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Adaptational Villainy / Marvel Universe

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Marvel Universe

Adaptational Villainy in this series.

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    Comic Books 

Comic Books

The following have their own pages:

  • Amalgam Universe:
    • Deathlok (a cyborg who, in every iteration, wishes to break free of his killing machine programming) and Jason Todd (the then-thought-dead Robin, whose Red Hood Anti-Villain days wouldn't be for another nine years) are merged into a ruthless cyborg HYDRA agent.
    • Mr. Freeze lacks the redeeming qualities he has in the comics, due to being merged with Nazi scientist Wolfgang von Strucker.
  • Heroes Reborn:
  • House of M:
    • Shang-Chi is the leader of a Chinatown street gang and seeks to rebuild his deceased father's criminal empire (in contrast to the mainline continuity, where he opposed his father's evil activities and thwarted them whenever possible). He eventually comes around, though, and acts as an ally to Luke Cage's Avengers.
    • Thunderbird was already portrayed as a hothead in the mainstream X-Men comics, but this version of the character is a Rabid Cop and Fantastic Racist who hates humans. He's willing to go to extremely shady lengths to take down Luke Cage's Human Resistance Movement, including using Police Brutality, allying himself with a murderous gangster like the Kingpin, and even performing an outright purge of a human neighborhood. His actions eventually prove to be too much even for Magneto, who has him placed on unpaid suspension.
  • When The Incredible Hulk comics decided to do its own version of Bruce's father (The Incredible Hulk (1977) has Banner's dad as a man named DW), Brian abused his family and killed his wife, unthinkable by DW Banner.
  • The Avengers (Jason Aaron) sees Phil Coulson, a Canon Immigrant from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, come back from the dead (after being killed by Deadpool in Secret Empire) as an ally of Mephisto. While Heroes Reborn (2021) suggests he was Brainwashed and Crazy when he was resurrected, it also reveals he engaged in waterboarding as a soldier, hence why he was in Hell in the first place.
  • Marvel 1602:
    • Similar to their Ultimate incarnation, the 1602 version of Black Widow turns out to be a reversal of her original counterpart, only in this case, she's a double agent for Count Otto von Doom.
    • There's also the 1602 version of Bruce Banner, who's presented as an Evil Chancellor with Undying Loyalty towards King James I and willingly assists in his goal of arresting Nick Fury and the "witchbreed" mutants for "treason" .However, at the climax, he does risk his life to save Peter Parquaugh in a similar fashion to the way he became the Hulk in the original comics by saving Rick Jones.
  • Marvel Noir has some cases, most notably X-Men Noir, who, in this timeline, aren't mutants, but sociopaths — and Jean Grey killed Rogue. Professor X himself is the Big Bad of the sequel miniseries.
    • In Wolverine Noir, the Big Bad is Rose, from Wolvie's mini Origin.
    • In Spider-Man Noir, Curt Connors is a Nazi-sympathetic scientist and assistant to Doctor Octopus (who’s also a Nazi) who remorselessly experiments on humans, very different from his mainstream comics counterpart, who is generally a good guy when he isn't having Superpowered Evil Side issues. Doctor Octopus himself while a Evil Genius in the mainstream comics still has never crossed the line into outright fascism. A later comic has Electro be a Nazi ally as well, unlike the 616 comics where he’s merely a greedy Jerkass.
    • In Iron Man Noir, it turns out in this universe Baron Zemo is Tony's father Howard Stark. Now, mainstream comics Howard isn't the nicest guy to begin with, but he certainly isn't an agent of Hydra note . A bit downplayed, however, as the character's villainy was a result of brainwashing drugs. There's also Madame Masque, whom is a Tragic Villain in the mainstream comics thanks to her scarred face and emotional abuse from her father Count Nefaria, but in Iron Man Noir she lacks that Freudian Excuse and is just a cruel Bitch in Sheep's Clothing before even getting disfigured.
  • In The Mighty Thor comics, Loki is generally depicted as an evil god (though some individual writers have made him more of an Anti-Villain), but in the original Norse mythology he's a much more ambiguous figure, usually taking the role of The Trickster.
    • He himself noticed this and killed himself in the Siege to change. His success is... ambiguous, but he managed to not go back to straight up villainy for years until 2016 where he joined a team of Asgardian villains.
  • Baron Karza in the Marvel Micronauts comic books is the Big Bad of the "Homeworld" sector of Microverse. The toy line gave little to no characterization of the various figures. In the toyline, he was described as the rival to Force Commander but he was also one of a number of assorted Magno figures of a similar theme. There were also other European release only characters such as Green Baron and King Atlas. All of these characters were lesser nobles under a figure named Red Falcon who was the right hand of an Emperor Megas. In the toyline, Karza seemed to be evil by default because of color coding and because Karza bore a passing resemblance to Darth Vader. But we don't know for sure if he was the worst of the worst, especially since Megas resembles Vader even more.
  • The Greater-Scope Villain in Nextwave is Devil Dinosaur. Usually a heroic character, he's now an Omnicidal Maniac in charge of a massive terrorist organization, killed and ate his partner Moon Boy (who is also abusive here), and he can also speak. When the events of Nextwave became part of mainstream Marvel continuity, they were both naturally revealed to be evil clones. All Played for Laughs, of course.
  • Mark Millar's Old Man Logan much like Ruins being a gritty and horrific outcome for the MU's heroes does this to a few characters.
    • Bruce Banner aka The Incredible Hulk while famously very rageful in his big green alter ego, is still a Bruiser with a Soft Center and Gentle Giant to his allies and loved ones and when the chips are down is extremely heroic saving the universe from threats like Onslaught. In Old Man Logan however Hulk is the insane leader of a Cannibal Clan of The Hills Have Eyes-esque inbred hillbillies (whom he fathered with She-Hulk) and has Wolverine's family killed when they can't pay their debt. This version of Hulk even eats Logan! Forcing Wolverine to claw his way of Hulk's stomach like a Chest Burster killing Banner in the process.
    • Magneto is just as awful as his Ultimate Marvel counterpart here and arguably even worse in some regards. While Mags is an Anti-Villain in the mainstream comics and thanks to flanderisation from several writers is a pretty awful father who has killed innocent people, he still cares deeply for mutantkind and eventually stops working for Supervillain teams out of disgust and joins the X-Men for good. In Old Man Logan, Magneto joins the united super-villains (inlcuding Red Skull) who take over the world and have most mutants killed, something his comic counterpart would never do even at his worst. In Old Man Hawkeye its shown not only was Magneto one of the villains who butchered Hawkeye's Avengers team, but he also killed his own (adoptive) daughter Scarlet Witch as well, albeit not without some tears of regret.
    • Old Man Logan's Mysterio is by far the vilest depiction of him period, far worse than even the MCU version. 616 Mysterio while he has done bad things to Spidey and his allies, is still a Noble Demon who is extremely Affably Evil compared to the worst of Spidey's rogues gallery, having displayed some Even Evil Has Standards traits. In Old Man Logan, Mysterio targets the X-Men and making Wolverine hallucinate he's being attacked by villains causing Logan to massacre everyone in the mansion killing all his allies, friends and loved ones, only snapping out of it as Jubilee dies in his arms while Mysterio tauntingly reveals his deception to a traumatised Logan.
  • Many of the Marvel characters unambiguously on the side of good that were featured in Ruins who weren't killed by the accidents that gave them their powers are portrayed in a far more sinister light, the most jarring examples including Professor X being a corrupt President of the United States who imprisons and mutilates mutants rather than the benevolent leader of the X-Men and Captain America's ally Nomad being a Nazi sympathizer.
  • Spider-Men II picks up where the original left in regards to Peter finding out about Miles Morales's counterpart in the mainline universe — a friend and former ally of the Kingpin back before Fisk did his coup against Don Rigoletto.
  • Spider-Man: Life Story:
    • The series gives this treatment to Iron Man. Tony’s moral awakening about about being an Arms Dealer is removed and he happily continues being involved in The Vietnam War and he later becomes a Corrupt Corporate Executive at odds with Spidey, similar to Norman Osborn. Particularly jarring given most other Marvel characters in the comic besides Tony have their personalities unaltered, if not improved in the case of Otto and Norman. Although Tony does posthumously leave behind a satellite that once activated will free the world from Doctor Doom's control.
    • The Venom Symbiote and Kraven the Hunter. While Kraven is far from heroic in the mainline comics unlike the Venom symbiote, they combine to become a major villain for the finale of the comic as the Symboite bonds with Kraven for murderous revenge against Spidey, in the 616 universe the Symboite doesn’t actually want to kill Peter since it genuinely loves him and it generally wants to be a hero.

    Films 

Films

The following have their own pages:

  • Spider-Man: Spider-Verse
    • The version of Doctor Octopus in Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is an utterly amoral Mad Scientist from the beginning, with detachable tentacles, whereas the mainstream comics continuity version only became evil after a lab accident which fused his tentacles to his body and damaged his brain.
    • Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse:
      • More like Adaptational Antiheroism but Miguel O'Hara aka Spider-Man 2099 gets a good amount of this. In the comics while he isn't quite the All-Loving Hero Peter is, being full edgy angst and substance addiction typical of a 90s hero, he's still got a fully fuctioning moral compass and was even worthy of wielding Mjölnir. Most importantly he gets along very well with other universe Spider-Men, literally the only hostile encounter was when Peter was taken over by Doctor Octopus. Here however he's much more of a flawed character, having replaced his dead Alternate Self who had a family — resulting in the destruction of that universe. He also demonises Miles, deriding him as a mistake that was never supposed to happen to the point where other Spider-People like Gwen and Peter call him out on his callousness. While Miguel does have justification for his extreme actions regarding Miles, given what happen to him, he's still far more of an antagionist than he's ever been in the comics. In fairness though he's not supposed to be the exact same Miguel O'Hara from the comics.
      • The Spot is mostly a Ineffectual Sympathetic Villain in the comics, like Mysterio he's willingly to work with some of the worst of Marvel's villains but is far less scummy than the majority of them. In particular he has a Delicate and Sickly son that he genuinely loves and at one point was able to break free of his Pocket Dimension and return to normal world just by thinking about his boy. Across Spider-Verse keeps Spot's Freak Lab Accident origins but dials the From Nobody to Nightmare traits up to eleven and throws out his more likeable and sympathetic qualities from the comics, making Spot a Giygas-like Humanoid Abomination Multiversal Conqueror that seeks to ruin Miles's life.
  • The Amazing Spider-Man Series
    • The Amazing Spider-Man 2:
      • The Gender Flipped character Dr. Kafka is an evil Mad Scientist, rather than a well-meaning psychologist who genuinely tries to treat her patients as in the comics.
      • Harry Osborn is notably less sympathetic than he was in the comics, being the Big Bad of the film, and the Green Goblin that's responsible for Gwen Stacy's death, rather than his father. In the comics, Harry was genuinely upset by Gwen's death.
  • Daredevil (2003): Believe it or not but Bullseye gets this. Now in the comics he’s definitely one of the vilest and psychotic Marvel villains, right up there with Carnage, but he does at least have a few sympathetic traits such as having had Abusive Parents, a genuine bond with Deadpool and is quite the Pragmatic Villain. Colin Farrell’s take on Bullseye however, utterly lacks even those tiny redeeming qualities being a cartoonishly evil monster who finds the smell of a rose repulsive and doesn’t even bother with pretence of being Faux Affably Evil.
  • While Deadpool is a Psycho for Hire in the comics, he's still an Anti-Hero who has some redeeming qualities. In Hulk Vs., Deadpool is a unrepentant member of Weapon X. Deadpool makes jokes about killing babies and almost shoots a child, when these are lines Deadpool would never cross in the comics.
  • Whereas in the comics, Algrim/Kurse was loyal to Asgard after he cut ties with Malekith, in Thor: Tales of Asgard, Algrim's presented as resenting Odin and Asgard for not coming to the aid of the Dark Elves against the Ice Giants (and going against them when the Dark Elves turned to Surtur for help) and blames them for the extinction of the Dark Elves, and was willing to use the Sword of Surtur against Asgard.
  • Elektra: Unlike the title character, who received the opposite of this trope in Daredevil (2003), Stone is a member of the Hand as opposed to a loyal devotee of the Chaste.
  • The comics version of Ezekiel Simms was marked out by his extreme selfishness in using his powers to benefit himself, and his terror of dying, but he was otherwise an Anti-Villain at worst who still wanted to help people and tried to atone for his past misdeeds. In Madame Web (2024) he's still driven by selfishness and fear of death, but goes far further; he murders Cassie's mother to gain the mysterious spider that gives him his powers, spends the movie tracking down and trying to kill three innocent teenage girls and killing numerous cops and civilians along the way - all to avoid going back to "nothing" as he puts it.
  • Spider-Man 3: Venom (the Eddie Brock version) from the comics is an anti-hero, when not obsessed with killing Spider-Man. While using lethal force, Venom still had a sense of ethics, twisted admittedly, and did not want to harm innocents even when he had to. In this film, Eddie is a self-centered Jerkass who gloats, cheats his way to success, and sleazily hits on any pretty woman he meets. He loses his job for far more legitimate reasons than previous incarnations; Spider-Man would unintentionally cause him trouble, while here Peter (under the influence of the symbiote) reveals he made a fake photograph of Spider-Man robbing a bank to get a desk job. Furthermore, in the original comics, Eddie is at the church where he receives the symbiote to confess sins and pray for forgiveness as he decided to commit suicide before the symbiote merged with him. In the film, he's praying for Peter to be killed.
  • X-Men Film Series does this a lot.
    • X-Men: The Last Stand: Psylocke, Quill, Spike, and Multiple Man are all associated with some branch of the X-Men in the comics, but here, they all appear as members of Magneto's Brotherhood of Mutants.note 
    • X-Men Origins: Wolverine: Agent Zero was a lot closer to being an Anti-Hero in the comics, but his movie counterpart is a straight-up villain who is completely loyal to Colonel Stryker.
    • X-Men: First Class: Angel Salvadore is a member of the X-Men and New Warriors in the comics, but she is depicted as a traitor and member of the Hellfire Club. Granted, she was briefly part of Xorneto's Brotherhood in the penultimate arc of New X-Men, but there, she realized how insane Xorneto was and turned against him, whereas her film counterpart is unrepentant.
    • While in the original comic book Bolivar Trask wasn't a good guy by any means, he did eventually come to realize that mutants are not a threat to humanity and even performs a Heroic Sacrifice to stop the Sentinels. Neither of those happen in X-Men: Days of Future Past.
    • X-Men: Apocalypse sees Storm, Archangel, and Psylocke being among Apocalypse's Horsemen of their own free will. And even before meeting Apocalypse, Archangel is depicted as a very vicious and cruel young man. Pyslocke is just as cruel and Ax-Crazy judging by the climax, showing none of the compassion or nobility of her comic counterpart. Storm still retains her better qualities, but she also stands by as Apocalypse kills thousands of innocent people in front of her, something comic Storm would never do.
    • The D'bari gets in this X-Men: Dark Phoenix in the comics they're an innocent alien race that is decimated when Jean Grey destroys their solar system as Dark Phoenix during the The Dark Phoenix Saga. In the film, the D'bari are tyrannical shapeshifting alien assholes who try to temp Jean into destroying the Earth and serve as the antagonists in the latter half of the film. This is likely as a result of the filmmakers compositing the D'bari with the Skrulls, whom Fox didn't have the rights to.
      • Vuk, the D'bari leader, did actually do some evil in the comics, but instead through desperation, as his debut appearance saw him turn the Avengers to stone because Sub-Mariner promised to help fix his ship if he did that, undoing their petrification when Captain America convinced him the Avengers could help repair his ship instead, and becoming the Last of His Kind when Dark Phoenix decimated his species later on, giving him understandable reasons to go after her. In the film, the gender-flipped Vuk manipulates Jean into becoming destructive, filling the role the Hellfire Club had in the original story.
    • In The New Mutants, the main antagonist, Dr. Celia Reyes, in the comics was an ally to X-Men and Actual Pacifist who rejects Xavier's offer to join the team because she wants to save lives in a hospital like a real hero. In the film, she's a manipulative Mad Scientist who's willing to kill a teenage girl. This, coupled with a Race Lift, renders her practically unrecognizable.

    Live-Action TV 

Live-Action TV

  • Inhumans
    • In the comics, Auran is one of the royal family's allies. Here, she's Maximus's enforcer, and since the show has not taken the time to establish her motivations (yet) as it did for Maximus, she ends up coming off as far more evil than he is.
    • The heroes of the series all get a good dose of this, due to the Fantastic Caste System in place. You go through Terrigenesis as a child and don't get powers, or do but your powers aren't "good enough"? Enjoy being Made a Slave in the mines for life!
  • Iron Fist (2017)
    • The most notable example is Colleen Wing who is revealed to have been working with the Hand, whereas the original did no such thing.
    • Harold Meachum is a downplayed example, since he plays a more passive role in the comics (though he was by no means a saint there). He is a more active threat in the show, serving as one part of Season 1's Big Bad Ensemble. Where his comic book counterpart facilitated the death of Wendell Rand because he was in love with Wendell's wife, this Harold is revealed to have arranged all three Rands' deaths because Wendell was about to discover his dealings with the Hand.
  • Luke Cage (2016): This show loves this trope:
    • Rafael Scarfe in the comics was an honest police officer, except for one story arc, who helped Luke and Iron Fist on a number of cases. Here, he is a Dirty Cop who kills Chico and sells Luke out to Cottonmouth.
    • Dr. Noah Burstein was a supporting character and ally of Luke Cage during his early days, but here, he is a bit of a Well-Intentioned Extremist scientist.
    • Reva was more or less a decent person, even if she didn't live very long during Luke's origin story in the comics, and up through at least Jessica Jones (2015), that seemed to be true of her for the MCU. We learn that she was aware of Seagate's experiments the entire time and was manipulating Luke.
  • WandaVision: Agatha Harkness is the final antagonist in the series, and much more malicious than her comic book counterpart, who was an ally, teacher, and mentor to Wanda, as well as an ally and babysitter to the Fantastic Four.

  • The Falcon and the Winter Soldier:
    • Batroc the Leaper; the comics (especially Gwenpool) have all shown he is an extremely Affably Evil Noble Demon who expresses respect to his opponents especially Cap and his allies. Batroc’s first MCU appearance in Captain America: The Winter Soldier touched upon this judging by the “I thought you were more than just a shield” line but in Falcon and The Winter Soldier Batroc Took a Level in Jerkass and is more of a Smug Snake, who happily joins the Flagsmashers for the sake of petty revenge after Sam defeated him.
    • Shockingly Sharon Carter aka Agent 13 gets this. In the comics and previous films she’s a heroic and compassionate ally to Cap as well as his Love Interest. Her worst action in the comics, killing Steve Rogers, was done while she had been brainwashed by Doctor Faustus. In the show Sharon has become embittered having been essentially abandoned by Team Cap after the events of Captain America: Civil War and now works as a hustler in Madripoor. It’s even revealed she’s one who freed Batroc from prison and hired him to hijack a Air Force plane. She's ultimately revealed to be the Power Broker, the person behind the events of the series and she's just begun...

    Video Games 

Video Games

  • Despite being a hero and even a member of The Avengers, Echo is portrayed as an unambiguous villain in the Daredevil video game adaptation.
  • Guardians of the Galaxy: The Telltale Series takes after the Marvel Cinematic Universe version and sees Yondu of the original 1969 team as a Space Pirate, as opposed to a superhero himself. That said, his reasons for taking Peter fall under Adaptational Heroism, as he was tasked by Peter's mother Meredith to take care of him, as opposed to his MCU counterpart being hired by Ego to kidnap him (and only instead keeping him when he realized that Ego was killing other children delivered to him).
  • Much like in Iron Man 3 Aldrich Killian in LEGO Marvel Super Heroes is a much nastier character than he was in the comics. He's not acting as an impostor Mandarin, however, because he is directly working with Mandarin in the story's campaign.
  • Marvel: Avengers Alliance
  • Marvel Future Fight
    • Ronan the Accuser started out as a standard cosmic villain, but was always presented as loyal to his own people's justice system and possessing of honor, and when Marvel Cosmic was highlighted after Annihilation, he was presented as a hero, which became his default characterization in every book since. In-game, Ronan is a two-dimensional, genocidal maniac like in the movie.
    • Yondu Udonta, who was a member of the Guardians of the Galaxy in the comics and a superhero. Even in the movies, which the game heavily borrows from, Yondu is mostly faking his antagonism to look strong in front of his crew and is proud of Star-Lord, who he sees as something of an adopted son. In the game, however, he's genuine in his desire to kill Quill and is angry instead of amused that Peter swapped out the Infinity Stone he was trying to steal for a troll doll.
  • Variant example in Marvel Super Heroes: War of the Gems. While Nebula is typically a villain or Anti-Villain anyway, she spent most of The Infinity Gauntlet as a victim being tormented by Thanos, and actually played a key role in defeating him in the end (albeit due to her own vengeful nature). In War of the Gems, an adaptation of Infinity Gauntlet, Nebula instead acts as Thanos' enforcer, and is actually the last villain the heroes have to defeat before the final battle with Thanos himself.
  • Marvel Ultimate Alliance:
  • Played with and addressed by Spider-Man in Spider-Man: Web of Shadows, stating that Venom is acting nothing like himself and is disregarding the very innocents he swore to protect. However, Venom in this case was really Drunk with Power, and he undergoes a Heel Realization at the end. The PS2 version however, plays this as straight as a line, featuring most likely the most evil incarnation of Venom to date in any media.
  • Spider-Man (PS4) does this to Mr. Negative by simply making "Martin Li" his actual name. In the comics, Negative's "Martin Li" persona is a case of Dead Person Impersonation, Negative having been a Triad member involved in human trafficking and the real Li one of their victims with Negative taking up the name after the real Li dies.

    Western Animation 

Western Animation

The following have their own pages:

  • Avengers Assemble sees Hyperion gain the villainy of King Hyperion, his Mirror Universe counterpart from Exiles. As such, he's depicted as a sociopathic Not-So-Well-Intentioned Extremist who is revealed to have destroyed his own planet when they wouldn't submit to his rule. However, given the rest of the Squadron appeared and how they behaved, it may be a downplayed version as they're more in line with the Squadron Sinister, including Nighthawk displaying the type of behavior that caused the Supreme version to leave the Squadron in disgust, though played straight with Power Princess and Nuke as the Squadron Sinister never had versions of them. The Avengers (Jason Aaron) would eventually introduce an incarnation of the Squadron Supreme in line with the villainy of their television counterparts, albeit as the simulacrums Mephisto created to serve the Power Elite in the Captain America run by Ta-Nehisi Coates.
  • The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes:
    • Wonder Man was a villain for only one issue of the original Avengers series, and has been depicted as a hero for the vast majority of his published existence. Despite this, he's a Tragic Villain and member of the Masters of Evil in the show, though this is due to the fact that Enchantress' magic is the only thing that stabilized him in later appearances, and working for her and Baron Zemo was the only thing that could keep him alive. He does however make a Heel–Face Turn in his final appearance, where he pulls a Heroic Sacrifice to stop Enchantress.
    • The Falcon and Doc Samson appear as part of Code Red, a team of government-sponsored superheroes who act in opposition to the Avengers, as the two work with Winter Soldier and Red Hulk to orchestrate Hulk's arrest, then the team goes after the Avengers due to a dangerous gas leak in Avengers Mansion. In the comics, the Falcon is Captain America's partner and a longtime member of the Avengers himself, while Doc Samson is an ally of the Hulk, and in the show itself, Samson was indeed an ally of Hulk and the Avengers in earlier appearances. Partially justified though, since it turns out they were brainwashed by the Red Skull, who created the aforementioned gas (which turns people into red-skinned, skeletal humanoids, like him) and had it put in Avengers Mansion to give Falcon, Samson, and Winter Soldier an excuse to invade the mansion (while Red Hulk kept Thor occupied). (And both of them have had notable Brainwashed and Crazy stories in the comics; in Falcon's case at the hands of the Skull.)
  • Medusa and The Inhumans in The Fantastic Four (1978). In the comics, the Inhumans can be elitist, arrogant and abrasive, but are on the side of good, and usually only fight other heroes due to Deliberate Values Dissonance or misunderstandings. In the TV show, Medusa flat out wants to conquer the world and subjugate mankind and kidnaps the Fantastic Four in order to force them to help the Inhumans accomplish this. Also, in the comics, Medusa only joined the Frightful Four because she was amnesiac at the time and was coerced by the Wizard. The cartoon has her join willingly to get revenge on the Fantastic Four.
  • The Guardians of the Galaxy (2015):
    • Mantis as a cultist and recurring villain. This is a far cry from the comics, where Mantis is a hero and a member of the Guardians.
    • Yondu is an even worse version of his film counterpart, as while his film counterpart did care for Star-Lord, in the cartoon, he's got no problem throwing Quill under the bus.
      • Uncle Pyko, the leader of the Halfworld Rebels. While in the original comics he wasn't completely innocent either, he was ultimately a good and peaceful man by the end, not like his portrayal here.
  • Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H.:
    • In "Planet Leader", Hiroim (A member of the generally heroic Warbound in the comics) is the brutal slavemaster of the mines of Sakaar.
    • Mainframe, an Avenger from the MC2 line, is turned into a villain who attempts to destroy New York City. However, the episode does end with Mainframe leaving to experience the world after being defeated, possibly hinting that he will become a little closer to his comic counterpart.
  • Iron Man: Armored Adventures
  • Marvel's Spider-Man:
    • Flint Marko AKA Sandman's daughter Keemia was a Cheerful Child in the comics and wasn't aware of her father's criminal activities. In this, she is a teenager who has his powers and joins his former boss Hammerhead's side, even though she hated her dad for working for the guy. She even murders Flint in their debut episode. She is also dubbed "Sandgirl" by Spider-Man.
    • Jefferson Morales originally started out a case of Adaptational Nice Guy as he lacks the original character's Fantastic Racism. Come season 3, he gained it and becomes a Composite Character, taking up the Swarm identity — though he's still arguably a case of Adaptational Nice Guy given the original Swarm, Fritz von Meyer, was literally a Nazi.
  • Silver Surfer: The Animated Series sees a Nova who resembled Richie Rider and Jack of Hearts, superheroes themselves in the comics, as part of Nebula's crew.
  • The Spectacular Spider-Man:
    • In the Spider-Man comics, Silver Sable is an anti-heroic mercenary. While she sometimes fights Spider-Man, they usually team up to fight the real villain. In The Spectacular Spider-Man, Silver Sable is a Mafia Princess and a straight up villain, since she's the daughter of the mob boss Silvermane in the show.note 
    • Ricochet is a member of the Enforcers (Fancy Dan) rather than a teen vigilante (or originally Spidey himself) like in the comics.
  • In the comics and most adaptations, Curt Connors is a sympathetic character and generally good-natured when he isn't the Lizard. In Spider-Man (1981), he is portrayed as a megalomaniacal monster who may have mutated himself into a humanoid reptile on purpose (he is only seen as the Lizard, but his tattered clothes and demonstration of scientific knowledge suggests that he could still be Curt Connors).
  • Spider-Man: The New Animated Series:
    • The show portrays Connors as a much more bitter and unpleasant character even before his transformation.
    • The show also depicted Silver Sable in a far more villainous light than the comics. She even planned to kill several of Peter Parker's close friends to spite him after he refused to give into her demands, something the comic version of Sable would never do.
  • Eddie Brock in the comics is an anti-hero and has activley opposed practically everything his Spider-Man Unlimited counterpart does in his own series, including being part of an Assimilation Plot and especially working with Carnage of all people.
  • Ultimate Spider-Man:
    • The series depicts Morbius as a willing member of terrorist organization Hydra, when he is an anti-hero in the comics.
    • In the comics, Eddie Brock becomes Anti-Venom, who was a Good Counterpart to the third Venom. Here, Anti-Venom is a creation of Dr. Octopus who is an Evil Counterpart and Man of Kryptonite to Agent Venom.
  • What If…? (2021) Hank Pym in What If... the World Lost Its Mightiest Heroes?, unlike his normal MCU self and the comic version, underwent a Face–Heel Turn due to Hope van Dyne's death and murdered the Avengers while framing S.H.I.E.L.D. for it, becoming his violent Yellowjacket identity from the comics to do so (when in the MCU the Yellowjacket identity went to the outright villainous Darren Cross). His original comic self did questionable things like build Ultron or strike Janet van Dyne, but didn’t initially turn into a supervillain over all of it, and his MCU incarnation had retired before and not done any questionably moral actions, whereas this depiction of the character turned straight up into the very thing his MCU counterpart despised Darren for becoming. Granted Hank would become a Fallen Hero for real in more recent comics, but unlike the What If... version it wasn’t under his own volition having his body and psyche fused with Ultron.
  • X-Men: The Animated Series/X-Men '97: Bella Donna gets a great deal of this in "X-Ternally Yours". In the comics she’s somewhere between an Aloof Ally and an Anti-Villain, she genuinely loves Gambit having been engaged to him since they were children and was heartbroken at him having to leave her due to friction between their Guilds and even more upset upon learning Gambit had found a new love in Rogue. While she does have villainous traits and has done evil things (such as orchestrating Rogue’s First Love Cody’s death out of revenge for Rogue taking her memories) she still gracefully accepts she’s lost Gambit and moves on. The show keeps Bella Donna’s backstory, but chucks out all her redeeming qualities as upon meeting Gambit again she puts a painful Power Limiter ring on him and swears that he’ll never escape her again. Then when Rogue shows along with Wolverine and Jean to save Gambit, Bella Donna drops everything to try and right kill her rival on the spot screaming that Gambit is hers. She also wants to destroy the Thieves Guild here, unlike the comics where she just wants to the Assassin and Thieves Guilds to combine.
  • X-Men: Evolution
    • Colossus and Gambit were members of Magneto's Acolytes, despite being actual members of the X-Men in the comics. They eventually pulled a Heel–Face Turn and were seen as part of the team in the epilogue. That said, Colossus is only a member of the Acolytes because Magneto is threatening his family.
    • Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch are only in the Brotherhood in the comics because Magneto saved him and they felt they owed him, leaving upon realizing how horrible he truly was. In the show, Pietro is a bit of a sociopath and Wanda suffers from a number of mental issues.

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