Generally, when we hear the word role model, the first thing that comes to mind is the image of a superhero. While growing up, everyone has that one superhero they look up to more than anyone else.
What better role model to look up to than a superhero. Especially when that superhero also happens to be one, or both, of your parents. For the most part, this sounds like an ideal scenario that fulfills every kids fantasy.
Unfortunately, having a superhero for a parent is not as fun as it sounds. The truth of the matter is that superhero parents do not always have the best track record when it comes to raising their kids or grooming them to join the family business. In fact, the actions committed by some superhero parents are so shady that it makes their villains pale in comparison.
In the following list, we look at some of the worst actions undergone by superhero parents. These actions include moments when superhero parents committed terrible atrocities towards their peers, their families, as well as acts they committed for the sake of saving people.
Now without further ado, here is a list of some of The Shadiest Things That Superhero Parents Have Done To
Their Kids!
15. Professor X Had An Affair And Neglected His Son
Whenever he is not sending teenagers to fight for the sake of the world, Professor X is a pretty decent guy. However, for someone with so much wisdom, he's made some big mistakes in the past.
One of his biggest errors in judgment was sleeping with his former patient, Gabrielle Heller.
This decision would later come back to haunt him in the form of his son David Heller, aka Legion. As one of the most powerful mutants in existence, Legion possesses several powers including telepathy, telekinesis and reality warping. What’s worse is that Legion’s powers are highly unstable due to his multiple personalities.
This combination of neglect and instability leads Legion down a path of destruction resulting in many casualties. Even though Professor X was not aware of who Legion was until after the events happened, he still bears responsibility for his son’s actions.
14. Lobo Wiped Out His Children
As an anti-hero, Lobo frequently engages in acts of violence. Arguably, he has done some good things, such as fight against Atrocitus and Darkseid, and is even friends with the Green Lantern, Guy Gardner.
Unfortunately, the overwhelming number of his misdeeds cancels out his good ones. His transgressions include eliminating his species, as well as killing his fourth-grade teacher and Santa Claus.
In terms of shadiness, one of the worst things he probably ever did was take out his own offspring.
In the mini-series, Lobo: Infanticide, scores of Lobo’s illegitimate children form their own army to try and eliminate him. By the end of the mini-series, Lobo ends up defeating and wiping out the last of his children. He may be a dedicated bounty hunter, but a father he is most certainly not.
13. Reed Richards Put His Son In A Coma
While he may excel in the field of science, Reed Richards doesn’t exactly have the best track record as a husband and father.
In Fantastic Four #141, Reed discovered that his son Franklin was developing superpowers. As Franklin's powers grew, Reed realizes that his son's abilities could make him one of the strongest beings on the planet. Unfortunately, due to his young age, Franklin's body was ill-equipped to handle the strain of his powers.
When it became clear that Franklin was a threat to not only himself, but to everyone around him, Reed uses a ray to put him in a coma.
While his actions may have saved his son and a lot of people, it was still a pretty terrible thing for him to do to his son. Shortly after this incident, Susan Storm temporarily left the Fantastic Four to get away from Reed.
12. Deadpool Used His Daughter As Bait
One of the most dangerous things about Deadpool is his insanity and unpredictability. One minute he is your ally, and then the next, he’s trying to blow your brains out.
Thus, it comes as no surprise that Deadpool would extend this same courtesy to members of his own family. In Deadpool #19, Deadpool learns that he has a daughter and goes to great lengths to save her from ULTIMATUM agents. Sadly, Deadpool’s over protectiveness does not last for very long.
Later, Deadpool uses his daughter as bait to lure out Mad Cap, who was framing Deadpool for hurting innocent people.
So much for being the type of dad who keeps his kid out of harms way. Then again what else would you expect from a guy as crazy as the Merc with a Mouth.
11. Scarlet Witch Loses It After Losing Her Children
Following Wanda Maximoff’s marriage with Vision, she uses her reality warping powers to create twin children for them to raise. While a little unusual, things go quite smoothly for Wanda and Vision. Sadly, her happy life soon comes to a tragic end. It turns out that her twins were fragments of the demon Mephisto, who later reabsorbs them back into himself.
Devastated, Wanda’s teacher Agatha Harkness chose to remove Wanda’s memories of her children. This later proves to be a terrible decision on her part.
When Wanda’s memories of losing her children return, she goes into a highly unstable state of mind.
While in this state, Wanda takes her frustration out on the Avengers, and eliminates some of their members, including Vision. After enduring so much trauma, it’s no surprise that she erased the powers of 90% of the world’s mutant population.
10. Wolverine Takes Out His Own Children
After being sent to Hell by the group known as The Red Right Hand, Wolverine seeks them out to get his revenge. Once he finds them, he is confronted by their mutant bodyguards and fights them until he is the only one left alive. After finding a recording left by the Red Right Hand’s leader, he learns that the bodyguards were in fact his illegitimate children. This drives Wolverine into a state of depression, especially after learning that the group took themselves out, making it impossible for him to get his revenge.
In the Uncanny X-Force series, Wolverine encounters yet another one of his children, Daken, who’s a member of the Evil Brotherhood of Mutants.
After Daken threatens his students, Wolverine is left with no other choice and is forced to eliminate his son.
In moments like these, nothing is more heartbreaking than seeing Wolverine carry such a heavy burden.
9. Superman Takes Out His Wife And Child
If you are familiar with Injustice: Gods Among Us, then you probably knew this was coming.
In this series, Superman is deceived by The Joker into taking out his wife and unborn child.
Even though he did not intentionally kill them, the incident still traumatized him to the point where he eliminates The Joker and later establishes his brutal regime.
However, this was not the only moment where Superman’s been forced to hurt his own family by The Joker. In Dark Nights: Metal, after Batman becomes The Batman Who Laughs, he takes out the entire Justice League, leaving Superman alive long enough to bring in Lois and their son Johnathan.
In one last act of cruelty, he uses Black Kryptonite to force Superman and his son to eliminate Lois before killing each other.
8. Batman And Talia Endangered Their Son
Ever since Talia revealed to Batman the existence of their son Damian, their relationship has become heavily strained. On the one hand, Batman wants to train Damian in his ways, but exposes him to dangerous threats and psychopathic killers. However, Talia wants to train Damian and groom him into a warrior and assassin worthy of inheriting her father’s legacy.
This dysfunctional relationship has not only endangered Damian, but has also put some strain on his relationship with his parents.
In the end, Batman and Talia’s relationship reaches its limit once Damian is taken out by the Heretic, a clone of Damian created by Talia. This coming shortly after she disowns him for choosing his father’s way over hers.
It is safe to say that between the two of them, Batman was the lesser of two evils.
7. Silk Spectre’s Father Wasn't Great
The Watchmen series does not hold back when it comes to showing the darker side of the superhero lifestyle. No one demonstrates this better than The Comedian.
One of his most brutal moments was when he attempted to force himself onto his teammate Sally Jupiter, the original Silk Spectre. Fortunately, fellow Minutemen Hooded Justice intervened before things could escalate. A few years after this incident, they had a brief affair leading to the conception of his daughter Laurie, the next Silk Spectre.
Sadly, this did little to deter The Comedian from performing other immoral actions, such as flirting with his daughter.
Though The Comedian did try to make some effort to reconcile with his daughter in his final moments, it does little to rectify his past mistakes.
6. Hank Pym Goes Too Far
Before he became Yellowjacket, Hank Pym was a well liked and popular hero as Ant-Man.
Unfortunately, this all came to an end in that one moment that forever tarnished his reputation as a hero.
In Avengers #213, Hank Pym faces expulsion from the Avengers for shooting an unarmed adversary. To prevent this, he comes up with a plan to build a robot to attack the Avengers and himself. Then when all would seem lost he would swoop in to save the day, by destroying the robot’s weak point that only he knows about. When his wife Janet attempts to talk him out of his plan, he retaliates by hitting her,and telling her to “shut up”.
Despite insistence from former editor and Avengers writer Jim Shooter that this scene was exaggerated, it does little to change its impact.
5. Omni-Man Betrays The Earth And Beats His Son
Created by Robert Kirkman, the Invincible comic series focuses on Invincible, aka Mark Grayson, a young superhero and the son of Omni-Man, Earth’s most powerful hero. As a child, his father reveals that he is a member of a peaceful alien race known as the Viltrumites.
Unfortunately, this story turns out to be false. He eventually reveals the truth that Viltrumites are a race of conquerors who enslave and destroy worlds. When his son refuses to join him in his mission, Omni-Man nearly takes his son out. Fortunately, he holds off from delivering the killing blow, and fly’s away in shame for his actions.
In the end, he rectifies his past mistakes and attempts to make things right. Unfortunately, it may be impossible for him to fully repair the bonds of trust he destroyed, especially with is son.
4. Cyclops Walked Out On His Wife And Son
When Cyclops married Madelyne Pryor, he only did so because of her similarity to his old flame, Jean Grey. This created a toxic relationship between him and Madelyne.
Their marriage eventually ends when he leaves her and their son Nathan to go back to Jean Grey.
From then on Nathan faced an extremely troubled and traumatic childhood. This includes his kidnapping by Mr. Sinister and facing harm from his own mother who tried sacrificing him to demons. After this incident with his mom, Scott takes custody of Nathan. After being infected with Apocalypses techno-organic virus, Scott sends him to the future in the hopes that his son would find a cure.
Eventually he returns to the present as Cable, having found a way to use his powers to keep the virus in check. Sadly, this did little to help improve his and Cyclops relationship.
3. Highfather Gave His Son To Darkseid
The New Gods are divided into two factions featuring the New Gods of New Genesis on one side, and the New Gods of Apokolips on the other.
For generations the planet’s leaders and their respective peoples have been locked in a never-ending war. To end this conflict, Highfather, the leader of New Genesis struck a deal with Darkseid, the leader of Apokolips.
Both agreed to a truce, with one of the conditions being that both rulers would trade their sons to one another.
This proved beneficial to Highfather as he took in Darkseid’s son who would eventually become the hero Orion. However, it is important to remember that Highfather also gave his son, Scott Free, to Darkseid. As a result, Scott, who would become Mr. Miracle, spent a terrible childhood under the abusive tutelage of Granny Goodness.
2. Richard Impossible Did Some Pretty Messed Up Stuff
A parody of Reed Richards, Professor Impossible is a super scientist/superhero from the show The Venture Bros. Despite his esteemed reputation, he tends to make some morally questionable choices.
He claims to not be an evil person, but his actions tell a different story.
Early in the series, he neglects both his wife Sally and their son, Rocket. He is also super jealous and made plans to kill Rusty Venture and his brother, after Sally became infatuated with them. Shortly after Sally leaves him for Jonas Venture Jr., he joins forces with some villains to form the Revenge Society.
He even used his brother in-law Cody, a parody of the Human Torch, to power his Impossible industries HQ, despite knowing that Cody’s powers literally burn him alive. Under these circumstances, it is safe to say that Professor Impossible is pretty damn shady.
1. Reed Richards Transforms His Team Into Zombies
If you thought Reed putting his son in a coma was bad, this next entry literally makes him a monster. In the Marvel Zombies series, Reed researches a deadly zombie virus following the passing of his children by a zombified She-Hulk. The rest of the Fantastic Four soon learn that Reed is not bothered by the deaths of his children and believes that the virus is the next step in mankind’s evolution.
He then proceeds to transform his team, and then himself, into zombies. As a zombie, Reed is far worse than he ever was as a human. Retaining his intelligence, Zombie Reed was able to contact his Ultimate counterpart, and infiltrate his universe. Thankfully, the Ultimate versions of Ben, Sue and Johnny were able to stop his plans.
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Which of these surprised you most? Let us know in the comments!