Ranbir Kapoor’s Animal is no new beast: Here are 5 other red flag characters celebrated by Hindi cinema

Ranbir Kapoor’s Vijay in Sandeep Reddy Vanga’s Animal is no new beast. Toxic characters, men and women, have existed and even been celebrated by Hindi cinema over the years. Below are five of the most memorable ones, for all the wrong reasons.

R Madhavan – Rehna Hai Terre Dil Mein

In a recent interview, Dia Mirza, the leading lady of Gautham Vasudev Menon’s 2001 romantic film, confessed that she wasn’t initially comfortable with how R Madhavan’s lead character of Maddy stalked her character. She even chooses to marry him in the end, instead of the more sensible one played by Saif Ali Khan.

Dhanush – Raanjhanaa

Yet another stalker, Dhanush’s portrayal of Varanasi boy Kundan was given the hero treatment by director Aanand L Rai. Sure, he gets killed in the end, but that’s treated as a sacrifice he makes for his unrequited love, played by Sonam Kapoor. She’s shamed into believing that Kundan died for her.

Aditya Roy Kapur – Aashiqui 2

A loose adaptation of A Star Is Born, Mohit Suri’s 2013 romantic drama had quite a toxic take on the death of its lead character played by Aditya. After throwing a fit in a perennially drunken state when his ‘find’, Aarohi (Shraddha Kapoor), gets ahead of him in her musical career, Aditya’s character kills himself so that he ‘gets out of her way.’ Instead of merely stepping aside and being the bigger man, he makes a statement with a suicide.

Priyanka Chopra – 7 Khoon Maaf

An adaptation of Ruskin Bond’s book Susanna’s Seven Husbands, Vishal Bhardwaj’s 2011 romantic thriller had Priyanka’s character court six husbands from various backgrounds and then kill each of them for pleasure. In the end, she’s seen confessing her crimes to her ‘seventh husband’ in Jesus Christ.

Madhuri Dixit – Pukar

Madhuri played a vengeful unrequited lover in Rajkumar Santoshi’s 2000 film. When her crush, Anil Kapoor, marries a beauty pageant winner, Namrata Shirodkar, she participates in a conspiracy that leads to his court martial from the Indian Army. While she later realises her mistake, atones it by helping Anil’s character reinstate himself, and he even forgives her in the end, she did come across as the rare toxic woman on screen back then.