The Top 10 Best Movie Mad Scientists
This List of Movie Mad Scientists is Alive! It’s Alive!
This week’s top 10 is tackling one of the best movie tropes of all time, mad scientists. Now I get that more often than not when we close our eyes and picture mad scientists from movies we think of a bad guy. Insanity though doesn’t necessarily make you good or evil, just crazy enough to go messing around with the fabric of reality as we know it. Because of that, mad scientists don’t have to be evil in order to earn a spot on this list. They do have to actually perform an experiment or star in a film that follows the consequences of their experiments though (sorry Doctor Strangelove and Marathon Man). As usual, I’m also sticking to live-action films as well (sorry, Dr. Finklestein). Finally, I’m only including one version of Dr. Frankenstein here (there are a lot of versions out there). Even with those restrictions in place, there are a lot of movie mad scientists out there. Not to worry though, because if my hypothesis is correct, then this list features the 10 best movie mad scientists of all time.
10. Dr. Josef Heiter – Human Centipede
While some mad scientists go insane with power tinkering in God’s domain, Dr. Josef Heiter was just a crazy sicko. Heiter wasn’t some misguided soul who went too far while trying to push the boundaries of science for the betterment of mankind (most mad scientists don’t think they’re the bad guy). No, he just wanted to see what happened when you stitched three people together, ass to mouth. His was the kind of madness that made you genuinely believe that he needed some serious psychological help. Maybe even a nice relaxing stay in an asylum somewhere to help him work through his issues. I try to remain pretty open-minded when it comes to the mental issues that a lot of people face, but when it comes to Dr. Josef Heiter, I can’t help but say, “Dude, what in the actual @#$%!?”
9. Dr. Edward Pretorius – From Beyond
Lovecraftian horror movies usually have to deal with mad scientists sticking their noses where they don’t belong in the pursuit of “knowing the unknowable.” In other words, the kind of stuff that would make your mind implode on itself, driving you completely insane in the process. Pretorious creates a machine called “The Resonator” that causes our dimension to overlap with another one. Like most movie mad scientists, simply coming up with the greatest invention of his generation isn’t enough, and pretty soon Pretorius is sucked into the strange alternate dimension. There, he undergoes a monstrous transformation and develops a hankering for human brains. Fortunately (for him), someone goes messing with The Resonator, and he’s granted access to our dimension once more. His time in “the beyond” though has cost him all chances of winning a beauty pageant anytime soon.
8. Dr. Wayne Szalinski – Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, Honey, I Blew Up the Baby, and Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves
The first non-evil entry on this list of movie mad scientists is Dr. Wayne Szalinski. Wayne really isn’t a bad guy, just dangerously incompetent when it comes to his experiments. I get it, accidents happen and everyone deserves a second chance. Wayne needed three. Despite the fact that he would probably go bankrupt from OSHA fines, I still have to admit that Wayne is an absolute genius. He was honestly hoping to make the world a better place with his shrink-ray technology (we saw a practical application of this technology in Downsizing). However, being your typical mad scientist, Wayne forgot one crucial element for his shrink ray, a dummy-proof safety. I mean, a baby managed to turn it on and fire it for crying out loud.
7. Dr. Eldon Tyrell – Bladerunner
I’ve seen more than enough sci-fi movies to know that you really need to be careful when it comes to technology. Of course, mad scientists don’t have time for things like considering consequences to their actions. What could go wrong designing androids that are meant to be “more human than human.” Let’s give them increased strength, speed, agility, and durability, then see how long they like taking orders from a bunch of humans. Hey, let’s take it a step further and make them so “human” that they don’t even know that they’re not. I bet nothing will go wrong when they eventually figure it out. Dr. Eldon Tyrell created the most advanced artificial life forms on the planet and then gave them the ability to “learn.” To make things worse, he only gave them a four-year life span, so they never have time to grow out of their emo phase.
6. Dr. Henry Wu – Jurassic Park and The Jurassic World films
Mad scientists and cloning go together like chocolate and peanut butter. Dr. Henry Wu was the man responsible for helping create some of the most fantastic movie theme parks of all time, Jurassic Park and Jurassic World. He’s also kind of responsible for turning the islands into a total no-man’s land. Sure, nature probably had a good reason for killing off the dinosaurs, but mad scientists seldom limit themselves with trivialities like the natural order of things. Dr. Wu doesn’t just clone dinosaurs, though. He gets a little creative with their genetics as well, in order to make them more “photo-friendly” for park guests. When he runs out of dinos to clone, he makes new ones from scratch. You might think that he would have learned his lesson sometime between Jurassic Park and Jurassic World, but mad scientists have never been great when it comes to being rational.