10 Best Marvel Comics About Villains, Ranked

Marvel Comics have made their business the superhero in a way that even their distinguished competition doesn’t match. DC created the superhero and has told some of their greatest stories ever, but they’ve also told a variety of other stories starring all kinds of characters. Marvel has basically just stuck to superheroes, telling the stories of battles between good and evil in a world much like our own. Some of the most interesting of these tales are the ones that don’t star the good guys, but ones that star the antagonists, the bad guys, the villains. It’s a great change of pace for readers, showing them another side of the fight.

Villain comics aren’t as rare as they used to be, but there aren’t a lot of them. Not all of them can be great, but there are some that have joined the ranks of the greatest comics ever. These are the ten best Marvel comics about villains, showing us the heart of evil in different ways.

10) Secret Wars

Marvel is known for their events, and 2015 gave us one of the best of all time, starring Marvel’s most beloved villain. Secret Wars, by Jonathan Hickman and Esad Ribic, told the story of the end and beginning of the Marvel Multiverse, as the heroes and villains of two worlds come together to fight God Emperor Doom after the destruction of everything they knew. This nine-issue story is all about the Doom, as he deals with getting what he wanted and still failing. It’s Doom at his most introspective, an interesting look at the character that we don’t get to see very often.

9) Infinity Gauntlet

Infinity Gauntlet is one of Marvel’s most beloved events. The classic story, by Jim Starlin, George Perez, and Ron Lim, sees Thanos unleash the power of the Infinity Gauntlet on the denizens of the universe. This six-issue series is all about who Thanos is, as the Mad Titan finally gets what he wants and has to deal with seeing what the universe is like at the top. It’s awesome to watch him get exactly what he thought he asked for and how it all turns to ashes. Starlin loves his creation and this story shows him in all of his complexity.

8) Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe

Deadpool is one of Marvel’s most popular characters, having grown from a rather standard crazy villain to one of the funniest anti-heroes ever. However, Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe, by Cullen Bunn and Dalibor Talajic, took him and made him into the psychopathic monster that is always inside him. He lashes out against the heroes when his mind breaks for a final time, showing how dangerous he truly is in one of the coolest killing sprees ever. It’s like a slasher movie where the killer is the main character, as Wade Wilson dispatches the heroes and villains of the Marvel Unvierse with extreme prejudice, and you can’t look away from it.

7) Superior Spider-Man

Dan Slott’s run on Spider-Man gets a lot of flack, but there are some very high highs and Superior Spider-Man is easily the best part. The Amazing Spider-Man #700 ended with Doctor Octopus killing Spider-Man and taking over his body, leading into his own series. For 34 issues, readers got to see what would happen if Peter Parker used his scientific knowledge for his own gain, as well as showing how Otto dealt with having great power, and the responsibility it brings. It’s a modern classic, and Marvel has tried numerous times to recapture what made it special, never able to replicate it.

6) Dark Avengers

Marvel’s “Dark Reign” was brilliant, putting evil in charge of the superhero national security apparatus created by Civil War. The center of it all was Dark Avengers, an 18-issue series from Brian Michael Bendis, Matt Fraction, Mike Deodato, Luke Ross, and Mike Mayhew. The book starred Norman Osborn as the Iron Patriot, leading a team of villains including Daken, Venom, Bullseye, and Moonstone as Wolverine, Spider-Man, Hawkeye, and Ms. Marvel, along with Ares, the Sentry, and Noh-Var as Captain Marvel. in battle against threats to the world, as they work to cement their power base. It’s a fantastic book about the bad guys, seeing how they deal with being the most important hero team in the world.

5) Immortal X-Men

When Jonathan Hickman left the X-Men, the Krakoa Era almost sank, but Marvel brought writer Kieron Gillen in to save the day. Immortal X-Men, by Gillen, Lucas Werneck, and various fill-in artists, starred the Quiet Council, the leading mutants of Krakoa, as they tried to keep things going for another day. The book put a lot of focus on Mystique, Destiny, Sebastian Shaw, and Mister Sinister, as each of them tries to either keep the future from burning down, gain more powers for themselves, and figure out a way to become a god respectively. It’s such a fun series, made all the better because of how much it focuses on the bad guys.

4) Immoral X-Men

“Sins of Sinister” was one of the best events of the Krakoa Era, as Mister Sinister made his move. He was able to suborn the resurrection process, and made everyone on Krakoa into Sinisters. They took over the world, and Immoral X-Men, by Kieron Gillen and Paco Medina, saw Sinister try to deal with the now evil Quiet Council and their thousand year war against each other. Gillen shows the ultimate evolution of Emma Frost, Xavier, Exodus, and Hope Summers as villains, combining great characters with wild sci-fi set pieces for a series that will knock your socks off.

3) Factor X

“Age of Apocalypse” is a Marvel legend and it gave readers some great books, with very different from the others. For fans who wanted to see the inside of Apocalypse’s empire there was Factor X, by John Francis Moore, Steve Epting, and Terry Dodson. This book followed Cyclops and Havok as they clashed over who would take Mister Sinister’s place as a Horseman of Apocalypse, while Beast experiments on prisoners and a traitor from within keeps freeing the imprisoned. This comic isn’t the most important to the overall story – it can be skipped and you’ll have missed nothing – but it’s such a cool book that once you pick it up, you’ll never put it down til it’s done.

2) Sabretooth (Vol. 4)

Sabretooth (Vol. 4), by Victor LaValle and Leonard Kirk, is better than it has any right to be. The book follows the titular villain during his time in Krakoa’s Pit, their prison. He’s given control of the Pit to fashion it into whatever he wants, in an effort to rehabilitate him, and he makes it a hellhole. When more mutants are sent there, he enacts a plan to escape that involves tormenting and gaslighting everyone. This story isn’t just about Wolverine’s greatest enemy outsmarting everyone, it’s about the horrors of the US prison system, a deep narrative on how what we do to criminals actually makes everything worse. It was a completely unexpected comic and one that deserves way more attention than it’s gotten.

1) Books of Doom

Books of Doom, by Ed Brubaker and Pablo Raimondi, is the greatest Doctor Doom origin story of them all. This story sees Doom tell the tale of his life himself, starting with his days with his Romani family, the tragedies that defined his childhood, coming into himself at Empire State University with Reed Richards and Ben Grimm, his terrible accident trying to free his mother’s soul, getting his armor, and retaking Latveria from the Baron. It’s a brilliant look at the character, as his narration clashes with the true events on the page. It was a sleeper hit and remains one of the coolest comics you’ll ever read about the lord of Latveria.

What’s you favorite Marvel villain comic? Leave a comment in the comment section below and join the conversation on the ComicBook Forums!

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