Stephen King has many novels, novellas, and short stories in his vault, from deeply vivid and memorable epics to narratives that inspired Academy Award-winning movies. One of the hallmarks of his writing is his ability to create truly memorable villains, whether they’re human or creatures from another world.
King makes great villains because he makes most of them sympathetic, no matter how vile their motives or their actions. “Even bad guys (most of them anyway) see themselves as good — they are the heroes of their own lives. Giving them a fair chance as characters can create some interesting shades of gray — and shades of gray are also a part of life,” he told Writer’s Digest in 2009.
Halloween is almost here. And Amazon’s Carrie adaptation just got renewed for season 2. So to celebrate, here’s our official ranking of Stephen King's 10 best villains of all time.
10 Kurt Barlow
In Salem’s Lot, King got to work with one of the oldest conventions in horror: the vampire. Still, despite the framing, the novel feels like King through and through, following novelist Ben Mears as he returns to his hometown of Jerusalem’s Lot, Maine, to write about the Marsten House, a haunted place that’s the source of one of his great childhood fears. He discovers that a strange man named Kurt Barlow has moved into the place. Barlow is a vampire posing as an antique buyer, who’s been slowly and steadily preying on the town’s residents and converting them. King modeled Barlow after traditional vampire figures like Dracula, making him distant and chilling, with a dispassionate approach to killing. He also deploys Barlow effectively, with the character appearing sparingly to great effect.
9 Henry Bowers
It is a novel of over a thousand pages. While readers have no trouble remembering Pennywise at the center of killing in Derry, a less prominent villain like Henry Bowers can slip through the cracks. As one of the tormentors of the Losers Club, Bowers is one of King’s most terrifying everyday villains. He’s racist and sadistic, gleefully terrorizing his classmates due to his upbringing and father’s influence. As the novel progresses, Henry falls under the spell of Pennywise and becomes even worse. Through the story, Henry carves his name into a kid’s belly, poisons a classmate’s dog (R.I.P. Mr. Chips), and commits murder. Still, he remains a tragic figure and a perfect example of a life ruined by Derry’s corruption.
8 Mrs. Carmody
Mike Flanagan’s Midnight Mass borrows some of King’s best elements. Bev Keane (played by Samantha Sloyan), one of the best villains in Flanagan’s career, feels written from the outline of Mrs. Carmody, the religious zealot in The Mist. The novella follows David Drayton and his son Billy as they’re trapped in a supermarket shrouded by a mist that hides all manner of Lovecraftian horrors. The people in the market are understandably panicked, with Mrs. Carmody making it all worse, taking advantage of the chaos to turn shoppers into a congregation, make herself into some sort of prophet, and preach that the mist is just God’s judgement.
7 William Wharton
The Green Mile is not one of King’s scary stories, but it’s among his most disturbing. The novel follows Paul Edgecomb, a death row supervisor in a 1930s prison who narrates the novel. He shares the story of John Coffey, a man with magical healing powers who arrives at the prison after being convicted of murdering two girls. The 1999 film from Frank Darabont remains a highlight in the history of King adaptations, with its villain, William “Wild Bill” Wharton, becoming a recurring figure in my nightmares. Played by Sam Rockwell, he’s gleeful and sadistic, and the true killer of the girls, making for a great foil to Coffey.
6 Chris Hargensen
King is not really a writer one would associate with female characters, but his first novel started with a girl getting her period. Carrie has a great origin story. Partway through writing it, King decided to throw it in the trash. “I don’t know anything about girls’ locker rooms,” he told PEOPLE. His wife, Tabitha King, rescued it and encouraged him to continue.
One of Carrie’s most awful and sharply drawn characters is Chris Hargensen, Carrie’s high school bully. An intelligent, wealthy, and popular girl, Chris is the ringleader of the students who make Carrie’s high school experience so terrible. She’s behind the tampon-throwing incident in the shower and the mastermind of the unforgettable pig’s blood prank at prom.
5 Margaret White
If Chris Hargensen is Carrie’s school bully, Margaret White is Carrie’s bully at home. King often relies on different villains in his stories, with each serving a specific purpose to the larger narrative. Chris is firmly rooted in the real world, while Margaret reinforces the story’s supernatural element with her faith, seeing the devil in her daughter’s telekinesis. Chris pushes Carrie to her breaking point, but it’s Margaret who breaks her. The face-off between mother and daughter is the story’s final confrontation and the one with the most emotional weight, with Margaret stabbing Carrie at her weakest and severing their already strained bond.
4 Jack Torrance
Jack Torrance is one of Stephen King’s most personal characters. To write him, King drew inspiration from his own fear of himself as a father and his struggles with alcoholism. And while the character is vividly linked to Jack Nicholson’s terrifying performance, King’s version of Torrance is just as frightening, even if his villainous transformation is more gradual. King has more empathy for the character than Stanley Kubrick did in his film, expanding on his traumatic childhood and the guilt he feels after hurting his son Danny while drunk. King’s version of Torrance still has him terrorizing his family (swapping out the movie’s axe for a mallet), but concludes on a redemptive beat. As the Overlook Hotel goes up in flames, Torrance breaks free from his demons and allows Danny to escape.
3 Randall Flagg
While King has many famous villains, Randall Flagg is the one he’s written about the most, appearing in The Eyes of the Dragon, The Stand, and The Dark Tower series. The character has become an Easter Egg for King’s readers thanks to his many aliases, with most having the initials R.F. Flagg is a sorcerer and plays a prominent role in the Kingverse, with his background depicting him as a human who became monstrous by choice. He changes slightly depending on the novel or story where he’s featured, but he's always charming and power-hungry, out to fulfill his ends no matter the cost. What makes him so engaging is just how much fun he’s having.
2 Annie Wilkes
Before Pennywise overtook pop culture as King’s de facto villain, Annie Wilkes was a major contender. With no scary clown makeup or superpowers, Annie was an old-school killer and the primary antagonist in Misery, made famous after Kathy Bates’ incredible performance in the 1990 movie.
At the start of the novel, Annie is introduced as the savior of novelist Paul Sheldon, who’s been involved in a near-fatal car crash. While she acts like a sweet woman and patiently nurses him back to health, things take a turn when she learns of the fate of her favorite character from his books. The discovery results in Sheldon’s torture and in Annie forcing him to write a new novel where she gets what she wants.
1 Pennywise
Pennywise is the first villain that comes to mind whenever we talk of Stephen King. It’s understandable. The name comes with an image: a happy clown with a playful voice, white makeup, a painted red smile and nose. Also a terrifying maw filled with sharp teeth.
Thanks to Andy Muschietti’s movies and the TV show Welcome to Derry, Pennywise has become one of the biggest monsters of the contemporary era and a fixture at Halloween parties. While it’s mostly associated with its clown form, Pennywise is an entity from another world, shapeshifting into its target’s worst fears. Unlike most of the characters on this list, Pennywise is not concerned with humanity or sympathy. It’s an embodiment of pure evil, in a league of its own.