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Rogues' Gallery Transplant

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https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/kingpin_roguesgallery_spider_daredevil.jpg
Left: The Kingpin with Spider-Man.
Right: The Kingpin with Daredevil.

Green Arrow: I can't believe your advice worked. We actually managed to turn Ra's Al-Ghul into an Arrow villain.
Daredevil: Hey, it's like I said. We turned Kingpin from a Spider-Man villain into a Daredevil villain in the seventies and I never looked back.
— I'm a Marvel... And I'm a DC, "Hi, I'm a Marvel...and I'm a DC...and I'm on TV"

Also known as The Supervillain Shuffle. The occurrence wherein a villain, originally introduced as an enemy for a specific hero, subtly through time or Continuity Creep, deliberately or unintentionally, becomes more identified with another hero.

While any Shared Universe may depict a hero fighting another's antagonist, usually they remain identified with the original. For instance, Superman may occasionally fight The Joker, and Batman may take on Lex Luthor from time to time, but no one would ever claim that either bad guy is anything but the other hero's Arch-Enemy. This trope refers specifically to characters that have reached the narrative point where the villain is now more identified in the popular consciousness as being an adversary to a character he did not originally fight.

There are various reasons why this occurs. Reasons include:

  1. Sometimes, a hero's series gets cancelled, but one of their villains is such a cool character that they get transferred to a different hero, or turned into a general utility villain for the whole universe.
  2. Or, years after the cancellation of a title has left them an obscure character, they get discovered by a new writer for a popular work or adaptation.
  3. Alternatively, a new hero gets created, or an existing hero gets a significant revamp, and something about their personality, powers or theme makes a particular existing villain an obvious foil to them. It's easier to use a pre-existing villain to antagonize them than make one from scratch, and if the bigger-name isn't doing anything with them, might as well put the villain to use somewhere.
  4. This can also be the result of a writer creating or forming a strong attachment to a villain while writing for one character, then moving on to another project and taking all of their toys with them.

Examples:

    open/close all folders 

    Anime and Manga 
  • Batman Ninja has Gorilla Grodd as being one of Batman's foes, despite having originated as a villain to The Flash. Similarly, Deathstroke also appears and while he tangles with Batman fairly often, he was originally the Arch-Enemy of the Teen Titans (he normally still has plenty of connections to Batman, but only because he is an Evil Counterpart to Batman himself, and Batman's first protege Nightwing, at times the Teen Titans' leader and whom also appears in the film, is the more specific Arch-Enemy he singles out among the team).
  • The third volume of Maboroshi Panty, a manga illustrated by Go Nagai of Kekko Kamen fame, had Kekko Kamen's nemesis Satan's Toenail serve as the main villain.

    Fanfic 
  • In the Doctor Who/Resident Evil crossover Dangerous Tenant, while Albert Wesker still considers Chris Redfield his main opponent, he observes to Donna Noble that the Tenth Doctor is rapidly becoming someone else Wesker truly hates.
  • In the Justice League: The Spider series, while they remain focused on their traditional enemies, Web of Cadmus sees the Joker and Metallo go after Spider-Man to avenge his past defeat of them.
  • In the DC Animated Universe fic Mercy, when Diana is trapped in a fantasy by the Black Mercy, her dream features her as the guardian of Gotham while her civilian identity is married to District Attorney Bruce Wayne, and she references encounters with foes such as Poison Ivy and the Joker.
  • Kingdom Hearts: The Antipode: In contrast to the other Disney Villains, Hans is recruited into Organization XIII; a Standard Evil Organization Squad consisting of otherwise Original Generation characters.
  • Pokémon Reset Bloodlines has a couple of particular cases, as they're less of a "Rogues" and more of a "Rivals" Gallery Transplant. While both Gary and Paul are introduced early as rivals to Ash, as the story progresses their rivalry with each other gets more focus. Also, to a lesser extent, Ash ends up facing against Solidad, who in canon was a rival of May as a coordinator as opposed to a trainer (though it's hinted this is only a temporary thing, since Solidad plans on going to Contests full time once she's done participating in the Indigo League).
  • The Cutting Edge features a minor example of this when Oliver's first target as the Hood after he returns to Starling City is Thomas "Tommy" Elliot, better known as the Batman villain Hush. While Elliot isn't a supervillain yet in the sense that he isn't going out in a costume to fight Batman, he's still a corporate criminal whom Oliver is justified in attacking.
  • In Spider-X, when Spider-Man joins the X-Men: Evolution cast, several characters who were uniquely foes of Spider-Man in the comics, such as Electro, Venom and the Green Goblin, end up facing the X-Men (although a few foes such as Rhino, Shocker and Mysterio are still focused on the wall-crawler).
  • Ultimate Sleepwalker: The New Dreams greatly expands Sleepwalker's Rogues Gallery beyond what he faced in the official comics. Its companion series Ultimate Spider-Woman: Change With The Light has an entire gallery made of transplants since protagonist Mary Jane Watson doesn't actually have one in the comics.
  • Due to the nature of Super RWBY Sisters being a crossover fanfic, it leads to Team RWBY and friends joining the Mario Bros. on their adventures, and thus any villains that the Bros. face automatically become villains for Team RWBY to fight. Examples of this include Bowser, Hades, Cackletta, the Shroobs just to name a few.
    • In RWBY: DK 64, King K Rool becomes this for Yang as well as the Kongs.
    • On a somewhat different note, The Meta becomes this for Pyrrha due to her resemblance to Agent Carolina.
  • Remnant's Bizarre Adventure:
    • Bruno Buccarati was Giorno's first Stand-using opponent before Giorno joined his team. Here he demonstrates the power of Stands to Team RWBY by fighting alongside Roman and Neo (since his services were provided by Polpo to Cinder), then faces off against Josuke.
    • Tamami Kobayashi was Koichi's Starter Villain in the manga, where here he is defeated by Blake and Weiss.
    • Toshikazu Hazamada fought against Josuke and Koichi in the manga and plotted to kill Jotaro. Here he tries to use his Stand Surface to mimic Jaune and force himself on Pyrrha (leading to a fight by the real Jaune and Koichi to try and stop him), only for Surface be found out and trounced by Pyrrha.
    • The Serial Killer Anjuro "Angelo" Katagiri was Josuke's Starter Villain in the manga. Here he's defeated by Koichi and Neo.
    • Bug-Eater and Not-Bug Eater were killed by Josuke in the manga. Here they were defeated by Blake and Zwei.
  • Fairytale of Doom has this happen for the fairy tale villains from Disney classics as a result of a Fairy Tale Free-for-All the Fairy Tail wizards (plus Jellal and Zeref) are trapped in.

    Films — Animation 

    Films — Live-Action 
  • Both Alien and Predator started as antagonists in their own movies. Today, the two races are more known for fighting each other.
  • DC Extended Universe
    • Birds of Prey (2020) pits Harley Quinn as lead hero against Black Mask and Mr. Zsasz, who are both Gotham villains in the comics, but have rarely had much to do with her. (Both of them usually fight Batman, apart from the periods when Black Mask has been used as Catwoman's Arch-Enemy in her solo title.) Of course, Harley herself is/was a Batman rogue, so this is a rather downplayed example.
    • The Suicide Squad has the titular team go up against Starro the Conqueror, who usually acts as a foe to major heroes like the Justice League, rather than a smaller team like this one.
    • The main villain of Black Adam (2022) is Sabbac, usually an enemy of Captain Marvel Jr. and the Marvel Family in the comics. In fact, the comics had previously portrayed Sabbac and Black Adam as allies rather than enemies.
    • Blue Beetle (2023): Downplayed with Carapax; Carapax, under the identity of "The Indestructible Man", was indeed a foe to the Blue Beetle in the comics, but he specifically fought the Ted Kord iteration. Here, he fights Jaime Reyes, who is usually Kord's successor but is the first Blue Beetle here.
  • The Kaiju Baragon was originally the enemy of a giant version of Frankenstein's Monster in Frankenstein Conquers the World. However, Baragon eventually became part of Godzilla's Rogues Gallery thanks to video-games, action figures, and the films Destroy All Monsters and Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah: Giant Monsters All-Out Attack!.
  • Thulsa Doom originated in a Kull story, and most of the heroic characters in Conan the Barbarian (1982) would probably have been much happier people if he'd stayed there.
  • Akivasha in Kull the Conqueror was originally a minor Conan antagonist that gets promoted to Big Bad here, ironically enough bringing this trope full circle.
  • Star Trek Into Darkness: Khan, in a change up from the original chain of events, ends up with Spock as his primary adversary in this film. He lacks the grudge that defined him from being marooned by Kirk in the prime-timeline, and ends up spending more time in an Enemy Mine with Kirk than he does fighting him, since without that glaring flaw of It's Personal with Kirk, he can make wiser decisions around him. Kirk still seems to gain his respect as a Worthy Opponent with a similar care for his crew, but this movie might be called Wrath of Spock once Kirk's Almost Dead.
  • Viper started off as a Captain America foe and is usually an enemy of Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. as well (to the point that she's now known as Madame Hydra). Despite this, she is one of the antagonists in The Wolverine. Understandable since despite her connections to Captain America and S.H.I.E.L.D., she has appeared in several notable Wolverine storylinesnote .

    Literature 
  • Randall Flagg was introduced as the enemy of Mother Abigail in Stephen King's The Stand, amassing an army on Earth to attack and destroy her more peaceful followers. However, Flagg is far more well-known as the nemesis of Roland Deschain, the dimension-hopping hero of King's epic fantasy saga, The Dark Tower, and acts as the main villain of that series, even though there's an even greater evil behind him.
  • When Faction Paradox became an independent spin-off not under the aegis of the BBC, it took a few individually-licensed elements of the wider Doctor Who Expanded Universe, leading to Sutekh or Sabbath Dei now crossing paths with new characters like Justine and Eliza instead of the Doctor & friends.
  • Faction Paradox was later on the giving end of things with Godfather Auteur, a FP-original character, making a slew of crossover appearances in prose franchises that aren't even properly part of the Doctor Who EU, including The Crew of the Copper-Colored Cupids and 10,000 Dawns, now serving as antagonist to the Cupids and Graelyn Scythes, respectively.
  • Marvel's Spider-Man: Hostile Takeover features Echo as an antagonist, with a storyline that loosely adapts her first appearance. However, this version of the character attacks Spider-Man after being tricked into believing he killed her father, unlike in the comics, where it was Daredevil who was framed for the deed.

    Live-Action TV 
  • Batman had the Green Arrow foe Clock King acting as a member of Batman's rogues gallery, setting a precedent for later adaptations. Contrary to popular belief the Puzzler and the Archer are NOT examples as them sharing the same names as 2 minor Golden Age supervillains was purely coincidental.
  • Darla was introduced in Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a Dark Action Girl; she's killed off in the seventh episode, which also reveals that she's Angel's sire and ex-lover. When he got a spin-off series, Darla was brought Back from the Dead for a longer-lasting and more emotionally potent role.
  • On Doctor Who, the Slitheen family started out as briefly recurring antagonists of the Ninth Doctor, then disappeared from the main series and started showing up frequently on The Sarah Jane Adventures.
  • Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and its spin off Xena: Warrior Princess:
    • Ares, the God of War, was occasionally fought by Hercules in its first season, but he became a regular antagonist to Xena. Hercules still fought Ares from time to time, specially after Season 3 where he was cast by Kevin Smith, but he is much more important to Xena, not just as an enemy, but also as a supporting character.
    • In regards to the original myths, the Minotaur was slain by the hero Theseus, while he is fought by Hercules in the TV-movie The Maze of the Minotaur, where its revealed he is also his half-brother and Theseus is Adapted Out completely.
    • Bacchus first appeared on Xena and was killed off by the end of his episode, but he would appear in subsequent appearances in Young Hercules, a prequel to Legendary Journeys where he fought against Hercules in his early career more than once.
  • Kamen Rider Ex-Aid: The Kamen Rider Brave special had Takeshi Asakura / Kamen Rider Ouja, one of the villains from Kamen Rider Ryuki, as the main antagonist. In fact, the special came to be because Ouja was the favorite Rider of Brave's actor.
  • Once Upon a Time puts either Rumplestiltskin or the queen from Snow White in everything. Rumple has been Cinderella's fairy godmother, Beauty's Beast, and Captain Hook's crocodile, while Regina has been the Little Mermaid's Sea Witch and the wicked stepmother who abandoned Hansel and Gretel (though not actually their stepmother, she was still responsible for the events.) Then there's the spin-off, Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, in which Alice's main antagonist is Jafar.
  • Peacemaker (2022):
    • The show does this by way of Composite Character. One of the core antagonists is Auggie Smith, the titular hero's white supremacist father, who in this continuity is also the armored supervillain White Dragon. In the comics, White Dragon was a Suicide Squad enemy who also clashed with Hawkman and the Justice Society of America.
    • It's also established that one of Peacemaker's first public victories was against Kite Man, a D-list Batman villain in the comics.
  • A meta example is done throughout Power Rangers, where a villain from one Super Sentai show would end up fighting Power Rangers adapted from a completely different Super Sentai season. While the first example was a villain in Denji Sentai Megaranger being in Power Rangers Lost Galaxy (adapted from Seijuu Sentai Gingaman), Ressha Sentai ToQger becomes a more prominent example as several villains from there are translated into villains for three different Power Rangers in a row. note 
  • Stargirl (2020):
    • The series sees the teenage Legacy Characters who make up the new Justice Society of America battling the Injustice Society of America, the villains who killed the original JSA. In the comics, most of the original Injustice Society members had either retired or died by the time most of the JSA legacies debuted in Infinity, Inc., and it was their own children who instead did battle with the young heroes. The most notable example is probably Icicle, the first season’s Big Bad, who, in the comics, died back in Crisis on Infinite Earths, well before Stargirl was even created.
    • In a more specific example, the Gambler is said to have been the arch-nemesis of the original Doctor Mid-Nite. In the comics, the Gambler was actually created as an enemy of Alan Scott, the original Green Lantern.
    • The second season continues this trend by featuring Eclipso, Arch-Enemy of The Spectre, as an overarching antagonist for the JSA heroes.
  • The Cardassians began as villains of the week on Star Trek: The Next Generation but ended up with much greater plot significance on Deep Space Nine.
    • To a somewhat lesser extent, the same thing could also be said of the Romulans being more associated with The Next Generation than with TOS.
    • The Borg are a subversion of sorts. After twenty (of which four were two-parters) appearances on Voyager, plus a Borg character joining Voyager's main cast for the last four seasons, one might have expected them to be more associated with that series than with TNG, which only featured them in four episodes (of which two were two-parters) plus First Contact. Despite this, in popular consciousness, the Borg are still considered Picard's nemesis.
  • Titans (2018):
  • In the Ultra Series, it's not uncommon for popular Monsters of the Week to appear in later series to be pitted against new Ultra heroes. The original Ultraman's most famous foes Zetton, Gomora, Red King, Antlar, Baltan, and Mephilas have all battled at least five (and as many as ten; sometimes more) subsequent Ultramen since their debuts in the original 1966-1967 series.
  • Zone Fighter had two of Godzilla's Rogues Gallery, Gigan and King Ghidorah, appear as monsters of the week battling Zone, although Gigan's appearance also saw Godzilla help out a bit.

    Professional Wrestling 
  • The main purpose of Black Tiger is to oppose Tiger Mask. From the very beginning of the defictionalization of the feud though, Black Tiger also opposed, and ultimately defeated El Gran Hamada before "first" Tiger Mask avenged him. Even though Tiger Mask would ultimately defeat Black Tiger, Tiger Mask was the one to "lose" his mask when it was bought from New Japan by All Japan. AJPW were uninterested in pitting Tiger Mask II against his traditional nemesis but Black Tiger simply changed targets again, going after The Cobra.
  • Besides the inevitable clash with his contemporary Tiger Mask, Black Tiger II was also known for harassing Jushin Liger and Pegasus Kid.
  • Black Tiger III's demise came not at the hands of a Tiger Mask, but at L.A. Par-K's at a CMLL event.
  • While Black Tiger IV was eventually unmasked by Tiger Mask IV, he did spend time going after NWA World Junior Heavyweight Champion Jason Rumble, if only to better position himself in later offenses on Tiger Mask.
  • Two years after Tiger Mask IV unmasked Black Tiger V, Black Tiger V reappeared in Toryumon Mexico to oppose Último Dragón.

    Tabletop Games 
  • Dungeons & Dragons 3rd edition book Elder Evils picks up Kyuss, the Worm That Walks, a well-known villain from Greyhawk, Zargon, a fan-favorite monster from Mystara and Pandorym, villain from Forgotten Realms novel Darkvision, and reinvents them so they can now fit to any D&D setting.
  • Downplayed in Sentinels of the Multiverse. Each heroes Nemesis will have more It's Personal backstories with variants of other heroes. Downplayed in that the Nemesis hasn't changed.
    • Probably due to the two being Foils, the Wraith has a decent amount of interaction with the Chairman. In particular, Freedom Six Wraith ends up killing The Chairman and taking over his operation.
    • This finally does wind up happening for a few villains in the Villains of the Multiverse expansion. Ambuscade switches from hunting Haka to The Naturalist, Plague Rat falls into the captivity of RevoCorp and is used to hunt their creation Setback, and Miss Information returns to take vengeance on the Freedom Five. Also, Citizens Hammer and Anvil get their own deck and nemesis in Visionary, whereas they were previously minions in Citizen Dawn's deck (nemesis: Expatriette).

    Video Games 

    Web Animation 
  • DC Super Hero Girls has a lot of this, largely due to many villains being alignment-swapped in this universe and pulling out more obscure DC villains to act as enemies. For instance, the Double Dare Twins are little-known Nightwing villains, but are often used in a Villain of the Week role, either against Katana or the Wonder Woman/Batgirl/Supergirl team, while he hasn't shown up at all. Dark Opal kind of counts, as while he menaces the DCSHG team, mainly Supergirl, here, his backstory flashback shows that he got there by running away from Amethyst.

    Web Original 

    Western Animation 
  • Avengers Assemble uses Impossible Man, another Fantastic Four enemy, as well as Doctor Doom. The Cabal, originally created as the Evil Counterpart of The Illuminati, act as the first main antagonists, founded by Captain America's Arch-Enemy Red Skull and his other enemy M.O.D.O.K. (whom is more acknowledged here by his later encounters with Iron Man), with Dracula, Sub-Mariner rogue Attuma, and Hyperion (a member of the Squadron Supreme, though his overall depiction is closer to the villainous Squadron Sinister version) also added. Later arcs find ways to add Thanos and the Black Order (though Crisis Crossover events do see Thanos face the team in the comics despite being better known for his encounters with cosmic heroes), a new Cabal featuring the Leader, Zola, Enchantress, and Loki, all enemies of Hulk, Captain America, and Thor, though Loki was the Avengers' original Starter Villain, and Madame Masque, whom normally faced Iron Man and Hawkeye (Kate Bishop), was used in a season that was heavily centric to Black Panther, just to name a few, that same season mainly having his enemy Erik Killmonger as the main antagonist.
  • The Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes essentially made the Black Panther villain Klaw into an Ant-Man foe, as Ant-Man is the one who mangles his hand and later comes up with the strategy to defeat him. This left Black Panther without an Arch-Enemy or someone to yell You Killed My Father at, so the writers made Man-Ape into his father's murderer instead. Klaw does still participate from the shadows, but its only because T'Chaka's fight with Man-Ape was really a Trial by Combat fight to the death for the throne, where Klaw's sabotage gave Man-Ape the advantage and victory.
  • While many of the villains on Batman: The Brave and the Bold came from the rogues galleries of other heroes, most of them were depicted as such. Only 2 villains of those villains were portrayed as being regular parts of Batman's rogues gallery: Gorilla Grodd and Gentleman Ghost. Gorilla Grodd (a Flash villain) was depicted as being completely obsessed with Batman, regarding him as the only 1 worthy of his intellect and a regular inmate of Arkham Asylum...despite having almost no interaction with Batman in the comicsnote . Gentleman Ghost was a major enemy of Hawkman who had three episodes in a Batman-centric show devoted to him before Hawkman was even mentioned. Although for a brief period in the Bronze Age Gentleman Ghost WAS considered a Batman rogue.
    • Occasionally this may also happen from the opposite side and a Batman villain may be an enemy of another hero. This is seen with minor Batman villain Kite-Man, who is depicted as the criminal who Plastic Man worked for prior to him gaining his superpowers, and who kidnaps the hero's family for revenge in one episode.
  • Beware the Batman uses Tobias Whale, who is traditionally an enemy of Black Lightning and Simon Stagg, who is the archenemy of Metamorpho (who, unlike Black Lightning, did appear). Deathstroke also appears, and while he is pretty much a general DC Universe menace these days and has fought Batman quite a bit, having some moments as an Evil Counterpart of Batman (this time around, Alfred mentored him too), the character originated as a Teen Titans villain.
  • They aren't really villains, but Chip 'n Dale originally started out as recurring antagonists for Pluto. Though they still pester Pluto at times, they're far better known nowadays for always bothering Donald Duck, or else being key components of the Rescue Rangers team.
  • The Red Guy from Cow and Chicken would also frequently antagonize I Am Weasel as well.
  • DC Animated Universe:
    • Batman: The Animated Series used Clock King and Count Vertigo (the latter depicted as a former friend of Ra's Al-Ghul to justify his inclusion), who were originally Green Arrow villains in the comics.
    • Inverted in an episode of Superman: The Animated Series where Superman briefly takes over vigilante duty in Gotham, posing as Batman. He falls into a trap set by Bane, Mad Hatter, and the Riddler, but escapes the trap with brute force, beating Bane into submission with ease, before using his super speed to apprehend the others, to their absolute shock.
    • While Sinestro in the comics fought several Green Lanterns, he was the archenemy and Evil Mentor of Hal Jordan. In the DCAU, his debut in Superman: The Animated Series saw him fight Kyle Rayner (and be the one to murder Abin Sur, therefore causing Kyle to get the ring) and Static Shock gave John Stewart Hal's role in Sinestro's expulsion from the GLC.
    • Inverted with the Royal Flush Gang as they made their DCAU debut in the future-set Batman Beyond and the Gang is explicitly stated to have a history with Batman. However, a different version of the Gang formed by The Joker chronologically made their debut fighting the Justice League, the Gang's traditional enemies.
    • Justice League:
      • Solomon Grundy does not fight against Green Lantern or Batman, but instead against Superman and Hawkgirl. Somewhat justified by Grundy occasionally facing Superman in Bronze Age stories.
      • Unlimited portrayed Devil Ray (the Captain Ersatz of Black Manta) as a foe of Wonder Woman instead of Aquaman. This was due to rights issues with the failed Mercy Reef pilot that kept Aquaman himself from appearing in the last season of JLU.
      • Gentleman Ghost and Shadow Thief spend most of their time-fighting Green Lantern instead of Hawkman, although in the latter's case, it is due to the Love Triangle involving Hawkgirl.
      • Instead of being a foe of the Justice Society, Roulette appears as a foe of the League. However, her debut does, however, involve Wildcat and Black Canary, members of the JSA in the comics.
    • While he's crossed paths with Batman before and was involved in the origins of Poison Ivy, the Floronic Man made his DCAU debut in Batman and Harley Quinn whereas the comic character started out as an enemy of The Atom and is a regular opponent of Swamp Thing (the latter of whom cameos in the film).
  • DC Super Hero Girls does the same thing as its Web Animation counterpart:
  • DuckTales (1987) had an episode called "All Ducks on Deck", where the villain was the Phantom Blot, who first appeared as an enemy of Mickey Mouse in old Mickey Mouse comics.
  • DuckTales (2017):
    • Don Karnage, one of the primary antagonists from TaleSpin, is a recurring villain that ends up declaring Dewey his Arch-Enemy.
    • F.O.W.L. are mentioned and eventually decide to destroy Scrooge McDuck and his associates, rather than Darkwing Duck (who is one of Scrooge's allies, even though nobody treats him with respect). They technically first appeared in an episode of the original Duck Tales, but the reboot largely bases them on the more fleshed-out version shown in Darkwing Duck (including their shadowy board of director and Steelbeak).
    • The Phantom Blot, Mickey Mouse's enemy from the Disney comics, is also a member of F.O.W.L. and has sworn vengeance on Magica De Spell (along with anything magical in general due to his and Magica's history).
  • Green Lantern: The Animated Series uses Byth Rok, who is traditionally a foe of Hawkman.
  • The sole costumed supervillain to show up in the first season of Hit-Monkey is Lady Bullseye, who is an enemy of Daredevil in the comics.
  • Hulk and the Agents of S.M.A.S.H. has put the Hulks up against Annihilus, Blastaar, and Ego, the Living Planet, all longtime Fantastic Four headaches, and Doctor Doom above especially. Bonus points for X-Men foe Sauron. However, The Man Behind the Man villain of the series is the Leader, who is a Hulk villain.
  • In The Incredible Hulk, some episodes pit the Hulk against other heroes' enemies.
    • Spider-Man foe Doctor Octopus is the villain in "Tomb of the Unknown Hulk".
    • "Prisoner of the Monster" features Iron Man adversary Spymaster as the antagonist.
    • "Bruce Banner Unmasked" has the Hulk fight the Puppet Master, whose usual adversaries the Fantastic Four get no acknowledgement aside from his step-daughter Alicia Masters having a bust of the Thing among her statues of Marvel characters.
    • The forces of Hydra are fought in "Enter: She-Hulk", when the organization is ordinarily an enemy of S.H.I.E.L.D. or Captain America.
  • The Mad Thinker and Awesome Android pop up in Iron Man: Armored Adventures as enemies (and classmates) of Tony and his buddies. In the comics, they're traditionally enemies of the Fantastic Four, even in the Ultimate Marvel universe (which the show went with, depicting the Mad Thinker as a teenaged girl, instead of an adult man like the original). And then there's Doctor Doom and Magneto, who both show up in Season 2 (Magneto's appearance, in fairness, also features Professor X and Jean Grey, both of whom were from the X-Men).
  • The "Armor Wars" two-parter in Iron Man: The Animated Series sees the title character hunting down various armored characters from across the Marvel Universe, including the Beetle (originally a Human Torch villain and best known for fighting Spider-Man) and Stilt-Man (an enemy of Daredevil).
  • Kim Possible occasionally reveals that one villain or another that the titular character fights used to be traditionally opposed by another group of heroes, Team Go, of which Kim's Arch-Enemy Shego used to be a part of. One of these villains, the Mathter, even completely shifted his vendetta from that team's leader to Kim's sidekick Ron. Naturally for the show, this was lampshaded.
  • Looney Tunes:
    • On a few occasions when he wasn't trying and failing to catch the Road Runner, a Suddenly Voiced Wile E. Coyote showed up to antagonize Bugs Bunny in five shorts. That said, the final one, "Hare-Breadth Hurry" plays with this, as Bugs is essentially acting out the Road Runner's usual role.
    • Similarly Elmer Fudd, originally set up as Bugs' Arch-Enemy, would frequently be placed against Daffy Duck or Sylvester in some shorts. Since both of them were often as bungling and hubris driven as Elmer, it tended to be less lopsided who would come out on top, or even if Elmer was the actual villain of the two.
    • Yosemite Sam is pitted against Bugs in all but two cartoons: "Along Came Daffy" (in which he and his black-haired twin brother pursue Daffy Duck) and "Honey's Money" (in which he marries a wealthy but shrewish widow and tries to kill her idiot son).
    • Marvin The Martian debuted in the short Haredevil Hare as a foe for Bugs Bunny. Three of the four following shorts featuring Marvin have him opposing Bugs. The fourth follow-up, Duck Dodgers in the 24½th Century pits Marvin against Daffy Duck and Porky Pigs in sci-fi-roles - that short laid the basis for the Duck Dodgers animated series where Marvin was a recurring villain and is probably most known for by modern audience.
    • Speedy Gonzales' main two recurring antagonists in his cartoons had already been previously established foes to other Looney Tunes: Sylvester (archenemy to Tweety) and Daffy Duck (archenemy to Bugs)
  • Marvel's Spider-Man has two examples:
    • The Blizzard used for this series, Randall Macklin, is a one-shot enemy of Iron Man, who does not appear in this episode, and his origin involves Harry and Peter's invention, likely in reference to Blizzard sometimes facing Spider-Man.
    • Absorbing Man is normally a foe of the Hulk and Thor, the former having appeared in only the Halloween episode, and the latter only appearing in later seasons.
  • The Marvel Super Heroes had an episode of the Sub-Mariner segment feature Doctor Doom as its villain. Doom's usual enemies the Fantastic Four couldn't appear because of rights issues (having already been used by Hanna-Barbera for The Fantastic Four (1967)), so they were replaced by the original roster of the X-Men, albeit referred to as the Allies for Peace.
  • The true villain of the first season of M.O.D.O.K. (2021) is ultimately revealed to be Hexus the Living Corporation, who originated in Grant Morrison's Marvel Boy limited series.
  • Mighty Mouse foe Oil Can Harry originates from the older and black-and-white Fanny Zilch cartoons, where he was a human rather than a cat and an enemy of J. Leffingwell Strongheart.
  • Big Bad Pete originally appeared in Walt Disney's Alice Comedies before becoming an enemy of Oswald the Lucky Rabbit and eventually Mickey Mouse. In the later years of Disney shorts, Pete mainly menaced Donald, though more as a bullying jerkass than a straight up villain. To modern audiences he's probably best known for his role as Goofy's False Friend on Goof Troop, or his role in the Kingdom Hearts series as the thuggish enforcer of Maleficent. He also is featured in several episodes of the original DuckTales series, seemingly "playing" different villain roles. House of Mouse however brought him back to being Mickey's Arch-Enemy in the early 2000's in animation, a role he was portrayed in the comics from the beginning.
  • According to the The Powerpuff Girls episode "Bought and Scold", Quackor the Fowl from Dexter's Laboratory is one of their enemies. On a similar note, Huntor from "Dial M for Monkey" appeared as a bounty hunter in an episode of Samurai Jack called "Episode VIII: Jack vs Mad Jack".
  • Doctor Doom was featured as a villain in Spider-Man (1981) and its related series Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends, neither of which acknowledged his usual enemies the Fantastic Four. Spider-Man considered him his Arch-Enemy instead of Doctor Octopus or Green Goblin in those series.
  • Spider-Man Unlimited had Spidey going up against the High Evolutionary, normally a cosmic Marvel villain (though he has ties to the X-Men; he was once a colleague of Spidey's foe Jackal in the comics, but that was about it for pre-existing connections).
  • The Spider-Woman episode "Realm of Darkness" had Spider-Woman fight Dormammu, who was traditionally an enemy of Doctor Strange.
  • Teen Titans occasionally featured Killer Moth, a villain mostly associated with the Batman franchise and Batgirl in particular.
  • While he isn't referred to by his real name, the same voice actor, the mirror mask, blue uniform hidden under trenchcoat and yelling "COBRA!" at the end of the episode made rather obvious the man called Old Snake, one-episode antagonist from The Transformers, is Cobra Commander.
  • Taken to the extreme in Ultimate Spider-Man, as part of the show's apparent attempt to be as different as possible to the traditional Spider-Man formula. So far, the show has largely avoided classic Spider-Man antagonists, the only ones showing up after more than twenty episodes being Venom (with Harry Osborn as the host instead of Eddie Brock, though the symbiote later goes to Flash Thompson and turn him into Agent Venom as it does in the comics), Doctor Octopus, Norman Osborn (who doesn't become the Green Goblin until the season finale) and Sandman. The other episodes involve either crossover episodes with other heroes involving villains from the guest-star's rogue gallery (Living Laser for Iron Man, Loki for Thor, Zzzax for Hulk, Mesmero and Sabretooth for Wolverine) or villains from other Rogues Galleries who are treated like they were Spider-Man's regular villains (Doctor Doom and the Frightful Four, who are Fantastic Four villains, Batroc the Leaper, who is a Captain America villain, Taskmaster, who debuted as an Avengers villain, Whirlwind, originally a foe of Ant-Man, the Juggernaut (though justified in that there was one notable comic story where Spider-Man did fight Juggernaut)...) As an added twist, some of Spider-Man's foes are now tied to other heroes, such as Kraven being the one who killed White Tiger's father, and the Scorpion being from the same mythical city as Iron Fist. Even though the show did eventually bring in more Spider-Man rogues and storylines, the aforementioned Taskmaster becomes The Heavy in the first half of season 3, where he recruits potential new S.H.I.E.L.D. heroes to spring Green Goblin from prison, leading to Goblin's travels across the Spider-Verse, and in season 4, HYDRA and its leader Arnim Zola, both foes of Captain America and S.H.I.E.L.D. (the latter being the mentors to Spider-Man and other heroes) begin to back the Sinister Six, and Crossbones, another foe of Cap and S.H.I.E.L.D., is selected by HYDRA to replace Dr. Curt Connors as the Lizard when Spider-Man successfully cures Connors for good.
  • Dick Dastardly and Muttley started out as the enemies of the other racers in Wacky Races but then they gained a new enemy in Yankee Doodle Pidgeon in their own show, Dastardly and Muttley in Their Flying Machines. But then the two started antagonizing Yogi Bear and the others starting with Yogi's Treasure Hunt, then it continues in Fender Bender 500, Yo Yogi! and The Funtastic World of Hanna-Barbera. However due to rights issues they were replaced with Dread Baron and Mumbly and they antagonized Yogi and the others in Laff-A-Lympics and Yogi Bear and the Magical Flight of the Spruce Goose, but the latter made them sound and act more like Dick Dastardly and Muttley so it's obvious on who they're replacing. SCOOB! features Dick Dastardly as the Big Bad, this time to Scooby-Doo and the Mystery Inc. gang, Blue Falcon and Dynomutt, and Captain Caveman and Dee Dee Skyes.
  • Woody Woodpecker's traditional archnemesis Wally Walrus was placed against Chilly Willy in two 1961 cartoons, "Clash and Carry" and "Tricky Trout", 8 years since Wally's last appearance. Wally Walrus also antagonized Andy Panda in the 1946 cartoon "Dog Tax Dodgers".
  • Young Justice:
    • The majority of villains are not associated to any specific hero. Almost all the heroes work for or with the Justice League while most of the villains are part of The Light. Speaking of The Light, the main council is led by Vandal Savage, whom originally faced Alan Scott but became an overarching villain to the DC universe as a whole, in this case here as a Well-Intentioned Extremist, and has maintained Superman villain Lex Luthor, Justice League International villain Queen Bee, and Etrigan villain Klarion the Witch Boy, who is also remembered for his role in the storyline Sins of Youth. Other members of The Light, most of which were rotated out and replaced by other villains, include Batman villain Ra's Al-Ghul, Aquaman villains Ocean Master and Black Manta, Doom Patrol villain the Brain, Teen Titans and Nightwing villain Deathstroke, original Superman archenemy and later Justice Society villain Ultra-Humanite, New Gods and Mister Miracle villain Granny Goodness, and Batman and the Outsiders villain Bad Samaritan, here an ambassador of Markovia in the United Nations. By the show's present time period, the whole concept of a Rogues Gallery has pretty much vanished.
    • Speaking of Luthor, he never interacts with Superman (though he retains his connection to Superboy in being his source of human DNA, a father of sorts). In fact, overall he comes comes off more as an Arrow Family villain—his first appearance sees him engaged in a Xanatos Gambit against clone!Roy, and he's eventually revealed to be behind the capture of the original Roy Harper and creation of clone!Roy as a Manchurian Agent. After that, he uses his Secretary-General position to attempt to promote the Justice League and the Outsiders as Heroes With Bad Publicity.
    • Queen Bee was originally the main enemy to Justice League International, even acting as an Evil Counterpart to Maxwell Lord before his Face–Heel Turn, but is positioned against Miss Martian and Beast Boy because she murdered Miss Martian's idol and inspiration for her human identity in revenge for impersonating and humiliating her and worming her way out of being blackmailed by her, said idol being Beast Boy's mother and therefore making Queen Bee the reason he is orphaned this time.
    • Klarion here is depicted as a Lord of Chaos on par with Nabu and a Doctor Fate foe, killing the Kent Nelson Doctor Fate in an attempt to get his helmet. He did actually have run ins with the original Young Justice team of the comics, but he is shown in a more powerful light this time around, filling the role Bedlam had in Young Justice story "World Without Grown Ups".
    • Even taking into account how Ma'alefa'ak, typically the Arch-Enemy of Martian Manhunter, was changed from his brother to Miss Martian's brother, he is also mainly seen as an adversary for the New Gods due to his loyalty to Darkseid and his stirring of tensions on New Genesis. His later loyalty for Lor-Zod, revamped as a time traveler, also makes him become an adversary of the Legion of Super-Heroes.
    • General Zod became the Starter Villain of the Legion of Super-Heroes rather than being one of Superman's major enemies, due to only finally being let out of the Phantom Zone in their time and being re-imprisoned by them. His son Lor-Zod, adapting changes in Superman Family Adventures and Superman (Rebirth) and being depicted as a time traveler, likewise becomes one when he hopes that killing Conner Kent will erase the Legion, and becomes another New Gods adversary through his partnership with Darkseid.

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