Falcon & The Winter Soldier: Captain America’s 15 Most Powerful Villains, Ranked

The superhero Captain America is one of the strongest in Marvel Comics, but he’s gone up against some major supervillain powerhouses in his day. Both on his own and with the Avengers, he has faced off against some of the best villains in all of comics. Though he generally wins in the end, it hasn’t always been pretty.

And Captain America bad guys aren’t always obviously the most powerful villains. Over the years, he has faced off against former friends and in one of the most controversial Marvel Comics of recent years, Secret Empire, Steve Rogers fought a terrifyingly evil version of himself. With The Falcon & The Winter Soldier now on Disney+, it’s a great time to revisit some of the Star-Spangled Man’s greatest foes with this Captain America villains list.

Updated on April 30th, 2021 by Darby Harn: The Falcon And The Winter Soldier ended its first season with the promise of more adventures for Sam Wilson as Captain America and Bucky Barnes as The Winter Soldier. It also promised some potential conflicts with interesting villains like The Power Broker, revealed to be former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Sharon Carter. With that in mind, it’s a great time to revisit Captain America’s most powerful villains from the comic books. Not all of them are the strongest enemies, but all of them represent a challenging threat to Captain America and everything he fights for. We’ve updated the top 10 Captain America villains to the top 15.

15 The Power Broker

The Power Broker is revealed to be a major player in the post-Blip world of FATWS. Curtiss Jackson originally had no superpowers, relying on his intellect and severe lack of ethics to run The Corporation, an international business with a hand in a variety of illegal activities.

One of them was the illicit creation of superhumans. Among them was John Walker, who initially only sought to join the superhuman only Unlimited Class Wrestling Federation. Jackson later gained powers through more experiments, but then died and was replaced by the mysterious Power Broker II.

14 The Flag-Smasher

Karli Morgenthau is the head of the Flag-Smashers in FATWS, but the original character in the comics is somewhat different. Karl Morgenthau is the costumed villain known as the Flag-Smasher. Though his politics are similar to hers, he is much more of an obvious villain, with his violent actions in direct odds with his stated philosophy of world unity.

Karl Morgenthau had no superpowers but was a powerful and cunning villain who had no compunction about hurting innocent people. He was the head of the international terrorist group ULTIMATUM, which was behind many major attacks, including hijacking airplanes.

13 Batroc The Leaper

One of Captain America’s most prominent villains in the comics is Batroc The Leaper. Georges Batroc has no superpowers of his own, ranking him low in the power index, but he’s a supremely skilled martial artist.

He’s an expert in the French form of fighting known as savate, which emphasizes kicking and acrobatics, hence his primary method of attack. Batroc has traditionally been a foil in the MCU as well, first in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and most recently in The Falcon And The Winter Soldier.

12 Crossbones

Crossbones is another non-powered Captain America villain who nonetheless is very dangerous. Brock Rumlow is a mercenary affiliated with the Red Skull and Arnim Zola in his earliest adventures, which date back to his comics debut in 1989.

He’s one of the cruelest and most effective Captain America villains, highly trained in a variety of martial arts, marksmanship, and military tactics. He’s played a role in several MCU movies, though he appeared to have died at the beginning of Captain America: Civil War.

11 U.S. Agent

John Walker is a complicated figure in FATWS and he is in the comic books as well. He has been a powerful villain of both Steve Rogers and Sam Wilson in their time as Captain America. He originally appeared as the supervillain The Super-Patriot, but that was part of a complicated ploy aimed at degrading Steve Rogers publicly.

Walker then was assigned to be Captain America when Rogers stepped down. His volatile nature led to his undoing and a major clash between Rogers and Walker. Rogers defeated him and retook the mantle. Walker would then continue as a hero, mostly, in the identity of the U.S. Agent.

10 Baron Zemo

Baron Zemo is one of the most notorious Captain America villains in the comics, and one of the most accomplished. He has been the leader of the Masters of Evil, who destroyed the original Avengers mansion in a daring assault in the Avengers: Under Siege storyline from the late 80s.

Along with the Masters Of Evil, he posed as the superhero group Thunderbolts when Captain America and The Avengers had been exiled to another dimension. He originally had no powers but did obtain them later from the Moonstones, giving him superhuman strength and durability. He appears in the MCU’s Civil War and The Falcon & The Winter Soldier.

9 Taskmaster

The Taskmaster is going to be the villain in the upcoming Black Widow MCU movie, but he’s primarily associated with Captain America in the comics. The Taskmaster is incredibly dangerous thanks to his ability to mimic the abilities of virtually any hero he encounters.

Taskmaster also makes and uses weapons associated with the Avengers, like Captain America’s shield, Hawkeye’s bow, and more. He first appeared in Avengers #195 in May 1980 in a brief cameo at the end of the issue, before going on to become a major challenge for the team.

8 The Winter Soldier

One of Captain America’s greatest villains is his greatest friend. Bucky Barnes was revealed to the Winter Soldier, a deadly Russian supersoldier, years after Cap thought Bucky had died in World War 2. Bucky actually survived the war, but was brainwashed and experimented on by Soviet forces.

With the aid of a supersoldier serum and a new bionic arm, he became an extremely strong and skilled soldier. With Captain America’s help, he would rediscover his identity as Bucky and become a hero again.

7 Iron Man

Iron Man is one of Captain America’s greatest friends and allies in the Marvel Universe. But in the epic Civil War event in the comics from the early 2000s, the two came to blows. Their rift opened when Iron Man supported the Superhero Registration Act, which compelled all superheroes to publically unmask and become agents of the government.

Steve Rogers resisted the idea for its imposition of civil liberties. This led to a major battle between them in New York City. The comic influenced the Civil War movie heavily, though the circumstances were slightly different.

6 Arnim Zola

Arnim Zola is one of Captain America’s most notorious and persistent villains. The disembodied spirit more or less of the German scientist resides in an advanced android, with Zola’s face appearing on a screen in its chest.

He has no superpowers as such, but his intellect and lack of morals concerning just about anything makes him one of the most powerful enemies in the comics and the MCU. His greatest achievement came when he stranded Captain America in Dimension Z, where Zola had been amassing a deadly clone army.

5 The Secret Empire

A powerful organization of villains that could potentially provide a storyline for the upcoming Captain America 4 is The Secret Empire. This group was behind the seminal storyline of the same name that tried to bring down Captain America by attacking his credibility. They were composed of elements of HYDRA, A.I.M., and many other villains, including Batroc The Leaper.

The ambition of the group was staggering. They threatened nuclear war if Captain America didn’t surrender. After he captured their leader, Number One, the mysterious figure killed himself rather than be taken in. The group continues to exist, with its roster evolving over time.

4 The Serpent Society

One of the most powerful groups of Captain America villains that the MCU has yet to utilize is the Serpent Society. This supervillain team first appeared in Captain America #310 in 1985 during the decade-long run by writer Mark Gruenwald that yielded many other major characters, like U.S. Agent and the Flag-Smasher.

The Serpent Society all share a snake theme, with snake-inspired costumes and codenames like Diamondback, Cottonmouth, and Viper. Some of them have superpowers and enhanced abilities while others are expert fighters. Together, they’re one of Captain America’s most powerful enemies.

3 Red Skull

Red Skull has no superpowers of his own, at least not traditionally in the comics, but he’s one of the most powerful and dangerous Captain America villains for one simple reason. His evil idealogy of hate and oppression have willed him to terrible acts across nearly an entire century.

Red Skull attempts revenge on Captain America through a variety of different means, including manipulating Sam Wilson, the Falcon, and engineering the replacement of Captain America by John Walker, the eventual U.S. Agent, by the federal government commission overseeing Rogers.

2 Hydra Captain America

Captain America faced one of his deadliest enemies in Secret Empire, in which it was revealed that Steve Rogers had been a secret HYDRA agent all along. This caused a lot of controversy among fans, but it was eventually revealed that the HYDRA Cap was not the true Steve Rogers.

The true version was restored by a living fragment of the Cosmic Cube known as Kobik. He defeated the evil version of himself, who possessed all of the true Cap’s abilities and powers, and set reality right again.

1 Thanos

Thanos is one of the most powerful supervillains in the MCU and in the comics. He defeated Steve Rogers soundly in one-on-one combat in Avengers: Infinity War, and in the epic comic book storyline that inspired it, The Infinity Gauntlet.

When Steve Rogers, one of the survivors of The Snap in the comics, confronts Thanos in his cosmic lair, Thanos dismisses him easily. He breaks Captain America’s shield with a single blow and appears to have killed him, though this isn’t depicted in the panels that follow.

About The Author