"...he's so clearly the odd one out — a brutish hulk amongst his clean-looking fellow knights — that I'm amazed he was even in the running to be a knight at all. I'm not one to the [sic] judge by appearances, mind you, but it's obvious this surly guy is bad news."
What's more baffling about Ruber is that at the beginning of the movie, he seems to be putting no effort at all into hiding his evil nature. When he starts acting up against Arthur, the knights' remarks suggest that this is typical behavior for Ruber. Of course, a passing line of his about supporting them all these years without reward implies that they never really liked or trusted him but allowed him to join their ranks because he was a very strong ally and seemed willing to work with them, even if there was something off about him.
The Critic also noted how Gary Oldman has a tendency to play Obviously Evil characters — in a previous review, the Critic continuously pointed out how clear it was that Oldman's character of Doctor Smith was evil and yet no one seemed to notice. He also lampshades Ruber's black clothes and horse later in the review. But it's worth it for that downright hilarious shot at the beginning of the movie in which we get a panning shot of the Knights of the Round Table: a line of identical-looking generic men, and then one with green skin, yellow eyes, and a banana-shaped head.
Steele from Balto wouldn't be out of place in a Steven Spielberg-produced animated film for how clearly evil he is.
The BFG: The giants look even more evil in the animated movie than their physical descriptions and illustrations from the book. For instance, Fleshlumpeater is not only a towering brute, but has fanged, rotten teeth, a scarred face, barbaric regalia, and blood-red eyes.
A great many Disney films do this, even going so far as to base their color and shape schemes around it (as talked about in the Aladdin DVD documentaries). Just take one look at a character sheet for an average Disney film and you can immediately pick out the villains. This is kind of odd when it's done with Animal Stereotypes and say - bears are painted as horrible, deadly, kaiju-like monstrous demons in The Fox and the Hound and as friendly and lovable heroes in The Jungle Book and Brother Bear.
Brother Bear is an interesting case of subversion, actually. When the mother bear first appears, she has beady black eyes and looks bestial, if not outright evil, but when the same bear shows up in the ending after the hero has undergone his character growth, she has wider, Disney-esqe eyes and seems more human and compassionate as a result.
This is the same for Brave after Elinor is transformed into a bear, her eyes are very much human and has a gentle face. But as she slowly loses her humanity, her eyes become cold and black and her face becomes more detailed and ferocious.
Parodied in The Emperor's New Groove, where Yzma is described as "scary beyond all reason" by the protagonist, yet he still trusts her for some reason.
Wreck-It Ralph has surprise villain Turbo. Oddly enough, he's the hero of his own game. But he looks like this.◊
Dean Abigail Hardscrabble in Monsters University is a subversion. She's basically a giant red and black centipede/dragon hybrid who makes her first appearance flying in dramatically and darkening the classroom. Later on you realise that, while she is a very strictSink or Swim Mentor, she's not evil in the slightest.
Jiminy Cricket: Avoid anybody with a fiendish cackle, sinister smile, or diabolical glare. Not necessarily in that order.
Frozen has the Duke of Weselton who has the obviously evil name (it's wrongly pronounced Weaseltown throughout, as a Running Gag), appearance, and motive. He's even voiced by the villain of the previous Disney movie! Then this trope gets subverted when the true Big Bad turns out to be the handsome, charming prince who has zero Obviously Evil signs attached to him until The Reveal.
Elsa is an aversion in the final film, but had this trope played straight in a previous draft of the film. In it Elsa actually was the villain (though how genuine her villainy was differed in production) and so she had pointy hair and a spiky dress, as opposed to the final film where she has a silky dress and long braided hair. In certain designs Elsa had black hair to contrast her with Anna's strawberry blonde however her finalized villain design used the platinum blonde, as does the final product.
Smiler in The Emoji Movie. It's hard to be shocked by the fact that she's the villain when every single shot of her in the trailers is trying to tell you that she's bad. Aside from her being shown ordering the main characters' deletion, she's also shown picking her teeth with a meat hook at one point. The Dishonoured Wolf made note of her lack of subtlety in his Media reloaded episode covering the film:
The Dishonoured Wolf: "So Meh is brought before Smiley, the most obviously bad guy ever who tries to kill him with terminators."
The Legend of the Titanic takes this trope to the extreme. Where the Big Bad is given an eyepatch and a harsh voice, the sharks are given stripes and prison gear, and the Wicked Stepmother and her sister both have vicious black cats (to top it off, the stepmother's cat is named Lucifer).
Played to creepy perfection in Rock and Rule with Mok, the waning rock megastar, who intends to summon a demon in order to enslave the world. Everything about him just oozes EVIL!
Rugrats in Paris: Coco LaBouche: with her dark eye shadow, triangular brows, and devilish outfits. Even the babies are quick to notice how Coco LaBouche means big trouble. Chaz on the other hand doesn't notice this blindingly obvious fact. Hell, even Dilnotices how obviously evil Coco is, as he promptly whacks her with his rattle upon first meeting her.
Lil: She's not a very nice lady. She's too "pointy."
Played with in The Swan Princess where you would think Derek would recognize Bridget's disguise seeing how he knows Odette only wears white dresses whereas Bridget was wearing an obviously evil red/black dress. It's done as a Shout-Out to the original ballet where Odile wears a black tutu.
of Quest for Camelot has this to say about Lord Ruber, one of Camelot's knights:"...he's so clearly the odd one out — a brutish hulk amongst his clean-looking fellow knights — that I'm amazed he was even in the running to be a knight at all. I'm not one to the [sic] judge by appearances, mind you, but it's obvious this surly guy is bad news."
