Top 10 Most Violent Marvel Superheroes

#10: Ghost Rider

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Being the Spirit of Vengeance, this fiery hero doesn’t pull his punches in the slightest. Though the mantle has been held by various characters, they all have the power to channel the fires of hell itself, imbuing objects like chains with red-hot fury. So it’s a safe bet that the demons, criminals and other nasty customers he deals with won’t be getting much in the way of due process. But even more terrifying is the Penance Stare, a power held by the various Riders that causes evildoers to feel all of the pain they inflicted upon others, often leaving them catatonic from the massive physical and psychic trauma.

You’d think that spending all your time underwater would be pretty relaxing, but Marvel’s ruler of Atlantis probably never relaxed a day in his life. One of the oldest characters still appearing in Marvel Comics, the Submariner is known far and wide for his violent temperament and tendency to fly off the handle. It’s gotten so bad that he’s been considered a villain as much as a hero. He’s frequently traded blows with other Marvel heroes, be it over mankind’s abuse of the world’s oceans or his serious interest in Sue Storm of the Fantastic Four. But let’s just say he’s the kind of guy who always finds something to be mad about.

Killing vampires can often be dirty work, and nobody knows that better than this seasoned vampire hunter. A half vampire himself, he has all the powers of his bloodsucking prey, but none of their weaknesses. This makes him especially well-equipped to battle the creatures of the night, and his arsenal of vampire-killing guns, sword and tricked out motorbike don’t hurt either. It’s no wonder that he was the star of some of the earliest R-rated superhero movies, which took full advantage of the character’s tendency to coat virtually every surface he gets near with a layer or two of blood like the world’s most morbid interior decorator.

#7: Daredevil

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Hell’s Kitchen didn’t get its name for being an especially happy and welcoming place, so the superhero dedicated to keeping it safe isn’t one to play nice. Blinded by toxic chemicals but also granted enhanced senses, the future guardian of Hell’s Kitchen was also trained by a blind ninja master into a brutally efficient hand to hand fighter. Throw in a pair of billy clubs and a powerful right hook inherited from his prizefighting father and you’ve got a hero who usually leaves the criminals he encounters with more than just bruises. Of course, he’s also been on the receiving end of a few bad hits himself.

#6: Moon Knight

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This soldier of fortune turned crimefighter is often derided as Marvel’s Batman knockoff, but most criminals would probably rather face the Caped Crusader if they had a choice. After being left for dead and later resurrected by the Egyptian god Khonshu, he began a one-man war on crime that became more and more brutal as his grip on reality began to slip. He even eventually carved off the face of his arch-nemesis, the mercenary Raoul Bushman. While his all-white uniform isn’t entirely practical for crime fighting, his arsenal of crescent-themed weaponry and considerable fighting skills make him a dangerous opponent for any criminal unlucky enough to run into him.

#5: Venom

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Did you expect the alien goop monster to be friendly? The jet-black symbiote has had a number of hosts over the years, and they’ve had varying levels of success at reigning in the creature’s homicidal tendencies and steering it toward the path of good. Even its most iconic wearer, Eddie Brock, has had a hard time keeping his alien partner from chowing down on the occasional human. Other bearers of the Symbiote like the Scorpion fully indulged it, giving in to and even encouraging the entity’s darker urges. Even with hosts like Flash Thompson, who arguably had the most heroic tour of duty as Venom, the symbiote’s desire for violent bloodshed is always lurking under the surface.

#4: The Hulk

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If any comic book hero in Marvel embodies mindless rage and violence, it’s this one. Normally a mild-mannered scientist, any emotional outburst will cause the otherwise unassuming Bruce Banner to transform into a nearly unstoppable force of destruction that only gets bigger and stronger the angrier he gets. While his incredible strength has often been used for good, his rampages once got so out of hand that a secret cabal of heroes launched him into space, exiling the Jade Giant from Earth. Given the number of incredibly powerful beings wandering around the planet, the fact that poor Bruce got shown the door should tell you a lot.

#3: Deadpool

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The only thing that the Merc with a Mouth is better at than taking punishment is dealing it out. Seemingly Marvel’s answer to Bugs Bunny, this gun for hire has a healing factor that lets him regenerate from any injury and a mind so cracked that it’s almost impossible to predict his next move. With a seemingly bottomless bag of tricks up his sleeve, he’s a master at finding new and inventive ways to brutally dispatch his fellow man, even when it comes to fellow superheroes and villains. In one alternate universe, even he even killed the entire Marvel Universe before moving on to murdering classic works of literature.

#2: Wolverine

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You’d be hard-pressed to sum up this classic character better than with the classic catchphrase “I’m the best there is at what I do, and what I do isn’t very nice.” A veteran of numerous wars and one of the most feared individuals in the Marvel Universe, very few characters can claim a scarier rep than this one. Thanks to his unbreakable skeleton and razor sharp claws, this longtime X-Men is almost unstoppable once he gets going, and his berserker rages have left a nearly uncountable number of people deader than disco. He’s had to endure several lifetimes trying to control his violent instincts and still struggles to contain that side of himself.

#1: The Punisher

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There are Marvel heroes bigger, stronger and physically deadlier, but none of them will get a criminal running for the hills faster than Frank Castle. After his wife and children were killed in the crossfire of a mob shootout, something inside this former US Marine snapped, transforming him into a dyed-in-the-wool vigilante who’s been cutting a swath of carnage through the underworld ever since. Armed with a seemingly endless array of weapons and a much more cunning strategic mind than you might think, he’s every criminal’s worst nightmare: a man with nothing to lose and absolutely no reason to hold back when it comes to punishing the guilty.