Black Panther's Villain Creates A Big Problem For Infinity War

Black Panther is breaking box office records and garnering adulation from audiences as a bonafide cultural phenomenon - thanks in no small part to Michael B. Jordan's electrifying performance as the villainous Killmonger. Suddenly, Marvel Studios has a tough act to follow. How does Avengers: Infinity War and its Big Bad, Thanos, top Black Panther and Killmonger?

It might be strange to think the biggest Marvel movie yet featuring every Avenger and Guardian of the Galaxy now has a difficult hill to climb. There is no doubt fans will turn out in droves to see Infinity War, which promises to be a massive and amazing spectacle on a scale never seen before in a superhero movie. However, Thanos is a big, purple elephant in the MCU. He remains a huge question mark.

Will Thanos be truly worthy of his status as the epic villain whom the entire MCU has built up to? What if the Mad Titan plotting to gain dominance over the universe by uniting the Infinity Gauntlet ends up being a huge letdown?

This Page: Marvel Has Fixed Their Villain Problem

Marvel Has Fixed Their Villain Problem

Villains have always been the MCU's Achilles heel, but the most recent batch of films in Phase 3 shows Marvel has finally fixed their villain problem. Killmonger is the prime example of this. Michael B. Jordan's American outcast of Wakandan descent boasts the most complex yet relatable backstory and motivations we've ever seen from an MCU baddie. Even at his most malevolent moments, the reasons why Killmonger is doing what he's doing and believes what he believes are clear (many fans even believe he's right and deserves to be king of Wakanda, at least on some level). We feel for Killmonger and find some aspects of him admirable, even as we root against him. Powered by Jordan's magnetic charisma, Killmonger is a Marvel villain for the ages.

Prior to Killmonger, the MCU has made huge strides to finally create memorable villains. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 had Peter Quill meet his father Ego. Though he came off at first like an immortal, intergalactic cad whom Peter wanted to be like, we soon learned both the universal scope of Ego's evil and the depths he sinks to in order to fulfill his goals, including giving Peter's mother terminal cancer. However, Kurt Russell portrayed Ego with a twinkle in his eye that made him memorable. Michael Keaton's Vulture in Spider-Man: Homecoming brought a working man's perspective to being a villain in the MCU: essentially, he was burned by the system and turned to evildoing to provide for his family. Vulture was a thief and a killer, but he was also a father who loved his family, though he takes an extreme position of fatherhood by threatening to kill his daughter's prom date. Still, Vulture has a code of honor and is grateful Spider-Man saved his life. He even chooses to protect Spider-Man's true identity from his criminal brethren in the end. In Thor: Ragnarok, Cate Blanchett's Hela, the Goddess of Death, was on an evil mission of conquest, but this is the result of being cast out and imprisoned by her father Odin. Blanchett has a ball being wicked and adds necessary dimensions to what would otherwise be a one-note baddie.

The common denominator here is this latest crop of MCU villains, while often CGI enhanced, are flesh-and-blood characters portrayed by fantastic actors. In each case, great care is taken to give them relatable backstories. Killmonger, especially, is a leap forward from Tom Hiddleston's Loki, the gold standard of MCU villains. It's also human nature that audiences generally relate more to seeing real humans on screen than they would a pure CGI creation. Can Thanos be the one that makes fans really feel for a CGI villain? From what little fans have been allowed to see of Thanos thus far, there is cause for concern.

Thanos Is A Step Back For The MCU

Marvel Studios scored by casting Josh Brolin to portray Thanos. Brolin is a fantastic actor of undeniable intensity. But we won't really be seeing Brolin on the screen; his performance will be motion capturing the entirely CGI Thanos and providing his chilling voice. However, no matter how good Brolin growls and moves as Thanos, a mo-capped CGI bad guy is simply not equal to seeing great actors like Michael B. Jordan, Kurt Russell, Michael Keaton, or Cate Blanchett act opposite their heroic counterparts. Fans have simply been spoiled by an embarrassment of villainous riches in the last few Marvel films.

Therefore, it's disappointing Marvel is going back to relying on CGI villains for Infinity War. Will Marvel's CGI finally be up to the task of conveying Thanos as a fully-realized character who captures the audience's imaginations and provokes their empathy? The studio's track record so far is not enviable in this regard. Despite James Spader's mo-cap and voice work, Ultron does not rank high among fans' lists of their favorite MCU villains. And even less esteem is shown to Malekith, the CGI baddie in Thor: The Dark World. The uncanny valley is already a huge challenge to overcome, but not only is Thanos a CGI creation but so are his minions, the Children of Thanos. Therefore, all of the bad guys in Infinity War will be CGI, and that doesn't sound promising.

Related: Marvel Has A Bad CGI Problem

Meanwhile, the truth is Thanos is actually one of the all-time great Marvel villains. Simply going by his characterization in what's arguably the greatest Thanos story, Jim Starlin's The Infinity Gauntlet, the Mad Titan is a power-hungry nihilist, yet he has understandable motivations and very human foibles. He assembled the infinite power of the gauntlet because he was in love with Death. He killed half of all life in the universe in a futile attempt to impress her. Thanos is evil, insane, and Machiavellian, but at the end of the tale, when his bid for godhood is ultimately foiled (and he doesn't even get the girl he wants), fans are allowed to peer into his very soul to find the truth behind the madness: Thanos fails and defeats himself because, deep down, doesn't believe himself worthy of his own desires. Thus far, Thanos has made a handful of brief appearances in the MCU but absolutely none of this depth of character has been seen or even hinted at in the films. He just comes off as an evil alien conquerer (and a horrible father) who has, so far, done very little to acquire the Infinity Stones he purportedly covets.

Marvel President Kevin Feige has promised Thanos is the main character in Infinity War. Therefore, fans hope the film delves into the Mad Titan's backstory and we get at least some measure of the comics' complex fiend represented in the film. The worst case scenario is Thanos coming off as Marvel's version of Steppenwolf. DC fans are still smarting over being burned by Justice League's cartoony Big Bad. Despite being voiced by CiarÃ¡n Hinds, the ax-swinging general from Apokolips was nothing more than a one-note CGI alien warlord who wanted to collect a power source to conquer the Earth while spouting generic villain-speak.

It's easy to fear Thanos might end up as one-dimensional because thus far, it looks like he's the exact same thing as Steppenwolf: an alien warlord come to Earth to collect a power source and fight its superheroes. There's so much depth to Thanos as a character, but will Infinity War have adequate time to explore him and his motivations while he and his followers are squaring off with the Avengers? After all, fans clamoring to see the Avengers reunited after the schism of the Civil War also hope there's sufficient time in Infinity War for the all of the interactions we hope to see. If Thanos is an eyesore or just a generic bad guy for the heroes to punch, it could potentially ruin Infinity War.

Few things would be a better triumph for Marvel than having Thanos be the first truly successful CGI mo-cap villain in the MCU, with fans holding him with the reverence they show Loki or Killmonger. Hopefully Infinity War delivers mightily on all accounts - especially in regards to its Big Bad - so Marvel continues to top itself and delivers on its promise as the greatest superhero epic of all-time. However, in the 6 years of building to Thanos as the biggest and baddest threat to the MCU, Marvel Studios has now altered their own landscape and heightened their own expectations, especially in the wake of Black Panther. Killmonger's swagger is an incredibly tough act to follow. Hopefully, Thanos and Avengers: Infinity War are up to the challenge.

Next: Marvel's Phase 3 Timeline Is Completely Out of Order