DC has long had some of the greatest villains ever. These dangerous and intimidating antagonists have provided some amazing battles for the heroes of the DC Multiverse, proving to be a force to be reckoned with for years. In the DC Multiverse, power creep is a very real thing. DC's heroes are amazingly powerful and so their foes have to correspond. Oftentimes, villains will debut with one power and then more powers will be added to their repertoire.
This makes them greater threats and opens up interesting new avenues for stories. Some villains' powers have gone through fundamental changes, altering their threat forever.
10 Darkseid Has Been Nerfed Something Fierce
Darkseid is one of the greatest villains in the DC Multiverse. One of the biggest reasons for that is how powerful he is. He's long been one of the most powerful New Gods and is one of the ultimate forces for evil in the Multiverse. One of the problems with Darkseid is that his power level has been continually lowered as he's taken a greater part in the DC Universe.
His Omega Effect eyebeams were supposedly vaunted one-hit kills, yet have rarely been so. In Final Crisis, he was nigh unkillable except in very certain ways but he keeps getting punched into oblivion to beat him ever since. It's great he has a higher profile but making him easier to beat isn't a good look.
9 One Of Doomsday's Most Interesting Powers Is Gone
Doomsday is the beast that killed Superman and is just amazingly strong. His strength and durability are unchanged but one thing about his powers has changed. In Superman/Doomsday: Hunter/Prey, it was established that one of Doomsday powers was that he was hyper-adaptive. He couldn't be beaten or killed the same way twice, meaning that every time he showed up, the heroes had to find new ways to beat him.
This has basically been abandoned. It was a very interesting little wrinkle to Doomsday's powers and the fact that it's gone makes takes away something from the character and his threat.
8 Anton Arcane Went From Mad Scientist To Powerful Demon
Swamp Thing has long been one of the most powerful heroes in the DC Universe, able to trounce just about any villain he came across. As far as his own foes have gone, his greatest enemy is Anton Arcane. Anton was a mad scientist who sicked his twisted creations on Swamp Thing until he was finally killed by the swamp monster.
Arcane went to Hell where he gained demonic powers and started to lash out at Swamp Thing and his niece Abigail again, even taking over the body of her husband Matt Cable and doing horrible things to her. Swamp Thing defeated Arcane but he always comes back, his demonic powers making him a dangerous foe.
7 Despero Gained Titanic Strength To Go With His Telepathy
When Despero first started fighting the Justice League, he was mostly a mastermind type of villain, using his twisted intellect and telepathic powers to bedevil the League. He was a cliche Silver Age villain but would get a massive upgrade in the '80s, becoming a titan of mental and physical muscle in the post-Crisis DC Universe.
Since then, Despero has been a much more savage opponent for the League, someone that could punch it out with Superman while vying telepathically with Martian Manhunter. He became a greater threat to the team than ever.
6 Dr. Light's Powers Became A Part Of Him
When Doctor Light first debuted, he was just an evil scientist type, creating weapons based on light. He mostly used a light gun against the League and wasn't that much of a threat as the years went by. This was changed as eventually, he gained actual light-based powers, allowing him to manifest the energy without any kind of technology.
This made him much more powerful and a greater threat to every hero he faced, even if he was still something of a joke at times.
5 Brainiac's Powers Have Been In Flux For Decades
Brainiac is one of Superman's most feared enemies, responsible for some terrible atrocities as the years have gone by. Much like DC's continuity, Brainiac has been through a lot of changes, going from the intelligent alien conqueror of the Silver Age to having a robot body in the years leading up to Crisis On Infinite Earths to being an alien possessed mentalist in the post-Crisis years to a character reminiscent of his old Silver Age self only with Superman level strength after Infinite Crisis.
Brainiac's powers and abilities have been changing for years. While he's always been superlatively intelligent, everything else has changed about him more than once over time.
4 Reverse Flash's Powers Have Only Gotten Greater Over The Years
Since the introduction of the Speed Force, the power of the Flashes has only gotten greater, so it makes sense that the Reverse Flash's power would grow as well. After Barry Allen's return to life, Reverse-Flash returned as well with a new set of powers based on the Negative Speed Force. While this gave him many of the same powers he had before, he also gained brand new ones.
He could travel unaided through time and manifest a parasitic energy that ate away at other speedsters, two big additions. With these new powers, Reverse Flash became even more dangerous than ever before.
3 Psycho-Pirate Got A Major Power Upgrade Post-Crisis
Psycho-Pirate has long been one of the most important and unsung villains in DC history. For years, his powers were just emotional manipulation but after working with the Anti-Monitor and surviving the end of the Multiverse and his homeworld, the old Earth-2, his Medusa Mask gained the power to manifest beings from the old Multiverse.
Psycho-Pirate could release these beings at will and ever since has become a big part of any Crisis level event in the DC Multiverse, working with villains like Alexander Luthor and Darkseid.
2 The Batman Who Laughs Gained Godlike Powers
The Batman Who Laughs rode into the DC Universe from the Dark Multiverse and began a reign of unparalleled savagery. Eventually defeating Lex Luthor to become Perpetua's top servant, he would gain power when she was able to defeat the Justice League and tip the balance of power over to Doom, becoming her main servant on the remnants of the Earth. That was just the beginning of his upgrade.
Finding a Doctor Manhattan powered Batman in the Dark Multiverse, he had a group of Alfred's transplant his brain into that body. He'd use his new godlike might to defeat Perpetua and was only stopped when Wonder Woman gained massive power of her own, enough to defeat him.
1 Anti-Monitor Got Much Less Powerful Over Time
When he first appeared, the Anti-Monitor was the most powerful being the heroes of the DC Multiverse ever faced. He had destroyed countless universes before he reached the main Earths and almost was able to defeat the heroes through a mix of intelligence and sheer unbeatable power. Their defeat of him was one of the heroes' greatest moments but he would eventually return.
Upon his return, he was never as powerful as he was before. His time with the Sinestro Corps was a huge disappointment and every return after that was a case of diminishing returns. He went from a universe-shaking threat to someone that could be defeated by the Justice League alone, a massive power downgrade.