Rank the Team Leaders from best to worst

[Captain Cadaver]

Rank them based on however you see fit. Personality, role, team, etc.

I'd say Giovanni > Cyrus > Guzma > Lysandre >> Archie/Maxie > Ghetsis > Lusamine

Giovanni had a lot going for him with his double life as Gym Leader and Team Leader, plus not being as overblown of a supervillain as those to follow him.
Cyrus' plans did seem somewhat stupid and edgy, though his backstory and the role he resigns himself to in the end makes him far more sympathetic and interesting than those below him.
Guzma has more personality than all the other Team Leaders combined, but is tarnished by just being the lackey of Lusamilf.
Lysandre's ideals of perfection and eugenics made him more interesting than most Pokemon villains, but Team Flare's overall goals weren't any different than previous teams, plus his personality and goals just make him ginger Perfect Shello without any superpowers.
Archie and Maxie were equally idiotic in their plans to flood or increase the land mass of the world respectively. Most life won't survive with no land or without much water.
Ghetsis is ranked below them due to being a huge disappointment. After a good change of pace with N, Ghetsis coming in to say "nah, Team Plasma's evil and so am I" just makes everything but his team feel underwhelming.
Lusamine has nothing going for her personality since it's entirely moulded by what's essentially an Elder God Jellyfish causing her to go insane and enter Yandere bitch mode. Haven't played enough of Ultra Moon to see if there's any improvements, but I doubt she'll get much.

 

[Super Saiyan Overlord1007]

I haven't played USUM so I can't say anything about what it does for the other leaders, but.

1. Ghetsis - SOB is just pure evil. His main pokemon is supposed to be pure evil incarnate, and even can't stand him evident by it knowing Frustration, opposed to other villainous leaders who pack a Crobat on their teams.

2. Lusamine - Yeah she's crazy. Honestly in my first playthough of Moon, I NEVER expected her to be the villain of Gen7, and didn't suspect her until after the first encounter with Nihilego.

3. Cyrus - He's edgy indeed, he's probably the most extreme of the antagonist with wanting to cause a universal genocide and fully intended on ditching his followers once he got what he wanted.

4. Lysandre - I can honestly understand his motives and worries, but he's essentially a diet/less extreme Cyrus. When you think about it, his plan would've done more harm than good. Yeah you'd commit genocide if you weren't stopped, but what if the people in your organization weren't essential people in a society, I.E. doctors, engineers, or people along that nature? Interesting, but eh...I thought his anime counterpart was much more threatening honestly. He probably suffers the worse fate of any antagonist though.

5. Maxie - He's the same as Archie being a well intentioned-extremist, but he comes off as being MUCH more condescending, antagonistic, and just all around villainous than Archie.

6. Archie - I haven't played AS so I may be uninformed on the new characterization he may have. He's an eco-terrorist that's more of "Well Intentioned-Extremist" than actual villain.

7. Guzma - Eh, I'm not too big a fan of Team Skull. I get that they're rejects who failed or gave up on their Island Pilgrimage, but I wasn't amused by them. They're no threat, they're just a bunch of street punks that literally NO ONE in Alola (barring Lillie) takes them seriously. Just the same, Guzma is just a street thug who I enjoyed beating just to shut him up, rather than stop his goals. I get that he has a sad backstory with him being abused by his father, but I still wasn't feeling him too much.

8. Giovanni - He's just a standard mafia boss with standard villainous goals, but no real reason for it or way of explaining how he intends to achieve his goal. Team Rocket is imo a bland organization for that same reason.