| “ | I'm not trying to conquer the universe... I'm perfecting it. | „ |
| ~ The High Evolutionary explaining his plans to Star-Lord, his most famous quote. |
| “ | THERE IS NO GOD! THAT'S WHY I STEPPED IN! | „ |
| ~ The High Evolutionary ragefully lashing out at his minions as he reveals his true colors to them about his self-proclaimed godhood, thus his most infamous quote. |
| “ | You thought you could escape me?! NO! You think you have some worth in and of yourself without me?! NO! YOU ARE AN ABOMINATION! NOTHING MORE THAN A STEP ON MY PATH, YOU FREAKISH LITTLE MONSTER! HOW DARE YOU THINK YOU ARE MORE, 8... 9... P... 1... 3?!! | „ |
| ~ The High Evolutionary's raging breakdown towards Rocket Raccoon in their final confrontation of the film. |
The High Evolutionary is the main antagonist of the 2023 Marvel Cinematic Universe superhero film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, the third and final installment of the Guardians of the Galaxy trilogy.
He is a space-faring cyborg alien scientist who longs to create a special society of perfects beings without any flaws at all at Counter-Earth, his own planet. To do so, the High Evolutionary founded OrgoCorp as his biogenetic company; it served as a front for his experiments on animals such as Rocket Raccoon and his friends Lylla, Floor and Teefs - painfully turning them into hyper-intelligent animals with cybernetics.
This soon led to Rocket escaping and then becoming a criminal after the Evolutionary killed his friends before coming to join the Guardians of the Galaxy, who eventually face the Evolutionary in their final mission. He is Rocket Raccoon's archenemy and creator.
He was portrayed by Chukwudi Iwuji.
What Makes Him Pure Evil?[]
In General[]
- While he believes he is a well-intentioned man who wants to make everything better to see what the ideal universe is and create a perfect and flawless society, the film shows that he is at his core a delusional narcissist who, as Rocket points out, hates things the way they are and wants to play God and will gruesomely punish those who fail to live up to his highly unreasonable expectations. This also makes him hypocritical since he refuses to acknowledge he himself is an imperfect organism.
- He is in no way capable of real care or love for others, as he objectifies his OrgoCorp employees, the Sovereign, and the Hellspawn to the same degree as his animals, who he cages and refuses to give them names in lieu of designation numbers and letters, and he objectifies everyone else too, considering that he always uses whoever he can to get his way. He is entirely indifferent to his right hand man, Theel, being in mortal danger by the enemy's hand. Furthermore, he only values Rocket for his high intelligence in accordance to his aforementioned objectification.
- Even though the MCU's heinous standards are astronomically high, the High Evolutionary's perfectionism-driven torture and atrocious experiments on defenseless animals are fairly unique, plus how he destroys every society he develops as soon as he deems them in any way contradictory to his unhealthy perfectionism, making him stand out as by far one of the darkest, vilest and cruelest villains in the MCU yet.
- Much like how Red Skull, Ronan the Accuser, Ego, the Supreme Intelligence, Mysterio, and General Dreykov were personally evil to Captain America, Drax the Destroyer, Star-Lord, Captain Marvel, Spider-Man, and Black Widow respectively, the High Evolutionary is a personal arch-nemesis towards Rocket Raccoon - as he was the one responsible for turning him into something he biologically wasn't, filling him with self-hatred and turning him into the wayward and angry-prone humanoid raccoon he was before the latter ultimately finding his place as a hero and it's shown to have a huge impact on him, as shown during his drunken rant in the first movie.
Background[]
- In the past, he kidnapped countless infant animals from Earth and painfully experimented on them, installing cybernetics into their bodies and mutating them into humanoid creatures known as "Humanimals", even incinerating them alive if they proved to be too dangerous to control after his experiments. Among these test subjects were a raccoon, an otter, a walrus, a rabbit, a pig and a bird, who later became known as Rocket Raccoon, Lylla, Teefs, Floor, War Pig and Behemoth, names the first four of them chose since the High Evolutionary never bothered to give them any, instead referring to them as numbers and letters.
- His torturous experiments on his test subjects, particularly with Rocket, were horrifying enough that even Nebula, a victim of nightmarish unethical cybernetic implantation, expressed her opinion that what the High Evolutionary did to Rocket was worse than what her adopted father Thanos put her through.
- Though he took Rocket's suggestions to his Humanimals, he then revealed that he would incinerate or otherwise imprison his test subjects for life. He mocked Rocket for naively believing that he would be to get his brain studied. He acted like this simply because he was outraged that Rocket figured out the flaw in his artificial evolution system instead of him, viewing this as a blow to his narcissistic ego.
- Upon discovering that Rocket and his best friend Lylla have escaped thanks to Rocket using a makeshift key, he sadistically shot and killed Lylla and ordered his minions to kill Teefs and Floor when Rocket tried to save them before heartlessly mocking Rocket for crying over Lylla's death by mimicking his crying and saying he "won the crying contest", causing Rocket to righteously lunge forward and furiously subject him to hideous disfigurement, which is played for absolute satisfaction.
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3[]
- He ordered the Sovereign to wake up their creation, Adam Warlock, earlier than expected from his cocoon, resulting in Warlock not having a mental capacity mature enough to be an effective soldier, but the Evolutionary still demanded Adam submit to his harsh demands. Then he sent him after the Guardians of the Galaxy to have his revenge with Rocket. This led to Adam wrecking Knowhere, hurting Nebula and nearly killing Rocket, prompting his fellow Guardians to start their latest mission to save his life.
- What's worse is that, he mocked Adam for his incompetence in spite of having recklessly awakened him prematurely and insisted there's something wrong with him beyond it. When Adam protested, he used his gravitational powers to crush Adam against a metallic door to force High Priestess Ayesha into compliance despite being aware that she treats Adam as her son and even though Adam's vulgar insult was called for word-for-word.
- He demanded that Ayesha and Adam find Rocket under the threat of destroying their civilization.
- He kidnapped hundreds of children all over the galaxy, keeping them caged for experimentation to create the Star Children. He even forced at least one of them to run in a hamster wheel-like device just as an extreme endurance test with barely any sleep, food or water.
- When Star-Lord and Groot confront him, he rudely ignores them until Star-Lord threatens Theel for Rocket’s pass key. He demands Rocket in exchange for the pass-key. Though the two Guardians realize that the High Evolutionary would not have honored this agreement and call him out on it.
- He ordered his minions to take off their mobile laboratory to their "new colony", razing all of Counter-Earth and killing every single Humanimal for failing to meet his expectations, rendering them extinct in the process, even saying that this was not the first time he had done this to the planets that he created.
- He captured Drax the Destroyer, Nebula and Mantis after they are found to have sneaked into his ship, having them caged and then thrown into a pit to be devoured by a trio of Abilisks that he had kidnapped, although the Abilisks would be redeemed and tamed thanks to Mantis.
- He unleashed the Hell Spawn, ordering them to kill everyone in Knowhere, characteristically feeling threatened by the severed head of a Celestial, one of the objectively real gods who fashioned worlds like Earth of pure cosmic energy, which wasted the ship's bargaining power and caused it to blow up, which also in the end, nearly led to Star Lord suffocating and freezing to death in the vacuum of space, which would've happened had Adam not saved him.
- In his own high intolerance for treason, he used a telekinetic wave to destroy the entire ship's cockpit with Vim, his Controller and his minions inside once they all order him to detach all broken sections of his mobile lab after the Guardians and Ravangers confront him in his ship due to his own arrogance, getting rid of his remaining underlings just for rightfully opposing him upon realizing how far his obsession over killing Rocket had taken over and his willingness to risk all their lives just to do so.
- Furthermore, they didn't know he wanted to be a god until moments before they were murdered.
- When his ship was about to be destroyed, he ordered his remaining crew to prioritize killing the Guardians rather than escape, and left the Star Children to die as he earlier dismissed them as worthless for not being as smart as Rocket.
- He followed Rocket into his ship's room full of all the other animals that he used for his experiments, including Rocket's original raccoon cousins, to experiment with and furiously started fighting him with his powers in an attempt to stop him from ruining his plans even further while telling Rocket that he's nothing more than a freakish experiment, before all of the Guardians come to Rocket's aide and give the High Evolutionary a well-deserved beating.
- And while Drax seemingly has second thoughts later and opts to rescue him despite wishing to kill him originally, he was merely following Rocket's orders of giving him the undeserved mercy he denied to his test subjects (with no indications he even thanked Drax for saving him), resulting in the High Evolutionary being thrown into Knowhere's prison for the rest of his life, which is also played for satisfaction.
Trivia[]
- In an interview with ExtraTV during the premiere of Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3, director/writer James Gunn discussed about the High Evolutionary's Pure Evil status. He opined that the Evolutionary is by far the cruelest and most sadistic Marvel film villain to date due to how negatively he affects Rocket Raccoon, Lylla and their friends, with his actor Chukwudi Iwuji revealing to BlackTreeTV that Gunn and him made sure to not provide the High Evolutionary with any type of sympathy to make the audience care for him like with Erik Killmonger or Thanos to emphasize how evil the Evolutionary is.
- He is the only characterization of the High Evolutionary to be Pure Evil.
- The High Evolutionary is also the second Pure Evil of Phase 5 following Kang the Conquerer, as well as the third Pure Evil of the Multiverse Saga, after General Dreykov and Infinity Ultron.
External Links[]
- High Evolutionary on the Villains Wiki
- High Evolutionary on the Marvel Cinematic Universe Wiki
- High Evolutionary on the Disney Wiki
- High Evolutionary on the Hate Sink Wiki
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 Pure Evils
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