"Thanos has been inside my head for six years since he sent an army to New York, and now he's back!"
Tony Stark: I get first crack at the big guy. Iron Man's what he's waiting for.
Vision: That's true, he hates you the most.
Vision: That's true, he hates you the most.
Marvel Cinematic Universe
Arch-Enemy in this series. open/close all folders
Films
- Iron Man has the Mandarin and Thanos as his arch enemies. The former is mostly just related to Iron Man's origin by way of the terrorist organisation he commands and most of Tony's battles with said group happen off-screen after Iron Man, with the real Mandarin and Iron Man in the end never meeting. Iron Man's war with Thanos, and the effect the latter has on his psyche, are on the other hand one of the fundamental aspects of the MCU and drive much of the plot in Phases 2 and 3, with Thanos also being an Evil Counterpart with Villain Respect for Iron Man. Their dynamic leads to Iron Man erasing a past Thanos using the Infinity Stones in a Heroic Sacrifice. Tony also has personal enmities with several other villains.
- Obadiah Stane, his treacherous mentor who sells Stark Industries weapons to terrorists and tries to have him killed, which leads to Tony becoming Iron Man in the first place.
- Ivan Vanko, who seeks revenge on Tony for his father's actions, as Tony's father had Vanko's father deported. Vanko has the technological expertise to create armor which enables him to challenge Iron Man in combat, which he does twice.
- Justin Hammer, Tony's business rival who frees Vanko in the hopes of using him to develop technology to upstage Tony.
- Aldrich Killian, who seeks revenge on Tony for rejecting him. Killian is behind a series of explosions, one of which puts Happy Hogan in a coma. Killian also kidnaps Pepper Potts and infuses her with Extremis.
- Ultron, Tony's own creation who becomes an Omnicidal Maniac.
- Captain America has the Red Skull, as in the comics. While Steve has went on to face a great many foes afterwards, his fights and ideological conflict with the Red Skull remain the stuff of In-Universe legends. The Red Skull is also responsible for Cap getting frozen and waking up in modern times, which is something Steve struggled with for years before giving it closure.
- There's also a good argument to be made that Captain America's nemesis is HYDRA itself. Even after the Red Skull's Death, HYDRA continues to plague Steve. In particular through their capture and brainwashing of the Winter Soldier, their infiltration of SHIELD, their attempts to create Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver and their murder of Howard Stark (who was not only a friend of Steve but also the father of Tony Stark), HYDRA in some capacity has been responsible for much of the conflict in all of Cap's movies. Captain America's feud with HYDRA, on top of philosophical differences, is deeply personal in a way that Cap's fight against Red Skull rarely was.
- Thor, as in the comics, initially had his adopted brother Loki as his enemy, as they once were close brothers but Loki grew to hate and betray his family over time. They were able to work this out later on and became close brothers again (just in time for Loki to brutally die in Infinity War), with Hela (Thor's evil older sister who destroyed Mjolnir, stabbed out his eye, and forced him to destroy his homeland) or the aforementioned Thanos (who killed Loki, Heimdall, and half of the surviving Asgardians, and caused Thor to suffer crippling depression after killing half the universe-and reminding Thor it was his failure) being the closest claimants to the title.
- Hulk, aside from being His Own Worst Enemy for most of the franchise, has Abomination as his nemesis...mostly because the latter is an Evil Counterpart who was the only real villain Hulk got to fight before Universal Studios' unwillingness to produce more solo Hulk movies forced Hulk to exclusively be explored as a member of the Avengers.
- The Guardians of the Galaxy has certainly made quite a number of adversaries throughout the entirety of their tenure in the MCU.
- Ronan the Accuser starts out as one in the first film, as his campaign to retrieve the Power Stone for his own gains is what leads to the formation of the Guardians of the Galaxy. While he has certainly gained the animosity of every member, it's mostly personal with Drax the Destroyer, who swears revenge on him after the former murders his family.
- For Star-Lord, It's Personal with his own evil father Ego, having killed Quill's mother so he wouldn't be tempted to stay on Earth instead of continue his assimilation. Considering she is his biological daughter and Peter's half-sister, Ego could also be this for Mantis, especially since he kept her isolated for most of her life and treated her as little more than an expendable (albeit useful) tool, or as she says "a flea with a purpose".
- Thanos also qualifies as a nemesis, being responsible for the deaths of Drax's family, half of Gamora's homeworld, and being a monstrously abusive adoptive father to both Gamora and Nebula. As mentioned below, Thor also has major beef with him when his pursuit of the Tesseract (which contained the Space Stone) led him to kill half of the Asgardians (including Heimdall and Loki), and therefore, Thor executes the present Thanos at the start of Avengers: Endgame in revenge. Being the overall Big Bad of the franchise will do that for you.
- It's Personal with High Evolutionary to Rocket Raccoon, who is responsible for the horrific experiments he endured and the sole catalyst for most of the horrible events in his life. He abducted him from Earth as a baby, performed deadly experiments on him, manipulated him into giving him what he wanted before coldly informing him he will be euthanised now his role is over, killed his friend and Love Interest Lyla and all his friends right in front of him and then mocked him for it. Rocket savagely mauled him beyond repair for this and made it his mission to take him down once his past caught up to him. For his part, the High Evolutionary wants Rocket dead and his brain dissected for study (both out of his twisted scientific mind and out of a desire for revenge for mutilating him). In fact, come the end of the movie all of the Guardians - even Gamora - want nothing more than to bring him down for all he did to Rocket and countless other civilizations.
- The Vision and Scarlet Witch have Ultron as their nemesis; as the latter is responsible for the death of Wanda's brother Pietro (and Scarlet Witch indirectly created Ultron by manipulating Iron Man into building him in the first place), and is also indirectly the creator of Vision (as Vision was originally a new body for Ultron before the Avengers stole it and uploaded JARVIS into it), and a representation of everything wrong Vision could be.
- Doctor Strange has Kaecilius, who kills Stephen's mentor, the Ancient One.
- Spider-Man has Mysterio and later, the Green Goblin from the Raimi-verse.
- Mysterio deceives him and takes advantage of Peter's grieving emotional state to acquire an arsenal of attack drones Tony left him. He then tortures Peter with a series of grueling illusions, nearly killed Peter, and forces him to step up his game to stop him. Both in the scale of his criminal activities and the degree to which it affected Peter on a personal level, this villain surpasses all the other villains Spidey had to face by himself up to the point, and even when Peter stops his scheme he gets the last laugh by revealing Spidey's secret identity to the world from the grave and turning him into a framed Hero with Bad Publicity, all but screwing over not just Peter's life, but that of his friends and loved ones. While the Goblin does the most personal damage to Peter, the events that led to it would never have happened if not for Mysterio.
- But the Green Goblin eventually supplants Mysterio as Peter's most hated enemy — to the point the young Avenger was willing to kill him in their final battle — by murdering Aunt May right in front of him. He also manipulates the other villains into revolting against Spider-Man and would risk the collapse of the Multiverse in order to leave behind his infamy to haunt Peter in a world where Norman Osborn never existed. And although Peter manages to cure Osborn of the Goblin persona rather than kill him, he is forced to sacrifice the world's memory of Peter Parker for the sake of the universe, meaning that he'll be left alone and unrecognized by his friends and allies.
- Both Black Panthers have their personal adversaries in each of their respective films.
- T'Challa, the Black Panther, has his cousin Erik "Killmonger" Stevens (real name N'Jadaka), his Evil Counterpart who wishes to claim the throne of Wakanda and use its advanced technology to get back at his oppressors. Killmonger is the result of a Create Your Own Villain by T'Challa's father who murdered N'Jadaka's father N'Jobu due to their differences in how Vibranium should be distributed amongst the world beyond Wakanda. It's also worth noting that Killmonger is ultimately responsible for T'Challa's death posthumously, as by burning the Heart-Shaped Herb during his brief reign in Wakanda, Shuri is unable to find a cure for her brother, who eventually passes away due to an unspecified illness.
- Shuri now Black Panther has Namor the Submariner, the ruler of the undersea kingdom of Talokan. While she has faced enemies before, none made it more personal (or focal) than him. After Namor (mistakenly) believes Shuri to have betrayed and murdered one of his people, he invades Wakanda and kills her mother Queen Ramonda. Having already suffered the loss of her father and brother, Shuri is seething with rage and hatred towards Namor, wanting nothing more than to kill the man to avenge her family, resulting in one of the most brutal and visceral battles in the MCU. They have formed a truce for the sake of their nations, but it's clear their vendetta is far from over.
- Black Widow (Natasha Romanoff) has Dreykov, the kingpin of the Red Room, a Russian private mercenary camp where young girls are trained to become assassins against their will. She escapes when Clint Barton disobeys orders and helps her blow up the building Dreykov is in. However, he survives and meets her again in a more ruthless way and uses his daughter, who was collateral damage in the explosion, as a tool to combat defectors and stave off Romanoff and her "family" in their second attack on the Red Room.
- Shang-Chi has Xu Wenwu aka The Mandarin, his father and leader of the Ten Rings, who put him through Training from Hell to turn him into an assassin without equal and the villain he faces off with the most out of the entire movie. The full story of their relationship is far more complex and tragic, but it doesn't change the fact that it was he who made Shang-Chi what he is today. The Ten Rings themselves could also count, though again they're under the leadership of his father.
- The Great Protector has the Dweller-in-Darkness, a Draconic Abomination who she helped seal away. When the Dweller-in-Darkness was freed in modern times, the Great Protector defeated it again with the aid of Shang-Chi, who killed the Dweller-in-Darkness outright.
- Scott Lang and Janet van Dyne have Kang the Conqueror. For Janet, she was responsible for him nearly escaping from exile and subsequently gained control over the Quantum Realm as a dictator. Janet spent 20 years of her life fighting his tyranny to prevent him from getting any more powerful. In turn, Kang is furious at Janet's betrayal, and when she comes back to his realm in Quantumania, he wants nothing more than to extract revenge on her. For Scott, in Quantumania, Kang captures both him and his daughter Cassie, threatening her life to get Scott to do what he wants. When he reneges on their deal anyways, Scott is utterly furious and spends much of his time smashing Kang's footsoldiers and buildings in retribution. For his part, Kang recognizes Scott as a genuine threat by the end of the film and actively tries to kill him with his bare hands for ruining his escape.
- Wade Wilson has Ajax also known as Francis. Running an illegal research program on people that were terminally ill, Ajax performed unethical and downright cruel experiments on them, forcefully transforming them into Mutants before selling them off on the black market. After Ajax tortures Wade to the point it unlocks his mutation at the cost of his body becoming horrifically scarred, Wade manages to escape and goes on a Roaring Rampage of Revenge against Ajax and everyone responsible for the program that made him. This in turn causes Ajax to kidnap Vanessa and lure him out in a final confrontation. It's made all the more personal since Ajax constantly led Wade on with the promise of a cure, but spitefully and mockingly reveals there never was a cure, and that he only said that to mess with him more. This causes Deadpool to kill him on the spot.
TV Series
- In Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., the SHIELD agents lead by Phil Coulson all have Grant Ward, a fellow agent on their team who turned out to be one of HYDRA's moles. After several things he's done to them over the course of the first two seasons that made every SHIELD agent hate him, he shares the same feeling by season 3 and takes extra delight in tormenting the agents, culminating in Phil finally killing him on an alien planet.
- Daredevil, like in the comics, has Wilson Fisk/Kingpin and The Hand:
- Fisk definitely takes this role in Season 1, to the point that Matt actually considers breaking his no-killing rule to kill Fisk. Even in Season 2 when Fisk is in jail, the one time they meet has Fisk promising to come after Matt and Foggy once he gets out of jail (which he does in Season 3, when Kingpin learns Daredevil's identity and has him framed for murder).
- The Hand serves this role for him in Season 2, especially after killing Elektra, and again in The Defenders after reviving Elektra and brainwashing her to be on their side, which results in her killing his mentor Stick and almost getting Matt himself killed.
- Season 3 introduces Benjamin Poindexter (aka Dex), a Sociopathic Soldier with Improbable Aiming Skills (you can guess who he's meant to represent) who Kingpin exploits to be his right hand man. He quickly becomes one of Matt's most dangerous and personal enemies after he personally attacks the Gazette and injures Matt and targets Karen and Foggy. He fully cements his status as Matt's most hated nemesis (second only to Kingpin) when he murders Father Lamton, wreaks havoc on the church, nearly kills Karen and does all he can through the remainder of the series to put Matt through hell. By the end of the season Kingpin has damaged his spine so badly he needs experimental surgery, with the classic "bullseye" pattern in his eyes as a side effect heavily implying he'll fully embrace the role as the MCU Bullseye.
- Jessica Jones, also like the comics, has Kilgrave (known there as the Purple Man), who before the events of the series used his Mind Control to kidnap, abuse, and rape her, and then in-series constantly threatens people she cares about. Even after she kills him at the end of Season 1, she later hallucinates him in her guilt after being forced to kill someone else in self-defense.
- Luke Cage's biggest enemies in the series are probably Diamondback (actually his half-brother Willis Stryker) and Mariah Dillard (known as Black Mariah in the comics), though she is even more Bushmaster's arch-enemy than his:
- Willis is the one responsible for getting Luke sent to jail in the first place by framing him, and comes the closest of anyone in the series so far to killing him via the Judas bullet. He also survives the end of Season 1, now possibly with the same unbreakable skin, leaving the possibility open for him to return at some point.
- By the end of Season 1 and the start of The Defenders it's clear that Mariah is the one who Luke is gunning for the most after she gets off scott-free for everything she did. While Bushmaster is theoretically the Big Bad of Season 2 and Luke (reluctantly) ends up on Mariah's side multiple times against him, it's clear that she is far more evil than Bushmaster, and is definitely this for him, as her grandparents killed his parents and she herself later kills most of his remaining relatives. By the end of the season, Bushmaster is never truly able to get his revenge on her, and she wills Harlem's Paradise to Luke in the hopes that it'll corrupt him.
- Iron Fist, like Daredevil, has The Hand, the sworn enemy of the Iron Fist whom it is his duty to defeat, for Season 1 and The Defenders.
- Madame Gao and Harold Meachum were involved in the murders of Danny's parents.
- The Hand also becomes this for Colleen, once she discovers that she has (unknowingly) been a member all along of a branch of the Hand that's just as evil as the others, and they try to have her killed.
- In Season 2, Danny's former best friend Davos becomes this to him after stealing the powers of the Iron Fist for him and using it to cause chaos in Chinatown.
- The Punisher has Billy Russo, who is revealed to have betrayed Frank and allowed his family to be killed for his own gain. When Frank finally gets his hands on him by the end of the season, he maims and mutilates Billy's face to an unrecognizable state in revenge (implying Russo will become his comic’s counterpart Jigsaw).
- Sylvie from Loki has both Ravonna Renslayer and He Who Remains as her most personal enemies. The former is because Renslayer was the one to prune her homeworld, abduct her as a child and then forced her to live her life constantly isolated and on the run when she managed to escape. Renslayer does all she can to cover up for this oversight and even apathetically tells her to her face she doesn't even remember why she did it all to begin with (which is of course bullshit) and continues to lie to her even during the series itself. The latter is because he is responsible for the TVA's existence and by proxy the cause of all her suffering at their hands, though this one is a bit more complicated, since she feels nothing but misery and emptiness when she finally kills him.
- Nick Fury and Talos in Secret Invasion have Gravik, a renegade Skrull terrorist who wants to overthrow humanity and claim Earth in the name of the Skrulls. For Fury, Gravik murdered Maria Hill in Fury's form, destroyed Moscow's town centre and framed him for it, leaving him stripped of his titles and alienated from his allies, despite Fury taking him in as a youth. This leaves Nick with a strong vendetta against him and he does whatever he can to bring him down, even if he does so alone. For Talos, Gravik derides him as a coward for wanting peace between Skrulls and humans, manipulated his daughter G'iah into joining his terrorist faction and is heavily implied to be responsible for Soren's death. Talos wants nothing more than to bring him down and stop his plans before peace becomes an impossibility. Gravik ultimately manages to kill Talos, leaving only Nick Fury left in his way to stop him. However, Talos finally started to get back through to Gi'ah before he died, and she promptly turns on Gravik and kills him at last.
