While Ultron is one of the most iconic Avengers villains in the history of the Marvel Universe, he wasn’t the first murderous android who existed in an army of bodies simultaneously, as that honor goes to another villain who was way more terrifying. However, the villain in question does share a connection with Ultron that fans may not expect.

Ultron made his Marvel Comics debut in Avengers #54 by Roy Thomas and John Buscema. Upon his introduction, Ultron was simply an unnamed android seemingly being used by the Masters of Evil to take down the Avengers. However, as readers would soon learn, Ultron wasn’t a robot being controlled by the Masters of Evil but was actually the real puppet master behind the evil organization’s assault. In fact, before Ultron made his first appearance, he was actually created by Hank Pym himself. Upon Ultron’s birth, the sinister android hypnotized Pym into forgetting that he ever created Ultron which gave the villain the element of surprise he needed to launch a strike against his creator and the entire Avengers team. Since then, Ultron has remained an enemy of the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes and has only grown in strength since his Avengers debut.

Related: Avengers’ Ultimate Enemy Merged Ultron with the Skrulls

In Avengers #42 by Roy Thomas and John Buscema, Hank Pym aka Goliath has been kidnaped by the villainous Diablo and the Avengers alongside The Fantastic Four are scrambling to get him back. Diablo is a villain who originated in The Fantastic Four comics, and his claim to fame is that he gave life to an incredibly deadly android known as Dragon Man. In capturing Pym and exploiting his scientific genius, Diablo hopes to give life to an army of Dragon Men who are all as equally strong as the original. Since Diablo also kidnaped Pym’s wife, Janet van Dyne aka the Wasp, Pym did as he was told and assisted in the creation of Diablo’s Dragon Men army.

Dragon-Man-Better-than-Ultron-comic

While the name sounds a bit goofy, Dragon Man is certainly no joke. Dragon Man aka Draconus is an android that resembles a humanoid dragon and possesses frighteningly powerful abilities including super strength, speed, durability, flight, and fire-breath. While that might seem a bit run-of-the-mill as far as super-villains go, Dragon Man’s powers far exceed most other villains in the Marvel Universe at that time–especially his fire-breath. When Dragon Man faced off against the Human Torch (aka Johnny Storm) in an earlier Fantastic Four comic, he was able to overheat Johnny, a hero whose body is engulfed in cosmic flames that can reach temperatures akin to that of an exploding star. Now, in this issue of the Avengers, Dragon Man is back and his original life-giver, Diablo, is forcing Hank Pym to give life to a multitude of Dragon Men just as Pym would later do for Ultron. Ultron is an immensely powerful villain who was responsible for a Terminator-style apocalypse in a later Marvel Comics storyline, but blow-for-blow, Dragon Man is way more terrifying. Not only can Dragon Man essentially melt anything on the planet given the fact that he was able to overheat the Human Torch, but the sight of a superfast, super strong, demonic-looking robotic monster flying around New York literally melting buildings with his fire-breath is something that even the Avengers-killing power of Ultron would never really be able t compete with.

While Hank Pym wasn’t directly responsible for the original creation of Dragon Man, his reluctant collaboration with Diablo would have only amplified the god-tier power set and horrifying aesthetic of the android by turning the singular creature into an army of unstoppable villains who could have decimated the world in ways Ultron could only dream of—making the Avengers original ‘Ultron’ way more terrifying than the original.