The Marvel Cinematic Universe is filled with fantastic characters – Iron Man, Captain America, Loki, Phil Coulson, Black Widow, Star-Lord and Daredevil for example – but some aren’t so great.

In some cases, the least popular characters have been killed off – look no further than Malekith and Whiplash for examples of that – but there are some who are still lingering.

While it’s guaranteed that certain terrible characters will reappear, in some cases we’re unsure, but we just have to keep our fingers crossed that they’ve made their last MCU appearances. This article will list such characters.

Here are five Marvel Cinematic Universe characters we don’t want to see again (but probably will anyway).

Darcy Lewis

Darcy Lewis – played by Kat Dennings – has appeared in both of the Thor movies to date (Thor and Thor: The Dark World). She is the friend and science colleague of the Asgardian hero’s girlfriend Jane Foster and wherever Jane goes, Darcy tends to follow.

She has provided nothing more than comic relief over the course of her appearances to date and she’s starting to get a bit annoying – in fact she got annoying pretty quickly in her first appearance.

She hasn’t been killed off, however – in fact she helped to save the world in Thor: The Dark World – and that means she could reappear on screen.

Foster herself was notably missing from Avengers: Age of Ultron, however, and as long as Natalie Portman’s character is off screen, Dennings’ character will be too – and that can only be a good thing.

Trevor Slattery

Trevor Slattery – played undeniably well in Iron Man 3 by Ben Kingsley, despite how pointless the character ultimately turned out to be – was the bumbling, alcoholic British actor that Aldrich Killian was using as a ruse to go about his terrorist activities as the “Mandarin” undetected.

He was jailed for his part in the whole thing and was subsequently practically worshipped by the inmates of Seagate prison, prior to being broken out in the One-Shot All Hail the King by people posing as documentary makers who were actually henchmen of the real Mandarin (who was really annoyed that Slattery had used his name).

It’s by no means certain that he will reappear, but you really can’t imagine Marvel Studios leaving his situation as it was at the end of All Hail the King – we’re probably going to see the Mandarin confronting him in the future.

Iron Man 3 annoyed people due to its depiction of the Mandarin and audiences would much prefer it if the whole thing was forgotten.

Howard The Duck

Howard the Duck – voiced by Seth Green – appeared very briefly in the post-credits scene of Guardians of the Galaxy, drinking booze in the aftermath of the explosion in the Collector’s museum that was caused by the Orb Infinity Stone (having previously appeared in the background in the main body of the movie).

While he made absolutely no meaningful contribution to the plot of the movie, you have to think he’ll be appearing in some capacity again in the future – even if it’s in another cameo or a One-Shot.

The problem is, movie audiences had truly had enough of the character way back in 1986 when an awful Howard the Duck solo movie was released to an enormous critical panning.

Talking raccoons and walking trees we can handle in the MCU, anthropomorphic ducks exhibiting their own unique brand of “Quack-Fu” we really can’t.

Glenn Talbot

Glenn Talbot – played by Adrian Pasdar – is a high-ranking officer of the United States Air Force who appears in the Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. television series.

When S.H.I.E.L.D. was infiltrated by HYDRA, Talbot was one of the most tenacious military leaders when it came to attacking the organisation – seemingly doing so without discrimination, even when it came to the good men and women who were part of the organisation.

It was his inability to determine who were decent people that made him look extremely stupid and incredibly annoying. Phil Coulson and his team were clearly not HYDRA agents, but Talbot was like a dog with a bone and insisted on attempting to take them down.

Even when Coulson did good deeds for Talbot – such as handing over super-powered criminals like Carl Creel to him – it was clear that Talbot still didn’t trust him. More of the same in future episodes/seasons will only serve to irritate audiences more.

Senator Stern

Senator Stern first appeared in Iron Man 2 and has since appeared in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Played by Garry Shandling, he is a United States senator who wanted Tony Stark to hand over his Iron Man technology to the United States government, deeming it dangerous.

Really though, Stern simply had a personal gripe against Stark and that came across through his smarmy and irritating personality.

He was later revealed to be a member of HYDRA – which really didn’t surprise anyone – and, after a meeting with fellow member Agent Jasper Sitwell, he creepily discussed his sexual relationship with a 23-year-old woman before whispering “Hail HYDRA” into Sitwell’s ear.

When his role in HYDRA was revealed publicly, he was taken into custody, but he’s still very much alive and likely to appear again – and we can probably do without his lecherous and off-putting characteristics.

What do you think? Do you think it would be better if these characters disappeared? Will they actually appear again? Have your say below.