I Know One X-Men Character That Could Beat MCU Thanos

There is only one villain in the Marvel Cinematic Universe‘s history to put the entire franchise on alert: Thanos. The Mad Titan spends his first few years in live-action plotting behind the scenes, sending Loki to Earth to retrieve the Tesseract. Despite that plan blowing up in his face, he runs it back with Ronan the Accuser, who betrays him and ends up dying at the hands of the Guardians of the Galaxy. Thanos finally realizes that he’s the being most suited to retrieve the Infinity Stones, so he gets out of his chair and goes to work. It takes him not much time at all to fill up the Infinity Gauntlet, and once that’s done, all there is left to do is snap.

Of course, Thanos completes his mission in Avengers: Infinity War and wipes out half of life in the universe, changing the MCU forever. The Mad Titan is easy pickings after that, but a variant of the villain causes problems when the Avengers attempt to reverse the Snap. It’s a shame that the X-Men weren’t around at the time because I know one character who would’ve taken down Thanos without breaking a sweat.

Magneto Is More Powerful Than Thanos On a Bad Day

It’s important to have perspective when discussing characters who can defeat the Mad Titan. In reality, Thor beats him with Stormbreaker, landing a devastating blow in Wakanda, but the Asgardians’ lust for vengeance consumes him, allowing the villain to snap his fingers to escape. Well, there’s one X-Men on the level of Thor that shoots first and asks questions later: Magneto. While the Master of Magnetism is usually Charles Xavier’s biggest rival, there are times when he joins Marvel’s most iconic mutant team and does good. X-Men ’97‘s first episode ends with Magneto becoming the leader of the X-Men, and despite butting heads with Cyclops and others, he proves to be a valuable asset. When Bastion releases his evolved Sentinels on the planet, Magneto decides to shut down the world’s power grid, forcing humanity to live like it’s the Stone Age.

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Live-action Magento also gets to let loose in X-Men: Apocalypse, when the titular villain transports his horsemen to Auschwitz. All the memories come flooding back to Magneto, who begins tearing the Earth apart from the inside with his Omega-level powers. Thanos may be strong, but he’s not indestructible, as his battle with Scarlet Witch in Avengers: Endgame proves. Well, her comic book father is every bit as dangerous as she is, if not more so. If Magneto gets his hands on Thanos while he’s wearing metal armor and carrying around a giant sword, the fight wouldn’t last long. I don’t even think the Infinity Stones would make that much of a difference because Magneto doesn’t like wasting time killing people, especially when he feels like mutantkind is being threatened.

Sadly, at the moment, this matchup is purely hypothetical because Thanos is a pile of dust and Magneto isn’t part of the MCU yet. However, there’s a small chance that the two characters cross paths in the near future and settle the debate once and for all.

Thanos & Magneto Could Come to Blows in Avengers: Doomsday

The MCU will pass the baton to its new Big Bad, Doctor Doom, in Avengers: Doomsday. The villain’s mission will see him cross paths with the X-Men, including Ian McKellen’s Magneto. The prevailing theory is that the mutants will serve as cannon fodder for Doom to prove just how dangerous he is. However, if the X-Men do end up playing a bigger role than that, there’s a chance that Doom throws the kitchen sink at them. There are rumors that Robert Downey Jr.’s new character will build his own team in Doomsday, and while it seems likely that he will reach out to variants of the original Avengers, another version of the Mad Titan wouldn’t be a bad option.

Tossing Thanos on the battlefield would allow Doom to get to work on the real goal, but he wouldn’t have all that long to mess around if Magneto is around. The Master of Magnetism would make quick work of the Mad Titan before turning his attention to Doom. It’s nothing but a pipe dream at the moment, but McKellen deserves the chance to show the real extent of his character’s powers after putting in the work for decades.

Do you think Magneto could beat Thanos in the MCU? Would you like to see the two characters fight in Avengers: Doomsday? Let us know in the comments below!