Best Villain Lairs

Ten properties with great bones, excellent security and one structural flaw each.

Entries
10
Category
Film
Updated
  1. A dark castle tower room with a crystal ball, an hourglass of red sand and a tipped-over bucket of water.

    10. The Wicked Witch's castle (The Wizard of Oz)

    Victor Fleming · 1939

    A green-lit fortress with marching guards, a crystal ball, flying monkeys and an hourglass of red sand to set the deadline. Its one weakness is a bucket of water left out in the open. Her guards seem delighted when it happens. HR issue.

  2. A tall black house with a dead brown lawn in a bright suburban street, an armchair sitting over a hidden hatch.

    09. Gru's house (Despicable Me)

    Pierre Coffin and Chris Renaud · 2010

    A black house with a dead lawn on a cheerful suburban street, hiding an underground lab staffed by minions and reached by an elevator in an armchair. He plans to steal the moon. The neighbors are mostly bothered by the lawn.

  3. A marble-columned underground hall with a swimming pool and bookshelves, old railway tracks running past one wall.

    08. Lex Luthor's lair (Superman)

    Richard Donner · 1978

    Lex lives deep under Metropolis in a forgotten corner of the old rail terminal, with marble columns, a library and a pool. He plans to sink California so his cheap desert land becomes beachfront. Real estate developer with a missile budget. Well furnished.

  4. A tropical volcano island with a monorail track, a waterfall hiding a steel door and rocket silos in the jungle.

    07. Syndrome's island (The Incredibles)

    Brad Bird · 2004

    Nomanisan Island has a volcano, a monorail, a jungle full of rocket launchers and a waterfall that hides the office. A Bond lair in everything but name, built by a man whose main skill was resentment. Its only weakness was the owner's need to monologue.

  5. An abandoned zoo arctic exhibit in a sewer, icy pools, an umbrella and a giant rubber duck boat.

    06. Penguin's Arctic World (Batman Returns)

    Tim Burton · 1992

    An abandoned zoo exhibit beneath Gotham, built on a Universal soundstage. Real penguins flew in by refrigerated plane and got a chilled waiting area with half a ton of ice daily, plus 40 penguin suits and early CGI. Better housing than most Gotham residents.

  6. A jagged black stone tower rising from a flooded ring of forges, uprooted trees floating in the water.

    05. Orthanc (The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers)

    Peter Jackson · 2002

    Saruman's black tower at the center of Isengard, surrounded by forges fed by the forest he keeps cutting down. The trees respond by marching over and drowning the place. Christopher Lee, the only cast member who had met Tolkien, kept the tower dignified anyway.

  7. A narrow limestone spire rising from green water beside a jungle island, a golden pistol on the beach.

    04. Scaramanga's island (The Man with the Golden Gun)

    Guy Hamilton · 1974

    The assassin's private island, with a funhouse for practicing duels and a solar power plant, was Khao Phing Kan in Phang Nga Bay, Thailand. It's now known to everyone as James Bond Island, and boats have been kept away from its rock spire since 1998 to stop it eroding.

  8. A round glass revolving restaurant on a snowy Alpine summit, a cable car approaching through clouds.

    03. Piz Gloria (On Her Majesty's Secret Service)

    Peter Hunt · 1969

    Blofeld's allergy clinic is a real revolving restaurant at 9,740 feet on Switzerland's Schilthorn. The producers found it unfinished and helped pay to complete it in exchange for filming there. It still rotates once an hour and now has a 007 exhibit. Lunch is good.

  9. A gray moon-sized space station with a giant dish crater, a tiny exhaust port glowing in a long trench.

    02. The Death Star (Star Wars)

    George Lucas · 1977

    A moon-sized battle station that can destroy a planet and can be destroyed by one well-placed shot down an exhaust port. Rogue One later explained the flaw was planted on purpose by its engineer. Finally, someone owns up to a design defect.

  10. Inside a hollow volcano: a steel launch pad, a monorail track along the rock wall and a crater roof sliding open to the sky.

    01. Blofeld's volcano (You Only Live Twice)

    Lewis Gilbert · 1967

    Ken Adam built a hollow volcano at Pinewood for $1 million, 148 feet tall with a working monorail and heliport, visible from three miles away. It has a retractable crater lid and a rocket launch pad. Every lair since has been measured against it, mostly by accountants.

Honorable mentions

  • A glass-walled modernist house set into a Norwegian forest beside a waterfall, a keycard on a concrete counter.

    Nathan's house (Ex Machina)

    Alex Garland · 2015

    A tech CEO's remote glass-and-concrete compound, part Pinewood set and part the real Juvet Landscape Hotel in Valldalen, Norway. Guests can stay there now. Unlike in the film, the doors open when the power goes out. Probably.

Dishonorable mentions

  • An icy planet with an enormous trench carved around its equator, a star being drained into it.

    Starkiller Base (Star Wars: The Force Awakens)

    J.J. Abrams · 2015

    The First Order hollows out an entire planet to make a bigger Death Star, then leaves it vulnerable to X-wings flying into one weak spot. The third time the same blueprint failed. At some point you hire a different architect.

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