DC villains that are more interesting in other mediums then they are in.comics.

[mathew101281]

Vandal Savage: most of my favor Vandal Savage stories are cartoons.
Mr. Freeze: He was kind of lame before BTAS remade him.

[Agent Z]

I liked Cheshire and Sportsmaster more in Young Justice than in the comics.

[batnbreakfast]

Harley Quinn
Clayface

Only time I found both of them interesting was in BTAS

[GilGarciaJr]

Nyssa al Ghul. She started out strong and had potential in the comics (in my opinion at least), but got cut down and almost forgotten pretty quickly. I'm glad she's gotten a good run in the CW Verse, and at least a bit part in "Gotham". The CW version has been a lot of fun, and a easy character to support.

[Frontier]

Mr. Freeze, if only because it was the animated take that made people actually care about him as a villain.

[GilGarciaJr]

I'm also going to say Tobias Whale. He's a decent enough gang leader villain in the books, but shines in the live-action Black Lightning series by comparison.

[K7P5V]

Vandal Savage: most of my favor Vandal Savage stories are cartoons.
Mr. Freeze: He was kind of lame before BTAS remade him.

Mr. Freeze, if only because it was the animated take that made people actually care about him as a villain.

Totally agree with both mathew101281 & Frontier about Mr. Freeze.

BTAS really made him special:


And I know Adam West's Batman did it first, but I'd like to add the BTAS version of the Riddler (visually speaking, a well-designed character):

[OpaqueGiraffe17]

There aren’t many good Zod stories in the comics. But he’s always a show stealer in live action.
I liked Riddler Hush more than Eliot in the comics, does that count?

[Osiris-Rex]

Reign and the other Worldkillers were more interesting like action than in the comic books.

[LifeIsILL]

Malcolm Merlyn I guess

[NeathBlue]

You could say through the 60’s, the tv version of the Joker was more interesting and popular than the comic version.
He was popular enough in the 40’s, 50’s and start of the 60’s, but he was hardly seen in comics due to Julius Schwartz disliking the character so much... without the tv show’s regular appearances making him popular, he could well have disappeared altogether.

[Jim Kelly]

"The Clock King" is probably my favourite episode of BTAS--and that revived an old foe with great style--although I guess you could argue it's not the same Clock King.

Professor Zoom aka Reverse Flash, even though a great villain, has been a one-note villain in the comics. But on screen, in THE FLASH, Tom Cavanagh and Matt Letscher have put a lot of meat on his bones--and he's the best TV super-villain I know.

In the classic comics, for the first 50 years of Batman, I would say Penguin was a really good villain--I don't care for all the later attempts to rewrite his character. I think the Burgess Meredith version from the 1966 BATMAN movie and TV show is the best on-screen version there will ever be. He takes the classic character and makes him just that much better.

I like James Jesse in the comics, but having Mark Hamill play him on the 1990 FLASH was quite a feat--and gave us a taste of what he would do with Joker. Having Hamill return for the 2014 FLASH has been even better.

[The Darknight Detective]

You could say through the 60’s, the tv version of the Joker was more interesting and popular than the comic version.
He was popular enough in the 40’s, 50’s and start of the 60’s, but he was hardly seen in comics due to Julius Schwartz disliking the character so much... without the tv show’s regular appearances making him popular, he could well have disappeared altogether.

True, but as much as I enjoyed Romero's interpretation as a little kid, I'm so glad the O'Neill-Adams version was around by the time I started reading comics.

[SiegePerilous02]

A lot of the BTAS villains. Chiefly Mr. Freeze, the Mad Hatter, Clayface and Harley (very few subsequent takes got what made the character work originally)

Also the Joker is far more consistently great there than he is in the comics. I'd love for comic book writers to take more cues from it, in addition to toning down his his antics and using him more sparingly.