The Dark Evolution Of The MCU's Thanos

4. Thanos, The Father - Guardians Of The Galaxy (& Vol 2)

When the time came for us to meet Thanos in his final form (at least when he had his "real" performer and he'd get to talk, we'd already learned a little more about the dangers of the Infinity Stones thanks to the stinger on Thor: The Dark World. We might not have known it at the time, but that post-credits scene introducing The Collector was the first real time a plan to bring the Stones together was mentioned. And it wasn't even Thanos who introduced it.

Having cast Josh Brolin as Thanos, Guardians Of The Galaxy began to explore another side of the character and it was that shift in focus from the traditional megalomaniac that is the most interesting thing to pick apart first. Particularly as it reflects a change in the MCU's mentality and their means to addressing the supposed Marvel Villain Problem.

Throughout Phase One (and even up to Civil War at the start of Phase Three, in actual fact), most of the villains - aside for Loki, but let's just put him aside for now - were fairly conventional supervillains. Most of them wouldn't have looked out of place in a James Bond movie or an episode of Doctor Who. Sure, they had some personal tie to the heroes, but their grander schemes were barely linked to those ties. The links, in fact, were mostly purely incidental or an inconvenience to the heroes.

More importantly, the links to the heroes - or the dark parallels of them in most cases - existed in place of real backstories and motivations. We didn't need to necessarily know exactly what made them tick because we knew how they fit into the heroes' stories and that was deemed enough. That's what the real root of the Marvel Villain problem was.

For Thanos, it became a different story when James Gunn introduced him into Guardians Of The Galaxy. Or more pertinently, when he introduced his daughters. And as a brief side note, it wasn't JUST Gunn working on the character, according to Joss Whedon, he worked alongside the Guardians director on implementing Thanos into the MCU broadly. The suggestion that he didn't know where to take Thanos (or at least how to write him intimately) also suggests that it was perhaps Gunn who took the lead.

Anyway, instead of simply being a villain intent on universal dominion - even one doing so in order to make the beast with two backs with actual Death - Guardians Of The Galaxy introduced us to Thanos through his actions. In introducing Gamora and Nebula as monuments to his evil as well as having his quest for the Power Stone, he was immediately given more depth in a way we hadn't seen with any villainous character outside of Loki.

It wasn't just that this was establishing that Thanos was a Bad Guy who thought so little of the value of life that he'd destroy it and break his supposed family to remould them - painfully - in his image and to his agenda. After all, Nebula's bodily augmentations and the mental torture he put her through - after stealing her away from her family - are arguably his sickest crime, particularly as he has no affection at all for her. More importantly, seeing Thanos' evil in those terms meant we couldn't ever fully sympathise with him even when he was presented as a far more sympathetic character.

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