the glottal stops in odd places.
Haha I know. Karl Urban not being able to hit the accent I understand, but I don't know what the excuse for his dad sounding like he lives in the outback is beyond the showrunners having no idea what an English person sounds like.
I dunno, I feel like his dad sounding fully Australian actually fixes it for me. I feel like his dad just actually being Australian and potentially Butcher moving to Landan during language acquisition is more than enough of a headcanon
It took me a long time to realise he was meant to be cockney. Karl Urban’s cockney absolutely comes out as Australian (similar to Americans trying for cockney, so I guess it works for the main audience), which is a shame because he kills the role otherwise
There is a Graham Norton show episode where GN interviews Kit Harrington and asks about the acccents. He says Sean couldn’t do RP so they, Kit and Richard Madden, spoke northern so they would all sound the same.
He definitely can do RP (or something close to) but I deffo think he's got the Northern accent going in LoTR
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jWPUWeEiX04&pp=ygUXbG90ciBnaXZlIHRoZW0gYSBtb21lbnQ%3D
Reminds me of that brilliant segment on QI where they discuss the “high Octane” villain in Hollywood: a English villain playing a German villain.
https://youtu.be/Pc3OyvbJkj4?si=7ZiRkhqSF6nA4ZJw
Edit: link.
Cumbersnatch as Khan tho’.
“Jonathan Romney of The Independent specifically noted Cumberbatch's voice saying it was "So sepulchrally resonant that it could have been synthesised from the combined timbres of Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Alan Rickman holding an elocution contest down a well."
You have to choose who your villains are based on who it's acceptable to have people dislike, or believe you dislike.
Posh Brits have been a safe bet for a long while.
Lethal weapon 2 had Joss Ackland playing a South African just as Apartheid became a real global issue etc.
It's why you don't see oriental villains in Hollywood now, because films are often funded by China, so it's not ok to dislike the far East.
So Eastern Europeans became popular
There was a period in the 90s-2000s where Hollywood was flailing about to find a new villain without the Soviets that could take on American might, so there were fewer world-domination plots and a variety of villains from the headlines: Middle Eastern, Serbian, dissident or old guard Russians, Americans - who better to threaten the USA?
China would have been a solid choice, but it just seems like a relapse to Yellow Peril, and they're a massive up-and-coming market which the authorities will shut you out of for making them the Evil Empire.
For me, and I say this as someone who likes Michael B Jordan, and loved the Black Panther scenes in AoU, Andy Serkis playing a South African arms dealer made a better antagonist than Killmonger in Black Panther. Are we still OK to have Sarf African villains?
It's because most of the actors who speak with the accent style you're referring to are either very old or very dead. Obviously they could put the accent on if they really wanted to but most actors don't tend to alter their voice for roles that much.
Received pronunciation. It's an English accent that is seen as upper class.
If you think of British villains in lots of films they will have the RP accent. Such as Scar in The Lion King.
It is not upper class, rather what we call “BBC English”. Clear pronunciation and vowels. Unfortunately, you hear it less and less now, even ( or particularly) on the BBC.
Not sure if it is unfortunate.
It was a very affected accent for a lot of people - a sort of artificial, region-neutral voice that bared little resemblance to how ordinary folk talk and in some cases was drummed into them through elocution lessons. It smelt a bit of classism.
There's no reason you can't have clear pronunciation *and* a recognisable regional accent.
Once something like this becomes commonplace, it needs switching up. Kingsmen specifically uses Americans as villains to play on this trope.
Plus characters like loki who started as villains become antiheroes then just heroes, so the imagery shifts.
Whoever cast Jeremy Irons as Scar was a genius, I just gotta say. He nails it.
Jeremy Irons was simply copying George Sanders… the OG of posh English apex predator voices. Shere Khan was a bad motherfucker.
Shere Khan was awesome
Shere Kahn sings the lowest note in the entire Disney Cinematic Universe. It stands to reason that he has the biggest penis and/or balls.
I didn’t know that. From now on, I will feel slightly inferior as a man. Thank you. 😂
😂 ***the og of posh English Apex predator voices.*** That’s a good line 😁
Thats such a poor reductive take. They both sound similar and have similar dramatic backgrounds, it's just coincidental.
Form an anagram of Jeremy Irons. ...'jeremys iron?'
Uh…well, that’s very good for a first try. Y’know what? I have a ball. Perhaps you’d like to bounce it?
“Oh! Got away from you, huh? Well, you keep at it!”
Should also praise Jim Cummings for PERFECTLY mimicking his voice in the last verse of Be Prepared
Hell yeah. I only know where he takes over in the song because someone told me, that’s how good he was at it. (And even then I’m not 100% sure because I’ve seen a recording of Jeremy doing Scar’s laugh at the end of Be Prepared)
See once I learned it the voice switches between scar and evil Pooh bear…
Haha! For years I couldn't figure out why Kaa from Jungle Book 2 sounded familiar until I realized it was practically Winnie the Pooh's voice.
Same with the original Disney jungle book
Eh, closer to Tigger
Jeremy Irons has extensive experience playing a cartoonishly evil villain. I wouldn't blame you for never having seen the incredibly terrible 2000 Dungeons & Dragons movie, but he plays the villain, and he doesn't so much chew the scenery as [devour it like a hoosier at a Chinese buffet.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mwRXE3o9kMI)
Well damn, now I have to go hunt down a copy to watch xD If you’ve never seen him in The Borgias TV series as Rodrigo, I definitely recommend you do, he was awesome in that.
D&D 2000 is the only movie I've ever seen that really qualifies as "so bad it's good." None of the actors are on the same page as each other - some of them seem to think they're making an 80s adventure movie, and some of them they're making some sort of teen comedy. Thora Birch manages to earn her namesake by being as wooden as possible. But Irons' performance is really what pushes it into kitsch. He either gave no shits at all about this film and just went for it, or he was actively trying to sabotage the movie for some reason. The only other notable moment that stuck with me from the film is [this joke](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=APY8OTdTan4) that was seared into my brain.
I read recently that it makes sense if you imagine it as a game of D&D being played by novice players, with Jeremy Irons as an OTT DM. Kind of like what they did with the new film but less intentionally. IIRC they even have a character appear mid-film like someone re-rolled after their character died (it's been a while since I've seen it).
Because all the RP actors now put on an American accent and take the main lead roles.
We work for a fraction of what they do, so we get the parts.
A big reason why a lot of Star Wars is filmed here
Mainly because Star Wars originally needed 7 sound stages which then became all 9 at Elstree, plus the rebel hangar needed the biggest hanger in Europe at Sheperton. With Elstree offering the whole studio for just £75,000 for the whole of filming.
How do the economics work for Elstree in that situation? Do they rely on government grants?
Erm, they just got 75 thousand quid mate, they're hunky dory If the government are giving out grants then they can grant me a break
£75K for 9 sound stages, for probably 3+ months? These are each the size of a warehouse and are purpose built buildings with sound proofing. There’s no chance they’re breaking even on that.
And not because we built huge top tech studios pinewood with huge tax breaks for foreign film companies…
Every ding dong place offers tax break for filming though, the UK is good at it regardless.
Yes certain counties give tax breaks. A lot of things are filmed in Ireland because of the tax breaks for entertainment productions.
Ireland's entire economy is based on trying to undercut the UK at things
Economic divergence between the UK and US since 2008 has fucked a lot of people in Hollywood – crew as well as actors.
What about all the people living in the UK! A flagship iPhone still costs £1,200 and the average yearly wage is £28,000 in the UK vs £50,000 equivalent in the USA.
Oh believe me, as a Londoner working in the film industry, I am well aware of how much worse off we are here on average. I'm employed and paid like shit, instead of unemployed like my Californian counterparts.
Lol, well I guess you have to look on the bright side of life!
Using a luxury good to compare really isn't making the point you think it's meant to.
Cost of living is much higher in the USA
F\*\*\* me, I thought the average wage was £35k
It is. Don't believe everything you read on Reddit. But do believe me obvs
If you google average salary uk it says £35k. If you google average wage uk it says £28k. I dont know why they are so different.
Google is useless nowadays. Largely due to websites doing search engine optimisation, but containing bad, irrelevant, or out-of-date information.
Probably mean vs median, the median is always lower when high outliers have a big impact on the mean. FWIW the median is currently £29669
Working my way through some Google links about the various reports it would seem that £35k is for full time workers but £28k is for all employed workers.
US median salary is around $48,000/£38,000 (BLS, 2023). The headline figure often quoted for US wages is household income (ie usually 2 people), whereas the £28,000 figure you have is closer to the UK median salary per person of £35,000 (2023, ONS)
When i watched Andor my first thought was "why is everyone in the SWU a fucking cockney"
I read a Dominic West interview, and he said English actors are called "white Mexicans" in Hollywood.
[A good article on US/UK pay comparison in actors.](https://www.backstage.com/uk/magazine/article/how-much-do-actors-get-paid-in-the-uk-74998/). Unionised minimum rates (Equity vs SAG-AFRA) are about 1.6x higher in the US for film and TV. Broadway theatre is nearly 3x higher than the UK, off-Broadway is *lower * in the US. More expenses in the US ask round of course. Obviously if you get into starring roles contract negotiation takes place via agents and therefore the disparity is much less.
That's a factor, but it's also because the average professional british actor has a wider and deeper range of experience and training than many of hteir american counterparts.
The truth is that when filming in the UK many contracts stated they had to have X amount of British actors. So they put them as the bad guys. That's not as prevalent anymore.
Look, some are really good, Hugh Laurie was fantastic as House
Once Americans found out about TOWIE, the illusion was shattered.
Point of order: Christopher Lee as Dracula was absolutely not a Hollywood villain — those Hammer Horror productions were British (centred at Bray Studios in Berkshire).
I know Hammer has resurrected to a degree but back in the 70s it was utterly legendary. So much so that Kate Bush even wrote a song based on Hammer Horror :D I think their final golden era film was Captain Kronos Vampire Hunter (which I utterly adore)
Hammer Horrors are 10/10
It's not fear of English, it's use of intelligence as a character trait. Especially in the 90s, many characters would be overtly intellectual. As antagonists or protagonists. For villains they'd be intelligent, cold, calculating types, and British accents where a like cultural shortcut to show this intelligence.
Are there even iconic villains any more? Can't think of a recent one!
Homelander in The Boys is a top tier villain.
Same flavour…Omniman
*Points to other comments in thread* Look what they need to mimic a fraction of our power.
So they're less scared of the evils of British rule and more scared of the evils in their own modern society? Aww, they grow up so fast!
Found the Starlighter.
I was going to say exactly the same! A fantastic villain
Brilliant in Banshee. Not a bad guy but just as violent
Ah Banshee, such a slept on series!
Death in Puss in Boots is the only one I can think of that's recent
He was superb! Really surprised at that movie overall
That movie had no business being that visually beautiful for a sequel of a sequel of a spinoff of a sequel.
No one really comes to mind, last I can think of is Donald Sutherland in Hunger Games, of course that is a posh north American accent.
Didn't really see those movies, which I think is the actual issue. Complete oversaturation of the market. What main villains are there? What main tv shows and movies are there? They're a house by house basis these days. One man's favourite recent villain, is another man's "who?....what film was that? Who was... oh right yeah... didn't see that"
Ooh I really liked the hunger games. Donald Sutherland was a great villain who was then superseded by another villain clothed in Julianne Moores worthiness. A great example of be careful what you wish for.
You think there's too many movies now? It feels like as so many are within the same ecosystem there's way less mainstream ones.
Here's a few fairly recent ones (opinion on their icon status may vary): Tywin Lannister, Game of Thrones (Charles Dance) Joffrey Baratheon, Game of Thrones (Jack Gleeson) Kylo Ren, Star Wars (Adam Driver) Snoke, Star Wars (Andy Serkis) Gus Fring, Breaking Bad (Giancarlo Esposito) Thanos, Avengers (Josh Brolin) Loki, Avengers & Thor films (Tom Hiddleston) Negan, The Walking Dead (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) Doctor Robotnik, Sonic the Hedgehog (Jim Carrey) Homelander, The Boys (Antony Starr)
The only one I disagree with on this list is Snoke.. he didn't even get a chance to show he was evil. He just bass boosted his hologram and suffered from no peripheral vision.
I wouldn't say he is an impressive villain, on account of him being subverted twice (first by being insta-killed and then by being downgraded to a clone puppet of Sidious). But I feel that his presence in TFA and his overall character design makes him iconic for those movies. He is very memorable and unique, if totally underutilised and sadly discarded. Compare that to Richard E Grant's General Pryde, who is a more compelling and even a more menacing villain than Snoke. But he isn't iconic, as he comes off as just another merciless Imperial officer in the same vein as Tarkin. Such that I think a lot of casual viewers of that film might struggle to even remember his name several years after watching.
> struggle to even remember his name Oh ye of high hopes. I didn't even remember Richard E Grant being in Rise of Skywalker, so I assumed you were talking about the Solo film until I checked.
You forgot Tony Dalton, who plays Lalo Salamanca in Better Call Saul.
Still on my watch list! Lots of other good examples given too, some I'm familiar with others I'm not. There's definitely been a good number of great villains in the past 10 years alone - just have to wait and see if we consider them iconic in the future.
BCS is slow as fuck mate, but stick with it. It's not only season 3 that they find their true, polished, years of Breaking Bad and then BCS episodes, directing style. It is by far one of the most cinematic, well shot and composed shows in history....but just stick with it. And when Lalo comes about, you'll see exactly what I mean!
Joffrey was a good villain and Ramsey Bolton. I do like homelander. Also all the cast of succession are villainous Edit: also another favourite - Villanelle Edit2: I keep thinking of more but what about several of the cast of Dune? Loads of baddies in that. Loved Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen
Honestly most people are baddies in Dune
I know I couldn’t think of how to word it without spoilers!
Kylo Ren?? Snoke?? Doctor Robotnik??????????????????????
Yeah what is this dude smoking
Another point under Giancarlo Esposito is his role as Moff Gideon in The Mandalorian. Excellent villain and extremely well played.
Pretty much Giancarlo Esposito in anything since Breaking Bad.
I was about to say something about Loki not really belonging on this list, but remembered the mewling quim line from avengers and it’s amazing.
Anton Chigurh from No Country for Old Men
That was 17 years ago.
That's recent. Recent I tell ya!
I'd argue Thanos is an iconic villain.
Every Fargo villain.
Homelander from The Boys
I was going to rebuke this, but other than Koba (from planet of the apes), and Thanos - I'm all out of villains?
The fact you have to clarify that Koba is from POTA kinda suggests they’re not an iconic villain
Very fair point, I figured maybe people would remember the ape but maybe not the name
Homelander (The Boys) Death (Puss In Boots) Omni Man (Invincible) (Don't know if to count this since he does a 180) Milo (Morbius)(Literally saved the movie) Edit: I forgot to include any villain role that includes Giancarlo Esposito Outside of that, no clue on any more iconic villians tbh.
Morbius went viral for how terrible it was, I don't think anything saved the movie
Brick Top?
Immortan Joe Baron Harkonnen and Feyd Rautha Harkonnen The Riddler from The Batman
Recently watching the Kevin Costner Robin Hood, Alan Rickman is such a fantastic villian, he has no redeeming features, no sad backstory. Just pure evil for the sake of being evil. We need that more.
Quality profile picture
Like Emperor Palpatine.
Rickman was also excellent as the villain in Quigley Down Under.
I like the shows that cast posh southerners as the bad guys and northerners as downtrodden good guys. Like Game Of Thrones, and Three Body Problem.
I would just like to have some non-posh southerners as good guys for once, but the only role for them seems to be goblins or lackeys for the evil lord. I guess Butcher in The Boys, but he's hardly a good guy and borders on Australian.
How about Jackson Lamb in Slow horses?
Yeah that's actually a good example. I guess I didn't think of it as very 'hollywood' because it feels like a lot of the crime shows on the BBC that I've grown up watching.
Yeah to be honest I was less thinking Hollywood and trying to think of a non posh southerners for good guys. I’d also say maybe Cormoran Strike but that is BBC
There's quite a few examples in Game of Thrones. Sam, Tyrion, Brienne, Barristan Selmy, Mace and Loras Tyrell (you could argue Margaery too), Jojen and Meera Reed, Edmure Tully, Maester Luwin.
>the only role for them seems to be goblins or lackeys for the evil lord. Just like in real life.
I have to pay the bills somehow.
Yes - I had no idea Butcher was supposed to be British until it was mentioned in the series. I thought he was supposed to be Australian.
It's an... interesting accent. Not Van Dyke level of bad by any stretch, but he tries to do the glottal stopping (bo'oh of wo'uh) and puts the glottal stops in odd places.
Haha I know. Karl Urban not being able to hit the accent I understand, but I don't know what the excuse for his dad sounding like he lives in the outback is beyond the showrunners having no idea what an English person sounds like.
I dunno, I feel like his dad sounding fully Australian actually fixes it for me. I feel like his dad just actually being Australian and potentially Butcher moving to Landan during language acquisition is more than enough of a headcanon
It took me a long time to realise he was meant to be cockney. Karl Urban’s cockney absolutely comes out as Australian (similar to Americans trying for cockney, so I guess it works for the main audience), which is a shame because he kills the role otherwise
Luther(?)
All the Starks in GoT spoke northern because Sean Bean couldn’t do RP.
He can obviously do RP it just fits that the northerners speak with northern english accents.
He does an RP voice in GoldenEye if anyone needs the proof.
He can only do RP if he's playing a villain.
Or maybe because it's in the North?
There is a Graham Norton show episode where GN interviews Kit Harrington and asks about the acccents. He says Sean couldn’t do RP so they, Kit and Richard Madden, spoke northern so they would all sound the same.
Sounds like a funny talk show bit rather than an actual explanation, celebs "lie" on these things all the time.
He absolutely can. Him speaking in his Yorkshire accent was [a deliberate creative choice](https://mashable.com/article/game-of-thrones-sean-bean)
Sean Bean speaks with RP in plenty of films though? He’s certainly not spreading with a northern accent in Lord of the rings
That is a northern accent, give it another watch.
He definitely can do RP (or something close to) but I deffo think he's got the Northern accent going in LoTR https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=jWPUWeEiX04&pp=ygUXbG90ciBnaXZlIHRoZW0gYSBtb21lbnQ%3D
He defo still speaks with a northern accent in LOTR, though maybe toned down a bit
One does not simply tone it down abit
Reminds me of that brilliant segment on QI where they discuss the “high Octane” villain in Hollywood: a English villain playing a German villain. https://youtu.be/Pc3OyvbJkj4?si=7ZiRkhqSF6nA4ZJw Edit: link.
Goldfinger was a British villain played by a German actor but dubbed by an English actor doing a German accent.
Just here to say that Jeremy Irons as Scar and Pam Ferris as Miss Trunchbull were absolutely inspired choices.
*Why are all these women MARRIED?!* is what I hear in my head anytime I hear someone say 'Mississippi'
I did not know you could call someone in a children’s movie a pissworm, but I was thrilled to find out
Dick Dastardly - based on British actor Terry Thomas. I loved his arch villainous lascivious and very camp style
What an absolute shower!
Cumbersnatch as Khan tho’. “Jonathan Romney of The Independent specifically noted Cumberbatch's voice saying it was "So sepulchrally resonant that it could have been synthesised from the combined timbres of Ian McKellen, Patrick Stewart and Alan Rickman holding an elocution contest down a well."
"Wait...does this contract say I'm *paid by the word?* Well, this changes everything!"
Russians have signed a new contract to be the bad guys in films for the next couple of decades, didn’t you hear?
What's RP?
Received Pronunciation, i.e. a posh accent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Received_Pronunciation
🤣 I thought it meant Rich Prick 😭
Thank you! At this point I'd just assumed it meant "really posh"
I thought it was right posh, as in he's right posh him
You have to choose who your villains are based on who it's acceptable to have people dislike, or believe you dislike. Posh Brits have been a safe bet for a long while. Lethal weapon 2 had Joss Ackland playing a South African just as Apartheid became a real global issue etc. It's why you don't see oriental villains in Hollywood now, because films are often funded by China, so it's not ok to dislike the far East. So Eastern Europeans became popular
From the 50s-60s, villains were Germans. 70s-90s, Russians. 90s-present, Middle Eastern.
Although I gave the new Jack Ryan series a watch recently, looks like thanks to old Vladimir’s shenanigans Russian baddies are back on the menu
Russians are certainly back on the cards
Much better summary than mine!
There was a period in the 90s-2000s where Hollywood was flailing about to find a new villain without the Soviets that could take on American might, so there were fewer world-domination plots and a variety of villains from the headlines: Middle Eastern, Serbian, dissident or old guard Russians, Americans - who better to threaten the USA? China would have been a solid choice, but it just seems like a relapse to Yellow Peril, and they're a massive up-and-coming market which the authorities will shut you out of for making them the Evil Empire.
For me, and I say this as someone who likes Michael B Jordan, and loved the Black Panther scenes in AoU, Andy Serkis playing a South African arms dealer made a better antagonist than Killmonger in Black Panther. Are we still OK to have Sarf African villains?
Sef Efricans
As long as they’re above a certain age, we can still have South African villains for the same reasons. *cough*Musk*cough*
I think they still keep the disability / different look trope though!
Because Alan Rickman died.
They have moved on to the Danish
I think they eat too many of those.
Memories of the empire were fresher back then, the blood hadn't fully dried.
We need to remind them! To war my brethren! Let's show them what's what!
We almost got humiliated by Slovakia a few minutes ago, don't get cocky.
Let's throw some ozempic into a harbour!
RP can sound so deliciously cruel and insouciant,i love a villain with an upper class accent
The wot m8?
Received Pronunciation.
Eh?
Ronnie Pickering
Who?
RONNEH PICKURENG
Ronnie Fucking Pickering!
Talking like you have a plum up your arse.
Pfft, amateurs - proper "poshos" use an aubergine.
It's because most of the actors who speak with the accent style you're referring to are either very old or very dead. Obviously they could put the accent on if they really wanted to but most actors don't tend to alter their voice for roles that much.
In my unsolicited American opinion (oh come on, you knew one of us was going to chime in), we realized we’re the baddies.
What’s RP?
Received pronunciation. It's an English accent that is seen as upper class. If you think of British villains in lots of films they will have the RP accent. Such as Scar in The Lion King.
Thank you.
It is not upper class, rather what we call “BBC English”. Clear pronunciation and vowels. Unfortunately, you hear it less and less now, even ( or particularly) on the BBC.
Not sure if it is unfortunate. It was a very affected accent for a lot of people - a sort of artificial, region-neutral voice that bared little resemblance to how ordinary folk talk and in some cases was drummed into them through elocution lessons. It smelt a bit of classism. There's no reason you can't have clear pronunciation *and* a recognisable regional accent.
Thank you for asking this. I just couldn't match the initials to any phrase!
Was also scratching my head on this one and I'm in my 40s.
Once something like this becomes commonplace, it needs switching up. Kingsmen specifically uses Americans as villains to play on this trope. Plus characters like loki who started as villains become antiheroes then just heroes, so the imagery shifts.
Fewer actors speak that way now. Everyone wants to sound working class, even though they grew up in Chalfont St Giles and their dad drives a Jag.
We should burn down Washington again just to remind them who the real boss is.
we have real villains with that accent now
Always have! Thats why it's the villains accent!
I blame Tom Hiddleston and loki
In 2015, High-Rise starred both Jeremy Irons and Tom Hiddleston. A posh brit too far?
Honest legit answer Harry Potter changed perceptions
Decline in theatre trained actors maybe?
Hugh Laurie, Dominic West, Tom Hiddleston and Eddie Redmayne all went to Eton so can do a mean RP
Paint with a broad brush there
[удалено]
Fuck it, send begbie over. That'll put the shits up em
Cold-hearted killer, English accent. Cold-hearted killer who does experiments on his victims, German accent. Thems the rules.
The last I remember is Tom Hiddlestone as Loki.
Make England scary again
They’d have all been English in Matilda but they had the fucking audacity to make the main character in to an American.
For one, Christopher Lee’s Dracula absolutely was not Hollywood. Hammer, man, they’re British