You Can Never Have Too Many Good Villains

By which mean, interesting enemies for our protagonists to contend with, not villains that become protagonists themselves, though that's fine too, if not overused. Some villains are just better off staying as villains.

I thought what I'd like to try (and it may become a recurring thing, or it may not) is to discuss a villain that only appeared once, and see if they could become a viable recurring foe. Not necessarily for the person they originally fought, just some hero or group of heroes. I figured a place to start looking for possible reclamation projects would be JMS's Amazing Spider-Man run. He did try and introduce a few new enemies, but most of them were one and done, and the one that wasn't (Morlun) perhaps ought to have been.

I decided to start with Shade. If you don't remember him, he was a convict whose cellmate was working to develop a mystical portal to escape prison. When he was ready to try it, Shade, bopped him, and took his place. But the fellow managed to damage the mystical circle, so the portal didn't work quite properly. Shade is can only operate in "our" world for limited periods of time, and has to abduct other people and dump them in an odd cocoon in the Astral Plane to buy himself some free time*. He abducted one of Peter's students, and so Spidey was forced to enlist the aid of Dr. Strange to get to the Astral Plane and save the day, rescuing all the missing people, and leaving Shade stuck there.

So we know Shade has at least moderately enhanced strength, as he can trade punches with Spider-Man. When he's in the physical world, he can turn intangible, and create portals back to the Astral plane, either for himself or with at least one passenger. He thinks he's clever, but up to the time of his defeat, he was stuck working with small-time gangs, because he could remove problems for them, while buying himself sometime in our world. And he's kind of a cocky smart aleck, as he made fun of Spider-Man's intelligence in their initial encounter. I wonder, since he's stuck on another plane of existence, did the secret identity-obscuring deal affect him? He didn't know Peter was Spider-Man, but he knew Spider-Man was looking after some particular students.

So he's strong, has underworld connections, access to a difficult to reach hideout, and thinks he's clever. Also, he's been stuck in the Astral Plane for awhile now, he may have started to learn some things about it. Could he have found doorways to other realms, struck bargains with dark powers in exchange for a way back to Earth? There has to be someone that would be interested in his modus operandi. He's cocky enough to think he could reach an accord with a Dormammu or Hela, or even think he was pulling one over on them. So Shade could be the unwitting harbringer of some assault from a dangerous realm. His opening doorways between worlds could weaken the boundaries, which would certainly suit some people. That would probably draw the eye of Dr. Strange, but he might be a bit too high up the ladder for Shade.

Perhaps his movements could disrupt the Nexus of All Realities? Can someone who feels fear still burn if they're intangible? Though there has to be someone a bit more, um, intelligent to contend with. Hey, we could blame Shade for Zombie Deadpool showing up in Marvel Zombies 3! Oh! Shade tended to grab people he thought no one would miss, the homeless, strung out druggies, kids from poor neighborhoods. Could that get him mixed up with the Runaways? They have a magic user on the team, maybe Nico** can pick up on it. Do any members of the team have friends from before they were a group, that could be imperiled to draw the team in.

Maybe we could portray the Shade as a man desperate to escape this curse. He's seen things in that other realm he'll nevre forget, and he wants out. Naturally, he'd want to retain the powers, because that's money in the bank. So he starts ransacking mystic libraries, trying to find a clue before he has to grab someone else to buy more time. Because he is done going back there for any extended period of time, yessiree. Who else is there in the Marvel Universe, magicwise? Dr. Druid is dead, I'm pretty sure. I guess there's the Enchantress and Loki, but again, that might be outkicking his coverage there. There's Doom, but I'm not sure we should write Shade as being that stupid.

Daimon Hellstrom's out there somewhere, he might be a possibility. Busiek wrote Nighthawk as being interested in the occult after his return from the dead, so he might have some useful texts. Hmm, I'm sensing a Defenders reunion here, get Strange, or Hellstrom if the Doc is still in his pissy "I need to divorce myself from mortal affairs" mode, throw Valkyrie and Hellcat into the mix***, both with mystical elements to them as well. Maybe his activities can endanger the Heavenly Cities, get him a little run in with the Green Mist of Death?

I suppose there's always membership in the Hood's little cabal of super-villainy. The hood itself has a demonic presence he appears able to contact, maybe it could sense Shade and convince the Hood he could be useful. Depending on the level of control Shade has over his powers, that'd be a pretty easy way to get in wherever you wanted. And since he's working with a bunch of scumbags, he shouldn't have much trouble getting ahold of people to trade for more time. Heck, the Hood could use him to remove dead weight from their organization if he wanted. Just drop them in the astral plane, anybody asks, they went for pizza and got caught by SHIELD, the dummies.

I think the key is to not throw the Shade out there as the most super-cool awesome character ever, who is so impotant the event must completely revolve around him. Hopefully, one of these as a story would establish him as a interesting villain that other writers might think was worth using, because you can frame his desires to lead to conflicts in at least a few different ways. I'm envisioning Daredevil or Moon Knight trying to tangle with him right now. DD because I'd like to see how his senses would react, Moonie because I'd like to see if he could maintain his sanity pursuing a crook into the astral plane. Would Moon Knight be able to hold his sense of self together. It's a realm of the mind, so would he split apart? Could he get all his parts back on the same page, would all of them make it back out, and if not, how does that change him?

* Now I'm trying to figure out how he got back from the Astral Plane the first time. He would have needed to escape from it and send someone in to buy himself the time to get out to abduct someone to buy himself, uh, you get the point. Hmm.

** Nico is the one with the staff who can only use a particular phrasing for a spell once, correct?

*** Yeah, putting Patsy and Daimon together is just asking for trouble, but isn't that sort of conflict between the group a foundation of the Defenders?