10 Most Underrated MCU Villains

There are two ways it can go when you think about the villains of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Your mind will either take you to relatively early villains like Ivan Vanko, Malekith, and Ronan the Accuser as some of the weakest in the franchise, or Thanos, Loki, and Killmonger, some of the greatest comic book movie antagonists of all time.

Between these two groups of bad guys sit the rest of the characters that have caused problems to the franchise’s heroes, and these have seen a mix of receptions to say the least.

Particularly early on, the franchise built itself something of a reputation for producing less than stellar antagonists, something that has stuck around for years after. Even though Phase Three stepped up the game, the Mad Titan almost made the rest of the MCU’s bad guys look bad.

It’s almost a given that villains will underwhelm, particularly as they are never given the same kind of development as the heroes, but too many have been unfairly treated in the past. There are a handful that have been painfully underrated by fans, and are far better than they have ever been given credit for.

It had been a long time coming since Thanos first showed his pearly white teeth in the Avengers post-credit scene in 2012, but he finally came to the forefront of the MCU with Infinity War in 2018. Naturally, he stole the show, but he wasn’t the only villain of the piece.

With him he brought his Black Order, and even from them Ebony Maw stole the show. Corvus Glaive, Proxima Midnight, and Cull Obsidian were left in the shadows somewhat, and while the latter was a hulking brute who offered little in the way of dialogue other than grunting, Corvus Glaive and Proxima Midnight brought more to the table.

Together they ambushed Vision and Wanda in Scotland, two of the most powerful Avengers in the history of the franchise, and would have defeated them had it not been for Captain America lurking in the shadows. Once again in Wakanda, Vision was saved from Glaive by Steve Rogers. Had it not been for the star-spangled man, these two of Thanos’ Children would have made the movie much shorter than it ultimately was.

There was also a time when Proxima Midnight was considered to take part in the underground fighting tournament in Shang-Chi opposite Deadpool. How much better of a story would this have been than Wong and the Abomination? After being relegated to background characters in Avengers: Endgame, it’s fair to say that these two villains could have and should have been utilised so much better than they were.