Best and Worst Villains in Marvel Animation

[The Overlord]

Who are the best and worst villains in Marvel animation? Now you can define this any way you want, best adapted from the page to the screen, best improved from the comics, best original villain, etc and vice versa. Also, this can cover animated property that exists, TV shows or movies, going from the 1960s till now.

[Mary Jay]

Who are the best and worst villains in Marvel animation? Now you can define this any way you want, best adapted from the page to the screen, best improved from the comics, best original villain, etc and vice versa. Also, this can cover animated property that exists, TV shows or movies, going from the 1960s till now.

Ultron from Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes was by far better than the movie one, IMO. It was a lot scarier, and I liked the tweak of its origins, that steered less away from comic book canon than the movie was.

[Snoop Dogg]

EMH Zemo was GOATed even though they just made Heinrich into Helmut because Robin Atkin Downes is a god.

Spectacular Spider-Man Green Goblin was hot fiyah and it also had the best Electro ever in anything.

Armored Adventures had a lot of great redesigns for villains that I wish the books would just take.

[K7P5V]

best adapted from the page to the screen

Sinister Six from Spectacular Spider-Man:

best improved from the comics

Shocker from Spider-Man & His Amazing Friends:

best original villain

Dark Aegis from Iron Man: The Animated Series (Season 2):

[Digifiend]

Bad:
Doctor Doom had no business being in the 80s Spider-Man cartoon. Why did they use him when Spidey has such a good rogues gallery of his own?
The current Spider-Man cartoon's goblins aren't very faithful to the comics.
The way 90s Spider-Man handled Morbius was just plain weird.

Good:
The Beyonder was a good villain in both the 90s Spider-Man cartoon and in Avengers: Secret Wars.
Doc Ock in the current Spider-Man cartoon had a decent arc recently.

[Huntsman Spider]

Bad:
Doctor Doom had no business being in the 80s Spider-Man cartoon. Why did they use him when Spidey has such a good rogues gallery of his own?
The current Spider-Man cartoon's goblins aren't very faithful to the comics.
The way 90s Spider-Man handled Morbius was just plain weird.

Good:
The Beyonder was a good villain in both the 90s Spider-Man cartoon and in Avengers: Secret Wars.
Doc Ock in the current Spider-Man cartoon had a decent arc recently.

Yeah, I'll admit the current Spider-Man cartoon handled the Superior Spider-Man arc and fallout somewhat better than the original comics did, especially since Otto didn't get to just die and not have to face the consequences of his actions before and after stealing (and returning) Peter's body. As for Beyonder in the 90s Spider-Man cartoon, it was kind of funny that the end of Secret Wars and the Spider Wars finale revealed that he was just testing Spider-Man all along to see if Spider-Man had what it took to save reality itself, though having a peaceful planet savaged and exploited by villains from Earth to set up that test was still messed up, so maybe he would still qualify as a villain. Getting into Morbius, I blame the censors for not letting him drink blood like an actual vampire, but those suckers in the palms of his hands were pretty creepy, so at least the body horror aspect was maintained from the original comic. On the subject of Doom in the 1980s Spider-Man cartoon(s), well, Doom is supposed to be apex villain of the Marvel Universe, so why not pit him against Marvel's apex hero?

[Digifiend]

Yeah, the writers did the best they could with Morbius, but it was still weird. You're quite right that the Fox Kids censors are to blame.

I wonder, was Amazing Friends always planned to be season 2 of 80s Spider-Man even before the show started? If so, Doom's usage there is potentially a leftover... remember that Amazing Friends was meant to use Human Torch (who would legitimately count Doom as an enemy, him being a Fantastic Four villain), but his rights being tied up elsewhere meant they created Firestar instead.

[K7P5V]

On the subject of Doom in the 1980s Spider-Man cartoon(s), well, Doom is supposed to be apex villain of the Marvel Universe, so why not pit him against Marvel's apex hero?

Totally agree. Doom even appeared in the fifth issue of Amazing Spider-Man which was written by Lee/Ditko, so I don't think any precedence was broken.

Yeah, the writers did the best they could with Morbius, but it was still weird. You're quite right that the Fox Kids censors are to blame.

I wonder, was Amazing Friends always planned to be season 2 of 80s Spider-Man even before the show started? If so, Doom's usage there is potentially a leftover... remember that Amazing Friends was meant to use Human Torch (who would legitimately count Doom as an enemy, him being a Fantastic Four villain), but his rights being tied up elsewhere meant they created Firestar instead.

Maybe you can help inform me, Digifiend. But is it true that the reason the Human Torch was replaced by Herbie the Robot in Jack Kirby's animated Fantastic Four was because the sponsors were afraid children would imitate Johnny?

[DigiCom]

Totally agree. Doom even appeared in the fifth issue of Amazing Spider-Man which was written by Lee/Ditko, so I don't think any precedence was broken.



Maybe you can help inform me, Digifiend. But is it true that the reason the Human Torch was replaced by Herbie the Robot in Jack Kirby's animated Fantastic Four was because the sponsors were afraid children would imitate Johnny?

No, that's a myth. The rights to the Human Torch were tied up in a film project, so he wasn't available for the cartoon.

[K7P5V]

No, that's a myth. The rights to the Human Torch were tied up in a film project, so he wasn't available for the cartoon.

Thanks for the information, DigiCom. It's greatly appreciated.

[Frontier]

Bad:The Beyonder was a good villain in both the 90s Spider-Man cartoon and in Avengers: Secret Wars.

I'll give you the 90's show, but I didn't really like their take on Beyonder in Secret Wars. Felt like they turned him from a cosmic God to cosmic Iron Man, and I didn't really dig Steven Webber in the role.

Doc Ock in the current Spider-Man cartoon had a decent arc recently.

It at least wasn't as rushed as his other arcs on the show.

[J. D. Guy]

Bad:The current Spider-Man cartoon's goblins aren't very faithful to the comics.

As a general matter of course, I feel the bold is not a bad thing, neither in and of itself nor in general. As far as the modern Spider-Man animated series go, for example, the shake ups have been consistently providing my favoite things about these shows.

[Frontier]

Bad:
The current Spider-Man cartoon's goblins aren't very faithful to the comics.

My biggest problem with them is they have such generic and clunky designs, and none of the personality and panache of the Green Goblin in other interpretations.

[Holt]

Worst: any Iron Man villain who isn't Obadiah Stane. Stark has to have the weakest rogue's gallery of any A-list hero.

[Huntsman Spider]

Worst: any Iron Man villain who isn't Obadiah Stane. Stark has to have the weakest rogue's gallery of any A-list hero.

I actually liked the Armored Adventures take on the Mandarin, and the redesigns for the rest of the rogues were pretty cool as well.