Welcome to I Am Your Target Demographic and today we’re talking about Thanos!
As the star of Avengers: Infinity War, a lot of you are likely wanting to know more about
Thanos and what the comic books tell us about this villain.
We’re also going to cover his loyal followers called the Black Order, who also appear in Infinity War.
Let’s start zoomed out.
It began on the world called Titan, with a race of beings called the Eternals.
These are incredibly powerful people, perfect in almost every way, and their civilization
was peaceful and prosperous.
However, there was a mutant gene caused the Deviant Syndrome and Thanos was born with
this disease, causing him to look hideous, his own mother tried to kill him when she
saw him for the first time.
He grew up an outcast, though incredibly smart.
He was obsessed with finding out why he was different though, so he began killing and
dissecting others to learn how they worked.
He even killed his own mother in hopes of finding out more about himself.
This whole time Thanos has been encouraged and motivated by a mysterious woman that wanted
him to embrace these murderous tendencies and it turned out to be Death herself, the
embodiment of all death in the universe.
He was in love and would do whatever she said, which usually resulting in killing people.
He needed power to do this, so Thanos used all sorts of means to make himself more powerful
including the reality-altering cosmic cube which gave him incredibly powerful cosmic abilities.
That wasn’t enough though, so Thanos began a quest for the infinity stones, six powerful
gems that would allow the user to control all means of power.
With this glove, he might be able to finally prove himself to his mistress Death and he
hoped to do this by killing half of all living beings in the entire galaxy.
He snapped his fingers and made this happen.
Those that were left battled him and ultimately it was Nebula who stole the gauntlet and undid his actions.
While Nebula is his adopted daughter in the movies, in the comics she is his grandniece.
Now, Thanos is part of a love triangle that we’ll likely never see on the big screen.
While he fights to impress Death, she’s often wooing after the anti-hero Deadpool.
Thanos actually cursed Deadpool with the inability to die, so that he and Death can never be together.
Thanos still fights to impress her, though nothing seems to do the trick.
In a newer effort to raze and pillage the universe, Thanos recruited a group known as
the Black Order, though in the film Infinity War, they’re called the Children of Thanos.
The most prominent in the film is Ebony Maw, whose powers differ quite greatly.
In the comics, Ebony Maw is a whisperer, able to command others with his voice and get them
to act against their own self-interest.
In the comics, he does face off against Doctor Strange and even gets him to summon an ancient demon to Earth.
The physical powerhouse of the group is called Black Dwarf, though in the movie is renamed to Cull Obsidian.
He is an immensely powerful warrior and in the comics leads an attack on Wakanda very
reminiscent of what we see in the movie.
He was killed by a character called Ronan the Accuser, who appeared as the villain in
Guardians of the Galaxy.
We also have a villain named Proxima Midnight, who leads an attack on New York that again
looks familiar from the film.
She is an incredible warrior and uses a spear that was forged using a dying star that was
caught in an endless cycle of star, supernova, and black hole, all at once.
She is married to another member of the Black Order, Corvus Glaive.
This warrior is forever connected to his weapon, so if the glaive he wields is intact, he can forever resurrect himself.
In the comics, Glaive is considered the right-hand of Thanos and one of his fiercest warriors.
There was a fifth member of the Black Order that did not appear in Infinity War, a telepathic
woman named Supergiant who was killed in a massive explosive.
She was considered a mental parasite and was able to take over her victims’ minds.
They likely decided that Ebony Maw served this role somewhat in the film so her role
would’ve been redundant.
Even with all of these powerful warriors under his command, Thanos still struggled to win
the respect of Death.
We have a more current story arc where Thanos is pulled into the future, where an older
version of him is King.
He is served by a fan favorite character known as Cosmic Ghost Rider, which turned out to
be a version of Frank Castle, the Punisher, but gifted with incredible cosmic powers of vengeance.
Even with all this power in the future, Thanos is still unable to earn the love of Mistress
Death and tries to convince the younger him to try some new methods, though the young
Thanos ultimately returns back to his normal timeline.
This is a superficial look so I skipped over a lot of major Thanos storylines and arcs
but you should have a good idea of what he’s all about.
Do you find him an interesting character?
How do you think the movie did of creating an interesting, though different, story for him?
Let me know in the comments and thanks for watching!