In the world of comics, supervillains often serve as the antithesis of their heroic adversaries, living only to spread misery and death. However, Marvel Comics is well-known for making its villains more multifaceted, both in their origins and in their goals. Indeed, many of Marvel’s most notorious evildoers decided to lash out at the world after having spent lifetimes being hated and abused. While there are still plenty of psychopaths who love being evil, others began their criminal careers because they felt they had no other choice. These are the Marvel villains who had the most harrowing upbringings or who were the most cruelty abused that sent them down a dark path.

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From the loss of family to the very essence of their humanity, these characters endured unimaginable pain to become the iconic villains they are today.

10) Rhino

While on the surface, Rhino may look like a dimwitted muscle-bound crook, the truth is that life gave him little alternative. As a young Russian immigrant, Aleksei Sytsevich became a thug for local gangs to support his impoverished family. When a shadowy government program offered Aleksei and his family more money than they could ever imagine, he signed up for an experiment to grant him superhuman strength. What the scientists didn’t tell Aleski was that the transformation would be permanent. Aleski found himself trapped in the rhino suit, permanently bonded to his skin and condemned to spend the rest of his life forced into a position he never wanted in the first place.

9) Red Skull

One of the most vile villains in Marvel Comics is the Nazi war criminal Johann Schmidt, aka Red Skull. Still, his origin revealed how a person could be filled with such overwhelming hate. When his mother died in childbirth, Johann’s father tried to drown him but was stopped by doctors. After Johann’s father took his own life, the young boy was put into an orphanage where he was regularly abused. As a teenager, Johann was homeless and in and out of prison. When Johann killed a woman who rejected him, he reveled in the control violence gave him. Soon after, Johann joined the Nazi regime, where his unrivaled anger made him the perfect choice in Adolf Hitler’s eyes to become the face of the Third Reich: the Red Skull.

8) Vermin

Edward Whelan, aka Vermin, never had an easy life. Edward grew up in an abusive household where his father would frequently beat him. After running away, Edward spent most of his time living on the streets as a homeless man. Given Edward’s impoverished and isolated existence, he was the perfect lab rat for the Nazi villains Baron Zemo and Armin Zola. After undergoing excruciating experiments, Edward was transformed into a rat-like beast whose humanity and sanity were stripped away from him. Now, Vermin crawls through the sewers of New York as a feral and cannibalistic serial killer. While the tiny bit of him who was Edward has tried to regain his humanity, the Vermin is dominant and always takes over in the end.

7) Lady Deathstrike

Yuriki Oyama, aka Lady Deathstrike, sacrificed her body and humanity to continue the legacy of her abusive father. A crime lord with severe scars, Yuriki’s father, Lord Dark Wind, scarred the faces of his children. After her brothers died following their father’s orders, Yuriki killed Lord Dark Wind to free her lover from his servitude. Instead of joining Yuriki, her boyfriend killed himself because of his loyalty to her father. This loss caused Yuriki to snap and adopt her father’s cruel mindset. When Yuriki discovered that Wolverine had undergone the adamantium-bone grafting procedure that Lord Dark Wind invented, she swore to kill the X-Man whom she believed stole her father’s life’s work. She would then augment her body with adamantium to become Lady Deathstrike.

6) Apocalypse

As one of the very first mutants in recorded history, En Sabah Nur, aka Apocalypse, was treated as a monster from the day he was born in Ancient Egypt 5,000 years ago. Left to die in the desert as an infant because of his strange gray skin, the mutant was adopted by raiders. Raised as a warrior, Nur’s clan was slaughtered by the Pharaoh and his army. Although Nur tried to avenge his people, he was instead captured and enslaved. Having been tortured for years and with everyone around him constantly trying to kill him because of his appearance and abilities, Nur had had enough. Deciding to embrace the role society placed upon him, Nur became the monster and tyrant known as Apocalypse.

5) Lizard

Even when scientist Curt Conners lost his arm during a war, he still had a lot going for him with a loving wife and son. However, in his attempt to restore his lost limb and help other amputees, he became a monster. By taking a serum that harnessed a reptile’s regenerative properties, Curt successfully regrew his arm. Unfortunately, it also resulted in his transformation into the vicious, bloodthirsty reptilian humanoid known as the Lizard. Despite his many attempts to cure himself over the years, the treatments never stick, and Curt always reverts to his savage Lizard form. As the Lizard, he even ate his own wife and child. In trying to help others, Curt doomed himself and his family.

4) Doctor Doom

Born in Latveria to a Romanian tribe, Victor Don Doom lost his witch mother at a young age when she was dragged to Hell by the demon Mephisto. Things got worse when Victor’s father, Werner, was asked to cure a Baron’s sick wife. When he failed to save her, Werner fled with Victor into the wilderness to escape the Baron’s wrath. Werner tragically froze to death while protecting Victor from a blizzard. Victor eventually went to college, where an experimental machine to save his mother’s soul literally blew up in his face. Disfigured and expelled, Victor purposefully scarred his face even further by donning his iconic mask before it cooled off. Having suffered his whole life, Doctor Doom seeks to take control of his destiny and the world.

3) Gorr the God Butcher

Having grown up on a barren world, the alien Gorr had more than enough reason to believe that the gods didn’t care about mortals. Gorr’s life was unending misery since he was a child, as ravenous predators devoured his mother. As he grew up and food became even scarcer, Gorr’s pregnant wife died in an earthquake. Then all six of his children slowly and painfully died of starvation. When Gorr buried the last of his children and rejected the beliefs of his people, the tribe cast him out. It was only when Gorr was on the brink of death that he found two dying gods and claimed the powerful Necrosword. Gorr then dedicated his life to exterminating the deities who left his people to die.

2) Galactus

For Galan’s transformation into the Devourer of Worlds Galactus, his only crime was that he hadn’t died with the rest of his people. A brilliant scientist from the planet Taa who lived eons ago during the previous incarnation of the multiverse, Galan witnessed the end of its natural life cycle. The radiation from the dying multiverse decimated Galan’s people, until he was the only person left in the multiverse. At this point, Galan was visited by the Sentience of the Sixth Cosmos, who merged with him to become Galactus. As the new multiverse arose, Galactus was doomed to spend an eternity devouring planets and exterminating countless people to satiate his overwhelming hunger.

1) Magneto

The mutant Master of Magnetism, Max Eisenhardt, aka Magneto, grew to hate humanity after surviving its darkest era. Born to a Jewish family during the early 1930s, a young Max and his family were captured by the Nazis and taken to a concentration camp, where his parents and sister were killed. Yet even when escaping Nazi Germany and starting a new life with a wife and daughter in Russia, tragedy still followed Max. When the KGB learned that Max was a mutant, they burned his house down with his daughter inside. It was at this point when Max snapped and killed all the KGB agents. Having experienced the worst of humanity’s persecution, Magneto dedicated his life to having mutantkind take its rightful place as the rulers of Earth.

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