Heroes Are Idiots, or Why I Cheer for the Villains
Call it blasphemy against Disney, but I felt that it had to be said. In any Disney movie, the villain is always smarter and/or more powerful than the hero. Take "The Black Cauldron", for example. Taran really is stupid. If he can't keep track of one pig, how does he even defeat the Horned King? (He doesn't. The Horned King trips and falls into the Black Cauldron, which kills him.)
Generally, Disney heroes rely on some sort of magical help, loyal friends, or sheer dumb luck (In Taran's case). If Prince Philip hadn't been with three fairies, he'd have never won against Maleficent, the Mistress of all Evil! And Aladdin never even defeated Jafar in Aladdin 2. In fact, Aladdin lost his climactic battle. Without the help of Iago, a secondarycharacter, Jafar would have killed him. And Ariel never defeated Ursula, either, even with her friends helping. Ursula would have succeeded, but sadly, these things just don't happen in Disney movies. So, she was killed in a rather illogical way. (Eric somehow rammed the figurehead of a sinking ship through her heart. Yes, I'm annoyed and puzzled too.) But hey, it's Disney. They thrive on illogic and sickeningly happy endings. Well, not for villains, obviously. At least they get good songs.
In my experience, the villains get all the best songs, if they get a song at all. "Poor Unfortunate Souls" from "The Little Mermaid", "Be Prepared" from "The Lion King" and "You're Only Second Rate" from "Aladdin 2" were the best songs in their respective movies, and they are, of course, villain songs. And Ratigan's song "The World's Greatest Criminal Mind" is the onlysong in "The Great Mouse Detective"! Yet there are some villains who don't have that moment in the limelight. For example, "Enchanted" has loads of songs, but there's no villain song. Poor Queen Narissa has to turn into a dragon just to get a little attention! Of course, there's no call for a villain song when the movie itself isn't a musical, which would be why the Horned King doesn't have a song. But then again, he doesn't have much dialogue either.
Since villains have a generally manipulative nature, they get some really memorable and interesting dialogue. In my opinion, Hades, Scar, and Ursula have the best lines in their films! The hero gets clichéd, mushy lines about destiny, love, and other 'hero stuff'. The villain, however, has far more important things to do, namely conquering the kingdom and killing the hero… or at least attempting to.
Villains, generally, are responsible for the turning point in the story and essentially forcing the hero to, well, act heroic. In fact, without villains, heroes wouldn't be needed at all, and there would be no stories of good vs. evil. A hero is really defined by their villain. Good cannot exist without evil, and that makes having a villain in a movie almost more important than having a hero. Yet, these 'Poor Unfortunate Souls' don't get any thanks for their important work. Villains need a little love too, and hey, someone has to cheer for them. Who cares if they're pure evil, or if they can never win? They're more intelligent and powerful than any hero, and that's why I cheer for the villains.