The Arrowverse has been around for almost eight years now since the kick-off in 2012 and in that time, many heroes and villains have made the jump from page to screen. While many of them have been winners, there have also been several that have been lackluster and disappointing. Whether it was through problematic writing, miscasting, or simply not fitting into the respective show, there have been troublesome villains. Some were the main antagonist for the whole season while others have been recurring. A couple of them are still even around today with little to no improvement.
As the DC TV universe on the CW grows, there will certainly be foes that will either work or flop. But looking at what has come and is around today, there are still a few that need to be explored. With that said, these are the 10 worst villains in the Arrowverse.
Cyborg Superman
It’s still a mystery how Supergirl justifies their version of Hank Henshaw (David Harewood) to be called Cyborg Superman to this day. It also doesn’t help that the design for their Cyborg Superman was incredibly weak. The idea of having J’onn eventually battle the man whose face he is using was insanely wasted during the time Hank was on the show. He ended up just being an agent of Cadmus and that was about it. Given the character’s big history in the comics, he only shared the name of Hank/Cyborg Superman and nothing else.
Non
The first season of Supergirl started with a compelling big bad in Astra Zor-El (Laura Benanti), Kara’s (Melissa Benoist) aunt. While her husband Non (Chris Vance) was decent as a secondary villain, the season committed its biggest mistake when the focus shifted to him. Even though Astra did die brutally, it didn’t help the fact that Non was a very one-dimensional villain and not strong enough to carry on as the main baddie. We’re fine with the fact that he hasn’t been seen since the season 1 finale.
Savitar
Season 3 of The Flash is arguably the darkest season of the series and it was mostly in all the bad ways. Despite starting with a Flashpoint focus, the season quickly shifted into yet another evil speedster. There was a twist though as this was a corrupted version of Barry Allen (Grant Gustin) that had been created as a time remnant in the future. While Gustin has no problem playing both a hero and villain, Savitar as a character was just disastrous. What that character did was to give Iris West (Candice Patton) only one storyline that season and that was to be destined to die at the hands of a version of the man she loves. A great character like Iris deserves better stories than that and that’s why Savitar, in the long run, was one of the worst villains for the show.
Cupid
There are only a handful of villains in the Arrowverse that get the title “worst” simply because they are insanely annoying. Carrie Cutter a.k.a. Cupid (Amy Gumenick) is one of those villains as she has been a constant annoyance since the day she appeared on Arrow. Even though we suspect she is supposed to be irritating, that doesn’t make her an enjoyable character. She was basically like a watered-down version of Harley Quinn with a bow and arrow.
Agent Liberty
The fourth season of Supergirl is remembered mostly as being the season when the show went into a more political direction. That introduced the character of Ben Lockwood a.k.a. Agent Liberty (Sam Witwer), whose hatred towards aliens became a driving point throughout the season. There is no problem in wanting to explore stories that reflect what is going on in our world today. However, the way they did it with the Children of Liberty and through Ben as a primary villain, made it difficult to enjoy that season.
Damien Darhk
Damien Darhk (Neal McDonough) is an interesting one to land on this list. On the one hand, we love to hate him because he was the worst in the fourth season of Arrow. From being a magical force to be reckoned with to being the man that brutally murdered Laurel Lance/Black Canary (Katie Cassidy), he was certainly a bad guy. However, he overstayed his welcome in the universe when Legends of Tomorrow decided to use him for two straight seasons. At that point, he was just lackluster and overused.
Longbow Hunters
The Longbow Hunters that Arrow introduced bore little to no resemblance to the iconic group from the Green Arrow comics. Rather than make them a full-on main group for the season, the Longbow Hunters that fans saw in season 7 came and went quickly. The characters had no development whatsoever and were just bad guys for the heroes to punch. The comic version of the group, especially the original incarnation, became memorable in the Green Arrow mythology, so it was a letdown to see how the TV version was handled.
Reign
For someone that has the name Worldkiller, Supergirl season 3 certainly didn’t have Reign (Odette Annable) live up to that title. This was supposed to be, in many ways, Kara’s Doomsday, someone who in theory should have been able to kill the Girl of Steel. While the set up for Reign was done compellingly through her human counterpart Sam, the end result was a letdown. This could have been the perfect opportunity for the series to adopt a Death and Return of Supergirl story arc. It would have had game-changing consequences for the show moving forward. But in the end, Reign was stopped and has already been forgotten.
Ra’s Al Ghul
After hyping and teasing this particular Batman villain, Ra’s al Ghul (Matt Nable) was a shocking disappointment. While this baddie can carry a two-hour feature film, Arrow proved that he was perhaps not the best-suited villain to hold an entire season. But the biggest aspect that the show failed with their Ra’s was that he never felt like a dangerous force. Ra’s is one of the scarier Batman villains in all of DC Comics and he doesn’t even have to try. Being someone who has lived for hundreds of years, Ra’s stands out in that rogue’s gallery and that was never reflected in this version. It also didn’t help that a middle-eastern character ended up being portrayed by a Caucasian actor, neglecting the character’s ethnicity.
Cicada & Cicada II
It’s still a mystery how The Flash failed with not one, but two versions of Cicada in the fifth season. While the second one (Sarah Carter) managed to hold her own compared to the first version (Chris Klein), they were both lackluster in the long run. Orlin Dwyer failed at every part from writing, acting, and execution, having almost nothing to do with the comic version that is far more compelling. For a long time, when they brought in the grown-up Grace from the future, it seemed like all hope wasn’t lost. But in the end, both Cicadas became the show’s weakest villain of all time.
