25 Menacing Facts about Marvel Villains

Charles Xavier is often depicted as a benevolent leader of the X-Men, but he has some skeletons in the closet, like his attempt to kill his twin sister in the womb. Charles detected that his sister was evil, and his subsequent attack led his mom to miscarry. Regardless, Cassandra Nova held onto life as a collection of cells and eventually rebuilt her body. As an act of vengeance, she convinced Donald Trask III to send his army of sentinels to the mutant island of Genosha. 

Daken creator Marjorie M. Liu confirmed that Wolverine’s son is bisexual. Liu says Daken also uses sex as a weapon to deceive people and achieve his own ends, such as when he charms a man so that he can ultimately kill the man and steal his passport.

Madcap is another villain with a tragic backstory, having lost his family in a car crash. Of course, it was no regular car crash, but one that involved experimental chemicals. Madcap tried to kill himself out of grief but found that his new power brought him back to life. His psyche became shattered and he gained the ability to turn people insane just by looking at them.

In the Old Man Logan storyline, the Red Skull is left in charge of his own swath of territory. Logan has a run-in with the villain, seeing a trophy room that includes several souvenirs, such as Iron Man’s armor and Cyclops’s visor. The Red Skull also dresses up as his old foe, Captain America, before Logan decapitates him with Cap’s shield.

Magneto’s real name is Max Eisenhardt, and the name we may be more familiar with is an alias Magneto was created after his first wife, Magda, died.

Bullseye is one of the few human Marvel villains whose full name has yet to be revealed. Bullseye uses the alias “Benjamin Poindexter” in a 1976 Daredevil comic, and Daredevil calls him “Lester” in 1998 comic, which may have been a continuity issue due to a new writer.

Mysterio might actually hold the title for the man who’s caused the X-Men the most pain, based mostly on his appearance in Old Man Logan. In one of the most brutal and horrifying moments in comics history, Wolverine wakes up one day to find the X-Men mansion overrun with enemies. He kills scores of supervillains before Mysterio reveals that it had all been an illusion—Wolverine had in fact been killing all of his fellow X-Men, as well as the mansion’s young students, as they begged for him to stop. Afterward, Wolverine left the mansion and didn’t unsheathe his claws for 50 years, living as a shell of his former self.

Loki, the God of Mischief, knows how to make life difficult for Thor and anyone else he views as a threat. At one point Loki used his shapeshifting abilities to turn himself into Sif, Thor’s ex-lover. This switch also accompanied some time traveling, which Loki used to kill his grandfather Bor. Loki also convinced Asgard that their ally, Beta Ray Bill, was a villainous Skrull. Thor caught on eventually, but by then, the damage was done.

On Wolverine’s birthday, he keeps an eye out for Sabretooth. The villainous mutant has the pesky habit of stalking Wolverine every year on his birthday, or the day Wolverine thinks is his birthday. Sabretooth never attacks but he’s there somewhere when Wolverine is blowing out his candles.

Reverend William Stryker, the man crusading against mutants in the X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills, has drawn comparisons to Mike Pence for his appearance. Artist Brent Anderson is aware of the comparison and confirms Stryker’s look was based on Alexander Haig, Ronald Reagan’s secretary of state.