Created back in 1964, Mysterio is a villain that first hit the scene in The Aamzing Spider-Man
issue 13, crafted from the imaginations of Stan Lee and Steve Ditko.
The character has been kicking around for half a century now, so naturally, like most
other comic book characters, there have been a handful of times when we’ve seen another
Mysterio from an alternate Earth pop up in the panels.
Seeing as alternate realities are the hot topic surrounding Mysterio thanks to his upcoming
appearance in Spider-Man Far From Home, we’ve decided to count down some of our favourites
with our list of the Top 10 Alternate Versions of Mysterio.
We’ll be talking specifically about alternate versions from alternate earths, not the multiple
men who have taken on the alias of Mysterio over the years in the 616 universe.
So with that in mind let’s get to it!
10 Old Man Logan This version of Mysterio may not be a prominent
character in the Old Man Logan comic, but he definitely plays a prominent role.
For context, Old Man Logan takes place in an alternate future where Logan, aka Wolverine,
has now aged significantly, and the supervillains have overthrown the superheroes, leading to
a bit of a post-apocalyptic scenario.
Logan has sworn to never let out his claws again thanks to a traumatic event that occurred
at the story’s start; an event that Mysterio is largely responsible for.
Mysterio, under orders from Red Skull, casts an illusion on Wolverine so that he believes
the members of the X-Men in the X-Mansion are all villains, and matches the villains
scents to boot.
Wolverine goes on a rampage and kills them all, only to realize the truth when he kills
the last villain, Bullseye, who he then sees as Jubilee.
With the X-Men gone, this allows Red Skull’s alliance of baddies to conquer the US.
And in order to ensure Mysterio can never pull the same trick again, Red Skull kills
him.
9 Mysterium – Eurth Mysterium is actually an alternate of Mysterio
that appeared on Earth 616 in the 2000 comic Avataars: Covenant of the Shield issue 2.
He’s a big green floating head who has a giant crystal ball sitting atop said head,
and he emits gases.
He’s part of the team Six Most Sinister who hail from Eurth, a medieval version of
Earth created by the Shaper of Worlds using the imagination of a child combined with the
history of Avalon.
He’s also a foe of Spider-Man’s Eurth alternate, Webslinger.
8 Fish-terio – Earth 7840 Fish-terio is one of the simplest alternates
on our list – he’s n anthropomorphic fish inside of a tank who is an enemy of Man-Spider’s,
aka Webster weaver, who is a literal spider.
Created by Don Glut and Jim Mooney, the character has only appeared in one Marvel comic; issue
8 of What The, the comedic series that runs in the same vein as Marvel’s What Ifs, exploring
hypothetical but significantly more absurd storylines.
It should come as no surprise that Fish-terio’s powers are unknown.
Gotta love an obscure alternate.
7 Mysterio the Actor – Earth 1610 While there is a mysterio from Earth 1610,
otherwise known as the Ultimates universe, this Mysterio is a different kind of alternate
– he’s an actor who was hired to play the villain in a Spider-Man movie.
He’s just a regular human named Bruce.
But what makes him a noteworthy alternate is the ties this character potentially has
to our real world.
In the original Sam Raimi Spider-Man trilogy, the director had initially intended to have
Mysterio be one of the future villains opposing the web slinger – something that never panned
out after the director left the franchise after Spider-Man 3 and the studio’s heavy
influence.
Raimi had intended for Bruce Campell, an actor who had made a ton of cameos throughout the
trilogy, to play Mysterio, which makes many believe that this version who appeared in
issue 55 of Ultimate Spider-Man to be a subtle reference to Campbell.
6 Mooseterio – Earth 8311 Moosterio comes from Earth 8311, which is
a universe in which all of our favourite Marvel characters are anthropomorphic animal superhero
alternates.
This includes the likes of Spider-Ham and Captain Americat (aka Steven Mouser, how cute).
Anywho, not much is actually known about Moosterio, aside from the fact that he’s a moose who
wears the same costume as Mysterio, and has yet to appear in a narrative story – he
only appeared in a collective pin up image featured in Spider-Ham issue 14back in 1987,
and hasn’t been seen since.
5 Misery-O – Earth 9047 Speaking of comical versions of Mysterio,
this one from Earth 9047 is exactly that!
Misery O is a parody of Mysterio that appeared in the comedy title What The, specifically
issue 8 back in 1990.
He presumably has all the same abilities as Mysterio does, except he has one dire weakness
– a serious drinking problem.
Aside from his addiction to alcohol, the character’s globe on his head is shown containing gold
fish at one point, where as in another panel that features him smashing a beer mug into
his face depicts the character with a note attached to his helmet that reads ‘do not
tap on glass’.
4 Mysterio – Earth 14512 This version of the iconic Spider-Man villain
appears in the Spider-Verse, specifically in issue 5 of Edge of Spider-Verse from 2014.
On this Earth, Spider-Man’s alternate is Peni Parker, whose father, the original one
to hold the mantle, died while piloting their suit – the SP//dr suit.
In order to operate it, one needs to be bitten by a radioactive spider to form the other
half of the suit’s CPU.
Mysterio is a big fan of SP//dr, and he’s even covered his walls in cut outs of SP//dr
from magazines.
Initially, he was a villain, having used a floating eye shaped vehicle to douse New york
City in hallucinogenic gas which manages to overpower the SP//dr suit’s filteration
system.
But at the end of the day, he’s stopped by SP//dr and gets locked up in prison.
But he does redeem himself, eventually aiding SP//dr’s organization, which on this earth
is Oscorp, by tipping them off about enhanced criminals who are holding innocent people
hostage.
3 Mysteriape – Earth 25 There’s a whole lot of animal alternates
out there for Mysterio, isn’t there?
Mysteriape is, you guessed it, an ape alternate of the villain.
He joins up with the Swinester Six, which is the equivalent of the Earth 25 Sinister
Six, and faces off against Earth 25’s Spider-Ham along with Dr Octopussycat, Eelectro, Sandmanatee,
Buzzard and Green Gobbler.
He aids in kidnapping Spider-Ham’s loved ones, but ultimately fails to defeat the web
slinging pig and finds himself in jail.
2 Francie Beck – Earth 12041 Francie Beck is the only alternate on our
list to come from one of Marvel’s animated series, appearing in the Ultimate spider-Man
show in a 2016 episode titled The Moon Knight Before Christmas.
Francie is actually the daughter of Quentin Beck, and has all the same powers as her daddy
dearest on Earth 616.
She wanted justice for her father after his alleged death, caused when he became trapped
in his helmet after fighting Spider-Man.
Francie would deceive Spider-Man, tricking him to let her into the Sanctum Sanctorum,
where she would retrieve her father’s helmet.
When she put it on, she discover that her father was still alive and imprisoned inside
the helmet thanks to a spell from Dormammu, and eventually, she works with both Spider-Man
and Moon Knight to break the spell, reuniting her with her father.
Later on, the character would join the SHIELD Academy.
And, fun fact – her name is possibly a reference to the third man to take on the mantle of
Mysterio, Francis Klum.
1 Ultimate Mysterio - Earth 1610 Let’s end off our list with the true Mysterio
from Earth 1610 – an alternate of Quentin Beck who first debuted in Ultimate Spider-Man
Annual issue 3.
This Mysterio looks quite different from the 616 version, wearing an entirely black costume
with a neck brace that creates a blue smoke shroud that conceals his head.
He ends up killing Kingpin after the events of Ultimatum in an attempt to become the next
crime boss of New York City by knocking him out of his skyscraper.
Ruthless.
Then, he releases a fear hallucinogen across all of Manhattan so he can rob a federal bank.
But here’s where it gets really interesting – it’s later revealed that this Mysterio
has actually been an android all along, and has been under the control of Mysterio from
Earth 616, who was looking to take over the Ultimate Marvel universe.
Neat.