10 Movie Villains Secretly Introduced Way Earlier Than You Realise

1. Captain America: Civil War's Biggest Revelation

Spider Man Far From Home
Marvel Studios

Now, this wasn't the reveal of a villain, per se, but more the reveal of a huge revelation that would, in Tony Stark's eyes, position Bucky Barnes as the villain of Stark's story.

Captain America: Civil War's main premise is the Avengers being divided down the middle, with Iron Man leading the charge for superhero registration, while Cap and his crew oppose this. But to really cause friction between these two factions, it's revealed that Bucky was the one responsible for killing Stark's parents.

During Civil War, we see Helmut Zemo push and prod for "Mission Report, December 16, 1991" from the traumatised Barnes. Eventually, we would come to learn that this date was the day that the Winter Soldier killed Tony's mother and father in cold blood.

In reality, we were all actually given a heads-up on this back in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. There, we had a glimpse at the front page of a newspaper that read, "Howard and Maria Stark Die in Car Accident". The date of this newspaper was December 17, 1991, reporting on the tragedy the day after it happened.

By getting access to the real details of these deaths - and to an old HYDRA base - Zemo had all of the ammunition and footage he needed to split the Avengers, and Anthony and Joe Russo had given us an early clue of this back in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.

As soon as we heard Zemo mentioned his "Mission Report" shtick, it should've been crystal clear what was afoot.

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