IGN has recently come out to announce their top 100 comic book villains and heroes. After sifting through their list I decided to make my own. However, I couldn't come anywhere close to naming a hundred villains, let alone putting them in order from least to most villainous. Lucky for you I can think of 12 villians I love:
12) Ra’s Al Ghul
Like Hitler and the many dictators before him Ra’s Al Ghul hopes to cleanse the world of all its faults, leaving only a master race to survive. Ra’s has survived for hundreds of years thanks to the Lazarus Pit, a fountain of youth that, after bathing, drives a person temporarily insane. Ra’s has had many children throughout his long life, but sees his only worthy successor in Batman. Ra’s has used Bruce Wayne’s attraction to his daughter Talia to try and sway the Dark Knight, tried chemical weapons to destory mankind, and even tried to gain Superman as an ally to further his quest for purity.
11) Bullseye
Ego is a tough thing to kill, and Bullseye is even harder. As one of Daredevil’s most deadly foes he has the ability to make anything a weapon with his precise aim. He’s killed Daredevil’s girlfriend, twice, and is always trying to show everyone he is better than the man without fear. He has no real morals, just the thrill of the hunt and the comfort of arrogance.
10) Brainiac
An alien android who loves collecting things, Brainiac once held in his possession the bottled city of Kandor, the greatest city on Krypton. Brainiac would go from planet to planet, stealing the planets pivotal city and destroying the rest of it. With no real emotions except his curiosity with civilizations he has become one of Superman’s greatest enemies. Brainiac cares for no one while Superman cares for everyone.
9) Red Skull
With the help of the cosmic cube the Red Skull has never been dead for too long. His mind has been put into so many bodies he must have a closest full of them. Never the less, the great heroes are the ones that have a villain to match. Captain America stands for all that is fair and right while the Red Skull quests for power and chaos. Now his daughter, Sin, continues her father’s reign of terror as the new Red Skull. She has a lot to live up too, but something tells me daddy raised her well, or un-well depending on how you look at it.
8) Professor Zoom
The reverse Flash, as he is sometimes called, to me, is a product of destiny. Eobard Thrawne was a criminal who grew up worshiping the Flash in the 25th century. He re-created the same experiment that made Barry Allen the Flash and used his new powers to travel back in time to meet him. Upon arriving he realized he would become a villain, and has proven history right ever since.
Professor Zoom has made Barry’s life miserable by killing his wife, Iris, and almost killing his girlfriend after that. Barry had no choice but to kill Zoom by snapping his neck, but Zoom’s knowledge of the Speed Force has made him a man unwilling to die. With his many resurrections, and now his manipulation of the timeline, Zoom has created this summer’s hot storyline in DC Comics; Flashpoint.
7) Ozymandias
He was once considered a hero; a Watchmen. But the worst kinds of villains are the ones that think they are heroes. Adrian Veidt was considered the smartest man on the planet. As he looked down upon Earth from his corporate tower he saw the world destroying itself. So he gave it an enemy it could unite against; a giant squid. In the film they changed it, but either way it produced the same results. Ozymandias killed millions to save billions. Even some of his closest friends couldn’t figure out if he was brilliant, or raving mad.
6) Bastion
He fights to see that humanity is the dominant species on the planet and doesn’t get taken out by mutants. I find this odd since he himself isn’t even human. Bastion is part Master-mold and part Nimrod, a sentinel from the future. In any event, he started his reign of terror on mutants from inside the government with Operation: Zero Tolerance. He almost succeeded had it not been for the X-Men.
Now he fights with Graydon Creed and the Friends of Humanity to continue his mission of wiping out all of mutant kind. In Second Coming he trapped the X-Men on their own island and brought sentinels from the future to kill them. Hope was the one to finally finish him off, but not before Bastion killed one of the most beloved X-Men; Nightcrawler.
5) Magneto
I see Magneto a lot like I see Catwoman. Sometimes they’re villains, sometimes they’re heroes. Magneto is another villain on my list who considers what he is doing is right. He fights for mutant rights, and if that means destroying New York City, launching nuclear missiles, or reversing Earth’s gravitational pull, so be it.
Magneto saw so much destruction in his life it baffles me why he would want to create more. Currently he is residing on Utopia, helping the X-Men save the mutant race and hoping the government doesn’t come after him for all the crimes he has committed against humanity. But if you want to see him at his prime check out Jim Lee’s Mutant Genesis and Grant Morrison’s Planet X. That’s what Magneto can do.
4) Lex Luthor
He believes himself to be the savior of mankind. The one person who sees past the lies that Superman tells the world and knows that one day he will turn against us all. That is why he has spent years trying to kill the man of steel, and even suffered his own death in the progress.
Lex used to carry a kryptonite ring on him to ward of Superman, but he suffered radiation poisoning and so he had to transfer his mind to a clone body that eventually died as well. Luthor always says that had it not been for Superman the world would be able to solve it’s own problems, and therefore much stronger. Through all his schemes Lex has yet to show he cares about anyone but himself. He seeks power, and it was shown in Blackest Night when he wielded the orange ring, knowing he had great avarice inside himself.
3) Norman Osborn
They don’t get much crazier than Norman Osborn. He turned himself insane on purpose trying to save his company, and ever since has made Peter Parker’s life a living hell. Osborn is responsible for killing Peter’s first love, Gwen Stacy and making Spider-Man doubt himself by making clones of Peter. Osborn even went so far as to plan a fake pregnancy and miscarriage for Peter and his wife, Mary Jane.
However, when Osborn stopped a Skrull invasion he was named head of S.H.I.E.L.D. and he cleaned house. He made his villainous friends heroes, drove the real heroes into hiding, and sought to destroy the city of Asgard with the help of Loki. All of this was done in the name of bringing true order to the world. What……a nutbag.
2) Darkseid
People say Lex Luthor is Superman’s greatest villain, but I disagree. I think it’s Darkseid. He is just as smart as he is powerful, and he’s almost killed the man of steel on several occasions. He killed his own family to gain power of Apokolips, and fights his own son, who he traded to an enemy in his constant war with New Genesis. With his Omega beams he almost killed Batman, brainwashed Supergirl against Superman, and threatened to destroy Earth more times than I have fingers. Darkseid looks to take away all free will in the universe and make it his own. He is the epitome of all that is evil.
1) Joker
A man who has reasons for why he goes things can be fought. You know why he does something then you know what he cares about, and how he can be defeated. Perhaps that is why the Joker has always alluded Batman, because he cares for nothing, and will murder people just for his own amusement.
The Jokers origin story has changed throughout the ages, the most recent being he fell into a tank of chemicals that made him insane. Never the less his terror on the people of Gotham, and the world, has not stopped since. He has killed Batman’s sidekick Robin, and ruined Commissioner Gordon’s life by killing his wife, son, and paralyzing his daughter, a.k.a. Batgirl. He does all this to try and show the world that any person, given the right push, can go crazy. As far as being Batman’s #1 nemesis I think Heath Ledger’s portrayal of the Joker in 2008’s The Dark Knight said it best. “This is what happens when an unstoppable force meets an immovable object.”
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