Baron Strucker

Baron Wolfgang von Strucker is a classic villain of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Avengers in the comic books, so when the brilliant Thomas Kretschmann was cast as the character in 2015’s Avengers: Age of Ultron, it was very exciting. Unfortunately, there was nothing to get excited about, so that excitement was extremely unfounded.

Everyone knew Ultron was the main villain in the movie (hence its title), but they at least expected Strucker’s role to form the foundation of a more prominent future appearance – but the titular robot killed him off at the start of the movie.

It was a complete waste of both a brilliant actor and a classic character, and you have to wonder what Marvel Studios was thinking. It would have been great to see Strucker in more movies in the future.

We’ll now move on to the first (and only) entry on this list that isn’t an individual.

The Chitauri

In 2012’s The Avengers, Loki was the main villain – of that there is no doubt – but he wasn’t alone. He came to Earth equipped with an army – the Chitauri – to unleash on the planet and we, as an audience, were expected to see them as a plausible threat to the Avengers themselves.

It was, therefore, pretty disappointing when Black Widow and Hawkeye were able to take them out in hand-to-hand combat. How on Earth were we mean to believe they could possibly harm the likes of Hulk, Thor and Iron Man when they were losing out to ordinary humans?

The hilariously convenient way in which they were defeated – and every single one of them accounted for – was ridiculous too. Destroying their mothership made them all fall to the ground dead…okay…

From an army of space aliens, we now move onto their commander.