Why Thanos Is The MCUs Best Villain (& 5 Alternatives)

Why Thanos Is The MCU’s Best Villain (& 5 Alternatives)

MCU fans don’t love every villain in the comic book franchise, but Thanos stands out as one of the most popular. However, he’s got stiff competition.

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Since its inception, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been accused of having a “villain problem.” While most of its heroes, from Tony Stark to Steve Rogers to Natasha Romanoff, are fascinating, fleshed-out characters with richly drawn story arcs and complex personalities, its villains have mostly fallen short. There are certainly a lot more forgettable villains in the MCU than memorable ones.

But the last two Avengers movies proved with their surprisingly nuanced portrayal of Thanos that Marvel does have the capacity to deliver on-screen villains that rank among the all-time best. The Mad Titan may be the MCU’s greatest villain, but he has some stiff competition.

10 Thanos Is The Best: Infinity War Humanized Him

The Russo brothers tackled the burden of introducing Doctor Strange and the Guardians of the Galaxy to Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in Avengers: Infinity War by telling the heroes’ stories through the eyes of the villain. Thanos is essentially the protagonist of Infinity War, as the movie follows his attempts to “save” the universe with trillions-strong genocide.

Sacrificing Gamora on Vormir humanized Thanos. He’s still overtly villainous, but Josh Brolin played the character’s emotional conflict in the Soul Stone scene beautifully.

9 Alternative: The Vulture

In the tradition of Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man villains, the Vulture has a personal connection to Peter Parker in Homecoming. In a shocking plot twist that brought the house down in every screening, Adrian Toomes is revealed to be the father of Peter’s love interest, Liz.

One of the movie’s greatest scenes sees Adrian driving Peter and Liz to the homecoming dance, and Liz unwittingly giving her dad all the clues he needs to figure out Peter is Spider-Man.

8 Thanos Is The Best: His Goals And Motivations Are Clear

It should be a given that the villain’s goals and motivations are clear because that’s screenwriting 101, but plenty of MCU movies have missed the mark in explaining why their villains want what they want (or what it even is that they want).

Within the first few minutes of Infinity War, it’s clear that Thanos is collecting the Infinity Stones so he can wipe out half of all life in the universe to allow the surviving half to thrive. He genuinely believes what he’s doing will save the world.

7 Alternative: The Winter Soldier

The best villains are the ones with an emotional attachment to the hero. Darth Vader is Luke Skywalker’s father, Annie Wilkes is Paul Sheldon’s biggest fan, etc. In Captain America: The Winter Soldier, the titular brainwashed Hydra assassin is Cap’s best friend, Bucky, who he thought was dead.

The conflict in The Winter Soldier is more complex than just outgunning the bad guys. Steve knows that Bucky is a good person, and that he can get through Bucky’s brainwashing and bring back the war hero he grew up with.

6 Thanos Is The Best: His Debut Lived Up To The Build-Up

Thanks to the MCU’s storytelling model, a lot of its movies’ villains have been teased in a post-credits scene years before making their debut. Thanos had played supporting roles in The Avengers and Guardians of the Galaxy and teased his quest to collect the Infinity Stones in Age of Ultron’s mid-credits sequence before playing a major role in Infinity War.

It would’ve seemed impossible for Thanos to live up to the six-year build-up, but Infinity War managed it. The character was as instantly iconic as he needed to be.

5 Alternative: Loki

Loki was first introduced as his brother’s adversary in the first Thor movie, but Tom Hiddleston didn’t really start to have fun with the role until he took on Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in 2012’s The Avengers.

In the years since the first Avengers movie, the trickster god has been redeemed in his brother’s eyes, thanks to heroic deeds in Ragnarok and Infinity War.

4 Thanos Is The Best: His Success Created The Most Iconic Downer Ending Since The Empire Strikes Back

Throughout Infinity War, Thanos was framed as another deranged megalomaniac with another ludicrous evil plan to “fix” the problems they see in the world. The Avengers were expected to defeat him at the last minute like they always do, and then they suffered their first defeat.

Earth’s Mightiest Heroes are left wallowing in the cosmic-sized consequences of their failure. The movie has a happy ending for the Mad Titan, but from the heroes’ perspective, it’s a devastating loss. This downer ending drew comparisons to The Empire Strikes Back.

3 Alternative: Hela

Taika Waititi delivered not one, not two, but three memorable villains in Thor: Ragnarok. Jeff Goldblum brought a hilarious dry wit to the Grandmaster and Surtur was just as visually stunning as comic book readers had hoped.

But the movie’s greatest villain is Hela, Thor’s long-lost sister who arrives to take over Asgard and reveal the blood-drenched history whitewashed by Odin. Cate Blanchett played the role with the delightful theatricality and mustache-twirling villainy of a character like Cruella de Vil or the Wicked Witch of the West.

2 Thanos Is The Best: Josh Brolin Played The Role With Unexpected Pathos

On paper, the role of Thanos sounds too silly to be taken seriously. He’s a bald-headed, purple-skinned alien who wants to collect six magical stones so he can reshape the entire universe.

Josh Brolin had a lot of heavy lifting to do with this character, but he brought so much unexpected pathos to the Mad Titan that the audience could overlook his outlandish appearance and see him as a real person.

1 Alternative: Killmonger

Like Heath Ledger’s Joker, Michael B. Jordan’s Erik Killmonger from Black Panther is a villain whose ideas make a lot of sense, but whose actions are morally questionable.

Killmonger wants to use Wakanda’s resources to help oppressed minorities across the world, which the audience can get on board with, but his plan to use violence as a means to an end is where T’Challa draws the line.

Link Source : https://screenrant.com/best-mcu-antagonist-thanos-other-choices/

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