Adaptational Sympathy / Marvel Cinematic Universe

Characters who are portrayed more sympathetically than their original comics counterparts in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

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Films

• Ant-Man: Darren Cross, aka Yellowjacket, became a supervillain in the comics when he overworked himself and required a heart transplant, the experiment unit of which he was given wound up giving him powers, until he burnt it out and kidnapped multiple patients for replacements. The MCU's Cross was Hank Pym's protégée, and genuinely enjoyed studying under and working with the man, until Hank shut him out when he saw Cross was getting a little too obsessed with the shrinking tech he had developed. A Broken Pedestal resulted, causing Cross to force Hank out and turn to villainy. It only got worse when Scott defeats him by disabling his suit's regulator, causing Darren to shrink uncontrollably and seemingly die...until Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania revealed he survived, but the damage he sustained resulted in him being turned into the franchise's version of M.O.D.O.K.
• Ant-Man and the Wasp: The Ghost in the comics claims that he was the victim of corporate greed, having been seduced by one his company's henchwoman to build them a profitable new invention, lost her to said company when she tried squeezing more money out of them, and became a vengeful, intangible being when a hitman almost took his life to keep him from squealing. This Ghost, now a woman, was just a little girl when her father's invention went off during a S.H.I.E.L.D. raid, causing her to become permanently intangible, and at risk of falling apart every day she's still around. She was then forcibly trained to be an assassin for S.H.I.E.L.D./HYDRA in exchange for being cured, which turned out to be a lie. Everything she does in this movie is to try and save herself from dying, in contrast to the vengeful and angry comics version.
• Avengers: Age of Ultron: Ultron in the comics is regarded as a monstrous robot psychopath that has to be destroyed no matter what, as he plotted the extinction of humanity from the moment he was brought online. Even his creations like Vision harbor little to no love for their "father" due to Ultron's abusive tendencies. Here, Ultron is depicted as a Tragic Villain tasked for an impossible mission of world peace, which gradually devolved into an insane plan of wiping out the humans to "save" them. Tellingly, Vision admits he feels sympathy for Ultron's plight while accepting he must be destroyed, and even engages with his "father" in a civil conversation about humanity's fate in the near future.
• ZigZagged in Avengers: Infinity War and Avengers: Endgame with Thanos. His comics counterpart is an unrepentant genocidal madman who only sought to conquer the universe and wipe out half of all life to appease his mistress, the literal personification of Death herself. The first film changes his motivation to where he still sought to wipe out half the universe, but made him into a Well-Intentioned Extremist who was trying to prevent an Overpopulation Crisis on every world before it claims the universe like his own planet was. The Avengers are still out to stop him, but they question his methods of solving the crisis rather than the reasoning as to why he's trying to accomplish it. Then again, when the team encounters a past version of the Mad Titan while trying to undo the damage he caused in Endgame, he decides to wipe out the entire universe and start over because he believes the universe is ungrateful for his sacrifices, proving he's no better than his comics counterpart. By the same token, he's shown to genuinely care for his daughters (well, Gamora anyway, Nebula... not so much), showcasing that, unlike his comics counterpart, who treated his children as tools, he is capable of love. It brings him to tears when he's forced to sacrifice Gamora for the Soul Stone, as he doesn't want to kill her, but he can't give up his goals for her sake. Before Thor kills him, he also admits to Nebula that he treated her too harshly.
• Black Panther: Erik "Killmonger" Stevens, alias N'Jadaka, son of Prince N'Jobu, and thus T'Challa's cousin, was a kidnapping victim in the comics, raised by the very people who killed his parents—themselves traitors to Wakanda—who molded him into a hateful and vengeful man that believed Black Panther's reign was in defiance of tradition. This iteration lost his father to King T'Chaka, his own uncle, as punishment for selling out Wakanda's Vibranium to Ulysses Klaw, and was forced to spend his youth on the streets while struggling with heavy systemic racism. His goal to take Wakanda and use it to force the world to submit to its whim was presented in the wrong, but T'Challa found that his cousin's desires, though misguided, raised several valid points about Wakanda being capable of helping to end systemic racism throughout the world, yet chose to stay hidden all this time.
• Black Widow: Tony Masters, alias Taskmaster, in the comics was a wisecracking mercenary with Photographic Memory, having hired out his skills because he thought doing legitimate things with his powers would be boring—or at least that's what he believed, as in truth, he was an ex-SHIELD agent who has a severe case of Identity Amnesia. In this film, Antonia Dreykov, the daughter of the progenitor of the Black Widow program, was burned to a crisp and had a building dropped on her when Natasha used her as bait to get to her father. Dreykov rebuilt his daughter into Taskmaster and used his mind-controlling nanites to ensure complete and utter loyalty out of her, making her into a ruthless killing machine against her will.
• Captain America: Civil War: Baron Helmut Zemo's comics iteration is an unrepentant Nazi doing his damndest to avenge his father's death at Captain America's hands. In the MCU, he's not a Nazi, instead wanting to tear apart the Avengers as revenge for how the destruction brought about by Ultron led to the demise of his entire family. In fact, when he returns in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, he outright admits he despises the Nazis and HYDRA, and his goal in that series is to eliminate Karli Morgenthau and her Flag Smashers for abusing the super soldier serum for their own gain, even admitting that Steve was a good man.
• Captain Marvel: To many's surprise, the Skrulls were given this treatment, along with Adaptational Heroism. Their comics counterparts are best known as shapeshifting conquerors that famously invaded Earth for their own ends, but the MCU depicts them as refugees fleeing from the xenophobic Kree Empire. When they did eventually try to infiltrate Earth as they did in the comics, it was shown to only be a Renegade Splinter Faction that had grown impatient from still not yet having a new home to settle on.
• Doctor Strange:
  • Kaecilius was little more than Baron Mordo's mook in the comics. In the film, he's a willing servant of Dormammu because he lost his wife and child, and went mad with grief trying to bring them back to the point he fell under the Dread's sway with the hopes he can finally succeed.
  • Baron Mordo, thanks to undergoing Adaptational Heroism. His comics iteration was already a power-hungry madman who had willingly sided with Dormammu so he could obtain ultimate power. He never sways his allegiance to the Dread in the MCU, and is a friend, mentor, and ally to Strange, until he learns The Ancient One had been sapping off the Dark Dimension's magic to prolong her age, and that Strange himself used the Time Stone to drive Dormammu away. Angered at this blatant disregard for the laws of magic, the film ends with him deciding there's "too many sorcerers" misusing their powers, and starts taking their magic.
• Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness:
  • America Chavez, a being who could travel the multiverse, lost her mothers in the comics to an alien invasion of her home dimension and is desperately trying to bring them back by traveling across dimensions to prove herself a hero, even though her home dimension required her to protect it. Her MCU Counterpart lost her mothers when she accidentally sent them into another universe after being scared by a wasp landing on her, and spends the entire film on the run from Wanda Maximoff, who sought America's dimension-hopping powers to force her way to a universe where her kids from WandaVision were alive and well. The fact that she's betrayed by a Doctor Strange from another universe does nothing to help her trust issues with the MCU Strange.
  • Speaking of Strange, his comics counterpart is marginally well-adjusted in spite of the tragedies he's suffered, but this Strange is, deep down, hurting over the fact that he lost the chance to be with Christine Palmer. In spite of everything he's done, he truly isn't happy. And none of his multiversal counterparts introduced in this movie have it any easier—Defender Strange suffered from a similar broken heart, Strange Supreme fell to the Darkhold's corruption and destroyed another dimension, allowing his compatriots in the Illuminati to kill him after the threat of Thanos was ended, and Sinister Strange let his grief over being unable to move on from Christine cause him to cause an incursion in his own reality. No matter what dimension, Strange can't catch a break. Both Strange and Sinister Strange's issues also stem from being unable to save their sister, Donna, from drowning as children.
  • The Illuminati, to a degree, gets this treatment as well. Their comics counterparts, in spite of being well-intentioned, usually cause more harm than good (such as laying the ground roots for Secret Invasion and exiling the Hulk). They have a similar MO here, but their actions towards besting their Thanos didn't cross any serious lines aside from their Strange trying to use the Darkhold. Professor X and Mr. Fantastic are also a lot more amenable and reasonable in their actions towards both MCU!Strange and MCU!Wanda. Only Captain Carter, Maria Rambeau!Captain Marvel, and Sorcerer Supreme Mordo aren't given much sympathy, treating them as overtly paranoid and far more willing to use threats to keep everyone in line. In fact, Supreme Mordo is an Inversion to his aforementioned MCU counterpart, as it's strongly implied he corrupted his Strange so he could become Sorcerer Supreme.
    • Black Bolt is a far greater example of this. His Mainstream MCU counterpart ruled over a Fantastic Caste System that effectively punished those who didn't get powers by making them pariahs, while those who became Alpha Primitives were enslaved—a fact that led his own brother to stage a coup against him and his family, yet never made Black Bolt change it when he did wind up back in charge. His Earth-838 iteration lacks that baggage, and is shown to have regretted killing his version of Strange in spite of the man's request to do so. Sadly, he's also the first to die at Wanda's hands.
• Guardians of the Galaxy: The Yondu of the comics hailed from the far future of the Marvel Universe as a member of the original Guardians of the Galaxy, largely a heroic character. The MCU has him undergo Adaptational Villainy here, making him a common thief and leader of a band of Ravagers, but it does add a lot of layers of sympathy to his characterization. Here, he was once a prominent Ravager until he accepted bribes from Ego, the Living Planet, to traffic the numerous children Ego sired so he can see if they're powerful enough to aid in his plan to spread himself across the universe (with the implication that he killed them if they failed). This cost him Yondu standing with the group, and feeling guilty for his actions, he refused to do the same to Ego's last child, Peter Quill, and took him in as a Ravager and his own son... even if he wasn't perfect at it. He proves himself a redeemed man once and for all when he gives his life to save his adopted boy—an act of which his comrades honor by declaring him one of their own once more.
• Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings: Xu Wenwu, better known as "The Mandarin" in the comics, undergoes this for a practical reason. While his comics counterpart is best known as Iron Man's arch-enemy and a ruthless and powerful conqueror, he's also infamous for being a textbook example of the Yellow Peril trope, lacking much depth beyond being evil. Given his history, the MCU depicts him as a more complex and tragic figure, showing that he willingly gave up being a villain when he fell in love and became a father, but he fell right back on old habits when an enemy he caused trouble for in the past took revenge by killing his wife, leading him to mold his son, the titular Shang-Chi, into the ultimate weapon to kill those responsible. Much of his characterization is motivated by wanting to bring his wife back when he seemingly finds a way to do so, unaware that he's being manipulated by the Dweller in Darkness, and shows a genuine love for his son. To add to this, when Iron Man 3 featured a faux Mandarin that the one-shot All Hail the King showed being released from prison specifically so he could be brought to Wenwu for making a mockery of him, it's shown that Trevor Slattery was spared and made a court jester of sorts, and that Wenwu finds how the Americans feared a man named after an orange more amusing than anything else.
• Spider-Man: Far From Home: Downplayed. In the comics, Quentin Beck became Mysterio, the Master of Illusion, because Evil Is Easy, unable to make it big as an actor in Hollywood and figuring his special effects mastery could help him make an easy buck. In this film, though he's hinted at being dangerously unstable, and ultimately proves to be worse than he usually is, his turn to crime was triggered by Tony Stark appropriating his holographic technology and firing him, leading him to create the identity of Mysterio with other disgruntled Stark employees (including the one Obadiah Stane yelled at for not being able to recreate Iron Man's suit where Tony did IN A CAVE! WITH A BOX OF SCRAPS!) so he can overshadow Tony's legacy following his Heroic Sacrifice in Endgame.
• Spider-Man: Homecoming: Adrian Toomes, alias The Vulture, underwent this compared to his comics counterpart. The original version was a genius inventor screwed over by his business partner, who had been embezzling funds and stole a flight harness that Toomes recently invented. His MCU counterpart was the head of a salvage company whose government contract was screwed over by the Department of Damage Control and Stark Industries, and was forced to leave without compensation. Deep in debt and unable to find further work, Toomes and his crew worked to invent super weapons leftover from the Battle of New York and sell them on the black market, so as to provide for their families.
• Spider-Man: No Way Home:
  • The multiversal villains from the other live-action Spider-Man franchises (except Lizard) also get even more expansion regarding this from their original movie outings:
    • When Electro's brought into the MCU and does his damndest to not be forgotten about, his return to villainy is played very sympathetically, with Goblin specifically using this to turn him against the others. After he's de-powered, he reverts back to his affable nature, taking his universe's Peter's apology really well.
    • Norman's struggles against his evil Split Personality, the Green Goblin, is played even more tragically here, where the actions of the MCU Peter Parker inadvertently resurrect him and the other Raimi and Webb villains, transporting them from their home dimensions in the process. While his Goblin persona goes off the deep end even further and winds up killing Aunt May, Norman is shown to be scared shitless of the Goblin and horrified at what his alter ego has done—contrast this to Norman's comics iteration, who is shown to still want the Goblin around and has no regrets for anything he ever did in costume.
    • Doc Ock's Adaptational Heroism, where he became a supervillain by a series of tragic mistakes, gets further hammered here after he's brought into the MCU. Peter is able to fix his inhibitor chip and Otto is overjoyed that he's free from his tentacles' influence, willingly helping Spider-Man in his mission. He even gets a chance to reunite with his Peter, and is able to come home a free man and with the technology he needs to make his dream come true.
    • Sandman's change from a petty thief to a desperate man turning to crime on a bad day is further emphasized here, as all he wants to do is go home to his daughter. When Peter fights Electro, Sandman helps him so that Electro doesn't kill him, only turning against him after he thought Peter killed Electro (which soon gets resolved). Him turning against the heroes is only because he wants all of them to go home, not to destroy the spell as the other villains wanted to, even listening to his universe's Peter that he truly means well after getting cured.
• Thor: Loki, son of Odin, is a pure villain in the comics (at least until this film came out, at which point he was altered to appear more like his MCU counterpart), being a conqueror and trickster that seeks only power for himself, or just to Troll with the other heroes for his own amusement. This film has him start off as a Well-Intentioned Extremist by setting up the plot of the Frost Giants' invasion of Asgard so he could get Thor exiled, knowing full well his brother's own rash behavior would cause Odin to inflict harsh punishment, as he feels that Thor's ascension to the throne and his Blood Knight tendencies make him ill-suited to rule, rather than trying to bump off Thor so he could claim the power for himself. His feud with Odin also gives him a more valid reason rather than simply detesting the All-Father's presence on what he believes is rightfully his throne — he is utterly crushed when he learns he was the abandoned son of King Laufey, ruler of Jotunheim, and Odin took him in as his own son, which leads Loki to think that Odin only took him in for political purposes. The rest of the series thereafter shows that Loki is indeed a victim of his own predictability, especially in Thor: Ragnarok, and eventually he tries to make a change for the better, only to die at the hands of the Thanos just when he finally started to do better.
  • His own self-titled TV series, which focuses on a variant from an alternate timeline created by the events of Avengers: Endgame shows that the Time Variance Authority refuses to let Loki—any Loki for that matter—redeem themselves because it goes against the "Sacred Timeline", and he must die a villain.
• Thor: Ragnarok: Hela, the Asgardian goddess of death, is given this treatment thanks to being Thor and Loki's half-sister this time around. Long ago, she and Odin once ruled over the Nine Realms as a powerful empire, but when Odin softened his stance and decided to become a kinder and wiser king, he was forced to banish her to Hel itself when she refused to change along with him. Thus, rather than just being the power-hungry queen of the underworld, she was yet another victim of Odin's many mistakes.

Live-Action TV

• Daredevil (2015): In the comics, Bullseye was simply an Ax-Crazy Psycho for Hire whose childhood ambition was "to be the bad guy" and no clearly-defined past aside from a few confirmed details. The show not only uses his name from the Ultimate universe (Benjamin Poindexter) but has a tragic backstory of losing his parents and being sent to an orphanage, not to mention that he tries to deal with his insanity by meeting with a psychologist. All of this culminates in Wilson Fisk molding him into the villain—little more than a tool for his own ends, as his attempts to live out a normal life are twisted by the Kingpin.
• Hawkeye (2021):
  • The titular archer himself usually goes through a bout of jerkassery in the comics, but, Depending on the Writer, he's usually that way most of the time. Here, his bad mood stems from three factors: the fact he's missing spending Christmas with his kids when his past as Ronin is drudged up by a young Kate Bishop getting in over her head and is facing a gang led by The Kingpin himself, his struggles to deal with Black Widow's death in Endgame, and seeing a cheesy musical about the Battle of New York.
  • Zig-Zagged with Eleanor Bishop. Like with the Thanos example, her comics counterpart is shown as far worse (due to becoming a vampire), but here, she's partners with the Kingpin due to a massive amount of debt her late husband owed the mobster. While she claims it's for Kate's own protection, there are subtle hints that Eleanor is too used to the rich and wealthy lifestyle to want to give everything up.
• The Falcon and the Winter Soldier:
  • Sam Wilson, the titular Falcon, wound up becoming Captain America in the comics when Steve was rendered an old man and couldn't carry on the title anymore (for a time anyway), with most of his struggles in the role coming from America's citizens not wanting a black man being Captain America. The idea is more or less the same here, but the huge weight and responsibility of a black man being Cap causes Sam to retire the role and let the shield rest with its namesake... only for the US Government to give it to John Walker, whose time in the role leads him to Sanity Slippage, combined with Bucky giving Sam a What the Hell, Hero? speech over throwing away Steve's gift to him, meeting Isaiah Bradley (a former soldier who was given the serum, only to be imprisoned and tortured when he did the exact same thing Steve did by disobeying orders to rescue his squadron from captivity), and having to deal with the Well-Intentioned Extremist Karli Morgenthau and her Flag-Smashers, which lead Sam to eventually accept that he can be Captain America, but not on anyone else's terms except his own.
  • The comics version of Flag-Smasher was a Well-Intentioned Extremist who became a terrorist to try and abolish borders to truly instill world peace. This version, Karli Morgenthau, has similar goals but also leads the Flag Smashers group to try and stop the world's governments from imposing deportation on citizens displaced by Thanos's snap and the subsequent returning of his victims to life. While she ends up Jumping Off the Slippery Slope, Sam, though disagreeing with her methods, acknowledges she's right about people in power making decisions that could affect millions without a thought to it.
  • John Walker in the comics was a Jerkass who was kicked out of the army before even really do anything notable. He willingly goes to the Power Breaker to become a superhero of his own for fame and money. When serving as Captain America, he had a very My Country, Right or Wrong approach he remains when becoming the U.S. Agent. In the series, he is a well-decorated veteran who genuinly wants to live up to Steve Roger's ideals and legacy, but struggles with the pressure of doing so. His jerkass tendencies are heavingly turned down and when he loses it by killing one of the Flag-Smashers, it is implied to be by the affects of the super-soldier serum and the death of his best friend.
• Moon Knight (2022):
  • The titular Moon Knight, a famous mercenary-turned-superhero who may or may not be imbued with the powers of an Egyptian deity, has a heavier emphasis on his multiple split personalities messing with his normal, day-to-day life. While his normal persona is the badass Marc Spector, who can summon Konshu's powers at will to become Moon Knight and beat the living crap of monsters and mortals alike, his more timid side, Steven Grant, is a relentlessly-bullied museum gift shop worker who's a genuine Nice Guy and on the Autism Spectrum (per Oscar Isaac's own comments) instead of a rich businessman who uses his public persona to fund Moon Knight's activities. And then it's later revealed that Mark is trying to get out from under Konshu's thrall, but in exchange, his wife will become the next avatar of the Egyptian god, something of which Mark is desperate to prevent. And then there's a third personality with a much more murderous streak that's beginning to emerge.... As the series goes on, it becomes even clearer how traumatized Marc truly is; as a child, his little brother drowned in a rainstorm while the two were exploring a cave. His mother blamed him and started beating him, which led Mark to create Steven as a means to protect himself. Poor Marc spent his entire life blaming himself for his family getting screwed up, and his inability to attend his mother's shiva caused the two personas to blend into one another. Even if Mark is making up the entire series in his head, the show really hammers how much he struggles.
  • Arthur Harrow, a minor character from the comics, is upgraded to the main antagonist in this series, and given a more sympathetic outlook than his single appearance in the mainstream continuity. While Earth-616 Harrow was a Mad Scientist researching into illegal Nazi experiments, afflicted by Trigeminal neuralgia—a condition that caused part of his face to be permanently locked into a painful expression. The MCU iteration was Konshu's avatar to start with, before he fell under the sway of Ammit, an Egyptian deity of judgement, and swore allegiance to her to "atone" for his time under Konshu. He admits in a conversation to Steven that he felt guilty over inflicting pain for his former master, and releasing Ammit to unleash judgement on the guilty will ensure the world is purged of vice and sin once and for all.
• Scarlet Witch underwent this for her own series, WandaVision. Her comics counterpart infamously underwent a mental breakdown thanks to a combination of resurgent memories of losing her children and coping with their deaths, Doctor Doom, and possession via a cosmic entity. The results? The Avengers broke up and lost a few of their members, she created a mutant-dominated reality where humanity lived under Magneto's thumb, and then reduced the mutant-population to near-extinction as punishment for said reality being destroyed. In this series, Wanda's grief stems from losing Vision to Thanos and having been dead for the next five years, meaning whatever happy life they might have had could no longer be. In her grief, she accidentally trapped the town of Westview, New Jersey in a sitcom-style reality, accepting this false narrative so she could be happy at last, and, at worst, making sure everyone played along through brainwashing. At the same time, she's being manipulated by Agatha Harkness and gets a good dose of What the Hell, Hero? from Monica and the fake Vision, who remind her that this is not a healthy way to process her grief. In the end, she lets Vision and her "children" go and releases the town, while also embracing her identity as the Scarlet Witch. Unfortunately, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness revealed that she couldn't let Tommy and Billy go, and allowed herself to be corrupted by the Darkhold in a maddening attempt to find a universe where she could be with her sons, even if it meant that she would have to kill her Alternate Self and America Chavez, the only being who could travel dimensions, in the process. When she realizes her efforts will have meant nothing if her own children hate her, she is Driven to Suicide by the end of it.

Western Animation

• What If…? (2021) has a few alternate versions of characters from Marvel Cinematic Universe undergo this, all because a single decision changed the course of history:
  • "What If Earth's Mightiest Heroes Never Formed?": Hank Pym, at least compared to his comics counterpart. While his Sacred Timeline iteration is very well-adjusted in spite of losing his wife, he doesn't have his Earth-616's infamous baggage of being a wife beater who abused Janet due to his Sanity Slippage. He still doesn't have that in this episode, but he has a far greater justification for Jumping Off the Slippery Slope: Hope joined S.H.I.E.L.D. instead of Pym Technologies (implied to be the result of him telling her of her mother's escapades earlier), but dies on the same mission where Black Widow fought the Winter Soldier in the Sacred Timeline. He goes mad with grief, and kills all the founding Avengers (save Captain America) to spite Nick Fury for his loss.
  • "What If Doctor Strange Lost His Heart Instead of His Hands?": Stephen Strange is still a well-adjusted man in the Sacred Timeline, but his counterpart here was deemed by the universe to become the Sorcerer Supreme by losing the love of his life, Christine Palmer, instead of having his hands damaged in a car accident. He loses his mind when he learns that nothing he does will change things; she will die under all manner of different circumstances to ensure he takes his place. Mad with grief, he amasses power to change things...and not only becomes an Transhuman Abomination made up of the evil creatures he absorbed, but he destroys the entire universe for breaking a fixed point and is left wallowing in the guilt knowing he was warned, yet did nothing to stop himself.
  • "What If...Zombies?": Peter Parker and his multiversal counterparts have already been through enough as it is, but this version is the leader of a zombie resistance group that winds up dwindling down to three by the time the episode ends, desperately trying to find hope in a world where none seems to be found. It doesn't help that, in addition to losing his parents and Uncle Ben, Tony Stark and Aunt May are amongst the zombified (and presumably MJ and Ned by extension), but Happy, Sharon Carter, Wasp, Okoye, and maybe Bruce Banner don't make it out alive.
  • "What If Ultron Won?":
    • Ultron's Sacred Timeline counterpart, as detailed in the Live-Action films section, already underwent this treatment, yet undergoes it again here. This version succeeded in uploading his body into the Vision, destroys everyone on Earth except Black Widow and Hawkeye, obtains the Infinity Stones from Thanos, and wipes out all life in the universe. Normally that wouldn't make a genocidal being sympathetic, but it shows the flaws within Ultron's programming as he questions what to do with himself now that his directive has been fulfilled. Unfortunately, his infinite power allows him to see The Watcher, and he decides to wipe out the multiverse next.
    • Both Black Widow and Hawkeye find themselves stuck as the last of their kind when Ultron wipes out humanity, and the latter has hit the Despair Event Horizon pretty hard to the point he makes a Heroic Sacrifice to save Natasha from Ultron's forces. When Widow is later recruited, albeit accidentally, to join a group of multiversal heroes to stop her Ultron from destroying all other realities, she tries to get Uatu to fix things on her world, only for his Alien Non-Interference Clause to keep him from doing this in spite of wanting to. Fortunately, he sends her to another dimension where she can help be a hero--one where Loki took over Earth.

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