big bad
noun/ˌbɪɡ ˈbæd/
Etymology
The noun was back-formed in 1998 in the episode “Bewitched, Bothered and Bewildered”, season two of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It is a nominalization derived from the long-established adjectival pattern within Big Bad Wolf and collocative constructions inspired by it (e.g., I tried to reason with her, but to her I'm just the big bad authority figure who can't be trusted).
Definitions
A major adversary or antagonist of a piece of fiction.
- Charlie, now menacingly equipped with a bionic arm, is these days in the service of new pantomime big bad, Poppy Adams, played with lysergic glee by Julianne Moore.
The neighborhood
Vish — recursive loop
No curated loop yet for big bad. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.
sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA