10 Times Comic Book Villains Became Heroes (In A Big Way)

8. M.O.D.O.K. Superior

MODOK Avengers
Marvel Comics

At a glance, the news that M.O.D.O.K. was at one point in time a good guy might seem pretty crazy. I mean, firstly the guy looks like a floating human egg. Secondly, his name stands for "Mechanised Organism Designed Only for Killing", which isn't exactly heroic either.

Although both those things are true, Marvel illustrated that being a floating egg human hybrid with a twisted title is no roadblock to embracing your inner hero in 2014's Secret Avengers, when M.O.D.O.K. Superior (a spin-off clone of the original, George Tarleton model), joined the team.

The reason for M.O.D.O.K's change of heart in this case is actually because he's fallen in love with none other than Maria Hill, one of the fiercest, most no-nonsense operatives in all of S.H.I.E.L.D. He'd originally planned to kill her as well, but changed his mind after realising his true feelings.

After saving the day along with Hawkeye, Hill and the rest of the Secret Avengers, M.O.D.O.K. had a brief vacay in Ohio. And bless him, he deserved it.

Content Producer/Presenter

WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.