Often when thinking about the greatest movie villains people think of characters such as Darth Vader, Heath Ledger’s, Joker or Thanos. However, there’s another villain that I think is severely underrated. Her name is Regina George, and she is a massive deal.
For those who haven’t seen the movie, the musical, or the musical movie, Regina George is the antagonist of Mean Girls. The general story of all three versions of Mean Girls is that Cady Heron, the main character, has recently moved to an American high school (Northshore Highschool) after years of being homeschooled in Africa, where she must adapt to the social norms and expectations there. On her first day she meets Damian and Janis, who befriend her and provide exposition on the school’s environment. The school is constantly compared to the Savannah, where everyone is vying for a place in the food chain, and at the top of this chain, is Regina George. Regina ends up inviting Cady to come sit with her group, who are known as ‘The Plastics’, who consist of two other people, Gretchin, and Karen. Janis and Damien end up seeing this as an opportunity to take revenge on Regina due to her hurting them in the past, and they decide to use Cady to help with that.
Enough exposition let’s talk about Regina George herself now, and why I think she is such an amazing villain.
Regina is feared by practically everyone within the school, she knows how to embarrass and insult her peers and uses that ability to accentuate her power. What I think is so interesting about her as a character and villain, is her progression throughout the story. She goes from someone who enjoys the spotlight and the power that comes with it, to someone who’s singular goal is to create discourse and chaos, as highlighted in my personal favourite song in the entire musical (and 2024 Mean Girls), World Burn. One power move that highlights her control over others was her kissing Aaron Samuels, the love interest of Cady, at the Halloween party, purely to assert herself as someone who shouldn’t be trifled with.
As well as this, she’s incredibly resourceful and uses this to her advantage. Even when she’s at her lowest, kicked out of her group, losing her power, she’s able to leverage her resources for the purposes of vengeance and regaining her status. This is highlighted especially with the burn book, a book made by Regina and her group which was created to start rumours and gossip about others in their grade. After finding out that Cady had been sabotaging her, and was the main reason she’d lost everything, she utilises the burn book to write rumours about herself, then leaving it in the middle of school for people to find. Once chaos is caused by the hostilities within the book, Regina uses it as an opportunity to pin the blame on Gretchin, Karen, and Cady. What I love so much about this part of Mean Girls is the turning point of Regina, where she descends into a state of simply wanting pure revenge. This moment is made even better by the previously mentioned, World Burn, in the two musical versions of the story, sung by Reneé Rapp, as Regina George in both instances. The sombre tone that the song begins with slowly builds into a climactic piece that highlights Regina’s progression as a villain, and it’s made even better by Reneé Rapp’s vocals. Despite the 2024 Mean Girls not being great compared to the Broadway musical and original movie, watching as Regina strides across the halls of Northshore high, singing about how she wants to watch the world burn whilst red lights flash and students fight all around her is an incredibly powerful image that serves to emphasise her power.
One thing that I think stops Regina George from being an amazing villain, is that the stakes aren’t as high as they would be in a Marvel movie, for example. People tend to attribute great villains to the amount of damage they cause, as well as their personalities and motives. Whilst Regina as a character and her motives make her a great villain in my eyes, she’s never going to
cause as much damage as antagonists such as Emperor Palpatine or Loki, which will make her a lot less memorable to others. Despite this, I think she is a spectacular villain, and she will continue to be one of my favourites, and my pick for one of the most underrated villains ever.
