An Inhumans movie is set to occur in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In October of 2014, when Marvel Studios announced its five year plan to see out Phase 3 of the franchise, an instalment simply entitled “Inhumans” was confirmed for 2019 (it will be the final movie in the third phase).

Of course, the Inhumans have already been introduced to the franchise – as key characters in the television series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – with Phil Coulson’s team of agents inadvertently coming into conflict with a group of them who are based in a remote location known as Afterlife.

The movie, however, will introduce the big guns from the comic books – the likes of Black Bolt, Medusa, Karnak and Gorgon – and will see the race play a much bigger part in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as a whole.

But who will they be facing off against? This article will take a look at five potential villains who would be great to see in the Inhumans movie.

 

Zemu

Zemu (sometimes spelled Xemu) is hardly a well-known villain – or one that is regularly utilised in the comic books – but his history with the Inhumans is undoubtedly interesting enough to justify bringing him to the Marvel Cinematic Universe.

First appearing in 1962 and the Prime Minister of the Fifth Dimension, Zemu is classically a Fantastic Four villain, but he was introduced in the Strange Tales comics and his most prominent storyline involves the Inhumans, so he should be usable by Marvel Studios.

He crossed over into Earth’s dimension in order to attempt to take over the planet – starting with Atillan, the Inhumans’ home country.

Not only would he represent a great way for the Inhumans to introduce themselves to the movies (in defeating him they would be saving the entire Earth from a global threat), but he would also represent the first transdimensional villain – opening up all kinds of new possibilities for Marvel Cinematic Universe Phase 4.

The Unspoken

Classically, Black Bolt is the ruler of the Inhumans but, before he was on the throne, it was the powerful being known as The Unspoken who ruled them.

The Unspoken first appeared on panel as recently as 2009 in Mighty Avengers #27 – his story being that, while he ruled the Inhumans fairly and justly, he also stole the Slave Engine – their greatest weapon – and hid it for fear of it corrupting them.

This led Black Bolt – the young, would-be king – to lead a revolt against him, which resulted in him and a small group of other Inhumans overthrowing him and Black Bolt ascending to the throne.

With Black Bolt on the throne in the MCU, it would be awesome to see The Unspoken – who is the living embodiment of the process known as Terrigenesis (the process through which the Inhumans gain their powers) – taking on his own race, looking for revenge, as he is capable of spawning almost any power he wishes, would be one hell of a threat for them to face and an awesome villain to see in live action.

In the comics, he returned to Atillan looking to marry Medusa, which brought him into conflict with the Inhumans – and he has also proven to be a powerful enough threat to take on entire teams of Avengers on his own.

Maximus

Maximus – or Maximus the Mad as he is sometimes known – is the brother of the Inhuman leader Black Bolt. He has become the classic villain of the Inhumans in the comic books and it would be, as such, not at all surprising to see him as the villain in the movie.

The main thing he has going against him is that Marvel Studios have already done the “brother rivalry” thing with Thor and Loki, so they might want to step away from that kind of plot in future movies.

He was essentially jealous of his brother being on the throne and vowed to usurp him – which, again, highlights glaring similarities between his situation and that of the Asgardians.

That being said, Maximus is a great character who could be a threat on a number of levels. The power he spawned through Terrigenesis was mind-based, in the sense that he can manipulate and alter people’s minds in various ways (mind-control, mind-swapping, invoking amnesia etc), but he is also a bona fide genius, capable of inventive schemes and the creation of high-tech weaponry.

He first appeared in 1966 in Fantastic Four #47 and, in spite of the brotherly similarities to the aformentioned Thor and Loki, would indeed be a great movie antagonist.

The Kree

The Kree are, of course, already an established presence in the MCU and, just like in the comic books (in which they first appeared in Fantastic Four #65 in 1967), they are the beings responsible for the creation of the Inhumans, through their experiments on humans thousands of years in the past.

It is known in the MCU that the Kree had already decided that creating the Inhumans was a mistake and had abandoned them and, in Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., they even sent a Kree warrior called Vin-Tak to Earth to eradicate the newly created specimens (like Skye, for example), in the episode Who You Really Are.

When Vin-Tak was prevented from completing his mission by Phil Coulson’s team, he explicitly stated that the Kree Empire would return to eliminate the Inhumans if they were to find out that the experiments they had carried out were a success.

This opens the door to their return and seeing a war between two species – creators and their creations – in a movie would be pretty cool.

The Shi’ar

Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn has recently stated that fans shouldn’t expect the Shi’ar hero Gladiator to appear in the 2014 space-epic’s upcoming sequel, due to Marvel Studios not currently owning him – but that doesn’t mean he won’t appear in future movies along with the rest of his people!

As we’ve already seen with Spider-Man, rights issues can be resolved and deals can be made to bring characters over to the MCU when it’s deemed worthwhile and that could definitely be the case with the Shi’ar.

The Shi’ar (who are a huge group made up of various alien species) have been at odds with the Inhumans on a few occasions in the comic books and a movie based loosely on the War of Kings storyline would definitely be awesome. In that story, the Inhumans inadvertently destroyed a Shi’ar ship during a battle with the Skrulls (who could be replaced by the Chitauri or another species in the MCU), which triggered a war between the two factions.

The Shi’ar have a number of great characters in their ranks who it would be awesome to see in a movie – the aforementioned Gladiator, Vulcan, Deathbird and Araki, for example.

What do you think? Who should go up against the Inhumans in their 2019 movie? Have your say below.