14 Times Comic Villains Won And How They Ruled While In Power

In the six-issue storyline "Thanos Wins," readers get to see what happens when the Mad Titan finally gets what he wants: supreme rule after killing almost everything in the universe to appease Mistress Death. The reality of this King Thanos timeline is known as Earth-TRN666, and it basically shows a future version of the Earth-616 reality where Thanos slays everything and rules at the end of time. He's basically got the Hulk as a lapdog. It's quite the visual.

The mainline version of Thanos is brought there to eliminate King Thanos by the elderly ruler so he could finally be with Mistress Death in the afterlife. The young Thanos refuses to do so, returns to his own reality, and vows to never end up like his older self, who would willingly beg for death.

In the realm of Marvel Comics, there are few more megalomaniacal than En Sabah Nur, AKA Apocalypse. That moniker should tell you everything you need to know. Technically, the "Age of Apocalypse" crossover event is in an alternate timeline where Legion accidentally took out his father, Charles Xavier, but that doesn't really matter. This mid-'90s story continues to be popular to this day and shows what would happen to Marvel Comics if Apocalypse went unchecked. Turns out he'd wipe out millions of humans!

The world ends up getting divided into two powers: Apocalypse's North America and the rest of the survivors on Earth who live under the Human High Council. Bishop ends up stopping this all from happening, but Earth-295 continues to live on every time Marvel decides to go back to this reality to sell some comics.

As far as X-Men comics go, there are few as infamous as the "Days of Future Past" storyline. It's up there with "The Phoenix Saga," God Loves, Man Kills, and "Age of Apocalypse" as one of the arcs that are spoken about with nothing but reverence. The cover is iconic. The title is confusing. It was loosely adapted into a major motion picture. "Days of Future Past" is big time, folks.

It sees a future where the Sentinels take over the United States and try to eradicate mutants once and for all. This results in many X-Men being slain, survivors being sent to concentration camps, and even other superheroes like the Avengers being wiped out as well. Kitty Pryde's consciousness ends up getting sent back in time to stop all this from ever happening, much to the delight of X-fans everywhere. "Days of Future Past" remains essential reading 40 years after it was first published.

"Old Man Logan" has proven to be one of the most popular X-Men storylines of the past 20 years. Heck, it's proven to be one of the most popular Marvel storylines of the past 20 years, period. The original 2008 Wolverine story arc was written by comics superstar Mark Millar and went on to inspire multiple volumes and other "Old Man" spinoffs like Old Man Hawkeye and Old Man Quill.

The United States of this story has been conquered and divided by supervillains, with the Red Skull declaring himself President of the United States to stroke his massive ego. The mentally-deteriorating Skull keeps various trophies of dead superheroes and ends up getting slain when Wolverine uses Cap's shield to decapitate the madman. 

In true Scott Snyder/Greg Capullo fashion, Dark Nights: Death Metal is sufficiently bonkers in a way all comic book fans should be able to get behind. The Batman Who Laughs is granted rule of Prime Earth by Perpetua (the original creator of the DC Multiverse) and warps everything to fit his twisted view of reality. Dubbed the "Metalverse," Prime Earth is reshaped into a world of nightmares.

Gotham City becomes a continent-sized city where massive Joker Dragons rule the skies. There are the Arkham Wastelands, a radiation-filled, desolate landscape where Captain Atom exploded and left destruction in his wake. And Superman is put into a giant prison for superheroes, dubbed New Apokolips, where he serves as the power source. Wonder Woman ends up stopping the Batman Who Laughs in the end, and reality is restored to its normal state, but Dark Nights: Death Metal proved to be a fun, short look into the dark side of DC Comics.

There are few worse things that could happen in DC's comics than the Joker becoming a god-like being. Just take a second and think about what that would be like. The Clown Prince of Crime getting the power to do whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted? This is the guy who tried to copyright a fish, people. There is no telling what kind of insanity he'd get up to as an omnipotent ruler! Well, we do have some idea of what the Joker would do thanks to the "Emperor Joker" storyline from the turn of the century.

Joker tricks Mr. Mxyzptlk into giving him the majority of his powers, and the Joker transforms all of reality to fit his vision of how everything should be. He forms a time loop where he kills Batman every day, among other things that a sadistic maniac would do. Superman ends up tricking Joker into giving up his power (reminiscent of how Supes usually takes care of Mxyzptlk's antics), and everything returns to normal.