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MCU Multiverse Saga Villains: Ranking Every Villain So Far

By Sofia Martinez · Culture & Entertainment Editor

April 21, 2026· 6 min read

Ben Sherlock

Published Apr 21, 2026, 8:00 AM EDT

Ben Sherlock is a Tomatometer-approved film and TV critic who runs the massively underrated YouTube channel I Got Touched at the Cinema. Before working at Screen Rant, Ben wrote for Game Rant, Taste of Cinema, Comic Book Resources, and BabbleTop. He's also an indie filmmaker, a standup comedian, and an alumnus of the School of Rock.

The MCU’s Multiverse Saga has been a mixed bag, and that extends to its villains. Just as the interdimensional storytelling has been hit-and-miss, the bad guys have been hit-and-miss. Just as there’s been a deluge of new heroes with no real plan to bring any of them back, there’s been a deluge of exciting but underdeveloped villains that didn’t come close to living up to their full potential.

This chapter of the MCU has brought some truly iconic villains, like WandaVision_’s Agatha Harkness and Daredevil: Born Again’s Bullseye. But it’s also had some forgettable baddies, like The Marvels’ Dar-Benn and Secret Invasion’s Gravik.

Kro

_ Kro facing off against Thena in Eternals

Kro, the villainous Deviant from Eternals_, is such a generic, unmemorable villain that it doesn’t matter for a second that he’s voiced by Bill Skarsgård. Skarsgård is one of the finest actors of his generation, and he was given so little to work with that no one watching the movie even noticed it was him.

Eternals was a failed experiment across the board. Its attempt to bring a slower-paced arthouse sensibility to the MCU was a noble effort, but ultimately fruitless.

Dar-Benn

_ Zawe Ashton's Dar-Benn sees Carol Danvers The Marvels

The Marvels_ is a much better movie than it gets credit for, but its villain is massively underdeveloped. Dar-Benn is the Kree leader hoping to restore her homeworld after it was destroyed in a civil war sparked by Captain Marvel, but you’d only know any of that from the clunky exposition shoehorned into the movie.

Dar-Benn’s motive is as generic as her personality. She’s in the bargain bin of forgettable MCU villains who speak exclusively in trailer-friendly soundbites, along with Malekith and Aldrich Killian.

Gravik

_ Kingsley Ben-Adir's Gravik in Super-Skrull form standing in a battle stance in Secret Invasion (2023)

Kingsley Ben-Adir is a brilliant actor; he was hilarious in Barbie_ and fully convincing as Bob Marley in One Love. So, there’s nothing wrong with his performance as the big bad in Secret Invasion; the problem is with the writing.

Secret Invasion might be the worst show Marvel Studios has ever put out. It takes one of the most momentous, earth-shattering crossover events from the comics and filters it through a gritty, grounded spy thriller coasting by on ludicrous twists and cartoonish action.

Taskmaster

_ Taskmaster aiming a bow and arrow in Black Widow

Before she got merc’d within seconds in Thunderbolts*_, Taskmaster was the main villain of the long-overdue Black Widow movie. She has a fascinating power — the ability to emulate the powers of all the Avengers — but the movie doesn’t do anything with it.

It’s a quasi-Bourne Identity gritty spy thriller in its first two acts, then devolves into another sky-is-falling final battle in the third. There’s no room for Taskmaster to make an impression.

Red Hulk

_ Red Hulk at the end of Brave New World

After squandering a perfectly good villain in Giancarlo Esposito’s Sidewinder, Captain America: Brave New World_ pivots to the more marketable Red Hulk as the main antagonist. The worst thing about this villain is that 99% of the enjoyment is the surprise factor, and almost every scene featuring Red Hulk was already spoiled in the trailers.

Harrison Ford is clearly having a lot of fun, but that fun doesn’t translate to the screen. His role has been chopped and changed by so many rewrites and reshoots that his half-baked character arc is barely coherent.

Kang

_ Kang in Quantumania

Early on in the Multiverse Saga, Kang was being set up as the next Thanos-level big bad of the entire MCU. He was an existential threat to the entire multiverse, and he was supposed to face the Avengers in what is now known as Doomsday_.

But it’s probably for the best that those plans changed. Even though the reason for the character’s absence has nothing to do with the story, Kang was never a particularly strong or interesting villain — certainly not on the same level as the Mad Titan. The threat he posed was too big to personalize in a relatable human story, and he was defeated by Ant-Man in his first movie.

Infinity Ultron

_ Infinity Ultron attacking in What If...? season 1

The What If...?_ animated series started off as a series of non-canonical hypotheticals imagining what would happen if the existing MCU movies had gone off in different directions. But as it went on, it became a more unified, cohesive, canonical storyline pulling together various heroes from across the multiverse.

Captain Carter was its protagonist, and Infinity Ultron was its big bad. It was fascinating to see what Ultron would’ve done differently if he was the Avengers villain who got a hold of the Infinity Stones.

The Scarlet Witch

_ Elizabeth Olsen's Wanda Maximoff aka Scarlet Witch in 2022's Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness

When Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness_ made Wanda Maximoff the bad guy, reactions were mixed. On the one hand, it reduced Wanda’s complex, three-dimensional character to a one-dimensional, mustache-twirling villainess, just over a year after WandaVision had turned her into one of the MCU’s greatest characters.

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But on the other hand, this cartoonishly gruesome portrayal of the Scarlet Witch as a heartless monster using her powers for evil was perfect for a campy Sam Raimi horror movie. Elizabeth Olsen understood the assignment and gave a hammed-up B-movie performance worthy of The Evil Dead 4_.

Galactus

_ Galactus in the MCU Fantastic Four movie

The MCU’s Fantastic Four_ reboot didn’t waste any time getting to the team’s most powerful enemy. Galactus is basically a space god who roams the cosmos, eating entire planets for a midnight snack, so it’s hard to imprint a personality on him.

But Ralph Ineson did an admirable job in First Steps. He played Galactus as a curious observer, looking down on us puny humans like a kid burning ants with a magnifying glass.

Gorr The God Butcher

_ Gorr looking to the gods at the beginning of Thor Love and Thunder

Gorr the God Butcher was a great villain in a not-so-great movie. Christian Bale brings all the pathos and righteous indignation to make Gorr a compelling, sympathetic baddie, but Taika Waititi is too focused on screaming goats and endless Korg monologues to give that performance room to breathe.

We don’t actually see the God Butcher butcher any gods on-screen for the entirety of Thor: Love and Thunder_. He’s the most interesting part of the movie, and he feels like a footnote.