Evil Counterpart Race

Pictured: The general drow (dark elf) greeting reserved for darthiir (surface elves).

Two races, one Always Lawful Good and one Always Chaotic Evil, which are specifically counterparts of each other. Essentially an Evil Counterpart on a species wide scale, and related to Cain and Abel and other sibling rivalry tropes.

While Elves vs. Dwarves is about Harmony Versus Discipline, this is about good and evil, at least from the elves' point of view. Often subverted by a Defector from Decadence or deconstructed when it's discovered that the 'good' race is not so harmless, or the evil one has a case of My Species Doth Protest Too Much (or is merely dark and not evil).

Compare and contrast Mirroring Factions.

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Examples

Comic Books

• Green Martians like the Martian Manhunter J'onn J'onnz are wise, peaceful, and obscenely powerful (with one exception: Omnicidal Maniac and Evil Cripple Malefic). White Martians have all the powers of their green cousins, but are monstrously evil (also with, to date, a single exception). No, the respective exceptions are not in any meaningful way counterparts. However, this depends on the incarnation; in some versions, the White Martians are simply subject to a prejudice.
• Daxamites are descended from Kryptonian colonists, and gain the same powers at the same levels when exposed to the light of a yellow sun (though they're vulnerable to lead instead of kryptonite). Unlike Superman, Supergirl, Power Girl and other Kryptonian heroes, though, Daxamites are rabidly xenophobic, to the point of murdering an alien who accidentally crashed on their planet. When a Korugarian Green Lantern helped liberate them from an alien conqueror, they merely demanded she leave the planet rather than killing her, as a show of gratitude (while making it clear that they'd rescind this gratitude and murder her if she didn't get lost). While there have been individual Daxamites who bucked this trend (Lar-Gand, "Julia" & Sodam Yat) they end up disowned for it. This really bit them in their collective asses when the Sinestro Corps invaded.
• Wonder Woman Vol 3: In an effort to keep Zeus from being quite as horrific as he has been acting, Athena requests that he act as the Amazon's guardian for her on her deathbed. This backfires horribly, as Zeus finds the Amazons too "rebellious" and independent so he creates the Gargareans to replace them. The Gargareans are a zombie-like army of resurrected ancient male Heroes who cannot be killed by traditional means. Zeus has them slaughter their way through any humans who have an army, weapons or any defensive capabilities whatsoever, as he sees this as men trying to become gods and spurning him. The very, very few Gargareans who manage to hold onto part of their former sentience do resist Zeus, which lets them go back to their rest in Hades.

Fan Works

• Dungeon Keeper Ami: Presumably what the dark elves of the Dark underworld are, to the normal elves of the Light surface.

Film

• The urRu (the "Mystics") and the Skeksis of The Dark Crystal. They're actually the good and evil halves of the UrSkeks, brought about by the species's attempt to purify themselves through use of the Dark Crystal.
• The Smurfs 2 has Gargamel creating the Naughties, who are two Chaotic Evil grey-skinned Smurf-like beings.

Literature

• In H.G. Wells' The Time Machine, the pilot of a prototype time machine discovers himself in AD 802,701, where humans have apparently evolved into two species, the Eloi and the Morlocks. The Eloi are childlike, harmless people preyed upon by the subterranean, predatory Morlocks.
  • In the original novel this was depicted as necessary symbiosis, since the Eloi can't live without the Morlocks running the machinery that keeps their home so idyllic. It's a major Take That! at the late Victorian society where few aristocrats could enjoy luxuries of "natural" lifestyle at the cost of thousands of workers living in squalid, artifical conditions for all their lives. Today, similar comparisons could be drawn between the developed countries and the Third World.
  • The Eloi incidentally aren't "good", but useless and childish, beautiful but meaningless. The morlocks, in contrast, are hideous brutes technologically advanced enough to turn the surface world into a paradise for their cattle, and build and maintain an extensive underground civilization powered by incomprehensibly advanced and vast machinery. This has been heavily flanderized in the subsequent adaptions that omit the Downer Ending, to the point of Disneyfication and even inversion of Wells' intended message that the morlocks were the real Ubermenschen, for better or worse.
• In The Lord of the Rings:
  • Orcs are generally seen as evil counterparts of Elves as they're both loyal to the Valar and later the Maiar (in the Orcs cases only to one Vala, Morgoth, and later to one Maia, Sauron, the Elves to a whole pantheon of them) and practically act in reverse to each other (Orcs despise sunlight while Elves like it, Orcs destroy the forest that many Elves guard, etc.). The exact origin of Orcs is still debated but a popular theory that went into the film adaptations is that the first Orcs were tortured, imprisoned and corrupted Elves; however other interpretations (of Orcs being made from Men, animals, etc) also exist.
    • Orcs can also work as counterparts of Hobbits. In the case of the Hobbits both Orcs and Hobbits are smaller in size than Men and live in isolated areas, but while Hobbits enjoy a simple life in rural areas Orcs tend to destroy everything turning it into industrial monstrosities. Also Hobbits might have internal fights and gossip but generally like each other and are otherwise peaceful folks while Orcs hate each other and are violent to everyone including among themselves.
  • The Easterlings to the Gondorians and other north-west kingdoms of Men. Despite the Unfortunate Implications the Easterlings who are loosely base in Oriental and Middle Eastern peoples are allies to Sauron and fight for him, whilst the Men from places like Gondor and Rohan are his enemies. Expanded material explained that they are often misguided by Sauron's propaganda who promoted trade relations and weird cults among them and have them convince that he's the good guy.
  • The Uruk-Hai to Men, as the Uruk-Hai are a mixture of Orc and Men they retain certain human characteristics like being taller and endure sunlight.
  • The Goblins to the Dwarves. Both races enjoy living underground and have a love for treasures, but while the Dwarves can be prideful and greedy they’re also honorable, friendly and hospitable, the Goblins are outright sadistic and cruel.
  • Trolls to Ents as both seem to be elemental-based, the Ents are tree-like and the Trolls turn into stone when exposed to sunlight. While Ents can be menacing if facing tree-destroyers as they were created specifically to protect the forest and be tree shepherds, the Trolls are cannibalistic monsters.
  • The Fellbeast to the Eagles; both big flying creatures but one clearly on the side of good and the other are ride by the evil Nazgul.
  • Balrogs are evil counterparts of the Wizards, as both are maiar, just that Balrogs are evil maiar corrupted and in servitude of Mordor and the Wizards still serve Iluvatar, though this is complicated when the wizard Saruman is corrupted by Mordor's influence.
  • The Rohan-Gondor alliance is often compared to the Mordor-Isengard alliance as an evil counterpart.
• Not races but rather nations, the Honor Harrington series has the two worlds which follow "The Church of Humanity Unchained:" Grayson, which is mostly just "heavily conservative", and Masada, which is violently misogynistic. It was an ugly schism.
  • In the same series, Beowulf and Mesa. The parallels with Grayson and Masada are lampshaded.
• In the Firebird Trilogy, the Shuhr are originally presented as the evil counterpart to the Sentinels. Brennen Caldwell, a high level Sentinel, even remarks once that the Shuhr provide a prime example of what the Sentinels would be like if not for the Sentinel's strictly enforced self-imposed moral and ethical codes. However, the trope is played with in the earlier books, as we see both Face Heel Turns and a Heel–Face Turn, and ultimately subverted in Wind and Shadow, where it is shown that only the upper level of the Shuhr were despicable, with the rest of the people being normal.
• In The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids, the Cupids themselves have the Discordias, who are their exact inverse, a Robot Race designed to spread discord instead of peace and love, also with a mythological theme.
• From The Mortal Instruments, the "Endarkened" Shadowhunters that Sebastian Morgenstern creates using the Infernal Cup and Lilith's blood. They are stronger and faster than regular Shadowhunters, but cannot use their Runes or angelically aligned weapons. They are given demonic equivalents.
• Each of the Angarak nations in David Eddings' The Belgariad map quite well as the evil equivalents of one of the Alorn kingdoms:
  • The Thulls are evil counterparts to the Sendars, as they're both the dedicated peasant race of each faction.
  • The Murgos are evil Algars, their Kings are Arch-Enemies, both cultures prize horses, they're the two sides that come into conflict most often, and they both use a fake city to deceive their enemies: the Algars have a giant fortified city to act as Shmuck Bait, and the Murgos built Rak Goska to look like a normal city and create the illusion that the Murgos weren't a race of soldiers planning to attack the West at any moment.
  • Nadraks are evil Drasnians, they're both sneaky, mercantile-oriented and the most secular faction on each side (the evil thing is downplayed in that the Nadraks end up going over to the side of the good guys in the Belgariad itself).
  • The Mallorean Empire acts as a counterpart to both the Chereks, as the "original" Angaraks and Alorns respectively, and to the Rivans, since the Mallorean Emperor and Rivan King are each generally considered the rulers of the East and the West.
• Subverted in Vampire Academy. The Moroi are presented as a good race of vampires and the Strigoi as their evil counterparts. Goes along with the Moroi having nature-friendly powers and a pacifistic philosophy, while the Strigoi are predators and are abhorred by nature itself. But the Moroi themselves turn out to be a not Always Lawful Good race. They have their share of cruel individuals and outright villains.
• A somewhat unusual case in The Wheel of Time series is of the Darkhounds, aka The Wild Hunt, which are the specific counterpart of ordinary wolves. While wolves are not exactly good by human standards, they are absolute enemies of the Shadow and fight on the side of Light in the Last Battle.
• A rare intentional sci-fi example happens in Seveneves: Each of the titular seven "Eves" picks certain traits they want to be engineered into their descendants. Aida, the pariah, is the youngest and will produce the most offspring in her life, which allows her to pick traits in each subsequent child to counters that chosen by another Eve. The trope doubles back, when Moira, the Eve who is doing the genetic engineering, recognizes Aida's goal and creates a counterpart to her counterparts by giving her own offspring "adaptability" as their hat via the ability to rapidly and radically under go an "epigenetic shift" (like a reserved academic who's never been in a fight before going through a short coma and emerging a fearsome natural fighter with incredible reflexes and ferocious instincts)

Live-Action TV

• Star Trek:
  • The Romulans to the Vulcans.
  • In the original series, the Klingons to Humans.
  • The Star Trek: The Original Series episode "Let That Be Your Last Battlefield" is an extreme case in which Bele acts as if Lokai is a member of an Always Chaotic Evil race, despite it clearly being a case of Grey-and-Gray Morality from the crew's point of view.
  • In the later series, the Cardassians to Humans. Cardassian history matches Earth's pretty well — they were both poverty-stricken and war torn but dragged themselves up into an ordered and unified society at the center of a galactic superpower. The parallels are even closer when you consider that The Federation and especially Earth have a clear democratic socialist philosophy, and the Cardassians are a totalitarian fascist state. The Cerrito's security chief Shax does refer to the Cardassians as "fascist" in at least one episode of Star Trek: Lower Decks.
  • In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, the Pah-Wraiths themselves are the same race as the Prophets (the Federation refers to them as "wormhole aliens"). They were expelled from the wormhole and imprisoned in the Fire Caves on Bajor for committing "evil acts". Exactly what they did, and exactly how they were expelled and imprisoned, is unknown. The Prophets exist outside of linear time (and in fact don't even understand the concept until Sisko explains it to them, and even then, it's implied that they still don't quite understand).
  • The Dominion was designed to be an anti-Federation, rather than a single hostile alien race like other antagonist factions. Like the Federation, the Dominion was made up of hundreds of races and thousands of worlds, but bound together by fear and enforced obedience rather than idealism.
    • The Changelings to The Prophets.
    • The Vorta to Bajorans.
    • The Jem'hadar to the Klingons.
    • The Dominion arc also introduces two profit-driven races: the Dosi, evil counterparts to the Ferengi, and the Karemma, who are good counterparts!
    • Back when the Ferengi were bad guys, they were often seen as the Tellarites' evil counterpart, as the Tellarites were also highly competitive and profit-driven traders but more honorable.
  • The Borg were also designed to be an anti-Federation: both of them are ever-expanding interstellar communities which believe themselves to be bringing enormous improvement to the species they absorb. However, while the Federation seeks voluntary membership and celebrates diversity, the Borg forcibly assimilate other species and erase every individual's identity by merging them into their hive mind.
• Stargate SG-1 had the Goa'uld vs. Tok'ra and the Ori vs. Ancients. In both cases the good race operated behind the scenes (the Tok'ra worked as spies and saboteurs since they lacked the numbers and the means to replenish them, and only a couple Ancients even tried to circumvent their self-imposed non-interference laws) while the bad race went around shouting "Worship me!"
  • The Ancients were discovered to have been holding another group of ascended beings called the Ori at bay for tens of thousands of years. The Ori have all the reality warping powers of the Ancients and none of their (questionable) ethics, having discovered a way to harness lowers' worship to increase their own powers.
  • The Asgard are the good counterpart of the Goa'uld, Sufficiently Advanced Aliens seen as gods by the humans of the worlds they lead, but the Asgard protect their charges instead of enslaving them.
  • The Goa'uld had a couple of other Good Counterparts of a similar nature, such as the Salish (who posed as Native American spirits) and the Oannes (Mesopotamian deities). However, none of them have the power of the Asgard.
  • Finally, the Tok'ra are also Good Counterparts to the Goa'uld, although they don't pose as gods. Both groups come from the same species: however, while the Goa'uld take human hosts by force and essentially "wear" their bodies like clothes until they wear out, the Tok'ra only take willing hosts with whom they have a symbiotic relationship.
• Doctor Who:
  • The original concept for the Cybermen made them Evil Counterparts to humans. Their home planet Mondas was literally Earth's twin planet, and their gradual slide into becoming cyborg monsters was as a result of the most human instinct possible: survival at any cost. This aspect of them faded over time, but the Revival brought it back to the fore, with the Cybermen essentially being positioned as humanity's collective Arch-Enemy, and almost every story depicting them as a result of people giving in to desperation or fear of death.
  • The Daleks were initially positioned as this to the Thals, however, "Genesis of the Daleks" subverted this and made it clear that during the War, they were just as bad as each other.
  • Similarly, the Revival initially upgraded the Daleks into this for the Time Lords, their equals in power and enemies during the Time War, but "The End of Time" demonstrates that the Time Lords have gladly sunk to their level.
  • As a whole, the Time Lords have the Daleks as their evil counterparts. Note that this wasn't always true, but as the series drew on, it became more and more this way, before being cemented as such in the New Series.
  • In "The Tenth Planet", Mondas is the evil counterpart of Earth. Mondas looks exactly like Earth but flipped upside down, and the Mondasians are humans but forced to replace their bodies with spare parts, becoming the Cybermen, in order to survive as their planet drifted to the edge of the universe. They are now abominations with no emotions and the inability to comprehend human feelings, and get to win their ethical arguments anyway. However, the Cybermen lost this characterisation later to allow them to fill the Dalek-shaped hole left after the Daleks got Exiled from Continuity in the Troughton era, becoming generic nasty robotic aliens/a Dalek Suspiciously Similar Substitute race from "The Tomb of the Cybermen" onwards.
• The Orcs in The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power are corrupted Elves, mostly from Beleriand, who got enslaved by Morgoth. In present, they are Morlocks-like creatures who cannot live under the sun. In contrast to the Elves who lived once in Valinor and still long for the light of the Two Trees, the Orcs have to terraform the Southlands into a place where the sun never gets in for them to thrive, Mordor.
• Babylon 5;
  • When first introduce the Shadows seem like an Evil Counterpart of the Vorlon. Both were part of the very old ancient races known as the First Ones but whilst the Vorlon were luminous beings seen as angels or its cultural equivalents for whoever sees them without their suits and with an ideology based on order and discipline, the Shadows were dark and based their philosophy on chaos and war. However as the show advances the difference is not as clear cut and is learnt that both sides are ethically questionable.
  • Played more straight with the "heirs" of the Vorlon and the Shadows. The Interstellar Alliance is made of mostly Vorlon-influenced civilizations like the Mimbari, Earth and Narn, whilst their main enemies are the Servants of the Shadows like the Drakh and Zenet. Whilst both are network of inter-species cooperation working together, and both have the influence of the philosophy of their respective First One "mentors", one is clearly heroic and the other antagonistic.

Mythology and Religion

• Angels and fallen angels/demons in a lot of works, though traditionally in Christianity they're the same species, just on different sides.
• Irish Mythology: The Fomorians are a race of sea and subterranean demons that represent the destructive and dangerous side of nature. They're the evil counterparts of the Tuatha De Danaan, the gods, demigods and fairies who are more benevolent. Each group is even connected to a goddess, with the Tuatha De Danaan descending from the goddess Danu/Anu and the Fomorians descending from her sister Domnu. The two groups warred with each other with the Tuatha De Danaan eventually winning out and driving the Fomorians into the sea.
• Subverted in Islam. The Djinn are often written off by Muslims as the evil counterpart to humanity, while the scripture implies that like humans, being good or wicked comes down to the individual djinn rather than the whole race. The monstrosities that haunt old ruins could easily be the fantastical equivalent of a human serial killer, or just trying to defend their homes from what they perceive to be intruders. The devil (called Iblis) and his followers act as The Corrupter and are motivated by Fantastic Racism against humans, but it's even specified that there are other djinn that worship God in more pious ways than most humans (the devil himself was the most devout free-willed being ever before the creation of Adam and Eve drove him away). People are still warned to stay away from djinn though, as even the benevolent ones aren't harmless, due to their Blue-and-Orange Morality.
• Jotuns have a similar role in Norse mythology as an evil counterpart of the Aesir.
• Devas and Asuras in Buddhist and Hindu cosmologies.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons has a habit of doing this for everyone, creating evil (and occasionally good) counterpart races for just about everything:
  • Elves vs. drow.
  • Dwarves vs. derro and duergar.
  • Aasimar and tieflings from Planescape onwards, being the descendants of humans and angels and of humans and fiends, respectively.
  • The Githzerai and Githyanki — though that's more like "paranoid neutral isolationists" and their evil counterpart.
  • Chromatic (evil) and metallic (good) dragons in many D&D settings — especially Dragonlance, where the chromatic dragons were corrupted versions of the original good dragons.
  • Subverted with the Svirfneblin, the Deep Gnomes from the Underdark, the home of the drow. They aren't evil (generally neutral, actually), but certainly can be considered "dark gnomes". Played straight with the gnomes and kobolds, due to the fact that their gods hate each other.
  • "The Book of Vile Darkness" gives us Jerren for Halflings (they used to be halflings, but then their ancestors got more and more corrupted with malevolence and evil magic in their efforts to fight their war with goblins) and Vashar, who are a race of purely evil humans (human prototypes, to be exact; they're the first crack the gods made at creating humanity, killed and put away when it tried to kill them and revived by infernal influences).
• Warhammer Fantasy has both High Elves vs. Dark Elves (with both being highly magical naval oriented empires who hate each others guts...) Oh, and incidentally humans usually can't tell them apart... And the dwarfish counterpart Chaos Dwarves (who are even more greedy than the regular variant) arguably the Vampire Counts also serve as a twisted reflection of Empire society, and the Beastmen serve a similar role for the Wood Elves.
  • The bit about humans' difficulty in telling High and Dark Elves apart is odd, because their visual designs pretty much scream good guys and bad guys respectively. Of course they are the same race, the design differences are completely down to wearing different clothes.
  • In Elfslayer, a particularly naive High Elf couldn't tell a Dark Elf was a Dark Elf (and was severely reprimanded by his bodyguard for that). Then again, Dark Elf cultists frequently infiltrate High Elf society, so it's not just naive High Elves who can't tell them apart.
  • The Skaven to the Dwarfs. Both are physically short, technologically-advanced, subterranean, xenophobic, clan-based races with a penchant for mad science and lifelong grudges, but the Skaven take all of the above to far greater extremes and also are in stark opposition to common Dwarf virtues like loyalty, honor, and family. One in-universe theory on the Skaven's origin is that they're Chaos-corrupted Dwarfs. The Dwarfs themselves consider the Skaven to be one of their two Arch-Enemy races, only rivaled by the Greenskins.
  • The Skaven are also this to the Lizardmen. Both are animalistic beings with a rigidly defined caste system that are led by powerful mages and use both magitek and monsters to bolster their armies, but the Lizardmen consider all members of their race to play vital roles in the Great Plan while all Skaven regard every other Skaven as varying degrees of expendable. Additionally, the Lizardmen's best weapons and beasts are, respectively Lost Technology and creatures native to Lustria that they have domesticated, while the Skaven's technology and monsters are creations of their dark sciences and magics. The Lizardmen hold a special hatred for the Skaven because unlike the other younger races, the Skaven have no place in the Great Plan and so have been marked totally for extermination, while the rat-men don't have a particular hatred for the cold-bloods but won't hesitate to screw them over given the chance.
• Dark Eldar in Warhammer 40,000. While the Craftworld Eldar aren't exactly nice guys either, being xenophobic and self-interested, they mostly just want to be left alone and will even willingly work with other sapients if it's in their interests. Meanwhile the Dark Eldar are an entire civilization of Card Carrying Villains whose entire culture is based around Rape, Pillage, and Burn + Cold-Blooded Torture. The Craftworld and Dark Eldar occasionally fight one another, with the Dark Eldar often taking Craftworld or Exodite Eldar in slave raids, though these conflicts are rarely sustained (a notable exception would be the mutually costly Webway War between the Craftworld of Ulthwe and the Dark Eldar Kabal of the Jade Knife). Humans sometimes have trouble telling them apart (they are the same species after all).

• In Nomine: A great deal of symmetry exists between the natives of Heaven and Hell, and this trope is very common.
  • Primarily, every Band of demons serves as a dark mirror of a Choir of angels, and archetypal most consist of the Fallen members of their matching angelic group:
    • Seraphim are beings of absolute truth and honesty, honed to perceive cases where others would twist the Truth of the Symphony to suit themselves. Balseraphs are liars without equals, who can impose their personal whims on the Symphony with such force that they can make others believe that their lies are the Truth.
    • Cherubim are protectors and wardens, who define themselves by their bonds with others. Djinn are miserable loners, who care for nothing and no one and go through life nursing the holes in their hearts.
    • Ofanim are creatures of motion and activity, filled with energy constantly in need of burning. Calabim turn that energy inwards, affecting lazy, complacent personalities while their pent-up energy destroys everything around them.
    • Elohim are calm and dispassionate, devoting themselves to pure objectivity in their study of the universe, and are particularly good at understanding the mindsets and motivations of other beings. Habbalah are entirely lost to their bitterness and passions, have let their biases twist their perceptions until they no longer understand what they truly are, and no longer see anything in others beyond every flaw in their hearts, real or imagined.
    • While Lilim and Malakim aren't each other's direct counterparts like the other Choirs and Bands, they still serve as mirrors of sorts — Malakim bind themselves with oaths where Lilim bind others with geasa, and Malakim are the one Choir who never Fall where Lilim are the one Band that has no connection to Heaven. The fact that Lilim can, albeit very rarely, become angels is something that the Malakim prefer to not to dwell on.
    • Kyriotates live their lives from as many points of view as possible, both in their constant drifting from one host to another and by inhabiting many different mortal bodies at once, and experience dissonance if they don't leave their hosts' bodies better off than when they took them over. Shedim have become so absorbed in their selfishness that they can no longer muster up the self-abnegation to inhabit more than one body at once, forcefully impose their base desires on their victims instead of experiencing their own points of view, and experience dissonance if they don't leave their hosts' bodies worse off than when they took them over.
    • Mercurians love humanity, love the cultures it produces, and want to help it achieve its best spiritual and intellectual potential. Impudites love humanity, too, but only as food, and no longer view it as anything more than a resource to be exploited.
    • Menunim seek to inspire hope and optimism in humanity, and prefer to work very subtly, without directly interfering in the lives they touch. Pachadim seek to tear down mortals, and do so by inserting themselves as major figures in the lives of their targets and steadily wearing away at them with abuse and manipulation.
  • Additionally, the Undead serve as a Hellish counterpart to the Saints of Heaven. Both are essentially "upgraded" mortals, given increased supernatural clout, potential immortality, and increased status in the eyes of their allied celestials. The primary difference is that Saints become what they are after their natural deaths, as a reward for leading righteous lives; Undead become such by striking dark bargains with demons, achieving immortality of the flesh while losing any hope of an afterlife.

Toys

• LEGO's Mixels has the titular characters opposed by the Nixels, who represent conformity juxtaposed to the Mixels representing creativity. This is apparent in their black and white blocky appearance and their base looking completely blank inside.
• Whether the Transformers' heroic Autobots and evil Decepticons constitute different races of robot, or merely different factions of a single race, varies depending on the version.

Video Games

• Mass Effect:
  • There are two factions of geth: "true" geth and "heretic" geth. While the true geth are mostly neutral towards other species (if aggressively isolationist for most of the series), the heretic geth are an Omnicidal Maniac faction that decided to join the Reapers to advance themselves, and have integrated Reaper technology into their own as a result. Mass Effect 3 reveals that geth controlled by Reaper code and those without it are also quite different at the software level, meaning they could be considered different "races" at that point.
  • Humans and batarians. The batarians are arguably the most human-like aliens in the setting, and both species overall are ambitious middle powers trying to play at the level of the big boys. But while the humans are (mostly) devoted to doing this via diplomacy and integration, with their galactic representative being the Systems Alliance, the batarians are a slavocratic statist society who attempt to leverage themselves through sabotage, terrorism, subversion, and military aggression (when they can get away with it). The two species have had a lot of conflicts.
  • The Reapers, similar to the dark lord in Lord of the Rings, tend to corrupt factions of other species through temptation of power or just straight indoctrination before using said factions disposable mooks. Javik talks about it happening in the Prothean cycle (the descendants of that faction may have become the Collectors), and it happens with humans too in the present via groups like Cerberus.
  • The Kett Empire to Citadel Space, in a similar manner as the Dominion and Federation mentioned above. Citadel Space is The Federation of integrated species in liberal, free market, borderline post-scarcity utopia, united for economic cooperation and defense. It values its diversity and all species and races can participate in it while maintaining their own independence. The Kett Empire is a feudalistic theocracy that conquers other races, including pre-FTL ones that can't possibly pose a threat. A few other parallels exist between them. For example, the Kett forcefully genetically modify conquered races to better serve as soldiers, while the Citadel has voluntary and near-universal genetic and cybernetic augments. The Citadel's first reaction to a pre-FTL species was to offer economic and tech aid, while the Kett decided to just slaughter the angara while faking friendship. The Citadel is a mostly rational society with a high-tech aesthetic, while the Kett are religious fanatics with an Organic Technology aestheric. So on and so forth.
• Initiating a black hole reset in Evolve Idle allows the player to create an Evil Universe. Most races from normal universes are present but evil, slaughtering the weak for their bones instead of using wood, for example.
• Warcraft
  • In Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, the orcs acted as an evil counterpart to the human race having armies that were nearly identical in gameplay. This continued in the second game in which more sapient races appeared in the setting.
  • In Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness, the humans and orcs formed the Alliance of Lodaeron and Old Horde respectively, which included new races, almost all of which had clear counterparts on the opposing faction.
    • Elves and Trolls, later known as High Elves and Forest Trolls, served as counterparts for eachother (this was before the high elf/blood elf split and before we knew of the night elves). Both races have an affinity for the forests they live in and have very long Pointy Ears. They also provide the main ranged unit and light naval craft for their respective factions. The series' lore has them as ancient rivals over territory as well, with their elite soldiers, the Elven rangers and Troll Berserkers being dedicated to the other races extermination. Later games add pretty clear hints, though modern Elves would be loathe to admit it, that the Elven race may actually be descended from ancient Trolls who were exposed to (and/or experimented with) powerful arcane energies over a prolonged period.
    • Gnomes and goblins mirror each-other with both being small inventors that create steampunk technology for their factions. In later games, the gnomes vs. goblins thing becomes more of a rivalry than outright hostility.
    • The Gryphons of the Wildhammer dwarves and Dragons rival each other being giant flying Beasts Of Battle used by the Alliance and Horde respectively. Downplayed in Tides of Darkness, as the Dragons there are actually neutral creatures that the orcs enslaved, but played straight in the expansion, Beyond the Dark Portal, where the Dragons are willing allies to the Horde.
    • Two-headed Ogres and Dwarves of Khaz Modan stand out for not having a real counterpart race, Ogres counter Human Knights and Khaz Modan Dwarven demolition squads mirror Goblin sapper units.
  • Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos
    • The orcs being the evil mirror to humans was dropped in the third game, as the Orcs had a Heel–Race Turn..
    • Various demonically corrupted versions of regular races appear in opposition to their uncorrupted counterparts these include Orcs and Fel Orcs, as well as Night Elves and Satyrs.
    • In the expansion, The Frozen Throne, the Naga, snake-like mutants originating from the corrupt Night elf aristocracy, have a fierce hatred with the Night Elves, which draws inspiration from the Drow's relationship with surface elves. In addition to being related, Naga share the Night Elves gender egalitarianism and affinity for Archery. The Night elf campaign mainly consists of the two linked races battling each-other fiercely.
  • World of Warcraft
    • Zigzagged with the Elves. Only specific factions of Blood Elves (those who followed Kael'Thas) and Night Elves (Highborne) have any claim to being evil. It's all a matter of perspective, otherwise. Night Elves are, at the very least, the most aggressive of the three races, while Blood Elves are High Elf survivors who resorted to demonic magics in order to survive.
    • There are also specific subraces like the Dark Iron dwarves (generally same look but black skin) or the several kinds of trolls opposing the Darkspear tribe that belongs to the Horde. And in Northrend there are several races heavily implied or outright stated to be the original of the player races, which developed on their own over time.
• The Warlords games, as well as having High Elves and Dark Elves, has Dwarves and Dark Dwarves, the former being the typical (if cheery) ale-swilling axe-bearers, the latter being joyless industrial Mad Scientists.
• In Dragon Age, The Darkspawn are created when a female of a race -Human, Elf, Qunari or Dwarf- is captured and turned into a Broodmother and spawns them. Each race has a Darkspawn equivalent that is born of the Broodmother of that race- Human Broodmothers produce Hurlocks, Dwarves produce Genlocks, Elves produce Sharlocks (more commonly known as Shrieks), and Qunari produce Ogres. Darkspawn, indeed.
• A lot of Digimon species are Evil Counterparts to other species:
  • Devimon to Angemon.
  • Deathmon and Demon to Seraphimon
  • Lilithmon to Ophanimon
  • Kuwagamon to Kabuterimon
  • Tsukaimon to Patamon
  • And, of course, the innumerable examples of cases where the evil counterpart's name is the good version's name plus the word 'black' (and coloring alterations to match), such as BlackAgumon, BlackTailmon, BlackToyAgumon, BlackWarGreymon, etc. Justified in that they are intended according to the fluff to literally have originally been of the respective good race, but were transformed by computer viruses.
• Super Mario Bros.:
  • Goombas to Toads. Both mushroom folk, but with the Goombas being the quintessential Mario Mook and... well... The Goomba. There are games however where friendly Goombas show up, such as the Paper Mario series, but there are yet to be any outright evil Toads.
  • An even clearer example for the Toads are the Shroobs of Mario & Luigi: Partners in Time, an alien race led by an Evil Counterpart of Princess Peach herself. Whereas the Toads are a peaceful, kind folk, the Shroobs are warlike and cruel.
• Splatoon.
  • Subverted with the Octolings. The humanoid-squid Inklings and humanoid-octopus Octolings are counterparts, with the former being more self-indulgent and fun-loving and the latter being more hard-working and serious. But the latter's antagonist role in the main campaigns of the first two games is the result of desperation rather than evil; the Octarians lost a territory war with the Inklings a century prior, forcing them to live underground where they're now struggling through an energy crisis and all their infrastructure might be starting to collapse on top of them. When talking about the second game's "Octo Expansion" DLC, which features an Octoling protagonist and made them playable in multiplayer (representing the in-universe mass migration of Octolings to Inkling territory), the series' producer made a point to note that the Inklings aren't "defenders of justice" or "good guys" whatsoever. By the time of Splatoon 3, both Inklings and Octolings are now peacefully living together on the surface again.
  • Played straighter with the Salmonids. They're a race of territorial mutant fish, with a highly violent disposition towards Inkling and Octoling kind (especially those employed by Grizzco) that has existed for centuries. Their battle strategies tend to mirror the player's sub-weapons and specials, and they also produce a dark green "ink" that is implied to actually be toxic waste.
• The Legend of Zelda:
  • The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has the Kokiri and the Deku Scrubs. Both are forest-based races with connections to the Great Deku Tree, but while the former are more human-like children who generally get along well with the few non-Kokiri with whom they interact, the latter are more plant-like monsters who spit seeds at anyone who approaches them. The Skull Kids, also act as a counterpart to Kokiri, being more malicious child-like forest spirits that torment adults with cruel pranks, though they're more mischievous than evil.
  • The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask has the Nejirons, Rock Monsters that are basically meaner-looking Gorons that try to roll into you and blow up. Their name is even the Japanese word "Neji" meaning "twisted" combined with "-ron."
  • ''The Legend of Zelda: Oracle of Ages'' establishes the enemy Zora as a different race than the friendly Zora race, the former being known as "River Zora" and the latter known as "Sea Zora".
  • In The Legend of Zelda: A Link Between Worlds, the Maiamai are an inversion, being a good counterpart to the Octoroks. Both resemble land-based cephalopods with tube-like mouths, but while Octoroks suck in and spit out objects to hurt Link, Mother Maiamai sucks in and spits out objects to upgrade them for Link.
  • In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, the Lizalfos have been redesigned into one for the Zoras. Both are gangly swimmers who prefer spears to other weapons and like eating fish. Water-based Lizalfos will even spit bursts of water at Link in a manner similar to the previously evil Zoras from the 2D games.
• Battle for Wesnoth: the two main water-bound factions, the Merfolk and the Naga: the former are legal and noble creatures that mostly form alliances with human kingdoms in exchange for metal and other resources unavaible to underwater dwellers, the latter are reptilian creatures who also prefers swamps and tend to live off pillage and raids, like other violent races such as Orcs and Goblins.
• In the Command & Conquer: Tiberian Series, the alien Scrin are revealed to be a dark mirror of the Brotherhood of Nod. More specifically, they're the logical endpoint of what obsession with Tiberium and the Technology of Peace will do to a species in the long run, becoming so addicted to the substance that they literally die without it.

Webcomics

• Played with in Drowtales, as explained in the no-longer-canon guide here.

Western Animation

• The Duloks as the evil counterpart of the Ewoks.
• On The Fairly OddParents!, fairies have two in the form of anti-fairies and pixies.
  • Anti-fairies, as their names imply, are the blue-skinned polar opposites of fairies in terms of both morality and their respective fairy counterpart's personality, the most notable being the Evil Genius Anti-Cosmo to the ditzy Cosmo, the hillbilly Anti-Wanda to the intelligent Wanda, and the charismatic Foop to the infantile Poof. Like fairies, they can have godchildren and grant wishes, but they're only assigned to mean people and they only grant wishes with sinister results, and they have a love of spreading bad luck amongst humans, so their favorite holiday is Friday the 13th.
  • Pixies are an entire race of incredibly boring Corrupt Corporate Executives that will only grant wishes if they conform to their strict standards and often attempt to take control of Fairy World to subjugate the fun-loving fairies. Because of their reliance on the system, they're frequently undone by loopholes in their ironclad contracts.
• The violent and warrior-like Fmeks, the Evil Counterpart of the peaceful Arquilians in Men in Black: The Series; both races of Lilliputian size that use giant (for them) suits to pass as humans.
• The animated series the Monchhichis, based on the popular Japanese toy series of cute monkey-like creatures has the Grumplins as the evil counterpart.
• On My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, the ponies are opposed by the insectoid changelings, who are similar in appearance and feed on the large amounts of love that the former produce. Where the ponies are presently ruled by princesses, the changelings are led by a queen that wants control of Equestria, and almost succeeded in obtaining it the first time the race appeared. Season six introduced a rogue changeling named Thorax who wanted to make friends, and in the season 6 finale "To Where and Back Again", Starlight Glimmer and Thorax convince the changelings to rebel against the evil queen Chrysalis, who has been using them to hoard The Power of Love for herself.
  • The season 8 episode "Sounds of Silence" introduces the peace-loving kirin, and another race that lives in their region called the nirik, which Twilight Sparkle describes as "creatures of pure rage and fire". Subverted when it's revealed that the nirik is just another form taken by the kirin when they get angry.
• In the animated series the Wartmongers seem to be an evil counterpart of The Smurfs (1981).
• Winx Club: For the most part, the Witches seem to be this to the fairies.

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