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Archenemy

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This article is about a main supervillain in a rogues gallery. For Archenemy (disambiguation), see Archenemy (disambiguation).

An archenemy, archfoe, archvillain or archnemesis (sometimes spelled arch-enemy, arch-foe, arch-villain or arch-nemesis) is the principal enemy of a character in a work of fiction, compare nemesis, often described as the hero's worst enemy. The reason as to why the particular villain stands out more than the other rogues gallery villains varies, although they may be the hardest enemy to fight, the hero's opposite, the most often recurring villain, always bearing the most dangerous plots or poses the biggest threat, such as global domination in comparison to burglary, was once a friend of the hero, or is the source of constant tragedy, pain and horror to the hero.

It should be noted that just because a villain is a hero's arch-enemy does not necessarily mean that they are their greatest, as there are often other enemies who may be considered more powerful, resourceful, intelligent and/or evil than the archvillain, or perhaps has larger-scale goals. For example in the Superman comics, Darkseid, who threatens the entire universe, is a much greater threat than Lex Luthor who usually just threatens Metropolis and sometimes the world. For these reasons, heroes team up with their archenemy to take down the greater threat (see below).

Superhero archenemies


Although there is usually only one archenemy in a particular superhero's rogues gallery, there are sometimes more than one, such as:

Archenemies outside of superheroes

Although superheroes mainly have archenemies, other works of fiction have them, such as these:

Examples of heroes joining forces with their arch enemies to fight a more powerful threat

Heroes who do not have archenemies

The following heroes have no archenemies:

Religious archenemies

An archenemy is used, in religion, often as the evil incarnate that plagues or tortures the god or gods. In Judaism, the archenemy is Satan and Anti-Semitism, most notably Hitler, the holocaust and the Diaspora. In sects of Christianity, the archenemy may be considered Satan, the Antichrist, the people who crucified Jesus or, in a few sects, the disciple Judas Iscariot. In Hinduism, the gods' archenemy is evil in general, although each individual person's archenemy is their karma. In Buddhism, the archenemy is generally desire and suffering. Scientology considers psychology and psychiatry to be a major enemy.

Debatable Archenemies

Although most people would consider the Joker to be Batman's archenemy, Joe Chill is the archenemy of Bruce Wayne. Also, the villain Hush has scared Batman noticably more than any other foe, even Bane, who has even broken Batman's back. Godzilla's archenemy could be considered King Ghidorah, Mechagodzilla or Destroyah. (Both Destroyah and Mechagodzilla have killed Godzilla, though due to radiation from the air or from Rodan, Godzilla has always been revived.) Spider-Man's archenemy has, for a long time, been considered the Green Goblin. However, Sandman has left Spider-Man running and hiding out of fear, although due to being excluded from the Spider-Man: The Animated Series, the supervillain Sandman has fallen out of the spotlight (although he is shown on the trailer of Spider-Man 3, a strong indication of his next appearance). The Green Goblin 2- Harry Osborn- has brought and twisted moral confusion and psychological abuse upon the web-slinger. It could also be noted, however, that many debatable archenemies could in fact be regarded as an example of the "more powerful threat" listed above.

Pronunciation

The correct way to pronounce 'archenemy' is (art-ch-in-e-mee). However, there is a second pronunciation, which, although it is incorrect, is somewhat fluent. This incorrect pronunciation is (ark-in-e-mee). The Japanese use this pronunciation of "arch" (アーク Āku) in borrowed English words (アークエネミー Ākuenemī). アーチ (Āchi) would refer to an arch bridge or an archdam. The proper pronunciation would be アーチエネミー (Āchienemī) in katakana.

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