50 Greatest Super Villains In Comic Book History

17. Apocalypse

(Write-up by Christina Roberts, Bam Smack Pow Staff Writer)

As the after-credits scene rolled on X-Men: Days of Future Past, I felt a chill run down my spine, and my eyes welled up with tears of disbelief as I saw familiar grey skin and blue lips.

Of course, I knew X-Men: Apocalypse will be the follow-up to DOFP, but to actually see the character somehow portrayed in a non-cartoon, non-comic form, even for a hot second filled me with such intense happiness that I wondered if it was actually happening or if it was a mere hallucination. Apocalypse has been my favorite villain since I was five years old. Why?

In the X-Men universe, Apocalypse never ceases to mess everything up. By everything, I mean everything. He screws up the past, which screws up the present, which screws up the future. He screws up the future, which makes people from the future screw up the past to screw up the future, but properly this time.

His powers cover the spectrum of mutantkind. You name it, he probably has it: telekinesis, telepathy, super healing, projecting and absorbing energy, and molecular control over his body, just to keep it brief. His blood heals mutants but kills humans. He merges himself with Celestial technology to basically make himself immortal — and he’s been around since Egyptian times, some 5000 years ago. These powers all come out stronger than ever when he’s angry, and he rebrands as Apocalypse.

What makes him the most intimidating is that he’s neither pro-mutant nor pro-human, but pro-survival of the fittest. If it benefits him, great; if not, destroy it/make it better/make it obsolete, and move on.

Apocalypse has his own agenda. He doesn’t care if Magneto is off building Asteroid M, or if Cable is making a fruitless attempt to kill him for the nth time. With his Four Horsemen to do his dirty work, Apocalypse rules the space-time continuum, the Axis of Time, providing anything he needs in order to create a beautiful world run on that survival of the fittest he learned from the Sandstormers. Portraying him in a movie is going to be a heck of a challenge.

He wasn’t named En Sabah Nur for nothing — he is “The First One,” the original mutant.

Next: No. 16: Not to be underestimated