Many of our favourite supervillains have a strong motivation for what they do.
In fact many of them believe that they are in the right.
To a supervillain, they are the hero of the story.
Getting back at society for wronging them or aiming to make the world a better place
perhaps but at the cost of things like personal freedoms.
The best villains have something about them that is frighteningly relatable to us.
But not all villains have such an inspiring motive behind them.
Some villains turn to a life of crime for reasons that are not understandable.
Villains who feel as though the world has slighted them still but in a way that might
make a reader chuckle or raise an eyebrow, not considered as relatable.
Today we are going to take a look at some of these supervillains as we count down the
top 10 supervillain origins you won't believe.
We'll be taking a closer look at some of the top villains whose motivations are less than
motivating.
Alright, let's get counting.
10 Plantman
Granted there are two different versions of Plantman in Marvel comics but for our purpose,
I would like to talk about Samuel Smithers, a man who worked for years with a botanist
and was working on perfecting a plant ray that would allow him to increase the IQ of
plants which he believed to be capable of intelligence.
Sure, why not?
After the botanist he was studying under died, he moved to the US but was unqualified in
terms of his schooling to find a job where he could continue his research.
Instead he worked as a gardner.
But instead of doing his job of tending the plants and cutting the grass he spent more
time working on his invention, causing him to get fired.
Fortunately a bolt of lightning struck his device which apparently was all needed to
become fully functional.
Smithers now realized that he could not only increase the plants IQ but command them with
his ray.
Does he want world domination?
To prove to the world his brilliance and terrorize them with his finished invention?
Nope, he just wants revenge for getting fired.
Even the new Plantman, Paul's motivation for villainy is pretty ridiculous.
He turned to a life of crime so he could make more than minimum wage after being caught
stealing variant covers in the comic book store where he worked.
9 Sportsmaster
Lawrence "Crusher" Crock was one of the worst sportsmen to play any sport.
And he reportedly played them all.
But he was also the dirtiest player around.
He cheated in every sport and became barred from all of them.
Infuriated, he decided to turn to a life of crime.
Despite the fact that he was still a trained athlete so he could have become a coach or
possibly a fitness model, but no, crime was the only path for the Crusher.
Oddly enough in the comic where he was introduced, All American Comics volume 1 issue 85, Green
Lantern is also keeping up with his career and sports.
Sure, why not?
Sportsmaster's master plan is to set up a polo match where they will put all the audience
to sleep and rob them.
But Green Lantern attends and handily foils it.
Oh yeah, did I mention he usually just fights with sports equipment?
8 Lenny Luthor
In the film Superman 4: The Quest for Peace, Lex has a nephew who helps him escape his
prison sentence while he is working on a road gang.
His motivation in the film seems somewhat unclear, appearing to be a villain simply
due to the fact that he is related to one without any specific reason for wanting to
defeat Superman.
Perhaps it is because Lex is the only one who will put up with him cause he's super
annoying?
Or he's doing it for an inheritance?
But just because your related to a villain doesn't mean you have to become their villainous
sidekick.
I guess this is based around the old adage, like Uncle like Nephew.
7 Yon Rogg
In the MCU film Captain Marvel, Yon Rogg is painted as a villain whose motive is to recover
and preserve Kree technology that could be used in a war against the Skrulls.
His comic book counterpart does not have such a strong patriotic motivation unfortunately.
Yon Rogg is colonel who immediately is painted as a villain when we meet him in Marvel Super-Heroes
volume 1 issue 12, when he orders Captain Mar-Vell to go down to the earth's surface
alone as the Kree spaceship arrives at planet earth.
This is apparently against all standard protocol but this act as well as all of his villainous
acts stems from the fact that he is jealous of the Captain who has the love of the ship's
lovely medic, Una.
The crazy thing about this origin story and motivation is that this feud continues even
after Una dies in the comics.
At that point Yon Rogg just seems to hate Mar-Vell just for thwarting him.
6 Calendar Man
This Batman villain was first introduced in Detective Comics in volume 1 issue 259.
Where did he come from?
Why did he commit the crimes he did?
None of these questions are ever really fully answered but it looks like did it because
he could...?
In later incarnations the Calendar Man is presented as a man obsessed with the calendar
and dates.
In his original appearance he was a traveling magician from India who was in town for five
days and decided to challenge Batman, performing 5 crimes in the 5 days he was there to prove
that Batman could not catch him.
He almost got away with it two but Batman noticed in the newspaper that there was an
announcement about the magician's shows and that he would be here for 5 days.
The clue he gave Batman was that he was basing his crimes on the five seasons.
Being from India the fifth season was supposed to be a reference to the monsoon or rainy
season.
The real mystery here is why a successful magician felt it necessary to gode Batman
into capturing him and why he turned to a life of crime in the first place.
5 Paste Pot Pete
Paste Pot Pete was introduced in the 60s in Strange Tales vol 1 issue 104.
There he appears as a villain with a particularly powerful paste gun which he uses to commit
crimes by trapping those who get in his way in paste.
His backstory was delved into in the 90s in Spider-Man vol 1 issue 91, where we learned
that Peter Petruski was a brilliant scientist who invented the polymer substance he uses
in his device.
Now going by the name of Trapster, it's revealed to us that Peter could have patented the substance
and made himself a fortune but instead he turned to a life of crime, believe that was
the better option.
I'm sorry, in what world is that the better option?
He'd already done a good amount of the work toward producing an invention that would make
him money without becoming a criminal?
I don't understand!
4 Rainbow Raider
This Flash villain was first introduced in Flash vol 1, issue 286.
He is Roy G. Bivolo.
I know, get ready.
As a young boy, Roy always wanted to be an artist but he was born colour blind.
Although his technique was perfect, the fact that he his choice of colours when it came
to his paintings was atrocious meant that he could never be a painter.
Sigh.
But wait a minute, can't he just paint in black and white?
No apparently not.
His father worked hard to build him prisma-goggles which would give Roy the ability to see colour
and on his deathbed handed them over to his son, saying that they would be his "compensation."
Roy interpreted this to mean that he would be compensated for years of being mocked as
a painter and robbed of the ability by using the powers of the prisma goggles to start
a life a crime.
His goal?
To steal priceless works of art and zap them of colour so that no one can enjoy them.
Even though, you can totally enjoy black and white art just fine.
He can also shoot colours at people to make them feel emotions.
For example, blue makes you sad.
Cause, yeah, that's how colour-rays work apparently.
3 White Rabbit
Lorina Dodson first appears in Marvel Team-Ups volume 1, issue 131 featuring a teamup between
Spiderman and Frogman that is kind of adorable.
When she was a young girl she was raised as a proper lady and to escape for her strict
and boring upbringing she found her escape in books.
How appropriate considering, us readers often escape in our own way through reading comics.
That's where the comparison and relatability might end with Dodson though.
She became obsessed with Alice and Wonderland throughout her childhood.
And even in the lap of luxury she was never quite happy.
She was married off at a young age to a very old man who later died and left her a fortune.
She could have done anything she wanted with this fortune but the thing she wanted most
was to become an Alice in Wonderland themed criminal.
Yup.
So that is why she became White Rabbit.
Ultimately she was just bored.
Also for someone who identifies as bibliophile, she misquotes Plato.
Attributing the phrase if you want something done right, do it yourself mistakenly to the
ancient Greek philosopher when it is often attributed as being a saying of Napoleon Bonaparte
and french playwright, Charles-Guillaume Etienne.
2 Film Freak
Burt Weston was a struggling actor who faked his death to try and gain some attention when
he came back from the dead and revealed that he'd survived.
The only issue is that no one noticed he had died.
No one in the public eye seemed to mourn him or care.
As a result, Burt Weston stayed dead and Film Freak was born.
A villain who quoted movies.
Burt had always been obsessed with the villain roles, considering them meatier parts.
So he decided to act out his fantasy of being criminal by actually pursuing a life of crime.
So you know he can get some notoriety and possibly an award winning film role, proving
his abilities by adopting the mantles of famous movie villains like Norman Bates from Psycho.
1 Codpiece
This backstory is about just what you think it's about.
When Codpiece was a teenager in highschool he was turned down for a date because he was
not "big enough."
The girl in school meant that he wasn't tall enough of course.
But he interpreted it in a different way.
All throughout his life he attributed all his failed romances to this singular problem.
What a guy to do?
Turn to a life of crime, I guess?
He built himself a giant utility codpiece and attempted to use it to rob a bank in Doom
Patrol, vol 2 issue 70 but was stopped by Coagula who dissolved his codpiece.
No codmobile for him, I suppose.
Thank you so much for watching, nerd squad.
I hope some of the motivations on this list made you laugh a little.
I love villains that have outlandish origins and motives.
They are not only entertaining but show us how something that may seem insignificant
or small to an observer can mean the world to those who are personally encountering that
perceived small experience.
Who are some of your favourite supervillains?
What are your favourite motivations for becoming a supervillain?
Which supervillains with ridiculous origins do you think should have made our cut?
Let us know in the comment below.
And while you are on your way down there, remember to like, subscribe and ring our bell
if you love supervillains as much as we do.
Till next time this has been top 10 nerd and I'm your host Amanda McKnight, reminding you
to stay nerdy, YouTube.