History Characters / XMenMarauders

* KickTheSonOfABitch: The ending of ''Hellions'' #1 reveals the Marauders (except Scalphunter) refused to have anything to do with Krakoa. As a result, they're now being held captive by Madelyne Pryor who is routinely torturing them.

A BadassNative of the Comanche tribe who has been alive since the days of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII and serving Mister Sinister for nearly that long. He's the tactical commander of the team, and since Malice's departure has been TheLeader of the group, with only Sinister himself ranking higher. On Krakoa, John wanted to atone for his crimes, and was drafted onto the ComicBook/{{Hellions}}, a makeshift team for those deemed to violent for the peaceful land of Krakoa to do some good, led by Kwannon. She and John would bring out the best in each other, and eventually become a couple.

* ADayInTheLimelight: He is promoted to a team member in the 2020 ''Hellions'' title.

* EvilCounterpart: To Cyclops, they're both field leaders for a team working towards the goal of someone who, to spite being a powerful mutant is generally a NonActionGuy. The difference is while Cyclops genuinely believes in Xavier's dream of peaceful co-existence between humans and mutants, considers him a father figure and has his complete trust. Greycrow is a SociopathicSoldier who never really liked Sinister, only working for [[BloodKnight only working for him to put his killing skills to use]] and Sinster sees him as a disposible {{Mook|s}} who if killed can easily be replaced with a clone.

* PapaWolf: [[spoiler:Come the finale issue of ''ComicBook/{{Hellions}}'', #18, the Quiet Council's decision to place Orphan-Maker in the Pit of Exile has Greycrow screaming first protests that Orphan-Maker is just a boy, and then threats that he will burn the Council hall (or possibly Krakoa) to the ground.]]

* TeamKiller: During World War II he earned his name from "scalping" his superior officers and earned himself a ticket to the firing squad in the bargain. Unfortunately, his mutant abilities kept the trip from being one-way.

* DarkActionGirl: As a former soldier she has the most training out of all the Marauders and is a lethal and ruthless combatant.

The original field leader of the team, Malice is a psionic entity who was once a disaffected teenage girl who became disembodied when her mutation manifested. She maintained a longtime possession of ComicBook/{{Polaris}}, in whose body she menaced the X-Men. Eventually she was expelled from Polaris's body and presumed dead, only to turn up years later as a 'digital entity' that possessed the Omega Sentinel Karima Shapandar. She was eventually forced to vacate that body too, and waited to squat in another mutant before finding one in Betsy Braddock.

* BlueAndOrangeMorality: Explored in one story where ComicBook/{{Nightcrawler}} goes after Scalphunter for his transgressions and easily defeats him, only to decide he cannot entirely blame the Scalphunter he has been hunting for the Mutant Massacre, since that Scalphunter died years ago and the one he's got on his hands now is a clone of a clone of the original. Overlaps with CloningBlues when one takes the premise to its uncomfortable conclusion: that it can be applied to almost ''all'' the Marauders, since Sabretooth is the only one of the original bunch who has survived over the years.

* CloningBlues: Most, if not all of them, have been killed over the years and replaced with clones, sometimes repeatedly. Interestingly, the ''Magneto'' solo series indicates that most of them aren't especially bothered by this.

[[Characters/XMenSupportingCharacters Supporting Characters]] | [[Characters/XMenMutants Mutants]] | [[Characters/XMenXavierInstitute Xavier Institute]] | [[Characters/XMenKrakoans Krakoans]] | [[Characters/MarvelComicsSavageLand The Savage Land]] | [[Characters/MarvelComicsShiar Shi'ar]] | [[{{Characters/Starjammers}} The Starjammers]] | {{Characters/NYX}} | [[{{Characters/Cable}} Cable's supporting cast]] | [[Characters/{{Deadpool}} Deadpool's supporting cast]] | [[{{Characters/Wolverine}} Wolverine's supporting cast]] | [[Characters/{{X23}} X-23's supporting cast]]-]]]]]

[[Characters/XMenRoguesGalleryAToI Rogues Gallery A To I]] | [[Characters/XMenRoguesGalleryJToR Rogues Gallery J To R]] | [[Characters/XMenRoguesGallerySToZ Rogues Gallery S to Z]] | [[Characters/XMenVillainousOrganizations Villainous Organizations]] | [[Characters/XMenAcolytes Acolytes]] | [[Characters/XMenArakko Arakko]] | [[Characters/XMenBrotherhoodOfMutants Brotherhood of Mutants]] | [[Characters/XMenClanAkkaba Clan Akkaba]] | [[Characters/XMenExternals Externals]] | [[Characters/XMenHellfireClub Hellfire Club]] | [[Characters/XMenHellions The Hellions]] | '''Marauders''' | [[Characters/XMenMojoverse Mojoverse]] | [[Characters/XMenMorlocks Morlocks]] | [[Characters/XMenMutantLiberationFront MLF]] | [[Characters/XMenOrchis Orchis]] | [[Characters/XMenSentinels Sentinels]]\\

* EarnYourHappyEnding: In ''ComicBook/{{Hellions}}'', John is the only draftee to genuinely make a go at being a good person and channel his dark instincts for Krakoa's sake without, ever performing any serious betrayals on the team. This is despite having to fight deformed clones of the original Marauders, learning that the one person he thought he could trust (and had feelings for) had her own ulterior motives, and then almost giving into his darkest urges to kill someone for her anyway. He ends up free as any other mutant and in a relationship with Kwannon like he wanted.
* EvilCounterpart: To Cyclops, they're both field leaders for a team working towards the goal of someone who, to spite being a powerful mutant is generally a NonActionGuy. The difference is while Cyclops genuinely believes in Xavier's dream of peaceful co-existence between humans and mutants, considers him a father figure and has his complete trust. Greycrow is a SociopathicSoldier who never really liked Sinister, only working for [[BloodKnight only working for him to put his killing skills to use]] and Sinster see's him as a disposible {{Mook|s}} who if killed can easily be replaced with a clone.

* DarkChick: Her powers are more of a supportive nature than anything else. Also, she's a very weak hand-to-hand combatant.

* BladeOnAStick: He uses them as his weapons.

Characters/ChildrenOfTheAtom | [[Characters/ExcaliburMarvelComics Excalibur]] | Characters/GenerationHope | Characters/GenerationX | Characters/NewMutants | Characters/NewXMenAcademyX | Characters/{{SWORD}} | Characters/XClub | Characters/XCorp | Characters/XFactor | Characters/XForce | Characters/XStatix | Characters/XTerminators\\

* YourWorstNightmare: She can force her victims to face this by rooting around in their psyche, as both Rogue and Sage can attest to.

''For Sinister and [[spoiler: Other Clones of Essex]] see'' [[Characters/XMenSinister Here]]

Appears in the cartoons: ''WesternAnimation/XMenTheAnimatedSeries'' and ''WesternAnimation/WolverineAndTheXMen2009''. Also appears in the games: ''VideoGame/X2WolverinesRevenge'', ''VideoGame/MarvelFutureFight'', ''X-Men Legends II: Rise of Apocalpyse'', ''VideoGame/MarvelHeroes'', ''VideoGame/MarvelAvengersAlliance'' and the BigBad of the ''VideoGame/{{Deadpool}}'' video game.

Was originally supposed to appear in ''Film/TheNewMutants'', portrayed by Creator/JonHamm. This role ended up being cut from the film.

* AbortedArc: It was once strongly implied that Sinister had contracted the Legacy Virus. Nothing ever came of this.
* AchillesHeel: Subverted, as X-Men were led to believe that his only weakness was Cyclops's optic blast (and indeed, in the '90s cartoon it really was) which seemingly destroyed him in their first battle. It was later revealed Sinister was just FakingTheDead and Cyclops's optic blast was no more effective on him than anything else. When he first made his return, it was pointed out that Cyclops's optic blasts have never blown things up before, just pulverized them, so they really should have suspected.
** What truly ends up doing in Sinister is Rogue's PowerParasite abilities that had, at that point, been boosted to an [[DeadlyUpgrade incredibly deadly degree]].
* AgentPeacock: Not originally characterized as such but has become one best seen under Creator/JonathanHickman. This version of Sinister is extremely vain and campy but still a brilliant geneticist and dangerous opponent. During "Powers of X", he comments he loves Magneto's cape and kills his clone who failed to mention he should have one too. He then goes back to business discussing mutant cloning, rejecting the idea outright... then ''another'' Sinister pops up, complete with cape, executes that Sinister and takes charge, declaring that his mutant power is "deposing tyrants and looking absolutely fabulous." Additionally, there are now gossip columns called "Sinister Secrets" started by Sinister hinting at things that have occurred and things yet to come. They are all written in a cryptic and flamboyant manner. ''ComicBook/ImmortalXMen'' explains this as his clones now having a personality template based on, among other things, five seasons of ''Series/RuPaulsDragRace'' and a dash of Oscar Wilde. It's implied that he's doing this to be underestimated.
* AntiMagic: What makes him so scary to mutants is his ability to telepathically prevent a mutant from accessing their powers. This was much more emphasized in the 90s when he was at his threat peak, but his continued collecting of mutant DNA in ''House of X'' hints that he may still have this ability on backup for the day of the sudden but inevitable betrayal...
* ArchEnemy: To the Summers family in general and Cyclops in particular.
* BadBoss: He is a ''brutal'' boss to his Marauders, sometimes [[YouHaveFailedMe killing them with his own hands]] for their failure because he knows he can just crank out clones of them anyway.
* BadassBookworm: An evil version, but he is probably the world's foremost expert on mutant genetics, and no slouch in a fight.
** Let's put it this way: the High Evolutionary is a character with cosmic power who has gone toe-to-toe with ComicBook/{{Galactus}} and evolved an entire world's worth of animals into an advanced society, and ''he's'' [[UnwittingPawn behind the curve]] when it comes to Sinister. Hell, Sinister actually went to the trouble of masquerading as an Oxford professor for years just to get him started!
** During ''Avengers vs X-Men'', he beat the Phoenix Five through pure smarts (via his Sinister London and Maddie clones) and made it look ''easy'', harnessing the Phoenix for himself. And when a robot billions of years old, impossibly advanced, so brilliant it was capable of talking entire civilizations to suicide, and serving as a kind of EvilMentor to the Lights (Hope's team) saw Sinister London and the Phoenix Five's prison after the Lights went undercover, his response was stunned shock and that it was a trap of "pure reason", and they should RunOrDie. It took the direct intervention of the Phoenix itself for the Phoenix Five to escape, and even then, Sinister got away clean.
** At the end of ''ComicBook/ImmortalXMen'', he uses a bizarre form of SaveScumming via [[spoiler: clones of himself and Moira [=MacTaggert=], with her timeline reset ability, to replay multiple future variations on killing Hope Summers - which he does, along with Exodus, via a psychic nuke made of cloned Xavier brains, and a considerable chunk of the rest of the Quiet Council]].
* BadassCape: Your mileage will probably vary, though.
* BeardOfEvil: He often appears with a goatee and he sure is evil.
* BigBad: One of the X-Men's main recurrent adversaries, and the architect of much of their misery.
* BreakTheHaughty: We see his cocky and confident demeanor shatter for the first time when Emma delivers news of Doctor Stasis’s and Orchis scientist who is a Sinister that he never knew about. Furthermore Stasis’ claims at being the original sends Sinister into such a panic that he runs away from the Quiet Council. ''Immortal X-Men'' implies that he's actually [[spoiler: a Victorian era clone - and that there are at least two more...]]
* CharacterExaggeration: As mentioned above, the Sinister of ''House of X'' is so exaggerated that to readers unfamiliar with the character he may well come across as a CampGay (or rather CampStraight, since he is still heterosexual as far as we know). Of course, since there are so many Sinister clones, all having different degrees of the original's personality, this could be semi-intentional - especially since Sinister is treacherous, untrustworthy, and most likely wants to be underestimated. It's revealed in ''ComicBook/ImmortalXMen'' that it is intentional, with the personality programming for his clones involving "five seasons of ''Drag Race'' and a dash of Oscar Wilde."
* TheChessmaster: Sinister always has elements of this, but bonus points go to his [=AvX=] incarnation who constantly refers to his battle with Cyclops and the Phoenix Five in chess terms, and after being beaten reappears before Scott in disguise just to invite him to "come out and play" again.
* ChronicBackstabbingDisorder: Don't trust him. Don't work with him. ''Definitely'' don't work [[BadBoss for him]]. It never ends well.
* ChunkySalsaRule: Averted. His shapeshifting and healing powers allowed him to survive getting gibbed.
* CloneByConversion: His "Sinister London" is a town converted into hive mind connected clones. Even ''animals'' such as horses are made genetically identical to him.
* CrazyPrepared: He has plans within plans within plans. He has multiple schemes to cheat death (despite being an immortal and one of the most difficult villains to kill even considering that) that were set up in the 1950's, and many possibly earlier.
* DealWithTheDevil: Has been on both ends of this relationship, though in most ([[UnwittingPawn and often either]]) cases The Devil is him.
* DeliberateValuesDissonance: [[DependingOnTheWriter Sometimes]], he gets portrayed as having the kind of prejudices you'd expect of a man from the Victorian era. His internal monologue cops to this in ''Immortal X-Men'', musing that he used to be a massive racist. He then internally adds that he's now surgically removed that part of his personality, on the grounds that in his eyes, ''everyone'' is beneath him (specifically, his basic philosophy is that he's the only truly real lifeform in existence). Therefore, why bother to discriminate?
* DiabolicalMastermind: One of, if not ''the'', foremost of schemers in the X-Men's corner of the Marvel U.
* TheDragon: To Apocalypse, though he [[DragonWithAnAgenda quickly turned against him and went solo]]. While they are both big believers in survival of the fittest and "improving" human evolution, Sinister found Apocalypse's methods appallingly unscientific.
** DragonAscendant: His ultimate goal, which he manages to pull off in various alternate continuities and ''ComicBook/WhatIf'' stories.
** DragonWithAnAgenda: Sometimes overlaps with TheStarscream, but Sinister is usually more interested in keeping the world safe from Apocalypse (so he can continue playing with it as his petri dish, of course) than he is in usurping his former master's power. Not that he'll pass on a chance to have his cake and eat it too, given the chance...
* TheDreaded: His role in the Mutant Massacre and subsequent manipulations has made him one of the most feared names in the mutant community. He is also one of the last opponents the X-Men ever want to tangle with, since they know from painful experience how much trouble he brings.
* {{Egopolis}}: Created an entire city, called "Sinister London", prior to ''ComicBook/AvengersVsXMen''.
* EnemyMine: He's allied himself with the X-Men in 2019's ''House of X'' story and seems to be working closely with [[GreaterScopeVillain Orchis]]. But unlike Proteus and Vulcan, he's not listed as being affiliated with the X-Men outright, and in worldbuilding materials it's mentioned that the X-Men still don't trust him as far as they can throw him, which is a perfectly sensible stance to take. This proves justified, though with Orchis, that's [[spoiler: a different version of Sinister, Doctor Stasis]].
* EnigmaticMinion: Particularly in earlier appearances, before his real name and history were revealed.
* EvenEvilHasLovedOnes: Or had loved ones in his case, as he had a wife and son as Nathaniel Essex and even as Mister Sinister he still retained a shred of compassion in the case of Faye Livingstone, but in the modern day there's no one he wouldn't kill or betray.
* EvenEvilHasStandards: DependingOnTheWriter. His choice to betray Apocalypse was this with a side of PragmaticVillainy, but he also betrays Apocalypse to Cyclops and Jean Grey specifically after Jean implores him to "think of the children" (the loss of his son Adam was a major factor in his SanitySlippage, and during this time he was depicted with a distinct shade of WouldntHurtAChild). He also condemns Stryfe and his Legacy Virus (biological warfare in particular seems to be a line in the sand for Essex) and reveals everything he knows about both to Cyclops of his own volition, and tries to save [[Characters/MarvelComicsXMan Nate Grey]] from Onslaught because he knows what Onslaught is up to (unfortunately, Nate is understandably disposed not to trust Sinister in the slightest, having lost his foster-father to the AOA version, who he promptly vaporized). Much of this CharacterDevelopment was forgotten after UsefulNotes/TheNineties and downright contradicted in ''Weapon X'' which used him as a generic Mengele-esque MadScientist instead (a depiction which would go on to become the predominating characterization for him until UsefulNotes/TheNewTens).
* EvilBrit: Born in 19th Century London, he's one of the most evil enemies of the X-Men.
* EvilGenius: Quite possibly the most evil ''and'' the most ingenious villain the X-Men have ever had to face.
* EvilIsBigger: His given height is 6'5, but he's usually drawn ''much'' larger than that, utterly towering over the likes of Sabretooth. This is perhaps not entirely surprising, given that he's a shapeshifter, and thus his size is up to him.
* EvilMentor: ''X-Men'' vol. 2 #99 revealed that Sinister was actually this to the young Herbert Edgar Wyndham (the future High Evolutionary), masquerading as a "Professor Essex" in Oxford and being the only professor on the campus who supported and encouraged Wyndham's more radical theories. Decades later he recycled this identity to use the Evolutionary as a dupe in his EvilPlan of the week.
* EvilutionaryBiologist: Implied to be directly responsible for the abundance of mutants in the modern world due to the strange, ''forbidden'' experiments he conducted in his day.
* FauxAffablyEvil: Acts all suave and gentleman-like, but really is nothing more than a cold, calculating Sociopath with a Supremacy-Complex.
* {{Flanderization}}: While Sinister was an evil scientist from day one, the [[PoliticallyIncorrectVillain politically-incorrect]] NaziNobleman interpretation of him was nowhere on his creator Claremont's map (though, to be fair, Claremont originally intended for him to be a contemporary of Cyclops who'd never aged past 8, and 'Sinister's was his projection of himself/a supervillain). That was added some 15 years later, after a decade of stories featuring him as some variant of HeWhoFightsMonsters. He later literally removed the racist part of his personality, considering everyone beneath him.
* ForScience: His usual motive. He has worked with the [[WellIntentionedExtremist High Evolutionary]] on occasion, and in fact back in the day he was the Evolutionary's inspiration, though both have learned [[NoHonorAmongThieves not to trust each other in the slightest]].
* GrandTheftMe: [[spoiler:After the death of his original body, he attempts to pull this on Xavier, before ending up in the body of Claudine Renko, who turns this around on him. Renko in turn attempts to do this to ComicBook/{{X 23}} in hopes of taking advantage of her HealingFactor to prevent Sinister from seizing control of her body and being reborn, but Sinister pulls a fast one and takes control of X-23 first. [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome Laura then kicks]] ''[[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome him]]'' [[SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome out!]] And Sinister has to settle for a spare Alice clone when Renko is critically wounded in the fight]].
--> '''X-23''': Get out of my head!
* HatedByAll: Nobody has ever liked or trusted Sinister. Even in the age of Krakoa, it’s made clear that he’s only there because they need his genius and DNA database.
* HatesEveryoneEqually: He used to be a huge racist until he surgically removed that part of his brain so he could consider everyone equally inferior to him. Apparently, hating one specific group clouds the judgement too much.
* HealingFactor: His signature power; far more advanced than Wolverine's except on the latter's best days. Think the [[Film/Terminator2Judgmentday T-1000]] cranked up. Sinister's latest body does not have this ability (or at least, not at the moment), but he makes up for it by now being a HiveMind.
* HeWhoFightsMonsters: Believes in stopping Apocalypse by any means necessary. In order to do so, he's sunk to horrifying lows more times than most villains could ever dream of.
* HijackingCthulhu: He managed to hack the DNA of the Dreaming Celestial in San Francisco to siphon enough power to create his Sinister London.
* HopeSpot: He once took on the identity of a seemingly kindly scientist working for Weapon X, offering mutants victimized by the program the opportunity to escape. Those who did were promptly subjected to even worse experimentation.
* HorribleJudgeOfCharacter: Yet another person who thought they could trust Mystique. Which eventually gets him killed.
* HumanoidAbomination: What Apocalypse turned him into, though maybe it's better said that he only completed the process and Essex was inhuman in all but fact by that point.
* HumanResources: Fond of using this, particularly in [=AvX=] where he has an entire bestiary stocked with clones of both heroes and villains to use against the heroes. And he doesn't just stop with ''human'' resources; in one particularly hilarious scene, Phoenix Emma Frost is complaining about fighting a "field of weaponized wheat", right before:
--> '''Herd of Cows''': ([[RedEyesTakeWarning with glowing red eyes]]) '''KILL'''.
** By ''Immortal X-Men'', he's stopped bothering with whole clones necessarily, save when he needs them, cloning bizarre things like winged Scott Summers' eyeballs as drones.
* ImmortalGenius: Has been alive since the Victorian Era, having been made immortal thanks to the intervention of Apocalypse, and even now is still widely known as a MadScientist ''par excellence'' specializing in biology and genetics.
* JokerImmunity: Thanks to his knowledge of genetic engineering and BrainUploading, any attempt to kill him never sticks for very long. And that's only if you get past his insanely powerful HealingFactor/kill off every part of his HiveMind. Sooner or later, he'll pop back up again.
* KickTheDog: Seperated the Summers brothers to make Scott more vulnerable and prevented Scott from being adopted.
* LaughablyEvil: From the Krakoa era onwards, he's utterly despicable and unapologetically awful, but he's also absolutely ''hilarious''. As a twist, this is intentional - it makes people lower their guard.
* LargeAndInCharge: Sinister is ''huge'', outright towering over his Marauders and most heroes.
* LargeHam: As written by Jonathan Hickman, he's so hammy you'd swear his DNA had a good percentage of pig in it. This is actually intentional on his part.
** Not to mention Kieron Gillen's previous take on the character.
* MadScientist: He emphasizes the science over the madness at least, being by far the most competent geneticist in the Marvel Universe (and no slouch with other forms of science, either). However, being more competent doesn't necessarily make him any less evil.
* TheManBehindTheMan: The man behind the [[MurderInc Marauders]], the [[QuirkyMinibossSquad Nasty Boys]], the [[HellOnEarth Goblyn Queen]], [[AllYourPowersCombined Xraven]] and even the ''[[CosmicEntity High Evolutionary]]''.
* ManOfWealthAndTaste: As ridiculous as Sinister might look in his usual getup, he can pull off classy and cultured in a suit very well when he disguises himself as a human. The X-Men's Beast even refers to him in one issue as a "suave, sophisticated sirrah", a backhanded compliment which [[https://i.imgur.com/XLq1fjQ.jpg clearly pleases him]].
* ManipulativeBastard: One of Marvel's best offerings to this trope.
* MeaningfulRename: When Apocalypse grants him immortality, he tells Essex to choose a new name for himself. [[AppropriatedAppellation Essex chooses 'Sinister' as it was the last word his wife Rebecca spoke to him.]]
* MorallyAmbiguousDoctorate: A curious example. Despite having a better claim to the title of doctor than maybe 90% of Marvel villains who claim it, Essex oddly chooses not to, identifying himself as ''Mister'' Sinister even to other doctor characters. This is possibly either because of his AppropriatedAppellation, or because he feels he's so far beyond them he doesn't need to bring up his own doctorate. Given his personality, either is entirely plausible.
* MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch: One of the first (ex-) human ''X-Men'' villains who was neither a stereotypical CardCarryingVillain nor an anti-human bigot [[FantasticRacism eradicate the mutant race]], but who instead actually embraced the idea of ''Homo Superior'' and worked towards "helping" the mutant cause in his own twisted way. And ironically, he's turned out worse than nearly all of them.
* MysteriousPast: Was in play regarding Sinister's origins for the longest time; it took nine years in real-world time from when he was introduced for readers to learn his origins.
* NamesToRunAwayFromReallyFast: Sinister's exceptionally unsubtle name has an interesting history behind it, relating to a rejected backstory for the character. He was originally going to be a young child mutant who could psychically project an adult body, whose ObviouslyEvil name and appearance were due to the fact that he's a little boy's idea of what a cool supervillain is. InUniverse, the name is a reference to his wife Rebecca's last words. Still doesn't explain why he chooses to eschew his medical title, though.
* NaziNobleman: Not originally one, this element of his character was added in the pages of 2002's ''Weapon X'', which featured him as the Mengele figure in the tasteless mutant concentration camp "Neverland". Since that story he's been written as having increasingly closer ties to the Nazis, from being retconned into collaborating with them under the alias "Nosferatu" to creating the [[ComicBook/SubMariner Namor]] clone N2 for them. That being said, he was probably just collaborating with them for the same reason he has with the likes of Weapon X: an ample supply of test subjects and more or less free rein in what he does to them.
* NewPowersAsThePlotDemands: At last count, he's an [[ReallySevenHundredYearsOld immortal]], [[NighInvulnerability invulnerable]] [[VoluntaryShapeshifting shapeshifter]] with {{Telepathy}} (mostly of the MindControl or [[GrandTheftMe body-snatching]] variety), [[MindOverMatter telekinesis]], [[BarrierWarrior force fields,]] SuperStrength, and [[KamehameHadoken energy blasts]] of some kind. And he rarely ever engages in any kind of physical fighting. Seems to have lost most of these powers in his latest incarnation but also gained some [[HiveMind new ones]] and further makes up for it by being more CrazyPrepared than ever.
* {{Nice Job Breaking It|Hero}} AntiVillain: A ''very'' rare case of this character being OutGambitted -- In the ''X-Cutioner's Song'' Stryfe tempts him into an alliance by promising him a canister from his future with 2,000 years worth of Summers genetic code. The canister actually ends up containing the Legacy Virus, with Sinister's assistant becoming its very first victim.
* NobleDemon: He's often a helpful presence when it suits his own ends. Not that he's to be trusted once he [[ChronicBackstabbingDisorder no longer has any use for you]]... But he's a villain who understands that if somebody else takes over the world before him (or destroys it), he loses. Magneto and Xavier seek to exploit this in ''Powers of X'', though all indications are that this could end very badly, for one simple reason: Sinister cannot be trusted.
* NonActionBigBad: Played with, as Sinister usually leaves the fighting to his underlings but is perfectly capable of throwing down with the best. As he quickly reminds BigBadWannabe John Sublime:
--> '''Sinister''': While I really do prefer not to resort to violence... that doesn't mean I'm not ''good'' at it.
* NotSoWellIntentionedExtremist: During ''Messiah [=Complex=]'', he gathers up the Marauders, the Acolytes and Mystique to try and grab the newborn Hope Summers, mainly for his own goals.
* OppositeSexClone: Miss Sinister, a failed attempt in his early experiments of virally converting others into a copy of himself. Managed to break free from the process completing itself and retain enough identity to have her own ambitions.
** [[spoiler: Mother Righteous]]
* PetTheDog: During his time as a Nazi, he would offer candy to the imprisoned children in exchange for blood samples
* PlayingWithSyringes: Often drawn with comically oversized ones to emphasize his menace.
* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: He varies on this score, sometimes being depicted as entirely uninterested in differences of race and sex, while at others being depicted as... well, what one might expect of a {{Jerkass}} from the Victorian era. As a result, he's been depicted as a racist (refers to Storm as "colonial pet") and a sexist (sees Emma as Scott's sperm receptacle). In the Krakoa era, he's surgically removed that part of his personality, on the grounds that he sees ''everyone'' as beneath him, and there's no point in specifically discriminating.
* PowerCopying: He has a wide range of powers (see below); he got them from copying or stealing them from mutants he captured.
* PracticallyJoker: Since the New 10s he’s become more and more of a LaughablyEvil CardCarryingVillain. For added points he’s always had chalk white skin, resembling a MonsterClown with a loud and flamboyant fashion sense. He’s also obsessed with a stoic hero.
* PragmaticVillainy: The reason he betrayed Apocalypse in the first place was the fact that the latter wanted him to engineer a [[ThePlague genocidal plague]] to unleash upon humanity. Sinister didn't really do this out of any sense of morality however; he just considered it ignorant and bad science (though it is hinted that Jean imploring him to think of the children, like his own recently deceased son Adam, influenced this).
* TheProudElite: He was born into a wealthy British family and had a very privileged upbringing. This, along with the changes made to him by Apocalypse, often results in him lapsing into cartoonish AristocratsAreEvil-inspired sneers. The following is a typical example:
--> '''Sinister''': I cannot abide the stench of the middle class.
* ThePsychoRangers: Sinister's Six, six X-Men clones he created to fight the All-New X-Men.
* PureIsNotGood: As a child, he thought the wealthy part of Victorian-era London he grew up in was Heaven and was fascinated by all the scientific advances being made, as well as how ''clean'' everything was. He became obsessed with purity thanks to this over time, culminating in his insane eugenical theories.
* ReallySevenHundredYearsOld: Or rather, about 150 or so.
* RedAndBlackAndEvilAllOver: Sinister's colors are red and black, and he's one of the most evil enemies from the X-Men.
* RedEyesTakeWarning: Often comboed with GlowingEyesOfDoom.
* RemovedAchillesHeel: He was initially set up as having a weakness to Cyclops's optic blasts. In the comics this was eventually revealed as a deliberate deception on his part.
* SelfMadeSuperPowers: Mister Sinister gave himself quite a few powers by copying or implanting X-genes of other mutants, such as shapeshifting.
* SinisterSurveillance: Appearances by him more often than not consist entirely of a cutaway to him sitting in his lab spying on the heroes. ''How'' he is seemingly able to observe any of the X-Men anywhere at any time has yet to be explained.
* SissyVillain: [[DependingOnTheWriter Sometimes]] depicted as having shades of this, being rather vain and campy. This is intentionally designed into his Krakoa era clones to lower other people's guard. They know they can't trust him, but it's hard to take him seriously. And not taking Sinister seriously is a horrible, horrible mistake.
* SlaveBrand: [[spoiler: Canonically, the red diamond on his head is "[[http://i.imgur.com/K55yJSm.jpg the mark of Apocalypse]]", branding Sinister as ''his'' forevermore. And yes, you did read that right. One of the most distinctive features of one of the most distinctive villains in the X-Men's rogues gallery is nothing more than a glorified tramp stamp]].
* StalkerWithATestTube: A major TropeCodifier.
* StalkerWithoutACrush: More or less his shtick, as he's forever stalking various X-people ForScience Stalking victims of his have included anyone even remotely connected to the Summers family, Colossus, Gambit, ComicBook/ProfessorX, Exodus, and most recently as of 2020 Franklin Richards.
* SympathyForTheHero: In ''X-Men'' #23 he has a strange conversation with Cyclops, mostly famous for the infamous "third Summers brother" hint, but also unique for Sinister exhibiting a rare sympathy for the X-Men. He [[EvenEvilHasStandards condemns Stryfe and his Legacy Virus outright]], saying that death at the hands of a madman like him is "the worst kind of death for people like you (Scott), who strive so hard to fight for the dream."
* ThereIsAnother: The Krakoan Age explores the idea that his red diamond is a reference to the card suit and that there are three other clones of Nathaniel Essex whose foreheads bear the other ones. A flashback in ''Immortal X-Men'' reveals the truth: As the original Essex was dying, he looked at the newly-invented computers and forsaw the possiblity of the singularity. Essex saw four potential ways to deal with this threat and made a clone of himself to investigate each: Mutants (Sinister himself), human ingenuity ([[ComicBook/XMen2021 Doctor Stasis]]), aliens ([[spoiler:[[ComicBook/XMenRed2022 Orbis Stellaris]]]]), and magic ([[spoiler:Mother Righteous]]). The clones all believed that they were the original.
* TragicVillain: ''The Further Adventures of Cyclops and Phoenix'' portrays Nathaniel Essex as a brilliant SeekerArchetype who is undergoing some ''steep'' SanitySlippage after the death of his infant son Adam. Even Scott and Jean, the two people with the most cause to hate Sinister, can't help but pity Essex and hope against hope his fate can be changed. [[spoiler:It can't]].
* UnwantedRevival: At one point while Colossus is dead Sinister goes to the X-Men and offers to give their teammate a second chance via his cloning technology. Quite understandably, they decline the offer. And then [[StatusQuoIsGod Colossus goes and comes back from the dead anyway]].
* TheVirus: Can transplant his consciousness and physical characteristics into the bodies of others or even multiple bodies at a time. He apparently learned how to do this by studying and reverse-engineering the biology of the Phalanx.
* VoodooShark: Sinister's first full use as a villain, in which he was TheManBehindTheMan and explanation for the {{Retcon}} that Madelyne Pryor was a clone, was definitely this, and it has long been scorned in fandom for the twin crimes of derailing the Madelyne Pryor character and making Sinister himself, supposedly a genius geneticist of the highest caliber, look like a bit of an idiot. The story establishes he acquired Scott and Jean's DNA early and that his goal is to create their child (who he has calculated will be an extremely powerful mutant)... so why didn't he just use their DNA to create their child himself? [[CuttingTheKnot He actually does just this]] in the ComicBook/AgeOfApocalypse and the result, Characters/MarvelComicsXMan, is genetically identical or thereabouts to [[ComicBook/{{Cable}} the child born to Maddie and Scott]] (and even more powerful), which just makes the original plot even more preposterous. (While Mads was brain-dead when he grew her--he had a Jean-Grey-shaped vegetable until a piece of the Phoenix came along--and his ability to create fully-functional clones came later, theoretically he would have only needed her uterus to work, since presumably that wouldn't have the same problems as his cloning process.)
* WellIntentionedExtremist:
** Another case of DependingOnTheWriter, and most prevalent during the 90s where most of what he was up to was in the name of opposing Apocalypse. His actions during 2007's ''[[ComicBook/XMenMessiahComplex Messiah Complex]]'' storyline also have shades of this, as he was working (in his usual StalkerWithATestTube way) towards the goal of reviving the mutant race after the ComicBook/ScarletWitch sterilized them en masse via reality warping.
** ''Immortal X-Men'' reveals that a major motivation of his is saving all of humanity, humans and mutants, from being supplanted by the advancement of artificial intelligence.
* WouldntHurtAChild[=/=]WouldHurtAChild: Zigzags: during the 80s Sinister stalks kid Cyclops, but doesn't harm him and even develops the glasses that allow him to control his power; during the 90s he was firmly in WouldntHurtAChild mode, and from the 2000s since he's been in unrepentant WouldHurtAChild mode (though he does make an exception for baby Hope).
* XanatosGambit: With a side order of XanatosSpeedChess and Batman Gambit and in some cases CloningGambit.
[[/folder]]

!Original Marauders

[[folder:Greycrow]]
!!'''John Greycrow / Scalphunter'''
[[quoteright:300:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/john_greycrow_xmen.jpg]]
!!!'''Nationality:''' American
!!!'''Species:''' Human mutant
!!!'''First Appearance:''' ''Uncanny X-Men'' #210 (1986)

-> ''It's amazing what you can put together with a few pieces of scrap metal and a little know-how.''
\\\
A BadassNative of the Comanche tribe who has been alive since the days of UsefulNotes/WorldWarII and serving Mister Sinister for nearly that long. He's the tactical commander of the team, and since Malice's departure has been TheLeader of the group, with only Sinister himself ranking higher. On Krakoa, John wanted to atone for his crimes, and was drafted onto the ComicBook/{{Hellions}}, a makeshift team for those deemed to violent for the peaceful land of Krakoa to do some good, led by Kwannon. She and John would bring out the best in each other, and eventually become a couple.
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* AdaptationalNiceGuy: Neither his film version discussed below or the cameo version of him that appears in ''Anime/XMen'' are anywhere near as evil or as sadistic as the original Riptide.