The X-Men have some amazing villains, but one of them has long stood above the others — Magneto. Magneto is possibly one of the most interesting villains ever. Magneto was a victim of the Nazis, put into a concentration camp with the rest of his family. He lost his entire family, and that destroyed his faith in humanity, birthing the first signs of Magneto. His friendship with Charles Xavier, and the dissolution of that friendship, as well as humans killing his daughter Anya continued that process, baptizing Magneto in fire and blood. Magneto has changed a lot over the years, going from a villain obsessed with enslaving and destroying humanity, to one who is more about saving mutants than killing humans. Magneto vacillated between hero and villain many times over the years, and this combined with his tragic backstory has made him a favorite of fans, with many of them believing that even Magneto’s worst actions are justified. There’s definitely an argument that could be made there, but it’s also ignoring some terrible actions from the mutant master of magnetism.
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Magneto is not the angel that many make him out to be. Sure, he has every reason to hate humanity, but some of his actions have been unequivocally evil. Magneto’s pragmatism and terrible past has led him down a dark road, and there are some actions of his that are impossible to write off. Magneto has done some monstrous things over the years, and these five are his worst actions.
5) His Treatment of Toad
Magneto took a page from his old friend Charles Xavier in the early days of his villainous career. Magneto gathered a team of mutants, christening them the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants (over the years, this name would be changed the Brotherhood of Mutants, but Magneto had no time for subtlety back then,) to fight for his own dream of a mutant future. Magneto’s right hand man in the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants was Toad. Magneto didn’t select Toad because of his awesome powers or because he particularly trusted Toad. No, Magneto choose Toad because he could browbeat the mutant into doing whatever he wanted. Magneto treated Toad terribly, berating him and physically abusing him. Magneto’s actions against Toad were completely evil. He used Toad’s feeling of inadequacy against him, constantly belittling Toad. Toad kept coming back for more abuse from Magneto, forming a toxic co-dependent relationship with him. Toad would even take credit for the death of Scarlet Witch, who Magneto had killed so she could create a realm of the dead for mutants during the Krakoa Era so that Magneto wouldn’t face any consequences. Magneto damaged Toad to a major extent. While this isn’t an action that killed a lot of people or did a lot of collateral damage, it shows just how truly monstrous Magneto can be.
4) The Way He Treats Quicksilver and Polaris
Magneto’s actions against Toad weren’t the only time that he showed that he was a terrible person. Magneto also recruited Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch for the Brotherhood, and also treated them horribly. He mentally abused them, and did sometimes physically abuse Quicksilver. There was even the impression that he used his beautiful daughter to trick some of the other men in the Brotherhood of staying with the team. Eventually, he found out that the two mutants were his children (which would eventually be retconned, but because it’s a stupid retcon, we’re ignoring it) and that changed his behavior. Well, his behavior towards Scarlet Witch. Magneto continued to treat Quicksilver like a piece of trash stuck to his shoe, and showed blatant favoritism towards Scarlet Witch, to the extent that it’s become a meme. Magneto would later learn that Polaris was his daughter, and he was somehow worse to her than Quicksilver. He never physically abused her — beyond the times where she fought him while he was a villain — but he always treated her as an afterthought. He faked caring about her so that he could tap into her powers while his were at their weakest, and has often told her what a failure she is as a person and superhero. Magneto’s issues as a father were a key part in the actions of Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch in House of M, which almost doomed the mutant race. Magneto’s treatment of Quicksilver and Polaris is straight-up evil.
3) Sinking a Russian Sub
Magneto endangered the entire world with his schemes, and the X-Men weren’t the only people who were trying to stop Magneto. Magneto decided to threaten the world, telling the human nations to give him all political control over planet. The governments of the world didn’t take this very lightly and the Russians decided to do something about it. They sent the nuclear sub Leningrad to attack the island that Magneto called home at the time. Of course, this was a fool’s errand, since the submarine was made of metal. Magneto easily sunk the sub, killing everyone on board to show the world that he meant business. This could have been a disastrous action. The Russians could have launched nuclear weapons against Magneto’s island in retaliation, which would have done a massive amount of damage to the planet. Also, if the Russians launched, there’s a good chance the US and their allies would have as well. Later, Magneto would pull the sub up from its watery resting place, taking its nuclear warheads and using them to hold the world hostage years later. Magneto’s nonchalance about a possible nuclear holocaust is definitely evil.
2) Magneto’s Actions During X-Men (Vol. 2) #25
Magneto was thought dead after a SHIELD satellite destroyed Asteroid M (this came when Magneto was using the Leningrad‘s nuclear weapons to hold the world hostage.) However, he ended up surviving as his Acolytes sacrificed themselves to allow him to escape. Magneto kept a low profile and eventually came into contact with Graymalkin, Cable’s secret space station (that’s right, Cable once had a secret space station; the ’90s were wild.) Magneto was able to take control of it, renaming it Avalon, and recruited an all-new team of Acolytes. Magneto began to send his Acolytes to Earth to recruit even more mutants to his mutant paradise in space. However, his reasoning for this would be revealed in X-Men (Vol. 2) #25. Magneto had decided that it was time to get serious about destroying the planet and humanity. He “raptured” the mutants that he felt were worthy, and then flew down to the planet and detonated a massive electromagnetic pulse. This pulse crippled the planet, and the X-Men decided that it was finally time to kill Magneto. They attacked Avalon, and were almost able to kill Magneto, with Wolverine getting the drop on the villain. However, Magneto remembered Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton, and tore the metal right off his skeleton. Magneto’s EMP did a ton of damage to the world. People who needed medical technology to stay alive died, planes fell out of the sky, and cars’ electrical systems broke down in the middle of traffic. Marvel never really established how many people died that day, but the lowest estimate would be somewhere in the thousands, although it was probably closer to millions. While he was definitely justified in his actions against Wolverine — Logan was trying to kill him, after all, which made that self-defense — it still shows just how brutal Magneto could be when it came right down to it.
1) Ultimate Magneto’s Actions During Ultimatum
The Magneto of the Ultimate Universe was a different animal than the one in the 616 universe. He was much more violent (he once seemingly admitted to eating human flesh in the past,) and didn’t have the nobility that marked Magneto on Earth-616. However, in this universe, Magneto treated Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch a bit better in this universe. The twins eventually left their father’s employ, and joined the Ultimates. Scarlet Witch was killed by Ultron, and Quicksilver rejoined his father, where he was seemingly mortally injured. Quicksilver survived, but Magneto’s rage at the death of Scarlet Witch broke him completely. He decided that he was going to make the entire world pay. First, he broke Xavier’s neck, killing him. Magneto then unleashed the full might of magnetic powers on the Earth. This caused a massive tidal wave to hit New York City, EMPs to devastate the electrical infrastructure of the world, and he even killed Doctor Doom, who was responsible for the death of Scarlet Witch. He then unleashed his Brotherhood on the world, and they attacked the survivors of Magneto’s previous actions. Eventually, the heroes went after him. Magneto killed Wolverine, but was defeated, and Cyclops disintegrated his head with an optic blast. This is the most evil thing that Magneto has ever done by a wide margin. Magneto devastated the entire planet, killing millions, and breaking the superhero community of the planet. His actions even led to the rise of the Maker, the evil Reed Richards of the Ultimate Universe that would play a big role in the Marvel Multiverse in the future.
What do you think Magneto’s most evil acts were? Sound off in the comments below.
