Marvel Universe/YMMV
- Adaptation Displacement: Blade. More people are familiar with the movies then with the comic book character, up to the point where Blade was all but turned into an African-American in the books to better match up with Wesley Snipes portrayal.
- ...wait, what? He was always an African American, wasn't he?
- He is African-English. He was born in London.
- Alternate Character Interpretation -- The Wasp. It's very easy to read her early stories and interactions with future husband Hank Pym as being that of a manipulative, exploitative bitch who ruined her partners confidence by leading him on then switching her affections to another team mate, taking advantage of a recently widowed man by playing up her resemblance to his deceased wife, and making light of his insecurities.
- Author's Saving Throw - Dr Pym was not involved in building the clone Thor, that was a Skrull.
- Complete Monster: Given that even several of the "heroes" themselves would be drinking buddies with serial-killing psychopaths such as Ted Bundy or Charles Manson by real world standard, almost all of the villains have to be presented as at least as bad, and frequently reach a scale of absolutely entitled and conceited genocidal ideological sadistic supremacism that easily by far eclipse Hitler or Stalin (who have both appeared as villains themselves in the comics). The difference being that they will essentially get away with it to return forever, and for some reason the governments of the world apparently don't deputise the heroes to deal with them in a truly permanent fashion, or rather that's the usual Hand Wave explanation.
- Bullseye. He loves to kill.
- Sabretooth. He also loves to kill.
- Carnage. He also loves to kill. Very much.
- Crossbones makes Bullseye look good.
- Roderick Kingsley (Hobgoblin). What he did with Ned Leeds.
- Prior to his supervillain career, Macendale (Hobgoblin II) was kicked out of the military and the CIA for being a sadistic creep, and Spider-Man remarked that he was less human than even the Demogoblin. Even the Devil refused to take his soul, because he had none.
- Mac Gargan is a cannibal. By the end of Secret Invasion, he's locked in a cage, more man than animal, and is fed prisoners by other villains.
- Whether it's using teenage runaways as guinea pigs or crippling an elderly man by breaking him apart one bone at a time, Mr Hyde is a cold-blooded son of a bitch.
- Norman Osborn is a monster. Ruining and corrupting people, torturing them physically and mind raping, killing their loved ones, just because he loves to see them suffer. In one of the comics he was called The Antichrist.
- Red Skull is another contender to get the title of most evil character in Marvel. An unrepentant ex-Nazi who was once Hitler's right hand man, but even Hitler became terrified of him before the end. He's so evil The Joker refused to work with him in one intercompany crossover. Hell, just working with him may qualify as a Moral Event Horizon.
- Crazy Awesome - Dr. Pym can be an amazing character when written well, unfortunately so few writers know what to do with him.
- Crosses the Line Twice -- After Frank Castle killed third-string villain Stilt Man (with a bazooka shot to the groin no less) a group of other less notable Spider-Man villains held a memorial for their fallen colleague at a local bar. Frank made sure they were all there, then blew up the bar.
- Dying Like Animals: If it isn't a Reindeer, its a Lemming, a Wasp, or a Jackal. The best you can hope for is that its a Bat. 99.9+% of this entire planet's population is either ready to join an anti-metahuman hate group or else so mind-bogglingly stupid that they should be put on suicide watch.
- Every once in a while a random preacher gives a pro mutant speech, or some cop mentions how much Spider-Man has done for the city, but such moments are sadly uncommon, and recent events are only making the whole thing worse. It makes one wonder if you shouldn't just let Galactus eat the place.
- Ending Fatigue - Roderick's story went on for several years with two unmasking teases before picking a character who was already dead to be him (later revealed to be a fake 10 years later).
- Ensemble Darkhorse:
- Batroc
- Blade in The Tomb of Dracula, along with Hannibal King.
- Eddie Brock
- Did Not Do the Research/Fan Dumb: When Disney bought Marvel, some Marvel fans angrily complained that the Marvel Universe would probably become more kid-friendly and have crossovers with Mickey Mouse and the Disney Animated Canon. Because everything the Disney company has ever owned has been totally kid-friendly and Mickey has appeared in all of it.
- Fanon Discontinuity - Sam Wilson was never a pimp, ever.
- High Octane Nightmare Fuel: Carnage
- A good majority of the villains that Ghost Rider goes up against. And even Ghost Rider himself, at times.
- Jerkass Woobie: Eddie Brock
- Magnificent Bastard:
- Doctor Doom
- Roderick Kingsley
- Nick Fury is a cold-blooded scheming manipulator who keeps files on everyone. He's also a good guy.
- Loki
- Moral Event Horizon:
- Crossbones crosses it by raping Diamondback and killing her brothers when they come to rescue her. Diamondback is a teenager at this point.
- Doctor Doom's is the whole Unthinkable arc (hence the title), but particularly what he did to Valeria, his old girlfriend.
- Immediately became Fanon Discontinuity. Shortly afterwards became Canon Discontinuity.
- The Green Goblin's is killing off Gwen Stacy.
- What Roderick did to Betty Brant and Ned was completely unjustified.
- For some Dr. Pym became irredeemable after he hit his wife Janet.
- The "Guardian Devil" storyline saw Mysterio cross the line multiple times.
- Narm Charm:
- Batroc. So ridiculous, but so fun!
- Electro's star mask looks goofy to some people, but it's so distinctive and such an iconic part of his character that it's hard to imagine him without it. Even after he loses the mask, he gains scars on his face that have the same pattern. His Ultimate version really loses out for not having the mask.
- Never Live It Down - Dr. Pym hit his wife once, and only once, while he was crazy.
- Replacement Scrappy:
- Suffice it to say that Macendale was a very poor substitute for Kingsley.
- Macdonald Gargan. "A loser dressed like Venom is still a freaking loser."
- The Scrappy -- Anti-Venom has not exactly been well recieved.
- Too Dumb to Live - See above. In recent years in a push to make the world Darker and Edgier, the civilian populous has shown a desire, nay, eagerness to emphatically embrace anything and everything that curtails their civil liberties and gives as much power as possible to megalomaniacal psychopaths.
- Ungrateful Bastards: No matter how many times Spider-Man, the X-Men or (insert individual hero or superhero group name here) save them, most of the populace of the Marvel Universe consist of a bunch of ungrateful douchebags who quite frankly don't deserve to be protected.
- Unpopular Popular Character -- Although he's come to be seen as something of a loser in the supervillain commmunity, the Shocker nonetheless has a sizable fan following. Ironically enough, it's his lack of a Freudian Excuse or obsessive vendetta with Spider-Man that make him stand out among Spidey's enemies. And as this profile shows, Shocker's actually defeated Spider-Man more times than you might think.
- Villain Decay:
- Bob Budiansky wrote 8-Ball as a clever, dangerous criminal with a wicked sense of humor. Later writers made him yet another in an endless line of disposable C-List Fodder. What a fucking waste...
- Jason Macendale basically lacked everything that made the Hobgoblin a good and unique villain in the first place. To illustrate how bad a villain he was, he once made a Team Rocket exit after a fight with Spider-Man when the latter was 'drunk!' It got so bad that Roderick had to come out of retirement and kill him to preserve his reputation.
- Wangst: The Silver Surfer
- The Woobie:
- Dr. Pym. First wife, dead. Second wife, dead. His robot son? Genocidal killing machine. The only robot son that wasn't genocidal? Killed by his genocidal brother. Best friend, Bill Foster, murdered. Other best friend, Scott Lang, also murdered. Just about anyone he ever cared about has wound up dead. He's had at least four documented mental break downs and all of his inventions have been turned to criminal use, tarnishing his scientific legacy. It doth suck to be Hank Pym.
- Jessica Drew has a record of not having luck in love; and then spent about 2 years getting caught and imprisoned by the Skrull until the epilogue of Secret Invasion, and when she returns, almost everyone hates her, thinking that she's still the Skrull Queen that impersonated her.