18 TV and Movie Villains Who Really Scored Good Points

In my opinion, O-Ren Ishii is an iconic villain and an absolute masterpiece of a character. In Kill Bill Vol. 1, he is one of the main enemies of the Bride. A highly trained ninja samurai, a member of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad (DeVAS) and leader of the Yakuza. You really don’t want to mess with him.

It’s understandable that the Bride wants to kill her former colleague, O-Ren Ishii, as she was part of the group responsible for her practically dying on her wedding day.

While the DeVAS massacre was truly horrific and the Bride lost someone she loved to Bill’s vindictiveness, O-Ren Ishii was merely following orders – something the Bride would have done in her day.

O-Ren Ishii’s character is also much more layered because he is who he is for a reason. After watching his parents die at the hands of assassins working for Yakuza crime boss Matsumoto, O-Ren has made it his life’s mission to avenge his parents’ deaths and become the ultimate leader of the Tokyo underworld.

He may be a heartless and violent character, but I think the complexity of his backstory shows that he wasn’t just an evil figure, but had good reasons for ending up where he did.