anti-villain

Noun

anti-villain (plural anti-villains)

1. An antagonist who has or may have noble or honorable aims, but pursues them destructively.
   • As much the anti-hero initially as Thorpe is anti-villain, Tinley's function in the first volume is to expose to Catherine various modes of triviality and affectation.1994, Alistair M. Duckworth, The Improvement of the Estate: A Study of Jane Austen's Novels, Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, page 95
   • The rise of the anti-hero as the protagonist of much of modern fiction was accompanied by the rise of what one might call the “anti-villain,” ironically understood as more interesting than his heroic counterpart.2019, Martin Jay, “Sociology and the Heroism of Modern Life”, in Warren Breckman, Peter E. Gordon, editors, The Cambridge History of Modern European Thought: Volume II, The Twentieth Century...