Sexy Villains, Chaste Heroes

"Why are all the gorgeous ones homicidal maniacs?"

Other factors being equal, evil characters are sexier.

Evil does strange things to people. It can be pleasurable, delicious, or addictive, it can make you more badass, and it even makes you more sexy. Even though Beauty Equals Goodness, villains tend to be more sensual.

Heroes in works that utilize this contrast will tend to be modest, celibate/chaste, and more sexually conservative. The hero will be a goody two-shoes Knight in Shining Armor, the heroine an ingenue in white, and if the two are a couple, they will have a reserved sex life, if they have one at all.

Villains, on the other hand, ooze sex appeal and carnality in a way that represents the sin of Lust as well as the lust for power that evil promises to its prospective followers. They tend to have looser sexual morals. They are as handsome as they are arrogant (much to the heroes' annoyance). They hide their demonic soul behind the face of an angel. And they're not afraid to use their beauty, wiles, and sex appeal to seduce the hero and carry out their nefarious plans. Their outfits tend to show more skin and have more leather, fetishist hangups, lace, on occasion, or even gorgeous and functional Femme Fatalons. A bare midriff is more or less essential, especially for females. Hey, what's the point of being evil if you can't do it with class? Or failing that, overdo it with style?

A very frequent storytelling device; what better way to show how seductive evil is than by making evil literally seductive. Because two common conventions are Beauty Equals Goodness and Sex Is Evil, this is reconciled by making the good characters' beauty more "genuine" and the evil characters' appearance more focused on inspiring lust, separating "pure" beauty from sex appeal. Thus, the hot chick is the evil seductress; the constant heroine, although beautiful, is not sexy because she exudes Incorruptible Pure Pureness, even if she's going to end up a wife and mother. Even in more Fanservice-heavy stories, this may still be present, if downplayed, by making the heroines Reluctant Fanservice Girls who are modest in demeanor, contrasted against shameless, deliberately provocative, and sexually-assertive villainesses.

As a further demonstration, a hero temporarily tempted by evil tends to suddenly wear skimpier clothes and be more sexually assertive. Many fans will find them sexier this way and perhaps dread the return to prudery that will accompany their inevitable return to goodness.

An opportunity for Fanservice of all kinds. Also sets the stage for Unfortunate Implications, frequently invoking various Double Standards attached to the sexuality (and the "goodness" of that sexuality) of a character depending on their gender. This is mostly applied to female heroes and villains, although attractive male villains are becoming more common, especially in series geared toward a female audience. This character's almost guaranteed to garner loads of entirely undeserved sympathy from fans, but is so ingrained in certain cultures that it's not going away any time soon. In American film specifically, this is probably related to the period way back when only evil was allowed to be sexy — since Sex Sells regardless.

Please note that for this trope to apply, the work must associate sensuality with evil by contrasting a sexy villain with a less sensual hero.

Compare its Inverted Trope, No Love for the Wicked, a markedly sexless villain.

See also Evil Tastes Good; Evil Is Cool; Ugly Hero, Good-Looking Villain; Shabby Heroes, Well-Dressed Villains, and Evil Is Easy. Compare with Beauty Equals Goodness. Contrast Evil Makes You Ugly and Heroic Seductress. Often a consequence of Power is Sexy, since Mooks aren't that attractive. Part of the appeal of Forbidden Fruit. Both a cause of and a result of Jerkass Dissonance.

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Examples:

Anime & Manga

• Fullmetal Alchemist (2003): Sloth is just as good-looking as Lust, though admittedly she doesn't ooze sex appeal. She contrasts with her more demure human counterpart, Edward and Al's mother Trisha.
• Heat Guy J: Daisuke, one of the show's two heroes, is fairly decent-looking in ways that don't really inspire lust, being a rather pretty young man with clothes that cover most of his body. By contrast, his enemy Clair Leonelli wears tight-fitting leather pants and a slinky purple shirt that opens all the way down his chest. There's also Daisuke's Knight Templar Big Brother Shun, who's much prettier than Daisuke himself and seems to be an object of desire for most women he encounters. He even shares a voice actor with Zagato above!
• In Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, main protagonist Nanoha wears a white schoolgirl uniform with a long white skirt and long white sleeves, a costume that's cute but conservative. The Dragon Fate wears a black swimsuit with very interestingly placed red belts and a pink skirt that's barely there, a costume that's sin incarnate. When panty shots are applied, Nanoha's are pink, while Fate's are black (save for that one instance with the pink thong). However, after she's switches sides she retains the outfit, and in later seasons it becomes more Stripperiffic.
• Welcome to Demon School! Iruma-kun:
  • The very concept of the "Wicked Phase", which acts as a Superpowered Evil Side for all demons, basically exemplifies this, as each time it has actually shown up, the character experiencing it has acted in a much sexier and more alluring way than they do normally, since part of it involves losing all inhibitions, such as how Alice gains a sense of Interplay of Sex and Violence that really amplifies his erotic aura. But none of the demons can compare in sexiness to Wicked Phase Iruma, who entered one thanks to mental alteration by Ali-san, as the "evil" effect of the phase at worst makes him a Jerk with a Heart of Gold with such a suave charm and forceful-yet-gentle attitude that he causes every girl and some boys to swoon. The sexiness of the phase is amplified tenfold when Iruma becomes Wicked Phase Irumi, as his elegant black short-hemmed dress, thigh-high boots, arm-length gloves, and hair extensions combined with a deliberately commanding attitude take Attractive Bent-Gender to the extreme, making him so stunningly beautiful and sexy that almost every demon of both genders are practically creaming themselves.
  • After he properly revealed his true evil self, Kiriwo frequently acts incredibly alluring and exhibits a constant erotic aura when being his true self. He especially piles on the eroticism when his Nightmare Fetishist mindset is in full drive, blushing, panting, and drooling in ways that even a demon in their Wicked Phase would find too lewd.
• Princess Tutu:
  • Rue/Princess Kraehe demonstrates a classic case of this: whereas Ahiru wears a conservative white dress when she transforms into Princess Tutu, when her rival transforms into her evil alter ego, her previously fairly standard ballet costume is now something strapless, backless, and cut down to her bellybutton in front.
  • Once Mytho is infected by the Raven's blood in season 2, he becomes much much more sexually assertive. He flirts openly, tracing his fingers over girl's hearts, draping his arms around one woman's shoulders, and essentially coming on to every girl he meets in an attempt to take their heart from them as a sacrifice. Although towards the end of the series, when it takes him over more and more, he becomes less sexy and more squicky.
• Puella Magi Madoka Magica The Movie: Rebellion: Goddess Madoka, the benevolent Big Good, is dressed in a white outfit and is the divine ascendance of a shy, modest girl; while Devil Homura wears a form-fitting black outfit with exposed cleavage and is a Yandere who takes almost orgasmic pleasure in bending the world to her will so Madoka will be forever hers.
• Ranma ½: When Akane Tendo is possessed by the Vengeful Doll, she's seductive, acts nicer, and strips to invoke Distracted by the Sexy.
• Kaaya from The Tower of Druaga wears a more form-fitting outfit and generally looks more grown-up and sexual after her Face–Heel Turn.
• Violinist of Hameln: The biggest monster in the manga, Chestra, also is the one of most gorgeous-looking men there (when he is whole). Also, Sizer wears a very modest outfit normally and a Stripperiffic one when Brainwashed and Crazy / tapping Superpowered Evil Side.
• Yu-Gi-Oh! 5Ds:. Carly's normal self is a nerdy, clutzy girl, but when she is forcibly turned into a Dark Signer, she becomes a vampiric-looking beauty who may even be able to kill with her kiss. (At least, she would have Jack believe that she could.) This also applies to Carly's monsters, with her Fortune Fairies turning from little fairy girls to sexy adults, the Fortune Ladies.

Comic Books

• The Supergirl from Krypton (2004): After being brainwashed by Darkseid, Supergirl replaces her modest outfit with black, tight leather clothes which show her figure off.
• X-Men:
  • Jean Grey as Dark Phoenix. The good Phoenix was already wearing the ultimate in Form-Fitting Wardrobe gear, but Dark Phoenix has unearthly beauty and a habit of combining Interplay of Sex and Violence with Earth-Shattering Kaboom. As Rachel Summers (the next host of the Phoenix, and despite being a sometimes Hot-Blooded Anti-Hero, entirely heroic) remarked when she chose to adopt the Dark Phoenix costume, Dark Phoenix might have been evil... but she had great taste in clothes! Of course, it should be said that Rachel had a repeatedly lampshaded penchant for impossibly tight red clothing to begin with.
  • Madelyne Pryor, evil clone of Jean Grey. Where Jean tended towards more practical clothing, Maddie pioneered the underboob look, daring choice in villain fashion. As she explicitly tells Jean during a crossover with X-Man, "I have lived the darker side of us", remarking that men are just toys to her and Jean. Since she was, at this point in time, hanging around with Nate Grey and playing him like a fiddle in a fashion that had more than a few sexual overtones (despite the fact that he's the alternate counterpart of her son - something which disturbed Nate, but didn't seem to bother her in the slightest, going by her If I Can't Have You… Yandere attitude) and shortly after became de facto consort of Sebastian Shaw, Black King of the Hellfire Club, she wasn't kidding.

Film — Live-Action

• When Sam Rockwell's character does his Face–Heel Turn in Charlie's Angels (2000), he gets a stylish Evil Costume Switch and reveals himself to be far more hip and self-confident than he had previously let on. He's also got a super-sexy evil girlfriend.
• The Faculty: Everybody who gets possessed by the alien parasite starts dressing more sharply, but it's most pronounced with Miss Burke, a formerly dweebish English teacher who ditches her Nerd Glasses, lets her hair down, and swaps her frumpy clothes out for a sleek red tank top and black blazer to show off her actress Famke Janssen's figure. Also, while she had been put off by Zeke's sexual advances as a human, as an alien she turns far more sexually assertive and starts hitting on Zeke herself.
• Destroy All Monsters: Kyoko is suddenly more assertive and dressed a bit less formally once under mind control.
• The Plastics in Mean Girls. While Karen is a mostly harmless ditz and a Minion with an F in Evil, Regina is the school's Alpha Bitch, and Gretchen her Beta Bitch. The three of them are also presented as the hottest girls in school, their beauty being a big part of why they are so popular. The heroine Cady also finds herself dressing sexier as she is pulled into Regina's orbit and eventually becomes the Alpha Bitch herself, going from baggy polo shirts and slacks to form-fitting tank tops and miniskirts.
• Subverted in Spider-Man 3. When Peter Parker flirts with The Dark Side due to the symbiote costume, he acts more sexually assertive and seems to think he's suddenly the hot stuff. To the objective gaze and the befuddled look a random girl gives him in the street, he just now looks like a more sleazy dork. He's still fundamentally himself, after all, as no matter how self-confident and sexually assertive he's acting, he remains a nerd and has no idea how to carry himself otherwise. Furthermore, in a neat little bit of irony that underscores this point, the only women who he does manage to charm with his new assertive manner were already attracted to Peter when he was "good" anyway.
• Stardust: Lamia starts out as an old crone but becomes young and sexy due to digesting the remains of a star's heart. When she first does it she even strips in front of a mirror to check out her new body. Subverted in that each time she uses magic, she regresses more and more back to her previous, hideous state.

Literature

• Victoria has a pair of Camp Gay crossdressers who are stunningly gorgeous when made up and in drag, and gleefully exploit this to manipulate, seduce and ultimately blackmail a senior political figure. More and stronger adjectives are used to describe their faux-feminine sexiness than the "genuine" female beauty of any of the wholesome women on the good side, including The Hero's straight love interest.

Live-Action TV

• Arrow: Earth-1 Laurel was a hero and fairly wholesome even when wearing her leather-and-buckles vigilante outfit. Her Earth-2 doppelganger is evil and strolls around seductively, purring all her lines, and is considered a Femme Fatale who makes men fall all over themselves.
• Normally, Hal from Being Human is a very repressed, anti-social vampire on the reform. When he falls off the wagon, though, or when there is a flashback to his bloodier days, he instantly becomes charming, charismatic, and (frequently) less clothed.
• Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Faith is the Evil Counterpart to Buffy and she wears skimpier clothes and is a Sex Goddess who is unabashedly promiscuous and seductive. When she's first introduced she's explicitly contrasted as being more "fun" than Buffy, telling "sexy" stories about how she Sleeps in the Nude and had to fight vampires naked when they ambushed her. In season 4, Willow lampshadingly describes Faith as a "cleavagey slut-bomb walking around going, 'Oh, check me out, I'm wicked cool, I'm 5 by 5.' ". Notably when she starts dressing more modestly and acts less sexually aggressive after her Heel–Face Turn.
• Doctor Who: The Master was designed to be sophisticated, handsome and charming (most of the time, at least), particularly to contrast against the Doctor's more... esoteric appearance. A particular point to observe is how the Master Honey Traps the queen in "The Time Monster" -even though the Third Doctor was very charming and masculine, this is something that would be unthinkable for him to do. Even when reduced to a rotting abomination in two Tom Baker stories, the Master is not beyond caressing the Doctor's arm and playing with his hair in an unnervingly sexual manner while the Doctor is paralysed. Ainley's incarnation slipped between this and Ax-Crazy, and while Simm's incarnation was almost entirely Ax-Crazy there is still the mountains of fetishes that are dumped on him in "The End Of Time," and his intense Foe Romance Subtext with the Tenth Doctor. And then when the Master becomes the Mistress, she amps up the Foe Romance Subtext even more somehow and outright makes out with the Doctor before he realizes who she is. All the while being very attractive, flirtatious, and even allegedly making the Simm incarnation get turned on (though she at least tells him that his comment was "very wrong"). The Sacha Dhawan Master carries on this trait into the 13th Doctor’s era as well, continuing the character’s classic charm and Foe Romance Subtext.
• Knots Landing: Abby is a beautiful bitch, and is the most beautiful woman in the series. She's also a manipulative Spoiled Brat. Downplayed though, as that Gary is also a Chick Magnet and Abby isn't truly evil.
• Power Rangers: Astronema had a liking for black leather and changed her hairstyle and color every five episodes or so (if you're watching episodes out of order, it's a great way to check where you are in the plot). Made more evident because Astronema was actually The Hero's amnesiac sister. When she reverted to the nice and pure Karone, she had straight blonde hair and modest clothes. When brainwashed to become Astronema again... form-fitting black leather and cropped red hair. When Karone returned in Lost Galaxy as the Pink Ranger, she evoked this by dressing up as Astronema to get back the Pink Ranger's Quasar Saber, but was still shown to wear black leather in her civilian form.
• From The BBC Robin Hood we get Guy of Gisbourne and his sister Isabella. Izzy is initially introduced as an ally to Robin, but as soon as she throws in her lot with the bad guys her outfits (which were always designed to make her Ms. Fanservice) also become leather. On the same show, when Allan-a-Dale turns traitor, he gets an Evil Costume Switch (the sheriff actually says "upgrade this boy to leather").
• Xena: Warrior Princess: Evil Xena is much more openly sexual than Good Xena, though it's more animalistic than seductive.

Video Games

• If you fail to save Richter's girlfriend Annette in Castlevania: The Dracula X Chronicles, she gets turned into a vampire who wears incredibly revealing clothing.
• Danganronpa: Zigzagged in the Hope's Peak saga. In the first and second games, main heroines Kyoko Kirigiri and Chiaki Nanami wear fairly conservative outfits that, at most, exposes some of their legs, and Kyoko is very cold and professional while Chiaki is reserved. By contrast, Big Bad Junko Enoshima is the rightful holder of the title of the Ultimate Fashionista, and her leggy outfit oozes sexuality, even while she's oozing insanity by changing her personality at the drop of a hat. Her desire for despair is treated as a sexual fetish, she makes jokes about her body and has a Hot Teacher persona, and she is in general more sexually aggressive than the main heroines. Mikan Tsumiki, one of her most fanatical followers, is also a Ms. Fanservice who is frequently placed in compromising positions and has just as much of a fetish for despair. All the other female characters zigzag it, with varying levels of sensuality and aggression.
• The Elder Scrolls: This is the case for Mephala, a Daedric Prince whose sphere is "obscured to mortals", but who is associated with manipulation, lies, sex, and secrets. She is considered to be one of the more malevolently inclined (or, incorrectly, outright "evil") Daedric Princes and sexuality falls under her purview. Two of the Aedric Divines, Mara and Dibella, represent different aspects of sexuality, being Love Goddesses, and are near-universally considered "good", but Mephala seems to represent the outright manipulative aspects of sex.
• Metal Gear: Depraved Bisexual and evil Vamp is repeatedly contrasted against Otacon, who's innocently handsome.
• Inverted in Once Ever After, where the heroines, The One Guy in the party, and their allies are the main source of h-scenes and sexuality in general, and their more open and free approach to sexuality puts them in conflict with The Order of Tales, who (with the exception of the Witch) dress modestly and want to capture the heroes for escaping their narrative roles, most of which include not being allowed to have sex (the exception being Ingrid, who comes from a lewd Tale but wants a life with more than sex). On the other end, Bloody Ingrid, a major antagonist, is dressed like normal Ingrid but actively rejects her sexual nature (since it got her raped) in favor of violence.
• StarCraft: Kerrigan becomes much sexier when she stops caring about what anyone thinks, slaughters people for fun, and coincidentally takes on the appearance of a mean naked succubus.
• Tales of Graces has Richard when he gets taken over by Lambda ending up a winged and shirtless sexy demon.
• Tales of Vesperia has the suave, clean-cut, well-spoken Schwann compared to the Dirty Old Man/Lovable Sex Maniac that is Raven. Just listen to how he addresses Judith during the boss battle, for one. On the more "Morally Ambiguous is Sexy" side, compare fully-armored Flynn with Yuri, who shows quite a bit more skin and occasionally hits on the girls in his party for the lulz.

Web Animation

• Helluva Boss: Mrs. Mayberry was originally quite conservative and overall generically pretty as a human, but after embracing being an evil Jerkass as a demon, she got a massive upgrade in sexiness, particularly having her dress torn off at the knee, showing off her demonic but nicely built legs.

Western Animation

• Aladdin: The Series: Princess Jasmine is turned against the heroes in an episode by Harmless Villain Abis Mal. She gets the dominatrix whip and the black, as-close-to-dominatrix-gear-as-Disney-will-allow outfit and the Dominatrix attitude.
• Kim Possible: Shego. The one episode when she turned good she was sweet and all, but when she's evil she is sexy! She wears a swimsuit, at work, in the same room as her boss, and his companion, several times.
• ReBoot: Post-timeskip AndrAIa was already hot stuff to begin with, but when she gets infected with the Daemon Virus she becomes downright seductive, going as far as calling Matrix "lover".

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