It's tough being a villain. The masterminds and monsters born with absurd levels of strength aren't the norm. That's kind of the reason why they're beloved in the first place. It can be easy to believe those are the only kinds of villains that any hero goes up against, but that's not true either.
Indeed, there are no shortage of villains who wind up being no challenge to the hero at all. Many of them have always been incompetent and never once posed a threat to anyone, never mind the main character. Other times, they were meant to be strong, but for power scaling reasons they have to be humbled by the hero to show how big a threat they are.
10 Emperor Pilaf Was Only Ever A Threat To A Powerless Child Goku
Emperor Pilaf was a serious villain when he was the main villain of Dragon Ball— for all of a dozen episodes. But that was before Goku had training from anyone other than Master Roshi, had no special energy attacks, and his strongest ally was Yamcha.
Once he began training proper, Pilaf simply wasn't a threat and became a comedic act. By Dragon Ball Super, Pilaf and crew wished to be made young again and that's the end of their relevance. They stay at Bulma's massive Capsule Corp and get into shenanigans there.
9 Team Rocket Can't Even Outsmart A Pretty Mediocre Trainer
Prepare for trouble...but like, only a little. Pokémon's Jesse and James are the primary antagonists for Team Rocket when dealing with Ash, but these guys are lucky if their schemes even come close to working. Their goal is to steal Pikachu, but no matter how hard they try they only succeed in mildly annoying Ash and Pikachu at best.
It's easy to think that kidnapping one Pokémon from a 10 year old would be a quick job, but they've failed at it time and again. They've nearly been fired several times because of how terrible they are, but the need for Pokémon to have a constant threat leaves them around.
8 Jeremiah Gottwald Is Always Quickly Foiled By Lelouch
Jeremiah was a dangerous threat when he was introduced. But after Lelouch uses his Geass on him, he freed Suzuki and became the joke of his own army. His career was completely destroyed and he spent a season as a laughing stock.
When he got a new power in R2, this was meant to elevate him into being a proper antagonist. But the reality is, the Geass Cancel ability didn't matter after a certain point. Lelouch had other ways to stay in control, and once Jeremiah heard Lelouch's plan, he was on board anyway.
7 Jerid Messa Is A Seemingly Terrible Pilot
Jerid is supposed to be a threat in the universe of Gundam, but he's one of the worst pilots of all time. He's got the job and the age and the experience. He meets Kamille in the first episode and makes fun of his name, and that turns out to be a mistake.
For the remainder of the series, Jerid is consistently embarrassed by someone who's supposed to be younger and have no experience piloting a Gundam. By the end of the series he's faced off against Kamille a half-dozen times and has nothing to show for it other than multiple losses.
6 Carta Issue Talked A Big Game & Was Instantly Embarrassed
Another Gundam villain who never really poses much of a threat in the series, Carta Issue was meant to be a major challenge to the Earth members of Tekkadan. She challenged them to a one on one match and thought the winner would have proven worthy to keep moving forward.
Mikazuki didn't care about honor or proving he was worthy— he jumped her before she even had her weapon ready and immediately rolled her.
5 Weevil Underwood Just Ends Up Giving His Best Cards To His Opponents
Weevil gave Yugi little to no trouble in the first duel. He angered Yugi by daring to throw Exotic into the ocean, leaving it lost at sea and Yugi without his best weapon. But the character gradually devolves into someone that's more useless.
He battles Joey and the only thing he does is hand over his best card, making Joey's hodge-podge deck somewhat better. Afterwards, he has a match with Yugi but the way Yugi dominated him it's probably best to pretend that wasn't an actual thing.
4 Jack Atlas Was Hyped Up As A Major Threat But It Never Went Anywhere
Jack Atlas was the villain of the earliest part of Yu-Gi-Oh! 5D's. He'd stolen the original bike Yusei created, and the Stardust Dragon card. In their first duel, he used both of them against Yusei and should have been a real threat.
But he wasn't. Despite having not one but two of the Signer Dragons on his side, Yusei found a way to win. After that, he was downgraded into a rival, and from there he was even less of a threat than before.
3 Ivan Dreyar Couldn't Even Hack It As A Member Of A Team
They really built this man up like he was relevant in Fairy Tail. His guild, Raven Tail, was meant to be the better version of Fairy Tail, but that's not how it played out. He had this cool, evil looking villain armor and a group of bad guys who were primed to confront the Fairy Tail group in the Magic Games.
But instead of being a real threat, his entire team got crushed. Not only did Ivan Dreyar get washed out, but the same fate fell the rest of Raven Tail, and it all happened at once, at the hands of Laxus, Ivan's son and Makarov's grandson. The character was never heard from again afterwards.
2 Seiryu Was Beaten Without Even A Struggle By Hiei
Only a handful of fans will remember this Yu Yu Hakusho character. He was a member of the Four Saint Beasts, and was the third one to appear after Genbu and Byakko. Though Genbu gave Kurama a challenge and Byakko was Kuwabara's challenge, Seiryu was instead paired against Hiei.
Comparisons to DBZ's Vegeta went out the door in this very episode, where the young demon didn't just beat Seiryu, he humiliated him. This wasn't a close fight at all, and Hiei didn't even seem like he was out of breath by the time he won.
1 Garou Is Tough, But Not Tough Enough For Saitama
Garou might have mowed through most of the Heroes in the One-Punch Man universe. Certainly his special ability to get stronger after every loss means even the fights he lost he eventually recovered from and got vengeance on his opponents. With one major exception: Saitama.
Every time Saitama runs into Garou, it's an instant loss for Garou. Saitama spent all of season two trying to find the legendary "hero hunter" and never realized he ran into and defeated him twice with ease.
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