Category:Necessary Evil

"You can't handle the truth! Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the Marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago's death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to."

- Colonel Jessup explaining why and how he believes that his actions - though ruthless and cruel - were necessary

Villains that can actually serve very important purposes and need to be kept alive, imprisoned or simply kept around. No matter how sadistic, bloodthirsty, cruel, or even how much they are hated, these villains cannot be destroyed/killed or something terrible can happen. These characters are similar to Virtually Resourceful characters, but are obviously opposed to their alignment. These characters are usually created to keep the story relatively three dimensional. Examples include:
 * 1) Villains keeping a much worse evil at bay (Galactus keeps Abraxas, a being able to destroy universes, out of the Marvel Universe, the Lich King keeps the Scourge from becoming an even greater threat to Azeroth, and The Seven Deities, while seeking a new world order, protect Gaea from the Gohma, and the Gohma Vlitra, while the remnants of the US Armed Forces in Last of Us, despite running the quarantine zones as police states, genuinely protect the inhabitants from the Infected and attempt to help and be friendly with civilians whenever they can, Anna Morgan keeps her adoptive daughter Samara Morgan from continuing her torment and killing spree)
 * 2) Jerk employees and employers that actually are capable of doing their jobs and it's made very clear the business cannot succeed without them (Benson is heavily trusted with keeping the park afloat, and Malcolm Tucker was very capable in doing his job as the Director of Communications.)
 * 3) Villains preventing catastrophes including end of the world or universe with their mere presence or actions (Each time a God of Olympus dies, a different ecological disaster occurs and Kyubey prevents Armageddon with energy collected from magic girls and Kurumi Tokisaki wants to travel in the time to 30 years ago to protect the planet Earth from the First Spirit in order to prevents the death of 150 million people)
 * 4) Some anti-heroes, (Vegeta, debatably, The Punisher, and The Hero of Bowerstone)
 * 5) Evil vs. Evil scenarios where one of the villains is the only subject strong/powerful enough to defeat the more dangerous threat (Lord Garmadon was the only person who could wield all four golden weapons and destroy The Great Devourer;  Stewie Griffin, in Family Guy, who was the only one who could stop Diane Simmons when she was about to kill Lois, The Hulk was the only one who could stop the Abomination in the 2008 adaptation of The Incredible Hulk, and Heinz Doofenshmirtz being able to stop Aloyse von Roddenstein from sending the Earth to a new Ice Age in Phineas and Ferb Save Summer.)
 * 6) Business Villains that can provide a product or service that is needed or well liked by people (Mr. Krabs runs the Krusty Krab which produces the very well-accepted Krabby Patty, Abstergo Industries have genuinely contributed to most of society's inventions, and Seto Kaiba is in charge of KaibaCorp. OmniCorp, despite violating RoboCop's human rights and removing large portions of his free will, does make the world a better place by providing automated peacekeeping machines for the American military and thus enables them to patrol Tehran and keep it safe from people like suicide bombers without endangering actual infantry troops.)
 * 7) Villains performing villainous acts that lead to beneficial results/consequence, whether the result itself was what they intended or otherwise. Some cases of this instance shows where villains whom their actions was turned out only to merely trained/molded the heroes so the said heroes can became a better savior (in which they often revealed in the end). Other cases however, shows that either their actions are the key for their future downfall at hands of heroes that they antagonize or made hero realized the grave situation that everyone faced (Joe Chill murdering Martha and Thomas Wayne leads to Bruce Wayne becoming Batman; Blackfire using her sister, Starfire, as a bargaining chip for the Gordanians leads to the creation of the superhero team called the Teen Titans that ultimately became her nemesis, Kessler antagonize Cole MacGrath so he can be powerful against The Beast, and The Ten Rings capturing and severely wounding Tony Stark, allowing Stark to see the harm that his company's weapons cause, and leading to him becoming Iron Man.)
 * 8) Rich Villains that helped the city they live in (Lex Luthor helped build half of Metropolis and Mr. Burns is Springfield's only taxpayer)
 * 9) Amoral entities that must keep the balance of nature in check (Almost every incarnation of the Grim Reaper or any Death God in mythology is this)
 * 10) Family Breadwinners (Al Bundy, and Peter Griffin are often the only people in the family that actually work to put food on the table)
 * 11) Successful Anti-Villains (Lelouch Vi Britannia purposely made himself an enemy of the world so the world would unite against him and temporarily create peace, and Ozymandias did the same to Dr. Manhattan in order to prevent World War III.)
 * 12) Villains with important information (Hannibal Lecter had information that helped Clarice defeat Buffalo Bill)
 * 13) Some heroes who turned to the dark side that had everything related to their evil actions upon their fall exposed, would led to undesirable consequences. (When Harvey Dent helped locked half of Gotham's crime bosses away in The Dark Knight, he gave hope to Gotham. When he became Two-Face and killed some people, Gordon and Batman knew if the truth came out, people would lose hope so Batman willingly took the blame so Dent would stay a hero after his death)
 * 14) Lawful Neutral or corrupt cops who keep order (Judge Dredd and Razoul, despite being amoral and corrupt, keep peace and order in their home cities)
 * 15) Hostile biological species, tribes, or civilizations that while hostile or xenophobic, are capable of producing children and families. Killing of a naturally hostile race, civilization or tribe would still be considered an act of genocide (The Yuuzhan Vong and The Predators)
 * 16) Certain Evil Teachers who keep unruly students in line (Viola Swamp and Principal Ed Rooney).
 * 17) Certain Evil Alter-Egos or powerful entities within a hero, the ones that has possessed the hero, or grant them their powers resulting in them saving his/her lives from time to time. (Zangetsu possessed Ichigo multiple times, and as a result, has saved his life multiple times, Kurama sometimes possesses Naruto, or give some of his power to prevent Naruto from getting killed or to fight off a powerful foe, and Yami Yugi frequently helps Yugi out.)
 * 18) Redeemed Villains that joined, or at the very least, helped the Hero (Yasha, Trish, Bagramon when he was the Old Clock Shop Man, and many others).
 * 19) Villains that saved a protagonist(s), Attempt to sacrifice themselves to save a protagonist(s), or sacrificed their lives to save the protagonist(s), such as SA-X, BlueMeramon, Sybok from Star Trek V: The Final Frontier (who also qualifies for "Redeemed Villains" above), Android 16, who attempted to self-destruct to kill Cell, and debatably Nemesis T-Type from the movie Resident Evil: Apocalypse.
 * 20) Double Agents that are on the side of good and pretend to be evil. (Severus Snape pretends to be allies with Lord Voldemort but was secretly helping Dumbledore and Harry Potter in retaliation for the death of Lilly Potter.)
 * 21) Dark Forms, Devils or other personifications of evil that are literally the source of evil. If they die, the balance between good and evil would imbalance. (In The Wheel of Time, Rand discovers that if he killed The Dark One, everyone would be happy all the time. But they couldn't feel a different emotion as Evil would not exist anymore)