The following article contains major spoilers for Eternals.The Marvel Cinematic Universe has been criticized in the past for its lackluster antagonists, but it’s taken strides in recent years to make up for that shortcoming. Characters like Thanos, Killmonger, Baron Zemo, and Wenwu have proven to be some of the most well-written bad guys in superhero movie history — and Eternals innovates even further on this trend with some of the most surprising and original antagonists to date in the entire MCU.
In the lead-up to the film’s release, the trailers and other promotional materials for Eternals revealed very little about the movie’s plot, instead focusing on the grand scale and spectacular visuals to convey the story’s appeal. Only the final trailer hinted at the film’s antagonists, offering brief glimpses of the monstrous Deviants and their menacing leader, Kro. At first glance, one could easily mistake Eternals for a simple good-versus-evil story where good aliens save the world from bad aliens — but as the final film reveals, that couldn’t be any further from the truth.
The Deviants — Villains or Victims?
Indeed, the film initially depicts the war between the Eternals and Deviants as an overly simplistic, black-and-white conflict, just as one would expect from a typical superhero story. It’s stated that the Deviants want to destroy humanity, and that the Eternals were sent by the cosmic beings known as the Celestials to protect Earth. This is very much in line with the original Eternals comic by Jack Kirby, in which the Deviants are a race of intelligent beings who are depicted as inherently evil, seeking to conquer humanity for no apparent reason. However, it’s eventually revealed that this premise is nothing more than a lie constructed by the Celestials.
In reality, the Eternals were sent to Earth not to protect humanity, but to ensure that humanity flourishes long enough to be harvested by Tiamut, the dormant Celestial incubating within the Earth, who must devour the collective life force of the human race in order to awaken. The Eternals learn that this is a process that they have repeated on countless worlds over millions of years, sacrificing innumerable innocent lives for the sake of preserving the Celestials. As for the Deviants, they were the predecessors of the Eternals, created by the Celestials to protect intelligent species by eliminating any predators that could endanger them. However, the mindless and bestial Deviants soon began to attack the species they were meant to defend, resulting in the creation of the Eternals.
With this knowledge in mind, it’s hard to call the Deviants truly evil — they’re essentially wild animals who are being systematically exterminated just for following their instincts. They’re still a threat to humanity, yes, but there’s no malice behind their destructive actions. The only exception is the lone Deviant who achieves sapience late in the film by draining the powers of Ajak and Gilgamesh. This intelligent Deviant, while not named within the film, is identified in the credits as Kro (voiced by Bill Skarsgård), originally the warmongering leader of the Deviants in the comics. While Kro receives precious little screen time, he’s depicted not as a typical mustache-twirling supervillain, but as a being driven purely by a need for survival.
As Kro tells Thena immediately after killing Gilgamesh, “We just wanted to survive. Eternals, you are not saviors. You’re murderers.” Kro’s evil deeds aren’t driven by a lust for power, but by desperation to protect himself and his kind from extermination. He despises the Eternals for perpetuating the Celestials’ endless cycle of destruction, and sought to kill them in order to prevent Tiamut’s awakening. Despite his cruel actions, Kro is still ultimately trying to save Earth from destruction. He, like his fellow Deviants, isn’t the true villain of the story — he’s just another victim of the Celestials’ manipulations.
Ikaris — a Fallen Hero
Indeed, the ultimate antagonist of Eternals isn’t Kro or the Deviants, but rather one of its supposed heroes: the Eternal Ikaris, played by Richard Madden. Ikaris is initially depicted as a courageous paragon hero. He fights to protect humanity from the Deviants, he’s the former lover of the protagonist, Sersi, and he’s even compared to Superman himself by Phastos’ son. However, the final act of the film reveals that Ikaris is no Clark Kent. Unlike his fellow Eternals, he’s willing to sacrifice all of humanity in order to let Tiamut awaken. In his eyes, fulfilling his mission is more important than protecting individual lives. And so, Ikaris ends up fighting against his own family in the earth-shattering final battle of the film.
It’s easy to compare Ikaris to Omni-Man of Invincible fame — after all, they’re both Superman stand-ins who orchestrate humanity’s downfall in order to fulfill a mission from a greater power. And just like Omni-Man, Ikaris is forced to choose between his loyalty to his masters (the Celestials, in this case) and his love for his family. In the end, what makes Ikaris such a unique antagonist isn’t the fact that he’s initially presented as a hero, but rather the fact that he’s still hard to truly call a villain despite his betrayal. He truly believes he’s doing the right thing by letting Tiamut awaken, and he isn’t even portrayed as hating humanity. He’s simply doing his duty as a loyal soldier to the Celestials’ cause, just as he has been for millions of years. Ikaris isn’t evil, just close-minded — but thanks to his love for Sersi, he ultimately sees the error of his ways and becomes consumed by guilt. In the end, Ikaris flies too close to the sun, choosing to end his own life rather than live with his shame.
The Celestials — the True Masterminds
Ultimately, all the conflict can be traced back to the machinations of the Celestials. Naturally, the audience is meant to side with the Eternals against the Celestials: destroying countless lives is wrong, even as a means to an end. But despite the atrocities they’ve caused, can the Celestials really be considered evil?
The Prime Celestial, Arishem the Judge (portrayed by prolific voice actor David Kaye), tells Sersi that the creation of new Celestials is crucial to ensure the continued safety of the universe. And while the accuracy of this claim is currently unknown, it’s clear that the Celestials exist on a higher level than any beings previously seen in the MCU. To them, wiping out billions of mortals is no worse than stepping on an anthill. It certainly doesn’t make their actions just, but it still explains why they’re so willing to engineer such a destructive cycle. Their actions are not immoral, but rather operating on an alien standard of morality.
Eternals is a rare superhero story that arguably has no true villains at all. The antagonists are all just doing what it takes to fulfill what they see as the greater good — their motives aren’t rooted in selfishness or cruelty, merely a difference in perspective. And in the end, the day is saved not through force, but through compassion. Once again, the MCU pushes the boundaries of what kind of antagonists viewers can expect from a superhero movie.