Have you ever thought what it would be like if some of your favourite superheroes really existed? Sure they may be fun to root for on the page or entertaining to watch on the big screen, but if you saw them on the street would you introduce yourself or cross to the other side? It’s been said that heroes demonstrate many of the same qualities as sociopaths. For many masked vigilantes, these traits go far beyond antisocial behaviour and acting without fear. Here are Screen Rant’s 10 Super Heroes Who Would Be Real-Life Psychopaths
Deadpool
What makes some of the best crime fighters so appealing is how they walk that line between hero and antihero. It’s on an extreme side of that line that we find Deadpool, the ultimate antihero. Wade Wilson would probably be the first to admit that he has psychotic tendencies and it’s his gleeful embrace of them that makes Deadpool a different kind of superhero. Quick to fillet a henchman or even dismember himself, Deadpool is one superhero who truly does not give a crap.
HULK
How do you reason with an indestructible rage monster? Well, you can’t. Anytime Bruce Banner loses himself as the Hulk everyone just has to get out of his way and hope he doesn’t do too much damage before calming down. Hulk is the Hyde to Bruce Banner’s Dr. Jekyll, and is only a hero when circumstances allow him to be. It’s really a miracle that he doesn’t leave more innocent people in his wake, or perhaps the comics and movies just kinda gloss over that aspect of the green goliath.
Batman
Superheroes are often divided into two camps: those who kill their enemies and those who don’t. While Batman may fall in the latter, he still demonstrates some psychopathic qualities. Traumatized by witnessing the death of his parents, there’s an anger in Bruce Wayne that it seems can only be released by beating up baddies. The more broken bones, the better. He might not go all Deadpool on them, but they need to believe he could.
Wolverine
As the only superhero with a body count rivalling Deadpool’s and rage rivalling the Hulk’s, Wolverine fits firmly within the ‘kill ‘em’ camp. If you grew up watching the animated X Men series, Wolverine was usually limited to using his claws to rip up robots and other objects to keep it appropriate for the Saturday morning cartoon audience, so it was both refreshing and shocking to see him kill so many members of Stryker’s team in X2. With mutants like Wovlerine, it’s no wonder the government would prefer to keep them in check.
Judge Dredd
Most legal systems are set up on a series of checks and balances, so that the people arresting criminals aren’t the same people prosecuting them. The prospect of someone like Judge Dredd actually existing is terrifying. With the authority to be judge, jury and executioner, Dredd was biologically bred without empathy so he could carry out his duties in a cold, calculated manner. Not exactly your friendly neighbourhood cop.
- Neo
Once Neo truly grasps the nature of The Matrix, everyone living in it becomes expendable. Since they’re all just slaves and the world is an elaborate virtual reality constructed to keep their brains occupied, killing innocent people becomes a non issue. It might as well be a video game to Neo. After a mind trip like that, anyone’s concept of what’s real or fake, or right or wrong, would be seriously warped.
The Punisher
The Punisher exists for one reason: revenge. A trained marine whose family was killed by the mob, The Punisher does not care about morality, just what he sees as poetic justice when he straight-up murders thugs. The only reason The Punisher isn’t a villain is the fact that he happened to be crossed by criminals and not The Avengers.
Hit Girl
The mafia also should really be more careful about whose family they kill. They created a Kick Ass assassin when they killed the mother of the kid who would become Hit Girl. Trained into a deadly weapon by her father, Hit Girl does not discriminate between blades and bullets when slaying bad guys. Perhaps it’s her young age, but of all the entries on our list, Hit Girl seems to take the most pleasure from her masked vigilante duties, but for some reason when the film came out audiences were much more offended by her naughty language.
The Mask
People familiar with Jim Carrey’s 1994 version of the The Mask probably don’t realize that the comic its based on is an ultra violent blood fest. When the ancient Mask gives Stanley Ipkiss limitless power, what begins as killing his tormentors in amusing ways, ends in a shootout killing 11 cops. The film kept the character’s mischievous Tex Avery aspects, but opted to leave out the Terminator tendencies Ipkiss adopts once The Mask throws all his inhibitions out the window.
ALL the Watchmen
If you want an epic explanation of why anyone who puts on a costume to fight crime is likely a psychopath, look no further than The Watchmen. These characters occupy a world much closer to our own than we’re used to seeing in comic book panels, there are no Clark Kents or Peter Parkers here, just dark characters like Rorschach and The Comedian. Adrian Veidt takes ultimate action by killing millions of people to save the world from itself. So is he a hero, or a psychopath?
