Marvel Comics characters like the Hulk or the mutants of the X-Men can’t always rely on their superpowers due to their fluctuating, dangerous natures.
Marvel has introduced readers to many powerful characters over the years. While the publisher’s heroes aren’t as well-known for being powerhouses, the Marvel Universe is full of people with amazing abilities. Many of them have mastered their powers, honing them to perfection. However, often times many of their powers aren’t the gift they seem to be.
Over the years, readers have been introduced to characters with powers that aren’t always the most reliable. Some characters have wild abilities. Others have powers that are so great they’ve caused them to fall to some dark places. Their powers can’t always be depended on.
10Echo
The X-Men and the Phoenix Force have a long history, but recent years have seen the Avengers have to deal with the Phoenix. Echo, a street-level vigilante who has a history with the team, became the newest Phoenix host. This was a huge power upgrade for her, but it’s also an upgrade that she definitely cannot depend on.
Echo may not have had any problems yet, but that doesn’t mean she’s in the clear. The Phoenix Force is a mercurial aspect of nature. It’s the embodiment of death and rebirth, and gives its bearer godlike power. If Echo depends on it too much, the chance that it will burn her increases.
9Bishop
Bishop came from one of many dystopian X-Men futures, traveling back in time to hunt down a criminal. He joined the mutant team, and has shown just how potent he can be as a fighter. His mutant powers are quite interesting, as well. Bishop absorbs energy attacks, giving him fuel for his own energy powers, as well as using it to enhance his strength.
However, there’s a reason that Bishop also always carries a gun with him. Bishop’s fuel tank can run out if he uses too much of his energy reserves, which means unless he’s fighting someone with energy powers, he has to take it easy. He can easily run his energy dry if he’s not very careful.
8Kang The Conqueror
Kang the Conqueror doesn’t have any powers of his own, but his technology gives him the greatest weapon of them all. Kang is a time traveler, having originated in the far future and coming back to the present, in order to prove his worth by going after the greatest heroes ever – the heroes of the Age of Marvels. However, time travel is definitely something he can’t rely on.
While Kang doesn’t go back in time and kill his foes – that would be dishonorable – he has used his time travel tech to lay the framework for his plans. This has never worked, whether the plans have fallen apart because of the heroes’ actions or because they went back in time themselves and undone them. Kang would be much better served just attacking head on with weapons from the future.
7The Sentry
Some Marvel heroes are rather disappointing, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t potent. The Sentry was perhaps the most powerful superhero on Earth, harnessing the powers of a million exploding suns. His powers included amazing strength, invulnerability, energy powers, reality altering powers, and mental abilities. However, that power was the huge problem.
The Sentry had a dark side, one that came to life because of his great power: the Void. The Void was a danger to the entire Earth and the more power the Sentry used, the more chance there was the Void would take over. It made him going into battle against the most powerful threats very dangerous, because he could become a monster if his used his powers too much.
6Scarlet Witch
Among the Avengers’ most controversial members, Scarlet Witch is the top of the heap. A big reason for this is her powers. Scarlet Witch is basically a god given flesh. Her reality altering powers have allowed her to change the very world itself, and are proof against the power of the Phoenix Force itself.
However, she’s also only human. She’s been traumatized by the events of her life and the great power she wields has only intensified her issues. Scarlet Witch cutting loose with her powers isn’t good for her, and it hasn’t been good for the world, either.
5Cable
Cable has a long history with the X-Men. In fact, Nathan Dayspring Askani’Son Summers is the first child born to a member of the team, and also one destined to be superlatively powerful. Mister Sinister created his mother Madelyne Pryor from the DNA of Jean Grey, and put her into Cyclops’s life so he could get his hands on a child with amazing power.
However, he was given a techno-organic virus by Apocalypse as a child and was sent to the future to deal with it. He learned to use his telepathic and telekinetic powers to hold the virus back there, from his half sister from an alternate future Rachel Summers. However, the problem is if he uses his powers too much, the virus can talk over his entire body. He’s always heavily armed so he doesn’t have to use his powers very much.
4Rogue
Some Marvel superpowers aren’t worth the hassle, something which described Rogue’s powers for a very long time. For years, Rogue couldn’t touch anyone without hurting them. For humans without powers, she drained their life force. For people with powers, she drained their powers and could completely take them away if she touched them for too long.
She’s finally gained control of her abilities, but this doesn’t mean she should use them very much. To begin with, taking someone else’s powers means having to be able to use them well. Rogue doesn’t know how to control the powers of everyone just because she can drain their powers, just her own. For this reason, she’s best to use her super strength and flight in battle.
3The Hulk
The Hulk is the strongest one there is. His gamma irradiated powers give him the potential for infinite strength, he is basically invulnerable to nearly all harm, and for anything that can hurt him, there’s his healing factor. The key to the Hulk’s power is rage. The angrier he gets, the stronger he gets, but that’s not always a good thing.
The Hulk can easily lose control at the higher levels of his strength, which makes his powers extremely dangerous. It’s one of the reasons putting Hulk on a team is a recipe for disaster. His powers basically make him lose control, and a more powerful rage-fueled Hulk is deadly.
2Wolverine
Not every Marvel hero reaches their full potential. This happens for a variety of reasons, but sometimes it’s for the best. Wolverine is an example of this. Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton is his most iconic feature, combining with his healing factor to make him nearly invincible. However, it also held back the true extent of his mutation.
Wolverine’s mutation was meant to transform him into a feral killing machine, one that was barely human. When the metal was removed, Wolverine had to work doubly hard to keep control of himself. His berserker rages were scary before, but without the adamantium, he could snap completely and become an animalistic killing machine.
1Cyclops
Cyclops has mastered the use of his powers, but that doesn’t mean that he can completely depend on them. Cyclops’s powers are uncontrollable, due to a head injury he got escaping his parents’ plane when it was attacked by aliens when he was a child. Thanks to his ruby quartz visor, he’s not constantly destroying everything he looks at.
However, take that away, and he’s basically death on two legs. At full power, Cyclops can destroy mountains. All it takes is someone taking away his visor, and he’s a danger to his friends. He’s a great combatant, but his powers are often just as much a weakness as a benefit.
