Superheroes aren’t perfect.
Their flaws are often what makes them more relatable to readers, and makes them more
complex, three dimensional characters whose stories we can really connect to.
So sometimes, they screw up, and often, with the amount of responsibility they have thrust
upon them, those screw ups can have catastrophic consequences.
Or at least consequences that are far from ideal.
So today, we’re taking a closer look at these mistakes with our list of the top 10
superheroes who were wrong.
10 Batman – The Dark Knight Returns Starting off this list with one of the lighter
mishaps of one of the most popular superheroes, let’s take a look at Bruce Wayne in Frank
Miller’s older incarnation, The Dark Knight Returns.
Early on in the story, Miller explores Bruce’s suppressed trauma over the death of Jason
Todd, and his ‘failures’ with his previous Robins.
So when youngster Carrie Kelley arrives on the scene and wants to work with Wayne as
his new Robin, Bruce isn’t having any of it.
But eventually, she proves him wrong, but saving him, making for one of the more rare
heartfelt moments in the story between the two.
9 Cyclops Over the year, Cyclops aka Scott Summers has
done some pretty questionable things.
But perhaps one of the more questionable actions he’s taken was to kill Charles Xavier.
During the Avengers vs X-Men storyline, Cyclops comes into possession of the Phoenix Force,
and takes it upon himself to look after the well-being of mutants and the world.
Xavier questions him, the two fight, and Cyclops kills him.
Which definitely didn’t have the best interest of mutants at heary, all things considered.
8 Black Panther Black Panther is a character with a strong
moral compass, but that doesn’t mean he hasn’t made some bad judgment calls in the
past.
In Avengers vol issue 6, T’Challa’s reasoning is skewed when he decides it’s a good idea
to blow up an alternate earth in order to save the regular earth.
It’s a storyline in which the Illuminati are forced to figure out what to do about
a situation in which earths are colliding with one another.
T’challa is faced yet again with a similar challenge a few issues later in issue 21,
where he decides to not detonate another earth, but in doing so, is still disowned by the
ghost of his father, causing him to lose Wakanda, and Namor picks up the detonator and blows
up the other earth anyway.
7 Black Panther, again Unfortunately, that’s not the only time
that Black Panther makes a dire mistake.
His alternate versions are guilty of it, too.
So on Earth 161, Black Panther is a little too trusting of Storm, who, at the time, betrayed
the X-Men and fought against them.
She shows up at Wakanda, and Black Panther takes her in, not realizing that this is an
evil version of his past love.
She starts using her powers to help the people of Wakanda, gaining their trust, and eventually,
T’Challa proposes to her.
On the night of their wedding, Killmonger shows up, kills his entire family, and then
kills T’Challa – all part of Storm’s plan to get power over Wakanda, and still
seem like a victim.
She murders Killmonger, and ends up becoming Queen.
6 Iron Man From panels to frames, let’s dive into the
MCU for this number and talk about Captain America Civil War.
Tony Stark didn’t believe that Cap was right about Bucky being innocent concerning the
explosion that went off at the UN and killed T’Chaka, who was king of Wakanda at the
time.
It acts as fuel to their already potent disagreement over the superhero accords, and whether or
not the avengers – and superheroes in general – need to be regulated by the government.
While Stark does realize that Cap is right, it leads to him coming to Cap and Bucky’s
aide, only to learn that Bucky was responsible for killing his parents, which results in
him and Cap duking it out.
5 The New Warriors Speaking of Civil War, let’s jump over to
that story in the comics, and look at one of the instigating factors – The New Warriors
and the televised fight that lead to the deaths of 612 people.
Prior to the events of Civil War, the New Warriors had their own reality television
show, and during the filming of one episode, they carelessly take on super villain Nitro,
a character that can explode and reform at will.
Nitro causes a massive explosion that kills 612 people in Stamford Connecticut and most
of the team.
4 Batgirl The New 52 offered a lot of promise for the
revamped version of Batgirl.
There was some controversy over the fact that DC was giving her the ability to walk again
– she had become paralyzed in the Killing Joke and was re-powered as Oracle, a superhero
in a wheelchair.
But despite that, with Gail Simone writing for the Bat Girl title, people were excited,
and Simone made the comic into something that DC had seriously been lacking when it came
to kick ass female superheroes who were complex, flawed individuals.
This included exploring the trauma Batgirl was still coping with.
At one point, still getting a feel for being able to utilize her body again, Batgirl gets
freaked out while trying to intervene an attack by Mirror at the hospital in the first issue
of her New 52 run.
She freezes up when Mirror points a gun at her, which results in him getting away with
killing a man in a hospital bed via pushing him through a window.
3 Superman In the Injustice universe, we’re presented
with alternate versions of many of our favourite heroes, half of which have gone bad and joined
a vengeful Superman and his regime.
This all goes down when the Joker tricks Superman into killing Lois Lane, who was pregnant with
his child.
When Superman realizes this, he completely loses it, and kills the Joker, despite Batman’s
attempts to convince him to do the just thing.
From then on out Superman dishes out his new brand of justice by becoming the supreme ruler
over the Earth, which becomes more of a totalitarian reign as opposed to one that benefits it.
I think that definitely classifies as making the wrong choice there.
2 Booster Gold Booster Gold aka Michael Jon Carter was born
in the 25th century and grew up in poverty after his father left him and his sister before
they could remember due to his gambling addiction.
Being a gifted athlete, he went to Gotham University on a football scholarship, but
then his father re-entered his life and convinced Michael to lose games for gambling purposes.
He was expelled.
So instead, he decided to go a different route, and stole a bunch of objects from the Legion
of Suoer-Heroes museum displays, went back in time, and made it his goal to become a
corporate superhero – in other words, get sponsorship and be super rich.
While the plan pans out at first, he eventually ends up bankrupt after he’s black mailed
by a member of the Manhunters into doing their bidding.
1 Spider-Man Perhaps the most profound mistake ever made
by a superhero – and most defining one – was Peter Parker’s decision to not stop the
burglar who was being chased by a security guard after his mishap television appearance.
The security guard calls out to him to stop the burglar from getting away, to which Peter
responds it’s not his job to catch criminals.
The burglar got away, and later, to his horror, finds out that the burglar shot his Uncle
Ben, giving him a fatal wound.
This is when Peter realizes the famous, underlying theme that continues to be prevalent in the
hero’s comics – with great power comes great responsibility.
There we have it friends!
Which of these heroes do you think were actually justified in doing what they did?
Do you think there’s other heroes who goofed up worse that we should’ve included on this
list?
Give us a shout in those comments!
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