Baron Helmut Zemo and/or the Masters of Evil
Count Nefaria
Dormammu
Grandmaster
Immortus
Kang the Conqueror
Kree Empire
Loki
Michael Korvac
Scarlet Witch
Skrull Empire
Squadron Supreme
Thanos
Ultron
Zeus
Squadron Sinister often is put in the same boat as the Squadron Supreme, but I do think Graviton, Grim Reaper and Super-Adaptoid are deserving of mention in the list.
In fact, I'd list Graviton as the top Avengers Villian who never lived up to his full potential, followed closely by the Zodiac Cartel. Both could be really awsome and, IMHO, have A-list potential (but I'm aware that are far from living up to this potential).
Peace
I read the comics the point is she is a powerful tool like the cosmic cube or a infinity gem that any villain can manipulate which is why imo she is the most definative because any villain on the list can use her as a tool to do their evil deeds, and when she is being manipulated by a villain she has caused the most damage to the Avengers.
The Avengers, as popular a team as they are, have never had a really strong rogues gallery, IMHO. Ultron is far and away their ultra villain, with Kang a distant second. AS others have said, after that it gets murky and rather skimpy, too. Most of their bad guys haven't been used often as say, a Red Skull or Dr. Doom type. Just Ultron and Kang. I think that Korvac COULD have become such a villain, but it may have been wise to keep him (mostly) dead after that epic Shooter tale.
Honestly, I know they are trying to hype up Thanos to the Nth degree, but I have never really even thought of him as an "Avengers" villain.
Thanos is a kind of Cosmic uber villain that all the cosmic heroes and the Avengers have fought.
Thing is Thanos has in story outlived his greatest personal enemies.
Mar-Vell is dead. Adam Warlock is dead.
That only leaves the Silver Surver and the Avengers and Thanos has way more history fighting the
Avengers (Thanos started out as an Iron Man rogue, irrc) than he does anybody else.
He is kind of their archfoe by default. Nobody else on Earth merits his attention and even dudes like Warlock and Captain Marvel knew they
had to get the aid of the Avengers to even have a chance at stopping him.
In a way that detachment is what makes Thanos a great Avengers foe. Only the Avengers
ever have a chance at even stopping him and 90% of the time even they aren't enough by themselves.
And yet, Wolverine, who already had a pretty high body count, gets a free pass for all the carnage he was responsible for when the Hand brainwashed him. But of course, he is Marvel's golden boy, so he gets a free pass, no matter how many times he goes berserk or on a killing spree. So, if it's a matter of double standards, it's not an X-Men vs Avenger thing.
And, for the record, Cyclops was possessed by the Phoenix, so, IMHO, think he should be forgiven.
Peace
It's pretty difficult to write a good Avengers villain IMO.
Superheroes - and superhero teams - tend to have an overarching theme from which their villains are drawn:
- Traditionally, the X-Men are mutants that have combated mutants that threaten ordinary humanity/other mutants, and humans that persecute mutants. So you already have a number of possible motivations for their villains - thwarted idealism leading into terrorism (Magneto etc.), bigotry and fear (the Sentinels and the Purifiers), or amoral scientific curiosity and ambition (Sinister).
- Cap, for example has fought enemies of America both external (Red Skull, Arnim Zola, etc.) and internal (Serpent Society, etc.).
- Any street-level vigilante tends to fight a number of costumed/non-costumed grotesques who represent various different aspects of organised/disorganised crime and corruption, which is a rich area (OK, to start with Daredevil's rogues' gallery still sucked all the same :-)).
What is the theme of the Avengers? They're powerful superhumans (except for Hawkeye, Black Widow, etc.), who band together in a team to fight threats which none of them can fight on their own.
This tends to mean that their enemies are drawn from the following different areas:
- World-conquering megalomaniacs like Kang.
- Primarily destructive threats, such as really powerful but generally unhinged geezers like Graviton or Superman-analogue Nefaria.
- People who have a really nasty personal grudge.
- Cosmic events - which often don't have the earth as their primary focus but end up involving the Avengers all the same.
It's quite difficult to write those guys - you can't have too many of the first, the second doesn't necessarily lead itself to many repeat stories with that character, the third often refers to people who have a vendetta against a particular hero (such as Loki with Thor), and by their nature you shouldn't have cosmic events all the time (cough* Hickman * cough).
I suspect that Ultron has been so heavily used because he rather combines several of these motivations, and therefore means that he doesn't lend himself to exactly the same story each time.
That's not to say the Avengers' villains can't be used well - if you have a writer as brilliant as Roger Stern you end up with the Masters of Evil storyline. He may not have originated the character of Baron Zemo, who started off as a Cap villain, but he made him into a marvellous antagonist.
With a less inspired writer, sadly, you end up with something like Thane Ector and his merry band of sentient bacteria.
Last edited by Coin Biter; 09-05-2014 at 06:02 AM.