Bad news, Marvel nerds: many of your favorite characters were probably stolen from your
arch-nemesis.
It's true.
DC Comics has been churning out awesome characters since 1934.
By the time Marvel Comics launched in 1939 under their first name, Timely Comics, they
were already five years behind.
Sure, Marvel is great, but they have quite a few characters of...questionable origin.
Don't worry—DC has a few Marvel rip-offs of its own, which you can learn about in our
companion video, "Characters DC Stole From Marvel And Gave A New Name."
But for now, here are some of Marvel's greatest characters, pitted against their earlier DC
counterparts.
The X-Men vs. The Doom Patrol
It's a comic about a team of misfits who've been shunned by society, coming together and
learning to use their powers for good.
They fight for acceptance under the leadership of a brainiac in a wheelchair.
They're called...The Doom Patrol, and they were first published in June of 1963—three
months before the X-Men showed up.
Coincidence?
The similarities between the two teams would grow in March of 1964, when the X-Men took
on the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants.
Meanwhile, the Doom Patrol fought The Brotherhood of Evil.
The similarities between the two comics were so strong that Doom Patrol creator Arnold
Drake accused Stan Lee of somehow stealing his ideas, though it's never been proven.
Maybe great minds think alike.
Or just have great mind-reading super powers.
Black Cat vs. Catwoman
Originally known as simply "The Cat," Catwoman appeared in the first issue of Batman, published
in 1940.
She was originally a cat-themed burglar with no fancy powers.
And today, Catwoman Selina Kyle is still pretty much the same: an agile anti-hero with a romantic
interest in Batman.
Writer Marv Wolfman basically ripped off the whole "literal cat burglar" Catwoman thing
when he created Felicia Hardy, the Black Cat, in 1979.
From the cat-themed, morally ambiguous thief aspects, all the way down to her weird love
of Spider-Man, Black Cat lacks any kind of real originality.
Over time, Black Cat got some vague "bad luck" powers and a super-suit, but Felicia "Black
Cat" Hardy still has her origins as a cheap Catwoman ripoff.
"Bye Felicia"
Deadpool vs. Deathstroke
Rob Liefeld has a bit of a reputation for not being able to come up with truly original
ideas.
When the Teen Titans fan showed his first drawings of Deadpool to writer Fabian Nicieza
in 1991, it was obvious that Deadpool wasn't much more than an unoriginal "homage" to DC
Comics' Deathstroke.
And Nicieza ran with it.
The terrible joke expanded to the fact that Deadpool was eventually named Wade Wilson...after
Deathstroke's real name, Slade Wilson.
Ultimately, Deadpool was such a silly character that he took on a life of his own, becoming
a fan favorite, and embraced the most absurd comic adventures ever written.
With his smash movie from 2016, he's become a cultural phenomenon.
Meanwhile, Deathstroke is still just a boring assassin obsessed with killing super-teens.
But at least he was there first.
The Vision vs. Red Tornado
You may know Vision from Avengers: Age of Ultron.
But he first appeared in the comics all the way back in 1968.
The original Vision is an evil creation of Ultron designed to destroy the Avengers.
And just like in Age of Ultron, Vision ultimately turns against his creator and becomes a hero
as he searches for his humanity.
However, this wasn’t the first time this story was told.
A few years earlier in 1963, a very similar event occurred when a supervillain designed
an android called Red Tornado.
The bot was created to infiltrate and defeat DC’s Justice Society of America, but ultimately
ended up becoming a hero as well.
Yes, team-destroying androids are common, and the two have different powers.
But their costumes have just a few too many similarities to be purely coincidental.
Those big belts and enormous collars are way too gauche to just be accidents…
Bullseye vs. Deadshot
Deadshot first appears in 1950 as a Batman villain, where he’s first seen wearing a
top hat while attempting to replace Batman as the hero of Gotham.
Deadshot basically has Batman’s fighting skills, but brings expert marksmanship the
table.
Later, in the world of Marvel, another street-level hero, Daredevil, would face a similar foe
with Bullseye.
But that wouldn’t happen until 1976.
Both Deadshot and Bullseye are master marksmen who never miss their targets.
"I never miss"
They’re experts at hand-to-hand combat, have metal body enhancements, and come from
abusive families.
The two are basically a couple of sad sacks with really good aim, and that aim is good
enough to keep both of them working in comics and on screen… but Deadshot was first...by
a longshot.
Boomerang vs. Captain Boomerang
Why Marvel comics would want to mimic DC Comics' boomerang-tossing bad guy is anyone's guess,
because both of them... kinda suck.
Obviously, both characters were born in Australia, but while Captain Boomerang primarily fights
the Flash, regular Boomerang spends a lot of time fighting Marvel's fast-talking Spider-Man.
The Captain arrived in 1960, while his unranked Marvel doppelganger appeared in 1966.
Both use ridiculous augmented boomerangs that include everything from bombs to razors to
probably bumblebees or something.
And Marvel's Boomerang even wears a boomerang on his face, like angry eyebrows, just so
everyone knows what he does.
Hey at least Captain Boomerang keeps it limited to a really terrible boomerang-print shirt.
Have we said the word "boomerang" enough yet?
Boomerang.
Super Adaptoid vs. Amazo
The idea of an android that could copy the powers of superheroes was created by Gardner
Fox and Murphy Anderson in 1960.
They named him Amazo, and he became a pretty big threat to the Justice League of America.
Six years later, Stan Lee came up with a strikingly similar idea, sending a robot foe with identical
power-copying abilities up against the Avengers.
"But from where did it come?"
"Ha ha ha ha!
Cannot you guess, Captain America?"
Granted, Lee's Super Adaptoid looks way cooler than Amazo's weird elf-ears and striped-pants
thing, but that's all thanks to Jack Kirby's awesome art.
Unfortunately, Super-Adaptoid was just six years too late to be the original.
Thanos vs. Darkseid
Darkseid is Jack Kirby's giant-jawed alien overlord of Apokolips, hell-bent on seeking
out the anti-life equation and eradicating the universe of all free will.
Thanos, on the other hand, is the giant-jawed overlord of Titan, fixated on making Death
his girlfriend and subjugating the galaxy.
Both are super-strong, telekinetic teleporters who seem to be ageless, and can travel through
time.
And both are pretty much the most powerful bad guys in their respective universes.
You can't really blame Jim Starlin for trying to come up with his own version of Darkseid
for Marvel Comics in 1973, because Darkseid is one heck of an awesome villain.
It doesn't get much cooler than soul-seeking eye-lasers, but those eye-lasers showed up
in 1970, three years prior to Marvel’s Thanos and his Infinity Gauntlet.
Even the Time Gem can’t fix that.
Thanks for watching!
Subscribe to our YouTube channel to watch more videos like the one you just saw.
And leave us a comment to let us know which characters you think are the biggest ripoffs...