Marvel Comics has some of the deadliest mercenaries of any comic book company. When it comes to Marvel, there have been several criminal organizations and government agencies that have used mercenaries to the most significant effect. This includes mafia bosses like Wilson Fisk and Tombstone, deadly organizations like Hydra and The Hand, and even government agencies like SHIELD. All of these have mercenaries on the staff who have built up a list of kills that rivals anyone in Marvel Comics, and the deadliest mercenaries in Marvel are among the most dangerous villains and antiheroes in any comic book series.
From assassins who work for Kingpin to those who operate under the authority of SHIELD, here are Marvel’s 10 deadliest mercenaries, ranked.
10) Crossbones
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Crossbones is a mercenary who has mainly appeared in Captain America comics. Brock Runlow was a gang leader when he was younger, and he soon entered Taskmaster’s school to train to be a criminal and ended up as an instructor there himself. After this, he found the real Red Skull and impressed the Nazi so much that he was hired to become one of his key assassins, with Skull naming him Crossbones. He has enhanced physical conditioning comparable to Captain America and is one of the world’s greatest hand-to-hand combatants.
9) Lady Deathstrike
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Lady Deathstrike is the daughter of Lord Dark Wind, the Japanese kingpin who mastered the process to coat bones with Adamantium. Even though she killed her own father, she then decided to carry on his legacy by targeting Wolverine, someone she believed was given his Adamantium skeleton unfairly, sullying her family’s reputation. She sacrificed her own humanity, having the process done to her, turning her into a cyborg mercenary with Adamantium claws coming from her fingernails.
8) Silver Sable
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Silver Sable is a unique mercenary because she is not a villain. Instead, she is a mercenary for the sovereign Kingdom of Symkaria, trained from childhood to be a trained killer. She eventually morphed her father’s Wild Pack into what she built as Silver Sable International. This corporation receives funding from her country’s government, and she works both with and against superheroes, depending on who hires her. She has mainly crossed paths with Spider-Man, and the two work together more than they fight each other.
7) Domino
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Domino is best known for her time in X-Force, but she is, by occupation, a mercenary. In fact, most of her time in X-Force was when the team worked as a mutant black ops merc group, with her, Cable, Deadpool, and others used to deal with problems the X-Men needed to remain far away from. She was even previously part of the Wild Pack (not to be confused with Silver Sable’s group), which was a mercenary group that Cable started. Dpomino is also a mutant with the power of psychic probability manipulation, which basically allows her to have good luck and her enemies to have bad luck.
6) Elektra
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Elektra has had an interesting journey in Marvel Comics. While she is currently operating as the female Daredevil and is trying to be a hero, she was, at one time, one of Marvel’s deadliest assassins, and she still has those skills she uses to an extent to this day. The daughter of a Greek ambassador to the United States, she met and dated Matt Murdock when she was young, but she was also part of The Hand at the time. They are the ones who trained her to be an assassin, and she went to work for the Kingpin until Bullseye killed her. The Hand resurrected her, and she continued to be a deadly mercenary for years before finally turning over a new leaf.
5) Gamora
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Gamora in Marvel Comics is very different from her MCU version. In the MCU, Gamora worked for her father Thanos, and she was a mercenary for him in space, and that is how she met Star-Lord and turned good. In the comics, she was even worse, as Thanos raised her to become the most dangerous woman in the galaxy after a cult worshipping Magus destroyed her kind. Thanos trained her to be an assassin, and he had her body mechanically improved to make her almost unstoppable. She became a hero over time, but it has remained complicated, as she turned bad again when she created Warp World, but has been mainly a force of good, although she will still kill when the need arises.
4) Fantomex
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Fantomex is a unique antihero who has a similar origin to Wolverine, as he also had his body improved by the Weapon Plus Project, and was part of Weapon XIII, three stages after Wolverine. He was created as a prototype for the next generation of Super Sentinels. His powers are confusing and have changed over time. Initially, he had three operating brains with an autonomous nervous system, although he later ended up as three different people. When he had the three brains, they all worked together to allow him to find every possible outcome of an event, making him an almost unstoppable mercenary.
3) Deadpool
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Deadpool is arguably the most popular mercenary in Marvel Comics, as he is the most entertaining of any hired killer in comics. He was initially introduced as a villain hired to kill Cable, but eventually, those two men became reluctant allies. He has since become more of an antihero, although he still struggles to get any hero to really trust him since he is not entirely sane. Deadpool is also almost unstoppable as he has a healing factor that is nearly as strong as Wolverine’s, although severe injuries take him longer to heal. He is as deadly as they come, although he has more recently begun to show more morals when choosing which jobs to accept.
2) Taskmaster
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Taskmaster is one of the most respected mercenaries in Marvel Comics history. He has the superpower of being able to replicate anyone’s moves and skillset after only seeing it one time. While this was initially just a talent, he had his mind enhanced to ensure he could perfectly replicate anyone’s fighting style instantly. This has only hurt him when fighting Moon Knight (whose style involves taking a beating) and Deadpool (who has no style). However, Taskmaster is such a great mercenary that he is the man tasked with training the killers of the future.
1) Bullseye
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While Taskmaster is the most respected of the Marvel mercenaries, Bullseye is the deadliest assassin for one big reason. Taskmaster has a code of honor he operates under, and he only kills people when he is getting paid for it. Bullseye doesn’t care who he kills, and he often murders people for his own amusement, making him the worst of the batch. He has mainly worked for Kingpin, and his kills include two of Daredevil’s closest lovers, Elektra and Karen Page. Bullseye also killed Daredevil in Daredevil: The End, proving he was always the Man Without Fear’s endgame.
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