Exclusive: Javier Bardem Has Joined Marvel As A Major Villain

According to our trusted and proven sources, Academy Award-winner Javier Bardem is set to become a major Marvel villain.

By Nathan Kamal | Published

This article is more than 2 years old

Now that Phase Four is in full swing, Marvel Studio is starting to bring in the big guns. We have reports of everyone from Cameron Diaz to Margot Robbie to Ryan Gosling looking to be brought into the Marvel Cinematic Universe, but this one has to be the most exciting so far. According to our trusted and proven sources, Spanish actor Javier Bardem has joined Marvel and will be playing a major villain. While there are many roles Javier Bardem could be playing as a Marvel Cinematic Universe villain, we are going to go ahead and speculate that he will be playing Nathaniel Essex, better known as Mister Sinister

Javier Bardem Marvel villain
Javier Bardem in No Country For Old Men
Mister Sinister

If Javier Bardem is going to be brought into Marvel as a villain, there are few more significant roles than Mister Sinister. While the character has not yet appeared in a live-action film, he has been hinted at or referenced in a number of Fox X-Men-related films, including X-Men: Dark Phoenix, The New Mutants, and Deadpool 2. Now that Fox has been acquired by Disney and its intellectual property rights to mutant characters available for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it is inevitable that he will be brought in eventually. Considering Mister Sinister has been built up in the Fox movies (not to mention Marvel Comics history) as a significant and mysterious figure, casting someone with the stature and gravitas of the Academy Award-winning Javier Bardem as one of Marvel’s most insidious villains would be a masterstroke. 

There is also the matter of how the X-Men and mutantkind in general will be brought into the MCU. So far, we know that there will definitely be a Deadpool 3 set in the MCU and Patrick Stewart’s Professor Charles Xavier (or an alternate version of the mutant leader) appeared briefly in Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, but otherwise, X-Men plans appear to be a closely held Marvel Studios secret. However, if they want to make the impact of mutant arrival felt the most significant, enlisting actors like Javier Bardem for the newly arrived heroes and villains will be vital.


Kicking off the Marvel Cinematic Universe X-Men franchise with Mister Sinister would also make a lot of sense. In most comics continuity, Mister Sinister is an ageless, mysterious scientist who is obsessed with the possibilities of genetics and has secretly manipulated the destiny of mutantkind from behind the scenes since the Victorian Age. Given that we have already seen Javier Bardem in old-timey costumes as a villain in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales, it is not that hard to picture him as a Marvel villain in a Victorian frock coat. He would be perfect as an obsessive and amoral scientist who is involved in the sudden appearances of the X-gene in the MCU, and sufficiently physically intimidating to serve as a primary antagonist against the X-Men. After years of live-action hints and appearances in the beloved X-Men cartoons, it feels like it is finally time for us to see Mister Sinister in action.