The Avengers are considered Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in Marvel Comics for a reason, as the team has successfully saved Planet Earth (and even the entire universe) on more than one occasion. Not only that, but the Avengers are trusted to be called upon whenever future danger occurs, and that’s all due to their successful track record with past crises.
However, the Avengers aren’t always celebrating their victories, as there have been more than a few defeats in the team’s history as well. In fact, during the early days of the team’s formation, the Avengers were just getting the hang of being world-class heroes, which inevitably meant they’d suffer a few defeats when going up against increasingly powerful villains. Here are the first 10 villains who defeated the Avengers in Marvel Comics (in chronological order).
10 Space Phantom Destroyed the Avengers RIGHT After They Formed
Avengers #2 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
The Space Phantom is a villain who has the power to shapeshift into anyone he chooses. He uses this power to not only physically dominate the Avengers by using the abilities of their own members (primarily the Hulk), but Space Phantom also creates distrust in their ranks, almost causing them to split up right when they formed into an official team.
The Avengers eventually rally to victory, but the Space Phantom’s attack yields more than just the Avengers’ temporary defeat, as it also results in the Hulk leaving the team he helped found, making this loss one with a lasting impact on the Avengers.
9 Hulk Proved Why He’s the Strongest Avenger
Avengers #3 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Before he leaves the team for a long period of time following Space Phantom’s attack, the Hulk and the Avengers have a proper falling out, one where the Hulk proves why he’s popularly considered ‘the Strongest Avenger’. When the Hulk left at the end of the last issue, the Avengers went looking for him, even though he clearly didn’t want to be found. This led to a battle when the Avengers eventually found the Hulk, one which ended with the Hulk once again making a successful escape.
The Avengers feared that the Hulk would be dangerous if left unchecked, effectively making Hulk as dangerous in the Avengers’ eyes as a villain, they just didn’t count on the fact that they, themselves, were in the most danger of all.
8 Namor the Submariner Came Back with a Vengeance
Avengers #4 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
In the previous issue, when the Avengers were scouring the globe looking for the Hulk, they inadvertently spark the wrath of Namor, who wages a small war against the Avengers for their transgressions. Namor first fights the Avengers at the end of issue #3, but he didn’t beat the Avengers until this issue, as he, indeed, came back with a vengeance.
While the conflict would end fairly amicably (as most do with Namor), this fight further confirmed Namor’s truly god-tier presence in the Marvel Universe, especially during this era of Marvel canon.
7 Masters of Evil Took Down the Avengers Without Throwing a Single Punch
Avengers #7 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
After a string of victories throughout the next few issues, the Avengers finally meet their match in the form of a team of villains who seem to be their exact opposite. The Masters of Evil (more accurately, the new and improved Masters of Evil, as the original iteration failed to make much of an impact) were able to take down Earth’s Mightiest Heroes without throwing a single punch. After Baron Zemo (the leader of the Masters of Evil) recruited the Asgardian villains, the Executioner and Enchantress, Enchantress used her sorcery to infect the minds of the Avengers, forcing them to fight among themselves.
The Avengers eventually broke free of this spell, but not before they took themselves down as a result of the Masters of Evil’s diabolical (and wildly effective) scheme.
6 Kang the Conqueror Made the Avengers Look Pathetic
Avengers #8 by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby
Long before becoming the big-bad of the MCU, Kang the Conqueror terrorized the Avengers during his first appearance in this issue. Using advanced technology from the future to conquer the past, Kang traveled back in time to fulfill his villainous designs. When the Avengers launched an initial strike against him, Kang made them look absolutely pathetic, as he easily defeated each one of them with his advanced technology, incapacitating them with seemingly no effort.
After collecting themselves and using their brains instead of just their brawn, the Avengers were able to save their present from this future conqueror, but not until after Kang made them all look like utter fools.
5 Wonder Man Reluctantly Took Down the Avengers (Before Helping Them)
Avengers #9 by Stan Lee and Don Heck
After the Masters of Evil saw success with their new-recruits, it seems Zemo wanted to keep that trend going in this issue by creating the ultimate super-villain, Wonder Man. Wonder Man is essentially unstoppable, with strength that can rival all the Avengers simultaneously – and this issue proves it. Wonder Man was created by Zemo to take the Avengers down, and Zemo threatened Wonder Man with a ‘kill-switch’ if he didn’t do as he was told. So, Wonder Man played his part to perfection, as he proved stronger than all the Avengers combined.
In the end, however, Wonder Man realized that he’d rather die a hero than to continue living as a villain, and he sacrificed himself to save the very heroes he was created to destroy – though not until after he proved that he could destroy them, anyway.
4 Count Nefaria Beat the Avengers AND Hurt Their Reputation
Avengers #13 by Stan Lee and Don Heck
Unlike many other Avengers villains, Count Nefaria didn’t use sheer power to defeat the Avengers, but rather good old-fashioned trickery. After inviting the Avengers to his castle for a special gathering in their honor, Nefaria gasses the Avengers, rendering them unconscious. He then copies their likenesses and projects his new ‘fake Avengers’ to the world, making them out to be a villainous group with designs for world domination.
Not only did Count Nefaria physically take down all the Avengers at once through trickery, but he also hurt the team’s reputation on a global scale.
3 The Kallusians Trapped the Avengers After Invading Planet Earth
Avengers #14 by Stan Lee, Paul Laiken, Larry Lieber, Jack Kirby, and Don Heck
The Avengers are no strangers to dealing with alien invaders and extraterrestrial threats, but this first encounter with alien conquerors definitely took them off guard. The Kallusians were a race of aliens who built a subterranean city on Earth in secret. After the Avengers discovered a single Kallusian, they were quickly bombarded by the life forms until each one of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes succumbed to their strength, and were incapacitated and taken before their leader.
While the Avengers eventually won their freedom and made an agreement with the aliens that resulted in them leaving the planet, that doesn’t hide the fact that they were all but helpless in the face of this secret, highly advanced race, and were effectively defeated by them during their brief conflict.
2 The Commissar Took Down the Avengers as a Group AND One-v-One
Avengers #18 by Stan Lee and Don Heck
The Commissar was the living embodiment of the Red Scare, as he was a ‘super-soldier’ (actually an android) of a nameless communist country who wanted to prove his superiority over the America-based Avengers – primarily Captain America. Unfortunately for the western capitalists, the Commissar nearly succeeds in doing just that. Not only did the villain lure the Avengers into a trap that incapacitated all of them at once (which alone is a defeat in and of itself), but he also took each of them down one-on-one with the sheer superiority of his physical strength.
The Commissar was finally defeated by Scarlet Witch, who took the villain out with her chaos magic. But, that doesn’t detract from the Commissar’s victory over all the Avengers at the start of their conflict, nor the fact that he defeated nearly all of them one-on-one.
1 The Swordsman Nearly Disassembled the Avengers For Good
Avengers #19 by Stan Lee and Don Heck
Not only does Jack Duquesne aka Swordsman have a personal connection to Hawkeye (as he trained the Avenger when Clint was just a child), but he also nearly disassembled the Avengers for good during his debut. After he outsmarted Captain America by tricking him into thinking he was accepted by SHIELD to run his own elite task force under Nick Fury himself, the Swordsman lured Steve Rogers to an isolated location, where he took him off guard and nearly killed him. Plus, with Steve apparently leaving the team, the other Avengers members start making plans to do the same, which would have dissolved the Avengers before they really even proved themselves to be Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.
The Swordsman’s tactics were more about trickery and manipulation than raw strength or power, which he proved was enough to take down the Avengers, nearly permanently.
One thing to keep in mind about each and every one of these defeats is that, afterward, the Avengers came together stronger and more unified than ever to take down whichever enemy momentarily got the better of them. Not only that, but each of these defeats ultimately made them stronger heroes in the long run, which led to the legacy Marvel Comics fans are very aware of today. And it’s all thanks to these first 10 villains who defeated the Avengers in Marvel Comics.
