When we previewed Comic-Con 2017, we specifically said that the thing we want the most out of this convention – as far as news announcements go – is something completely unexpected. The awesome idea we didn’t know any of the studios had yet. And we’ve already got one.
At the Comic-Con panel for the popular and trippy superhero series Legion, producer Noah Hawley dropped a last minute bombshell on the audience: “I’ll just say two words. The first one is Doctor and the next one is Doom” (via Variety).
Doctor Doom is a megalomaniacal dictator who is also a brilliant scientist and sorcerer. His face was scarred in a scientific experiment, and now he wears a metal mask to hide his deformity. The iconic image and persona of Doctor Doom, who was first introduced in Fantastic Four #5, way back in 1962, is said to have directly inspired the design and character of Darth Vader in the original Star Wars.
Although Doctor Doom quickly became one of Marvel’s most iconic characters and – arguably – the greatest comic book villain of all time, the live-action versions of the character have always had to share their screen time with that infernal Reed Richards and his blasted Fantastic Four. Details about Noah Hawley’s Doctor Doom movie have not yet been made available, but the implication is that, for once, the spotlight will be Doom’s.
Also: 6 Reasons Why Roger Corman’s ‘Fantastic Four’ Is Better Than The Reboot
This is a very clever way for 20th Century Fox to keep their rights to release Fantastic Four movies without simply rebooting Fantastic Four again. After the ill-fated Roger Corman version, Fox acquired The Fantastic Four and put out two reasonably successful but not particularly popular live-action movies under director Tim Story, and then they rebooted the franchise under filmmaker Josh Trank, in a version that is widely considered one of the worst superhero movies of the modern era.
Telling a similar story but from the perspective of the Fantastic Four’s greatest nemesis – who has, if we’re being honest, never been adapted faithfully in any film – gives the studio an opportunity to work backwards, starting with a novel approach and then potentially sliding back into a more conventional Fantastic Four franchise.
We can expect to see more movies like this in the future. Suicide Squad did big business and proved that audiences are interested in supervillain movies, not just superhero films. There are many supervillain characters who could either carry their own movie, as an antihero or even in a manner akin to horror movie franchise villains (what are Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees if not their own kind of supervillains, after all). It will be interesting to see which comic book bad guys get their own franchises next.
The 15 Best Supervillains Who Haven’t Been in a Movie Yet:
Top Photo: 20th Century Fox
William Bibbiani (everyone calls him ‘Bibbs’) is Crave’s film content editor and critic. You can hear him every week on The B-Movies Podcast and Canceled Too Soon, and watch him on the weekly YouTube series What the Flick. Follow his rantings on Twitter at @WilliamBibbiani.
The Best Supervillains Who Haven't Been In A Movie Yet
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Annihilus
This old Fantastic Four villain reinvented himself in 2006 when he damn near conquered the universe, and inadvertently brought the all-new, all-different Guardians of the Galaxy (a.k.a. the version everyone currently knows and loves) together in the first place. He's big, he's powerful, he looks scary as hell, he totally deserves a badass name like "Annihilus."
Photo: Marvel
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Anti Monitor
The all-powerful Anti-Monitor (whose name only makes sense with a LOT of context) destroyed an almost infinite number of universes, forcing the entire DC comic book line to reboot itself in the 1980s. Bad guys don't get much badder than this.
Photo: DC
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Bizarro
In some stories Bizarro is a failed clone of Superman, in others he's from a "bizarro" planet in which everything is the opposite of Earth. Either way, he's just as powerful as the Man of Steel and dangerously deranged, making him one of Superman's most popular villains for many years.
Photo: DC
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Brainiac
Another one of Superman's most popular bad guys, Brainiac is an alien android (in some versions, just an alien) obsessed with collecting intelligence from the around the universe. Some storylines claim he is directly responsible for the destruction of Krypton, others depict him as a destructive force that eliminates whole planets after he's learned everything about them.
Photo: DC
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Cassandra Nova
Cassandra Nova is Charles Xavier's twin sister (sort of), who escaped from the womb and became the mirror image of everything he stood for. Professor X tried to bring about a new age of peace between mankind and mutants. Cassandra Nova was responsible for a genocide that left 16 million mutants dead.
Photo: Marvel
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Clayface
There aren't many popular Batman villains who haven't shown up in theaters yet, but Clayface is easily the most prominent. An actor who fell victim to a toxic substance that melted him into clay, but gave him the ability to shapeshift into different people and deadly objects, Clayface is one of Caped Crusader's most powerful foes.
Photo: DC
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Kang the Conqueror
Kang the Conqueror is a little bit complicated, but time travel will do that to you. Basically he's a descendant of Reed Richards from the future, who became a time-hopping despot, who also became a more wizened villain named Immortus later in life, but thanks to time travel they sometimes work together. He's an ambitious villain, but the possibilities are inherently endless.
Photo: Marvel
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Kraven the Hunter
A lot of Spider-Man villains have animal powers (so does Spider-Man, obviously), so a big game hunter was always a natural fit. Kraven the Hunter may seem like a gimmick villain but his obsessive need to prove his superiority to Spider-Man eventually led to one of the hero's best and darkest storylines, Kraven's Last Hunt.
Photo: Marvel
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Metallo
Warner Bros.' obsession with Lex Luthor and General Zod has left a lot of Superman's best villains on the cutting room floor. Here's another one: Metallo, a criminal trapped inside a powerful metal body, whose ability to rebuild himself - and his kryptonite battery core - has made him one of the Man of Steel's most formidable foes.
Photo: DC
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M.O.D.O.K.
He's a big head with little arms and legs, and he's "Designed Only for Killing." This is M.O.D.O.K., one of Captain America's strangest and most unforgettable villains, who uses his mental powers to lead an army of evil super scientists.
Photo: Marvel
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Mr. Mxyzptlk
This hard-to-pronounce villain (here goes: 'Mix-YEZ-pit-lick") is an all-powerful prankster deity from Dimension X, who routinely pops into Superman's life to stir up mischief. But Mr. Mxyzptlk is more than a joke character, he's been the cause of major strife in the DC universe on multiple occasions and, in a classic story by Alan Moore, revealed himself to be one of Superman's most dangerous adversaries.
Photo: DC
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The Phalanx
One of the most fearsome alien races in all of comics, the Technarh are "techno-organic," alive but made of machinery, with the ability to transform themselves and infect other races. They formed The Phalanx and helped conquer the universe with Ultron as their leader, and proved themselves one of the most visually interesting and formidable threats in the Marvel universe.
Photo: Marvel
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Sinestro
Sinestro technically appeared in the live-action Green Lantern movie, but only as a hero, not as a villain. Once the most celebrated hero of the Green Lantern Corps, he eventually was revealed to be a corrupt influence, and went on to form his own army of Yellow Lanterns, who used their powers to instill fear across the galaxy.
Photo: DC
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The Skrulls
Another mighty alien race, The Skrulls are a species of shapeshifters who have repeatedly infiltrated the ranks of Marvel's heroes in an attempt to conquer our planet. In the epic crossover event Secret Invasion, they came shockingly close.
Photo: Marvel
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Thunderbolts
Nowadays the Thunderbolts are a group of supervillains employed by the government, not unlike the Suicide Squad. But when they first premiered they had one of the cleverest ideas in comic book history: they impersonated a new team of superheroes, and defeated their fair share of other supervillains, to earn the world's trust. Then, when the time was right, they revealed their secret identities and took over the planet! Lots of these villains deserve to be the bad guy in a superhero movie, but that's such a clever idea that the Thunderbolts probably deserve their own film.
Photo: Marvel
