Control: Marvel Vs. DC Villains…

I, Dalton Lewis, love DC Comics and Marvel Comics. I know that Marvel Comics makes better surface-level quality entertainment. Random people look up at their movies in awe and wonder and go, wow: that’s awesome. The good guys save the galaxy/planet from the bad guys on a regular basis. They made it in life: made movies that made billions of dollars and won awards and won over millions upon millions of adoring fans. They developed an interconnected universe of movies, with several movies coming out each year connected to each other. They culminated with the Avengers movies, with the third and fourth ones finishing a story ten-plus years in the making. They told a story which made people say, wow, you’ve told a huge amazing story which we know and love. They also made many billions of dollars. Most of these movies have had weak villains, though, according to many fans and critics. DC Comics has had some weak ones, too, but has had an ace in the hole: the Joker. I wanted to look at the villains each universe has and the way those villains reflect their storytelling techniques.

Marvel succeeded in making more money and receiving more acclaim in their movies. And DC? Didn’t.

Let’s talk about villains. Thanos is Marvel’s villain. He wants to destroy half of reality. That’s a mental health problem and a crime. He’s certainly evil. He has a huge army and has children. He teaches his children to fight and become significant agents in battles — they fight well and are competent to do the hero/villain fights. He teaches and raises Gamora to become one of the most formidable people in the galaxy, a fighter and assassin who goes on a rampage through the galaxy, saving lives and becoming a legend. Thanos has good qualities and bad qualities. He is sympathetic in that he teaches his children to be good fighters and seems to care for them. He is less sympathetic because he sometimes tortures his children, particularly his child Nebula. Spoiler alert — are you ready? He also kills his own daughter Gamora. He kills his own daughter in order to get the Infinity Stones to destroy half of reality. He is an impressive villain. He also seems to be a businessman. He takes things seriously. He fights very well. He does everything very well. He is a successful person — a formidable fighter, someone who conquers worlds and destroys half their population. The Marvel movies set him up for a number of years and a lot of movies, and that was a smart move. They set him up and then showed these two facets of his personality — an abusive family man and a shrewd mathematician/businessman who succeeds in the business and political world of ruling.

This is what is interesting to me — the contradiction between him and Tony Stark, the patriarch of the Avengers. Tony Stark also has a family and is shrewd and successful in business and politics — but he isn’t abusive or mentally ill. Thanos tortures and murders his own family in the name of accomplishing his objectives. Tony Stark doesn’t seem to want to do that. The Avengers seem to be a cohesive unit at this point — they sometimes fought but eventually gathered together to all be on the same side against Thanos. It’s that unity of diverse characters — a couple dozen different characters from different teams and different movies — that combination of people doesn’t abuse each other. They don’t hurt each other as children. They don’t turn people into machines to punish them for failing at fights the way Thanos did to Nebula. Thanos even mentions when his goons die — this is unusual for these movies. He cares for his minions and cares when they fall. He doesn’t want to lose them. He doesn’t understand that he abuses them? The story seems to have two families: one good and one bad. The good one — the Avengers and the Guardians of the Galaxy — coordinate and care for each other. They like each other. They want to help each other. The bad one — Thanos tortures his own team. He demands that they succeed. He thinks that he loves them but doesn’t understand that he abuses them. He is mentally ill: a scared man who thinks that he should kill half the universe to make things better for the other half. He is an impressive villain.

Let’s talk about the Joker for a second. I primarily talk about two of his appearances — The Dark Knight and Joker. In The Dark Knight the Joker steals $68 million or so and kills his entire own team of thieves as he does it in the opening scene. He later burns the money after buying a suit, some knives, some gasoline, and some guns, and the use of a truck, and maybe some explosives. He then tells the Gotham City underworld that they are losing because Batman has scared them into not doing the crime that they love doing. He tells them that he will kill Batman for half — half their money. He kills one of their goons for threatening him. He then kills a judge who is allowing the prosecution of many of the crime lords in town and he kills the police commissioner as well. He blows the judge up and poisons the police commissioner. He kills people on his own side as often as he does the good guys. He takes over the criminal underworld. He shows what is wrong with society by twisting things and testing people and pitting them against each other. In the movie The Joker — spoiler —

In the movie The Joker he shoots a talk show host on the air for being a symbol of the one percent, the rich and successful who don’t care about the mentally ill outsiders…now, understand, in the real world, I am a mentally ill outsider who isn’t in the one percent. I can tell you that I don’t approve of the Joker’s actions. I still don’t approve of the one percent or their control over the rest of us. The Joker is beloved by many people — he is beloved for his attitude about things. He loves to blow people up. He loves to cause chaos and incite riots and screw with people. He enjoys screwing with Batman so much — he enjoys hurting people. He is a symbol of anarchy and rebellion against a moral majority who are often suspect. Often the Joker has a point…but of course he is evil. He corrupts Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight and corrupts much of Gotham City in The Joker. He convinces people to stand up to the assholes in charge because they don’t understand the rest of us. He is that guy.

Both characters are beloved and feared. Both characters make a strong impact with their audiences. The Joker is more beloved; Thanos is more feared. I think that both Marvel and DC created interesting villains.

Thanks, and take care, friends.