Everyone says that the Marvel Cinematic Universe has a villain problem. While it seems that the studio has figured out the hero formula, fans often complain about one-dimensional villains. The various heroes come from a wide variety of backgrounds, and they each have their own, unique reason for doing what they do. Thor learned humility and now desires to earn his own worthiness. Captain America knows what it's like to be powerless, and now feels a sense of duty to do the right thing with his power. Iron Man is trying to atone for his past. Meanwhile, most of the villains are just shadow versions of the heroes. They just can't rise above their own issues. Another common problem with the villains is that many of them seem to be evil just for the sake of being evil.

This has created a situation where many of the villains are completely irredeemable. They're so evil that it's not even conceivable that they can ever make things right. That's not to say that this is true of all Marvel villains. There are plenty of complex baddies, and many of them actually have a chance at redeeming themselves. That's not to say that they will, but that's what makes them interesting.

15 IRREDEEMABLE: HELA

While Thor was always led to believe that he was Odin's firstborn child, that was actually a lie. After discovering that Odin had been abandoned on Earth by Loki, Thor found his father near death in Thor: Ragnarok (2017). Before passing on, the All-Father spoke ominously of Ragnarok and a mysterious woman that was coming. Once he died, Hela appeared. Odin's true firstborn, she had helped him conquer the Nine Realms. Odin became wary of her bloodthirsty nature, however, and eventually set the Valkyries upon her. After a brutal battle, Hela was locked away and was only able to escape once Odin died. Upon her escape, she destroyed Mjolnir and set about conquering Asgard.

None of the gods were powerful enough to hold her back. Since Hela drew her power from Asgard, Thor realized that the only way to end her reign of destruction was to destroy his homeland. Hela spent eons locked away for her warmongering and still couldn't change. She watched Asgard crumble around her and still couldn't see the error of her ways. Odin reigned in relative peace for thousands of years, yet all Hela could see was the possibilities of conquest. While she likely died during Ragnarok, she's the goddess of death. It seems possible that death might not be the end for her.

14 COULD BE SAVED: THE VULTURE

After the battle of New York in Avengers (2012), Adrian Toomes' salvage company is hired to clean up the wreckage. Unfortunately, Tony Stark's recently-formed Damage Control steals the contract out from under him. Since so much alien technology was left behind, Toomes and his team steal some and begin building their own weapons from it. From there, they launch a successful business raiding superhero battle scenes and stealing the damaged tech left behind. The best part of the entire plan is they're operating completely under the radar, meaning no one even knows that they exist. That is, until Spider-Man discovers the operation and blows the lid on the whole thing. Desperate, Toomes attempts to steal a jet full of Avengers gear but is stopped by Spider-Man. Normally, this would leave a man full of hatred, especially for the hero that put him away.

However, the thing about Toomes is that he's a man who truly cares about his family.

Also, Spider-Man saved his daughter and then saved Toomes' life during the jet battle. Toomes was never an evil man, and at the end of the movie, he seems to show a moment of selflessness. He refuses to tell other inmates what Spider-Man's secret identity is, which suggests that he doesn't want to see Peter get hurt. While it's possible he has other plans, it seems like Adrian Toomes still has some good in him.

13 IRREDEEMABLE: KAECILIUS

Magic was revealed to exist in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Doctor Strange (2016). After getting into a horrible accident, Stephen Strange comes to the Ancient One seeking a cure for his injured hands. There, he discovers that with the right training, humans can draw upon mystical energies and manipulate reality. It's eventually revealed that the Ancient One draws energy from the Dark Dimension to extend her life. When one of her students, Kaecilius, discovers this, he rebels against her and plans to use those same energies for his personal goals. He attempts to make a deal with Dormammu, who promises Kaecilius and his followers eternal life.

Kaecilius came to Kamar-Taj to learn the mystic arts after the death of his family. Initially, this makes him seem like a sympathetic villain. As the story unfolds, however, it's clear that his quest for eternal life has driven him completely mad. He kills several innocent people, which doesn't exactly flow with his supposed quest for life. Also, at the end of the film, Kaecilius is transformed into one of Dormammu's Mindless Ones. Still, even if he regains his freedom, he's shown no sign of caring for anything other than his personal goals. He was willing to sacrifice the entire Earth to the Dark Dimension, so it's probably best that he's trapped there for the time being.

12 COULD BE SAVED: ABOMINATION

After years of hunting, General Ross finally found evidence that Bruce Banner was hiding in Brazil in The Incredible Hulk (2008). He put together a team led by Emil Blonsky, a commando on loan from the United Kingdom's Royal Marines. Up to that point, Blonsky had been a good soldier, but he was starting to get old and felt the years catching up to him. After encountering the Hulk, Blonsky agreed to undergo an experimental treatment to make him a super-soldier. While the procedure initially works, it causes Blonsky to slowly become unhinged. He later forces Dr. Samuel Sterns to perform another procedure on him, using the Hulk's irradiated blood. This turns Blonsky into the Abomination.

Since he was defeated by the Hulk, the Abomination hasn't appeared in any more Marvel movies.

The thing about Blonsky is, at the time he agreed to undergo the procedure, he believed the Hulk to be a legitimate threat. It's also not his fault that the procedure drove him mad. He's not that different from the Hulk, who sometimes loses control. So, if the Hulk can become a full-fledged hero, the same is possible for Blonsky. He just needs to regain some control, which based on his military background, seems like it should be possible.

11 IRREDEEMABLE: JIGSAW

During the first season of The Punisher (2017), it's revealed that Frank Castle doesn't have many friends. After the death of his family, he went underground and cut almost all contact with his former life. Castle still meets with Curtis Hoyle, a fellow soldier who runs a support group. Through Hoyle, Castle is reunited with Billy Russo. Castle's former best friend, Russo now heads a private military contracting firm. Initially, it seems like Russo has Castle's back, and wants nothing more than to help his old friend. Through flashbacks, however, it's revealed that Castle and Russo's unit was used to smuggle heroin into the United States. In order to keep the operation quiet, members of the unit were targeted for assassination, which is what led to the death of Castle's family.

It's also revealed that Russo has in on the entire operation. Russo helps eliminate other members of Castle's former squad and then targets Castle himself. During a brutal fight, the Punisher gets the upper hand and smashes Russo's face into a glass wall, horrifically scarring his former friend. Russo is a man who destroyed the lives of those closest to him, all in the name of profit (or protecting himself). While he has a code of honor, he's still willing to sacrifice anyone for his personal gain. He's a complete sociopath and having his formerly handsome face completely ruined isn't likely to make him a friendlier person.

10 COULD BE SAVED: BARON MORDO

When Stephen Strange first comes to Kamar-Taj in Doctor Strange (2016), he's guided there by Karl Mordo. After initially being rejected by the Ancient One, it's Mordo that convinces her to accept him. During his training, Strange grows close to Mordo, although it's clear that his new friend takes the mystic arts much more seriously than Strange does. While Strange is curious and open to learning any aspect of the magical world, Mordo is overly-concerned with the cost of performing any spell. Mordo is disillusioned when he learns that the Ancient One has been drawing power from the dark dimension, which is something that he considers forbidden.

Mordo wants to protect people, and he's just approaching it from a different perspective.

Furthermore, when Strange uses the Time Stone to defeat Dormammu, Mordo sees it as the breaking of the natural order. He's concerned with the price that will be paid in the future for these actions. This sets him down a dark path, and he's last shown stealing another magician's magical powers. The thing is, Mordo isn't being selfish. The Ancient One's actions drove Kaecilius to almost destroy the world. Mordo doesn't want to destroy magic for personal reasons, he just doesn't want it to be used in a harmful way. He's seen what it can cost, and he's trying to spare the world from disaster.

9 IRREDEEMABLE: JUSTIN HAMMER

In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Tony Stark was the top name in weapons manufacturing. Coming in at a distant second was Hammer Industries, led by Justin Hammer. Nowhere near as brilliant as Stark, Justin tried to compensate by being more ruthless. In Iron Man 2 (2010), he's first shown trying to help the government take the Iron Man suit away from Tony. It's also revealed that he's been trying to build his own suits, but the results were catastrophic (and quite messy). It isn't until he witnesses Ivan Vanko's attempt to murder Tony Stark at the Monaco Grand Prix that he turns completely evil.

He breaks Vanko out of prison, which leaves at least one guard and another prisoner dead. Then, he attempts to get Vanko to build suits for him to rival Tony Stark's Iron Man armor. While his plan was geared more towards humiliating Stark, Hammer still hired a madman to build weapons for him. Then, when things go bad and Hammer's suits start attacking innocent people, Hammer shows little remorse. He obviously cares more about clearing his own name that stopping the madman and even protests being arrested. His actions resulted in hundreds of innocents lives being put at risk, and he cared more about his reputation. It's a good thing he's not actually a genius, because Justin Hammer truly doesn't care about other people.

8 COULD BE SAVED: SHOCKER

Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017) introduced a bunch of minor Spider-Man villains as members of Adrian Toomes' team. Aside from the Tinkerer, Jackson Brice and Herman Schultz both play significant roles. The two men appear to be Toomes' street team, moving his dangerous hardware to the streets without letting anything get tracked back to Toomes. Brice starts wearing wrist gauntlets and calling himself the Shocker (in the comics, he's known as Montana from the Enforcers). After crossing Toomes, Brice is killed and Schultz becomes the Shocker. Wearing the gauntlets, Schultz attempts to prevent Spider-Man from leaving his homecoming dance to stop Toomes from robbing the Avengers cargo plane.

Like his boss Toomes, Schultz's Shocker is just a man trying to make a living.

He wasn't driven to crime by greed, he was forced into it after getting screwed over by Tony Stark. Unlike Brice, Schultz isn't shown to be bloodthirsty. He's really just a guy doing a job. Sure, attacking a high school is a pretty awful thing to do, but Schultz had been pushed into a desperate situation. Also, like Toomes, he knows Peter's secret. As the end of the film reveals, Mac Gargan is looking for information on Spider-Man but hasn't gotten any yet. If Schultz isn't revealing Peter's secret identity, then there's hope for him yet.

7 IRREDEEMABLE: KINGPIN

In the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Wilson Fisk is a complicated man. Born to a caring mother and an abusive father, he learned at a young age to use violence to solve his problems. After murdering his father, he eventually grows up to become one of the most powerful criminals in the New York City underworld. He attempts to unite the various criminal factions, including Russian, Chinese and Japanese mob families. He's eventually taken down by Daredevil and is arrested before he can leave the country. Prison, however, suited Fisk, and he quickly took control of the various gangs and bought off the guards.

Fisk sometimes seems like he has a soft side. His angriest moments tend to involve people hurting or endangering those closest to him (like his mother). The problem is that he always responds the same way: murder. He murdered Ben Urich, a seasoned reporter with a sick wife. He also assaulted Matt Murdock, a man the Kingpin believes to be blind. He set the Punisher loose in the prison to kill his enemies, only to eventually betray Castle. While Castle survived, the ensuing fight cost many prisoners their lives. Wilson Fisk is good to the people cares about, but once someone isn't useful to him, he destroys them, no matter how insignificant they are.

6 COULD BE SAVED: SURTUR

Despite being set up as a major villain, Surtur ended up being an accidental hero in Thor: Ragnarok (2017). The film starts with Thor imprisoned by the demon in Muspelheim, the fiery underworld from Norse mythology. Surtur seems intent on igniting Ragnarok, the prophesized end of Asgard. Thor defeats Surtur, taking his crown and locking it away, seemingly halting Ragnarok. After Hela invades Asgard, however, Thor realizes that he has to destroy his homeland in order to stop her, since she draws her power from Asgard. Loki places the crown on the eternal flame, resurrecting Surtur and setting Ragnarok into motion.

While Surtur seems evil, he ends up saving the universe from Hela's wrath by destroying Asgard.

Still, does that make him redeemable? The thing is, Surtur isn't really good or evil, he's more of a force of nature. And while he does destroy the golden city, he doesn't attempt to stop anyone from fleeing. The people of Asgard successfully evacuate, and Surtur is perfectly okay with that (as far as the audience can tell). When he's attacked by Hulk, Surtur simply swats him away, but doesn't pursue him. Basically, Surtur seems to be content with fulfilling his role in the cosmic order, which doesn't make him a bad guy.

5 IRREDEEMABLE: RED SKULL

During World War II, Johann Schmidt was the head of Hydra, the Nazi's deep-science division. While attempting to create a super-soldier formula, his face was burned off until nothing remained but his hideous red skull. He used Hydra to locate the Tesseract in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011) and used the power within to develop powerful weapons. While he did betray the Nazis, that was only because he had his own vision of world domination. Eventually, Captain America leads a team of soldiers against Schmidt's forces and prevents them from launching a fleet of powerful bombers intended to destroy every major city on the planet. During the fight, the Tesseract transports Schmitt to another part of the galaxy.

He reappeared in Avengers: Infinity War (2018), where it's revealed that he's become the guardian of the Soul Stone. It's unclear if he still seeks power, but he seems fairly resigned to his current position. Of course, this is still a man who planned on committing mass murder. If anything, he seemed resigned to the fact that the true power of the Infinity Stones was forever out of his grasp. It's unclear what his current status is, seeing as how Thanos obtained the Soul Stone. However, one thing is for certain: he's still evil.

4 COULD BE SAVED: THE GRANDMASTER

At first glance, the Grandmaster seems completely self-absorbed. He rules over Sakaar, a junk-world where he forces various warriors to compete as gladiators. When Thor arrives in Thor: Ragnarok (2017), he's immediately fitted with an obedience disk and forced to fight. Luckily, the grand champion of Sakaar is the Hulk, who ended up on the planet after the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015). The problem is, Hulk likes it on Sakaar since the Grandmaster treats him well (aside from the forced Gladiator fights).

Still, the Grandmaster is shown to be nothing but self-serving and obsessed with his own hedonism.

How could he ever redeem himself? Well, if he's anything like his brother, the Collector, then it's definitely possible. While it hasn't been directly stated in the films, it's been revealed behind-the-scenes that the Grandmaster and Collector are, in fact, brothers. The Collector is shown defying Thanos in Avengers: Infinity War (2018), likely at the cost of his own life. While the Guardians arrived too late to save him -- they only witnessed Thanos recreate the scene using the Reality Stone -- it's still clear that the Collector was willing to die rather than give up the stone willingly. If this trait runs in the family, maybe the Grandmaster isn't so bad?

3 IRREDEEMABLE: ULTRON

After the Avengers retrieve Loki's scepter from Hydra in Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015), Tony Stark and Bruce Banner experiment on it. They create an artificial intelligence called Ultron, and it immediately becomes aggressive and attacks the Avengers. After escaping, Ultron sets up his base in Sokovia and begins working on destroying all life on Earth. He plans on using giant engines to launch Sokovia into the air, and then smash it back down to the Earth, acting like a giant asteroid. The impact would've been powerful enough to cause an extinction-level event around the globe, but the Avengers prevented Ultron from crashing the giant rock back to the ground.

Ultron is seemingly destroyed after being cut off from the Internet. Still, his essence is just a computer program, and he could have backed it up anywhere. That's bad news because there's nothing good about Ultron. He claims to want to protect the Earth, but his answer is to kill everything on it. Unlike Thanos, Ultron isn't trying to make life better for those that survive. He seems to want everyone dead, and it's not entirely clear why. There was no tragedy that shaped Ultron's anger, he just immediately decided to start destroying the moment he was "born."

2 IRREDEEMABLE: ARNIM ZOLA

Hydra's head scientist, Arnim Zola, first appeared on-screen in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011). During the events of that film, he worked for the Red Skull, studying the Tesseract and using its energies to build weapons. It's also heavily implied that he was experimenting and torturing prisoners that Hydra's forces had taken captive. Zola is captured by Captain America and the Howling Commandos and seems to switch sides. In Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014), however, it's revealed that Zola stayed loyal to Hydra. After the war, Zola is pardoned in exchange for helping to found S.H.I.E.L.D. Instead, he helped Hydra secretly infiltrate the organization.

Eventually, Zola's brain was uploaded into a massive computer bank, where he continued to undermine S.H.I.E.L.D.'s mission.

He helped create "Project Insight," which was going to use weaponized helicarriers to kill off any citizens that could be considered a potential threat. In other words, he came up with a plan to murder tons of innocent people. Everything this man has ever worked on has involved murder, usually on a massive scale. He clearly doesn't value any life, other than his own, and he seems to have become even more detached from humanity after becoming a computer.

1 COULD BE SAVED: THANOS

Out of all the villains the Avengers have faced, Thanos is the worst. After witnessing a catastrophe befall his home planet Titan, Thanos decided that there was too much life for the galaxy to support. He began a quest to kill off half of all life in the universe to ensure that those who survived would have plenty of resources to live. It's a horrifying plan, and when Thanos successfully collected all six Infinity Stones in Avengers: Infinity War (2018), he immediately put it into action. With just a snap of his fingers, half of the life in the universe was turned to ash. It's a truly horrifying moment.

Thanos is insane, but his motivation is still to save lives. He just believes that without taking drastic steps, the universe is doomed. In his eyes, it's already doomed, and there's no other choice. He's not being greedy or seeking power. He'd rather kill half the universe than watch the entire thing die. Granted, that's an awful plan, but his overall goal is still to save lives. It stands to reason, then, that if Thanos were presented with another way to save lives on a galactic scale, he'd go for it. If he could just see a better option, it's believable that he would take it.