Shockingly Enough, Thanos Is Not the Character With the Highest Kill Count in the MCU
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Recently, we’ve discussed Iron Man’s kill count and the fact that it’s likely the highest when it comes to Avengers in the MCU. But even Tony Stark’s substantial kill count paled in comparison to Thanos’ snap which erased half of all life in the Universe.
Such a terrifying number is hard to even comprehend, but believe it or not, it’s not the highest in the MCU, and no, we’re not talking about the fact that it was eventually undone, Thanos’ kill count does not even scratch the surface.
Thanos’ snap effectively erased from existence half of all living things in the entire universe. We’re talking about basically everything that can be classified as life technically, but what if you erase the entire universe with everything in it? Following the conclusion of ‘Endgame’ and with the start of the Multiversal Saga, a concept of a Multiverse or parallel universe has been introduced in the MCU big time, and with it characters that have been destroying countless timelines and parallel universes for who knows how long – Kang the Conqueror, Kang variants, the council of Kangs.
In the 31st century, scientist Victor Timely discovered the Multiverse and facilitated interactions among alternate versions of himself, leading to a temporary peace and the exchange of knowledge. He created an AI named Miss Minutes as his assistant, though he never gave her a physical body. However, some of his Variants, like Kang the Conqueror, sought to conquer these alternate universes, sparking a Multiversal War.
During the conflict, Timely’s Variant, Ravonna Renslayer, led his forces. Timely ultimately harnessed the power of a monster named Alioth, which emerged from space-time rifts, to defeat his Variants and end the war. He dubbed himself He Who Remains and established the modern TVA which kept the Multiverse under strict supervision.
The only way to ensure peace among the variants was to “terminate” the timelines that would give rise to the evil variants. He Who Remains culled every single timeline that would eventually lead to another Multiversal War, establishing the Sacred Timeline as the baseline for the Multiverse.
He Who Remains isolated a set of timelines that adhered to a specific pattern, calling it the Sacred Timeline. He established strict rules to ensure all branches adhered to this pattern, pruning those that did not. Additionally, he created the Temporal Loom, a device designed to manage and delete any branched timelines that were not pruned in time, as a safeguard to maintain the Sacred Timeline’s integrity.
Now we don’t have an exact number but it’s safe to say that He Who Remains destroyed countless realities and universes. We’re no longer talking about math – advanced math – we’re going into a territory that is unfathomable to human beings and becomes something that can be pondered only with philosophical musings.
Things become even more grim if you take into account the potential he destroyed, yes you can argue that being killed is way worse than being prevented from existing in the first place, but He Who Remains did not only “prune” living beings, he pruned the potential as well, the future.
We’re not going to argue the morality of his strategy, but it’s safe to say that He Who Remains (and his variants) are the most lethal characters in the MCU so far, far overshadowing what Thanos has done.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments below!
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