Thanos Has Died More Times In The MCU Than Marvel Fans May Realize

Following his introduction in 2012's "The Avengers," Thanos (Josh Brolin) was built up as the ultimate threat of the Infinity Saga. And he made good on his formidability by snapping away half of existence at the end of "Avengers: Infinity War." Everyone was brought back, and the Mad Titan was defeated in "Avengers: Endgame," but he made his mark. With all that build-up, it's odd that the Multiverse has shown characters killing Thanos pretty easily.

At this point, Thanos has officially died seven times in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, with two other instances where it's pretty clear he was about to bite the dust (more on that later). Naturally, he dies twice in "Endgame" — Thor (Chris Hemsworth) decapitates him at the beginning of the film while Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) snaps him away in the finale. Doctor Strange (Benedict Cumberbatch) may have only foreseen one way for the team to win out of 14,000,605 possibilities, but in alternate realities, other characters haven't had problems killing him. 

"Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" shows the Illuminati of Earth-838 impaling him on Titan. The remaining Thanos deaths have all been on "What If...?" Across various episodes, Thanos becomes a zombie, gets split in two by Ultron (Ross Marquand), dies at the hands of Ronan, and gets snapped away by Killmonger. They all show how it's possible to kill Thanos without needing to get every superhero around involved. 

"What If...?" Season 2 also has two honorable mentions for Thanos' death count. "What If... Iron Man Crashed Into the Grandmaster?" ends with Gamora (Cynthia McWilliams) attacking her father figure, but the story ends before we see if the Melt Stick works. "What If... Hela Found the Ten Rings?" shows Hela (Cate Blanchett) and Wenwu (Feodor Chin) making their way toward the genocidal maniac, where they would presumably kill him to bring about peace. With so many powerful deities shown through the Marvel Multiverse, perhaps it shouldn't be surprising that Thanos has met his doom numerous times outside the main timeline. And to be fair, the supervillain's been killed frequently within the pages of Marvel Comics as well.

Many Marvel Comics characters have bested Thanos, including Drax in the "Annihilation" storyline, written by Keith Griffin with art by Andrea Divito. The creator of Thanos, Jim Starlin, crafted a story where Adam Warlock emerges victorious over the antagonist by turning him into stone for "Marvel Two-In-One Annual" #2. Even Deadpool gets a chance to beat him in "Deadpool vs. Thanos" #4. Tim Seeley wrote the story with art from Elmo Bondoc, where the Merc with a Mouth gains the power of the Enigma Force to obliterate his opponent. 

With all due respect to Thanos, many powerful characters get killed repeatedly in the comics. Ultimately, it's just kind of cool for fans to see all the ways in which a legendary character can be defeated. Marvel's "What If...?" series on Disney+ seems to understand this, which may be why it continually goes back to this well. Plus, future seasons of "What If...?" could get even wackier, presenting new, wilder ideas on how to kill Thanos.