Are you feeling a little bit naughty? With the new Kneel Before Zod series setting its super sights on the most notorious criminal of Krypton, we can’t say we blame you. Nearly ninety years of DC history have given us some truly iconic superhero stories, but I’ll admit, it can be fun to see how the other half lives and take a walk on the dark side every now and then. But where to start? Well, you could hit up your local henchperson and see what they recommend…or you can just keep on reading as I list off ten wonderfully wicked comics that give DC’s villains their due, ranked in order of my personal favorites.

Heroes, you can sit this one out.
 

Secret Six

Ask any Gail Simone fan to name the magnum opus of her career and they’ll…well, they’ll probably say Birds of Prey. But that’s just fine, the Secret Six were born to be losers. Spinning out of the Infinite Crisis tie-in Villains United, Simone’s Secret Six volumes tell the equally comical and dramatic misadventures of a loose cadre of horny, chaotic, would-be schemers and conquerors turned morally ambiguous mercenaries. Strong on found family, Secret Six will make you fall in love with baddies you’ve always treated like a joke and empathize with villains you’ve only known as pure evil. You’ll never think about Bane, Catman or Deadshot the same way again once you’ve seen them laugh, and cry, and [CENSORED].
 

Superman: The Black Ring

Lex Luthor is considered by many to be the smartest man in the DC Universe—and by none more so than Luthor himself. But what makes Lex one of the most compelling villains in fiction isn’t his cunning or intelligence, but his Melvillian obsession with Superman. At a time when Superman had left Metropolis behind to embark on an American walkabout, it was Luthor who filled in for the Man of Steel in Action Comics, driven by a need to recapture the power he temporarily touched in the Blackest Night event. So began a journey which brought him into the crosshairs of Vandal Savage, Deathstroke the Terminator, the Joker, Death herself, and to the ends of the universe where he’s granted the opportunity of his dreams…if he can only give up that which defines him most.
 

Gotham City Sirens

For unadulterated chaotic fun, you can’t beat the 2009 Gotham City Sirens series. Launched by Batman: The Animated Series maestro Paul Dini with initial art from the world class Guillem March, Sirens took everything we loved about the chemistry of “Harley & Ivy” from the animated world and translated them into their own comic—with Catwoman thrown in the mix for added flavor. Together, the three dance back and forth across every angle of the moral spectrum that their whims allow, proving you can never pin a bad girl down.
 

Deathstroke (2016)

One of DC’s most successful breakout villains, Deathstroke has had no fewer than five self-titled series since he was first introduced as a vengeful grieving father in The New Teen Titans. But with all due respect to Marv Wolfman, no one has ever painted as woefully complete a picture of this irredeemable villain as Priest in the fifty-issue 2016 Deathstroke series. Motivated by a perverse desire to surround himself with unconditional love, Slade continues to persuade those in his life to give him chance after chance as he tests them with new ways to slither ever further beneath the bar. None have ever so elegantly captured Slade Wilson’s essence as a pathetic, hollow man who just so happens to be one of the deadliest killers alive.
 

The Shade (2012)

This incredibly powerful immortal, amoral, darkness-wielding former Flash villain was arguably the most likable character in James Robinson’s Starman epic of the 1990s, with his wry Oscar Wilde wit and long view of history. In the 2012 Shade miniseries, continuing Richard Swift’s story from where Starman left off, James Robinson employs his own deep knowledge of DC history to further elaborate on the Shade’s own involvement in the hidden chapters and corners of the superhero world. Consider it the Frasier to Starman’s Cheers.
 

Penguin: Pain and Prejudice

This five-issue miniseries from Gregg Hurwitz and Szymon Kudranski is nothing short of operatic in its character study of Gotham City’s criminal kingpin. Hurwitz strikes a difficult balance between evoking sympathy and loathing in each chapter for its protagonist, allowing the reader to relate to his existence as an outcast without ever overlooking that the Penguin’s ugly reputation is entirely earned. Kudranski captures the Penguin’s depravity in all its ugly detail, betraying Oswald Cobblepot in even the most intimate settings for the monster he is. Sweet in one page and ruthless in the next, Penguin: Pain and Prejudice is an all too real illustration of how the monsters who walk among us paint themselves with a victim’s brush.
 

Reverse-Flash: Rebirth

Printed in 2010 as The Flash #8, this prelude to Flashpoint by Geoff Johns and Scott Kolins stands as one of the strongest single issues in their storied careers—not just a definitive story for the Flash’s greatest enemy, but a deeply affecting sci-fi horror story which feels like it might have arisen from the heyday of those self-same genre anthologies of the 1950s. What would the ability to change time on a whim, to reverse every regrettable decision, do to a man? How might it divorce a person from reality when all the people and events in your life are reduced to mere pathways that either aid or hinder your goals? How would you feel when you realized that no matter how thoroughly you rearranged the timeline, it would never be enough? The Joker once taught us that all it takes for evil to take root is one bad day. But when time is without meaning, Eobard Thawne shows us how things can get exponentially worse.
 

Joker: Year of the Villain

Leave it to master of horror John Carpenter to co-write one of the greatest Joker stories ever told. Dead set within comic book continuity during the chaos of a world-threatening event from the perspective of one of the Joker’s own overlooked henchmen, Joker: Year of the Villain provides a surprisingly poignant examination of the issue of separating neurodivergence from evil which silently hangs over every Batman story. Once you discover the Joker’s secret, you’ll never look at him the same way again.
 

Lucifer (2000)

How do you get more evil than the devil himself? Spinning out of Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman, Mike Carey’s Lucifer shows us what God’s former favorite angel gets up to once he rids himself of stewardship of Hell…and no, it’s considerably more ambitious than solving crimes with the LAPD. In 75 epic issues, the Morningstar learns all too well that it’s easy to be critical of the Master Plan until you’re the one doing the planning.
 

Batman: Birth of the Demon

One of the gravest critical injustices is that Batman: Birth of the Demon is rarely rated among the all-time greatest Batman stories. A pinnacle in the careers of legends Dennis O’Neil and Norm Breyfogle, Birth of the Demon provides the definitive origin story of O’Neil’s greatest contribution to the Batman mythology: Ra’s al Ghul. With each heartrending page beautifully painted on canvas, Birth of the Demon pulls off the heady feat two decades in the making of providing a satisfying solution to a long-enduring mystery—one which not only answers questions, but enriches the story ever onward. Where once one might have only seen an eco-terrorist despot in Ra’s al Ghul, Birth of the Demon presents the man as he was before his fall from grace and rise to power: a man with no less lofty a goal than conquering death for all mankind. But even if such a foe could be vanquished, is mankind worthy of salvation? These are the questions which lead Batman’s most cunning and powerful nemesis to become the Demon’s Head. Behold, and find yourself reborn.
 

Kneel Before Zod #1 by Joe Casey, Dan McDaid and David Baron is now available in print and as a digital comic book. All of the other comics on this list are available through your local bookstore, comic book shop or digital retailer and can all be read in full on DC UNIVERSE INFINITE.

Alex Jaffe is the author of our monthly "Ask the Question" column and writes about games, movies, TV, comics and superhero history for DC.com. Follow him on Bluesky at @AlexJaffe and find him in the DC Community as HubCityQuestion.

NOTE: The views and opinions expressed in this feature are solely those of Alex Jaffe and do not necessarily reflect those of DC or Warner Bros. Discovery, nor should they be read as confirmation or denial of future DC plans.