A Marvel Villain's Powers Are Secretly Useless

The Mimic Master may be one of Marvel's most popular villains, but his powers have a secret weakness - meaning he's always going to be defeated.

Marvel villains' master impersonator may have a formidable reputation, but an unnoticed flaw in his abilities renders them practically useless. Former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Anthony Masters is one of Marvel's most dangerous mercenaries. Over the years, he has brushed shoulders with countless superheroes, fought with Captain America and others, and fought wits with Spider-Man. Villains are often trained using the experience and skills of the Mimic Master, who often works for evil armies.

The Foreman's secret lies in his unique memory. His brain has a near-perfect memory of any action he sees, and his body can replicate it perfectly. He can even imitate movies and TV shows; hilariously, Overwatch even copied James Bond. But the imitator's mind can only retain so much knowledge, which means his brain prioritizes that knowledge -- and erases other memories. Events, people, places - Foreman forgets them all and moves on to new moves. This means he lives a lonely life, unable to maintain relationships or friendships.

As skilled as the Foreman may be, there is a logical weakness to his abilities. The main problem is that he replicates the moves he sees, but he cannot replicate the thinking and training behind them. the best Martial artists train their entire lives, and they can instantly assess a situation to figure out which move to use. However, Foreman is limited to the reactions he sees, and he has no choice but to trust his body to choose between possible options. He tries to solve this problem by watching people for a while, checking all the footage he can find of top martial artists and hand-to-hand fighters. But he can't learn with them, only from them, so his knowledge is always based on the tactics they had in the past - not the tactics they learned. The ability to imitate a master is much more limited than most fans realize.

Taskmaster's Ability To Copy Fighting Styles is Very Surface-Level

Compounding the problem is the fact that Overwatch spends a lot of time learning from Superman. For example, he wears a shield because he mimics Captain America; but any moves he replicates would be poor substitutes, since his shield is not the same weight as the vibranium-rich shield used by Steve Rogers, and he Lacks the super strength of the Stars and Stripes Avengers. This means that the movements copied by the imitation master are always far less effective than the ones he saw. Taskmaster also spends a lot of time Study heroes with enhanced senses, such as Daredevil - his radar sense gives him a supernatural awareness of his environment. While he might emulate Daredevil's agility, Foreman lacks radar, so he'll never be able to have the solid foothold of the Dreadnought.

This may explain why imitation masters tend to lose against skilled or powerful opponents. He's powerful enough to take on normal foes, but he's rarely been able to defeat the superheroes of his dreams. However, the master imitator may forget about these failures, which means he never learns from them. This is perhaps the ultimate weakness of the master of mimicry - it means the hero always wins.