Comic Book Adaptations’ Big Problem: The Doppelganger Villains

There's no question that Marvel Studios has seen incredible success, from characters like Iron Man rocketing from the back row of a comic shop to the international consciousness, down to a successful Ant-Man film campaign that included posters that said, "From the Studio that brought you Guardians of the Galaxy."

Read that last one again; they promoted Ant-Man using Guardians of the Galaxy. It's safe to say the general public hadn't heard those two names very often, or at all, until the past year.

That clearly shows the strength of the studio and their hit machine. Ant-Man has received critical acclaim and fan response alike for its unique over-the-top humor, it's action sequences on a microscopic level, and even a climactic battle that takes place on a child's train set. Indeed, this writer quite enjoyed the movie, and sees it as a character and franchise that can and should live on.

There was just one thing that sat wrong with me in the days that followed: the use, yet again, of a doppelgänger villain.

This time around, it's Darren Cross donning the Yellowjacket suit, becoming a size-changing insect-themed villain to Scott Lang's size-changing, insect-themed hero. It's a theme we've seen in comic books for decades, but in film and TV adaptations it seems to be at a critical mass point.

Ant-Man : Yellowjacket. Iron Man : Iron Monger (and even Whiplash, who wound up just being in yet another suit, or Ultron, who was his suit come to life in a way). The Flash : The Reverse-Flash. Arrow : Dark Arrow (Malcolm Merlyn). Captain America : Winter Soldier. Superman : Zod. Heck, it even reaches into video games with Batman: Arkham Knight in which it's, um, Batman : Arkham Knight.

So what is it about the doppelgänger that works so well in superhero narratives within film, tv, and video games (let alone comic books)? The reasons are actually quite simple. The biggest is that in an "evil twin" scenario, you get to see how things would be if the hero didn't have that innate sense of doing good. What would happen if you had Spider-Man without the responsibility? What if Superman had a militaristic background and a chip on his shoulder? These questions, and others like them, are generally answered through alternate worlds and "What if?" scenarios in the comics, but the easiest and most concise way for film to them is through a twisted mirror image version of the heroic character.

There's also a logistical reason; it's hard to show an all-out fight scene between a character the size of an ant and one the size of a human as your major emotional climax. Likewise, pitting Iron Man against some random armed soldiers is a good way to show off his power, but it doesn't exactly represent represent his full potential. And sometimes, we just want to see The Hulk or Superman punch someone as hard as they freaking can.

The trope is understandable, and not inherently bad or overplayed. The way The CW team handled Reverse-Flash on The Flash season one made so much sense, and did things so much differently from other superhero adaptations, that I hardly noticed until sitting down to write this article. There, his identity was secret for most of the season, and he posed as a mentor to the young hero. It wasn't just so you could have two characters moving at super speed, but also to have a father-son level betrayal, in a show that frequently features complex and dynamic parental and parental-style relationships.

The reason why adaptors need to be wary of this habit, however, is that it even though it's the easiest way to show a character's traits, it's not always the best. The most heroic fight and coolest use of his powers in Ant-Man was actually Ant-Man versus the Avengers member The Falcon. There, the two had off-setting technologies instead of identical technologies. It's not just a bigger gun attached to the same suit (see: Iron Monger, Yellowjacket); instead it was about how they could each use their own abilities in the best possible way. It's similar to the awe fans and critics expressed at the Quicksilver scene in X-Men: Days of Future Past, or even the armorless infiltration sequence in Iron Man 3: Seeing our heroes use their talents in new ways is exciting, and when they're just fighting a doppelgänger, we don't get to experience that as much.

What's the solution going forward? It's Likely a mixture of these elements. The stories shouldn't necessarily add more villains, but make sure there's a balance between peering inside the dark version of a character and making the character actually change their tactics to overcome their foe. The best villains tell you something new about the hero when they meet and fight, and there's a lot more to explore than simply "what if a bad guy was in this situation?"