baddie

English

Alternative forms

• baddy

Etymology

Etymology tree

Middle English badde

English bad

Proto-Germanic *-j-, *-ij-

Proto-West Germanic *-i, *-ī

Old English -iġ

Middle English -y

English -y

English -ie

English baddie

From bad + -ie.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈbædi/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ædi

Noun

baddie (plural baddies)

1. (informal) A person of bad character, especially in a work of fiction.

   Synonyms: antagonist, evildoer, villain

   Antonym: goodie

   In a western, the baddie typically wears a black hat.

   • 1986 February 13, Antony Jay, Jonathan Lynn, “A Victory for Democracy”, in Yes, Prime Minister, season 1, episode 6, spoken by Humphrey Appleby (Nigel Hawthorne):

     All the press, the people and their elected leaders want to know who are the goodies and who are the baddies.

   • 1995, Paul Vautin, Turn It Up!, Sydney: Pan Macmillan Australia, page 127:

     What really gets to me in these goodies versus baddies movies is just how useless the baddies are.

   • 2006, That Mitchell and Webb Look, season 1, episode 1 (television production), spoken by Fritz (Robert Webb):

     Have you noticed that our caps have actually got little pictures of skulls on them… Hans, are we the baddies?

   • 2022 May 2, Peter Coy, quoting Alexandra Vacroux, “Putin’s Failure to Hold on to the Educated Could Be the World’s Gain”, in The New York Times‎^[1], →ISSN:

     It’s important not to brand all the Russians as the baddies in the world.

2. (neologism, slang) An attractive, confident woman, especially one who is a social media influencer.
   • 2020, Kenshi Hayabusa, The Road to Becoming a Bad Bitch: How I Overcame Low-Self Esteem and Negativity‎^[2], Hayabusa Publishing, →ISBN, page 56:

     Aside from all of the abstract aspects (things we cannot see), you do not have to be an Instagram model/baddie to be a bad bitch.

   • 2021, Priya-Alika Elias, Besharam: On Love and Other Bad Behaviors‎^[3], Chicago: Chicago Review Press, →ISBN:

     All day long, she can immerse herself in the world of crop tops and contour and IG “baddies” that do not look like any Indian girl she knows.

   • 2021, Shauna Pomerantz, Miriam Field, “A TikTok Assemblage: Girlhood, Radical Media Engagement, and Parent–Child Generativity”, in Fiona Blaikie, editor, Visual and Cultural Identity Constructs of Global Youth and Young Adults: Situated, Embodied and Performed Ways of Being, Engaging and Belonging‎^[4], Abingdon, England: Routledge, →DOI, →ISBN:

     Miriam noted that Instagram had “Insta baddies,” who made names for themselves by posing “with scandalous clothes on and maybe they'll have a bunch of makeup on.”

   • 2021, Zeba Blay, Carefree Black Girls: A Celebration of Black Women in Popular Culture‎^[5], New York: St. Martin's Griffin, →ISBN:

     On Instagram, baddies and models of every ethnicity rock fashion and beauty trends that Black women either created or popularized: cornrows, oversized door knocker earrings, long, intricately designed acrylic nails, artfully sculpted baby hairs.

   1. (by extension) An attractive person.

      I didn't realize my professor was dating an absolute baddie; I didn't know he had motion like that.

Translations

a person of bad character in a work of fiction

• Danish: skurk c
• Dutch: slechterik (nl) m
• Finnish: pahis (fi)
• French: méchant (fr) m
• German: Bösewicht (de) m
• Polish: czarny charakter (pl) m
• Portuguese: vilão (pt) m, vilã (pt) f
• Russian: отрица́тельный геро́й/персона́ж m (otricátelʹnyj gerój/personáž), плохо́й (ru) m (ploxój), плохи́ш (ru) m (ploxíš) (colloquial), злоде́й (ru) m (zlodéj)
• Swedish: skurk (sv) c, bov (sv) c
• Welsh: dihiryn (cy) m

See also

• badling

Anagrams

• abided