Thanos has nothing on The Fifth Element’s Zorg

polygon.com:

The villainous Zorg’s small stature in The Fifth Element does not stand in the way of his big dreams. “If you want something done,” he mutters partway through the film, “do it yourself.” Though evil, murderous, and selfish, the guy makes a point.

Villains in science fiction have the privilege of being bigger than life, while characters anchored firmly in our own reality run the risk of overinflating their own importance and ability to cause mayhem. Take Ivan Drago in Rocky IV. He might symbolically represent the Soviet side of the Cold War, but in actuality he is only a physical threat to a few people overall, and in a generally contained platform. But Agent Smith in The Matrix is a threat to humanity and human consciousness for all people everywhere, a stand-in for the Matrix itself and all of its grand possibilities of destruction.

This brings us to Zorg. Masterfully overacted by Gary Oldman in Luc Besson’s 1997 science fiction space opera, Zorg is the perfect example of what happens when middle management gets a little too drunk with limited power.

In The Fifth Element, Zorg is an errand boy for the great big evil force that tries to destroy life across the universe every 5,000 years. On Earth, Zorg is the head of a massive corporation. He flippantly lays off a million of his workers in one of his first appearances on screen, which includes the film’s hero, cab driver Korben Dallas (Bruce Willis). His overall lack of interest in other people’s emotional well-being is evident, but he does have a certain streak that advocates for the financial well-being of others. This is not to say he is at all looking out for anyone but himself, but he makes an argument in favor of energizing the economy through chaos and