Even the MCU's strongest and most charismatic villains have weak spots of their own, through
which the hero winds up gaining the upper hand and saving the day. From Iron Monger
to Killmonger, here are the biggest weaknesses of these MCU bad guys.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe got its start in 2008 with Iron Man, which introduced the
world to Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark and laid the groundwork for the next ten years
of genre-defining superhero movies. As iconic as the first Iron Man film is, however, we
wouldn't blame you for forgetting about Obadiah Stane, the vicious opponent who inadvertently
pushed Tony to transform from a brilliant but selfish arms dealer into a world-saving,
self-sacrificing hero.
Stane was an old friend of Howard Stark, Tony's father, and served as CEO of Stark Industries
after Howard's death until Tony was able to take over. Despite his fatherly demeanor,
Stane coveted Tony's role as the man in charge, and he wound up throwing in his lot with the
Ten Rings in an effort to get Tony out of the picture and regain control of the company.
Stane simply was not content to be Tony's mentor and second-in-command, especially when
Tony's conscience started cutting into Stark Industries' bottom line. He hoped to seize
back the company from its idealistic CEO, and he created the Iron Monger suit to help
him do just that.
Unfortunately for Stane, the greed that motivated him to steal a company was also what led to
his ultimate demise. Not only did he pause to gloat rather than finishing Tony off, his
rush to build his own Iron Man suit without Tony's brilliance backing it up left him with
a powerful but crucially flawed design.
"How'd you solve the icing problem?"
"Icing problem?"
"Might want to look into it."
That combination of arrogance and greed, along with an unfortunate choice to open up his
armor to brag face-to-face, put a quick end to Stane's career as a supervillain.
It's no secret that the children of Odin could use quite a bit of family therapy, although
each of them seems to struggle with a different issue. The Allfather's youngest son, Loki,
wrestles with a godly inferiority complex that pit him against his family and would
come to threaten not just the world, but the entire universe. Even before he learned that
he was actually the biological son of the Frost Giant king Laufey, Loki felt like he
could never get out of his brother Thor's shadow.
"So I am no more than an unearthed stolen relic, locked up here until you might have
use of me?"
"Why do you twist my words?"
After learning the truth of his origins, Loki's insecurity kicked into overdrive. He compensated
by attempting to get rid of his brother entirely so that he wouldn't have to compete with him
anymore, even though Thor himself never saw Loki as anything but a beloved brother. That
anger even drove him to drop into the vast emptiness of space rather than accept his
brother's mercy after his first defeat.
When Loki returned in The Avengers, it was as a puppet of Thanos, throwing in with the
universe's most evil villain in an effort to prove himself superior to his brother.
Even then, the greatest opponent Loki faced was his own self-doubt. Well…self-doubt
and the Hulk.
Over and over, he attempted to prove that he was worthy of something he already had,
the love and respect of his adopted family. At first, he acted out in unhealthy and harmful
ways in an attempt to convince both his relatives and himself that he didn't need anything from
them, even though he obviously yearned for their approval. Eventually, as he learned
to accept that Thor had always loved him just the way he was, he was able to work productively
alongside his brother, instead of feeling threatened by him…just in time to be taken
out by Thanos in front of the brother with whom he'd just made peace. Better late than
never.
As a literal robot, it's unsurprising that the genocidal Ultron adhered pretty stringently
to rules of his own making. However, his inability to compromise or bend his rigid views is what
ultimately led to his downfall in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Well, that and the Hulk. These
bad guys don't really do so well with him, huh?
A product of Tony Stark's peacekeeping program, which was subsequently beefed up by the Mind
Stone, Ultron's core objective was to protect the Earth from future threats. Unfortunately
for everyone, after mulling over his mission for a while, Ultron determined that the biggest
threat to Earth was, in fact, humans, and he set about attempting to eradicate them.
The fixed mindset that sent Ultron on his destructive path was also what caused his
end. Even after meeting opposition from the Vision, an artificial being created the same
way, Utlron couldn't be reasoned with. If Ultron had been able to change his mind, perhaps
the Avengers would've found a way to allow him to exist. As it was, Ultron's single-mindedness
paved the way for his complete annihilation, just like all of his robotic creations.
Superhero movies might be popular, but they tend to be a hard sell when it comes to critical
acknowledgement. Every now and then, though, one manages to break through as an awards
contender because it's simply too compelling to ignore. This was the case with Black Panther,
and a big part of that film's success was thanks to its villain, Erik Killmonger. Unlike
most Marvel movies, which tend to open with the hero's origin story, Black Panther started
with Killmonger's, and from the moment we saw him as a child in that opening scene,
he was incredibly sympathetic.
In fact, as the film progressed, the moviegoers in the audience, and even some of the film's
good guys had to admit that Killmonger was making a few good points.
"These items aren't for sale."
"How do you think your ancestors got these? You think they paid a fair price? Or did they
take it like they took everything else?"
T'Challa himself conceded that his father, T'Chaka, was wrong about Wakanda's policy
of isolation, and that abandoning young Erik had been a mistake.
Yet rather than cultivate the favor of people already inclined to agree with him, Killmonger
wound up pushing them away with his uncompromising extremist views. While adopting a more measured
approach could've won him allies within Wakanda, including possibly even T'Challa, Killmonger's
plan was to stoke civil uprisings by flooding the world with Wakandan weapons. His all-or-nothing
approach to achieving his vision meant that rather than finding an ally in the king of
Wakanda, he found an opponent, and the two wound up battling to the death.
Loki spent his entire cinematic lifetime struggling to dig out from under a hefty pile of self-doubt
and prove his worthiness to his father, his brother, and most of all, himself. His older
sister, Hela, had the opposite problem in Thor: Ragnarok. She was so convinced that
she should be ruling over Asgard that she thought all she'd have to do was show up,
and people would fall in line behind their beloved new queen. Granted, she was a formidable
opponent, as evidenced by her ability to take out the Warriors Three and the armies of Asgard
single-handedly. Still, marching through the streets taking out beloved second-string Marvel
characters and sending all the other Asgardians into hiding doesn't really endear you to the
public, no matter how cool your giant wolf is. In other words, she wasn't exactly greeted
as a liberator, and her entitlement lulled her into thinking she'd prevail simply because
she thought she should.
"Believe me, I would love for someone else to rule, but it can't be you, you're just
the worst."
Hela's sense of superiority kept her from winning anyone to her cause, with even her
right-hand lieutenant abandoning ship when he couldn't stomach any more of her actions.
She could have relied on her legitimate claim to the throne to win over the Asgardians.
But instead of working with her brothers, she blasted them into oblivion without even
checking to make sure they were gone for good, leaving herself wide open for them to team
up against her. If she'd taken the time to actually interact with the people of Asgard
instead of terrorizing them, or if she'd collaborated with her brothers instead of opposing them,
it may have led to an Asgard that all three of Odin's children could've live in together,
instead of one that had to be razed into nothing.
Carol Danvers faces a variety of opponents in Captain Marvel, but Yon-Rogg is by far
the most insidious. He spends most of the film pretending to be her mentor and ally,
but even when he's being set up as Carol's friend, there are hints of darkness lying
beneath his friendly surface. Multiple times, he attempts to diminish her power under the
guise of "training" her, accusing her of being "too emotional." He pushes her to hold back
rather than develop her strength, and discourages her from exploring the limits of her powers.
He claims this is for her own good, to teach her control, but it's really designed to keep
her weak, so that he can hold the power in the relationship.
Gradually, as Carol uncovers the truth of who she is, she begins to realize that Yon-Rogg's
training was never meant to help her. Instead, he was giving her a pair of metaphorical handcuffs,
holding her back so that the Kree can use her for their own purposes. Carol stepping
into her own power feels like a threat to Yon-Rogg, who wishes to keep her small so
that he can feel big, important, and powerful. He even goes as far as trying to win her over
with the approval he's been holding back once she realizes the truth. Strip away the superpowers,
and it's a story all too familiar for many women who've been abused by insecure men.
Yon-Rogg's weakness doesn't have anything to do with his physical capabilities but everything
to do with how threatened he feels by a strong woman. It's an attitude that leads him to
getting blasted into a rock because once Carol figures out what he's doing, she has no tolerance
for it anymore.
There isn't a single Marvel villain who doesn't have some degree of hubris in their character,
but no one displays this trait more than Thanos, whose plan to eliminate half of all life in
the universe culminates in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame. Thanos is convinced
that what he's doing isn't just right, but necessary, and that it's up to him to set
things on a path that only he's allowed to determine no matter the cost.
Granted, Thanos is incredibly powerful, and he actually does succeed despite his arrogance.
But in viewing himself and his plan as "inevitable," Thanos doesn't ever consider that there may
be value in individual lives, teamwork, and self-sacrifice. He views the Avengers as pests
to be swatted down rather than serious threats, and it never occurs to him that someone else
could be willing to sacrifice everything to preserve the lives Thanos wants to take. The
Avengers fight their battle knowing the odds are against them, which makes them willing
to do whatever they have to in order to earn their victory. They're willing to sacrifice
themselves while Thanos is only willing to sacrifice others. The Mad Titan never even
considers that he might lose, which cracks open the door for exactly that to happen.
For the first act of Spider-Man: Far From Home, Quentin Beck seems like a pretty good
guy. He's funny, he's charming, and he seems like exactly the sort of smart and nurturing
mentor figure Peter Parker is looking for. Unfortunately, he's also a con man nursing
a serious grudge against his former employer Tony Stark, and he's decided that the whole
world has to pay for the wrong that was done to him.
To be fair, Tony Stark was probably a pretty terrible boss to work for, and absolutely
underestimated the technology Beck and his crew use throughout the film. Beck has every
right to be mad. But the lengths he goes to in drawing together a group of similarly wronged
ex-employees and hatching a plan to destroy entire cities in order to usurp Tony's legacy?
That goes a little beyond leaving him a bad review on Glassdoor. This bitterness pushes
Mysterio to keep going way past the time when he should've stopped. It leads him to keep
attacking Peter with his drones even after they start malfunctioning, which ultimately
leads to his death.
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