Overrated Villains

There are hundreds of heroes and villains in the superhero canon of both Marvel and DC, yet we see the same characters in adaptations over and over again. So here is my list of wildly overrated villains that don’t necessarily need to be retired but absolutely need a break.

Joker

Fight me on this all you want but I’m right. The Joker has appeared in nearly every Batman adaptation. Animated, live action and otherwise and I am so sorry but he just isn’t an interesting character. His solo movie basically stole origin stories from more interesting villains (particularly Lex Luthor) in a desperate attempt to make his character not super boring and repetitive. It didn’t work. In addition Batman fanboys who like the Joker are absolutely insufferable and if there was less Joker material perhaps they would fade away into their moms basements where they belong. Also if you are someone who has ever thought or dared to say out loud that you identify with the Joker, please proceed directly to therapy and do not speak to any real life people mkay thanks.

Darkseid

Now this is perhaps because Zack Snyder handled him so poorly. To be fair he handled every character he touched poorly but Darkseid was such an underdeveloped afterthought. He had no sense of how to build the stakes around this character at all. Nothing surrounding his place in the story made any kind of coherent sense, and it's a shame because if it wasn’t for Snyder’s arrogance and lack of talent Darkseid could have been a really cool character to build up to. But if you google DC comic book villains he pops right up and my guess is that's all the research Zacky bothered to do. Popular does not equal good.

Mephisto

This is solely because the internet reactions to WandaVision made me want to bitch slap everybody. Wanda appears in over 1,200 Marvel comics. The number of comics in which she and Mephisto both appear is 3. 3 comics do they have any overlap in and yet the people who think they know comics were dead set on Mephisto being the villain of the story. I hope you realize now that that made no sense whatsoever and all of your fan theories were stupid and unfounded. And maybe when trying to guess what a show is going to do next we should watch what’s in front of us and not make up shit out of our asses.

Doctor Doom

Definitely the most associated with the Fantastic Four, but not at all the most interesting. Sure he has plenty of comic book appearances but I am begging Marvel when they finally get to the Fantastic Four to use literally anyone else. Doctor Doom just feels so expected and unearned. The Frightful Four, the Salem Seven, Hyperstorm, Occulus for the love of god anyone but Doctor Doom. That would force them to actually do research and write something interesting and unexpected. What’s the fun in that?

Overall Marvel has some incredible villains that mirror their heroes in a way that bring out some amazing character development. Adaptations seem to avoid these villains like the plague. As Marvel and DC forge through their future projects I am begging for some variety and some actual comic book education when writing these characters. Even as one shots there are many characters to choose from and not everything has to set up something bigger. Petition to make comic book movies fun and actual adaptations instead of every project having to be related to every other project.