I know people dog on the Roger Moore era of Bond films, but The Man With the Golden Gun remains one of, maybe my number one, favorite Bond movies. This is in no small part thanks to Francisco Scaramanga; I've always found him pretty charming, and honestly, compared to some of his fellow bad guys, not really that bad of a guy.
I mean really, a lot of Bond villains, especially the classic ones, have some dream about taking over the world or some horseshit, but all Scaramanga wanted to do was monopolize solar power. Is that really that evil? I'm pretty sure every executive and shareholder on wall street would choose to monopolize their particular industry, given the opportunity to do so without consequences. The most evil thing Scaramanga builds is a solar gun that, from what we see, is literally no more destructive than an RPG. Hardly a devastating superweapon to be selling off to the highest bidder, and that itself is only a free bonus to be included with the purchase of one of his solar power plants.
Okay, yeah, he's an assassin, but so is John Wick and everybody loves him. Scaramanga charges a million dollars for a killing, roughly ten million in today's money, and prides himself on taking out only the intended target with a single shot from his wickedly cool golden gun with no collateral damage. He's a complete non-threat to the average joe and his broader plans don't call for the destruction of society, world order, or the human race. 99.999% of people would experience exactly zero negative impact to their lives if he were to succeed.
Not to mention that he himself isn't some cocky asshole super genius. He freely professes to know very little about the science of any of his equipment. He's just a classy dude who happens to be a really good shot and has three nipples for some reason. And we're supposed to root against him?
He only loses because he has the gentleman's honor to challenge Bond to a duel, during which he intentionally handicaps himself with a single round of ammunition compared to Bond's six, and despite this Bond only wins the duel through employing use of a dirty trick.
Honestly, if there ever was a Bond antagonist that deserved to triumph over Her Majesty's Secret Service, it was this guy.