Top 20 Worst Things That Happened to Deadpool

Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for the most disturbing and terrible incidents to happen to Wade Wilson, AKA Deadpool. We’ll only be exploring the unsettling moments in the comics and usually the main 6-1-6 version, with a couple of exceptions. Which comic book character should we do next? Captain America? Superman? Wonder Woman? Howard the Duck? Or someone else? Let us know below!

#20: Doing "Buried" Before Ryan Reynolds

It’s weird how long before Reynolds strapped on Deadpool’s katanas, the two have had a long connection. In 2010, the actor was locked in a box for the film “Buried.” Yet, beyond being one of the best single-location movies, Wade did it first. In “Deadpool #49” in 2000, the Merc with a Mouth was betrayed by love interest Ananastasia Rinaldi. When he regained his faculties, Deadpool was buried underground in a coffin. Trying to see in the dark, he used a lighter, believing he was wearing a fire-proof suit. Spoiler, he wasn’t, and he was engulfed in fire. Ananastasia eventually got him out, but he was badly burnt until his healing factor kicked in.

#19: The Incursion

“Deadpool #45” in 2015 was epic. DP took away the comedy – mostly – as he laid siege against ULTIMATUM for attacking his family and friends. Wade Wilson showed his frightening and tactical side as he slew swaths of minions and took out Flag-Smasher. By the end, Wade ended the Deadpool character. To celebrate his new beginnings, he took his friends and family on a boat trip. Yet, instead of him being able to enjoy this newfound…well, joy, the incursion happened. As part of the “Time Runs Out” storyline, the 6-1-6 Earth was set to collide with the Ultimate Universe Earth. Each character burnt up from the destruction. While Wade was content with this ending, it cut short his chance at a normal, happy life.

#18: Assaulted by Typhoid Mary

During volume 3 of “Deadpool,” the title star struggled with anger. But Wade did have one light, his love for Siryn, Theresa Cassidy, even if she didn’t share those feelings. However, she seemingly changed her mind and spent the night with him when he was valuable. The next morning, “Siryn” turned off the image inducer and showed she was actually Typhoid Mary. Wade struggled with this assault while the villain had no remorse, instead mocking him. He threw up and took a shower, driving him deeper into the dark recesses of his mind. Wade took out his trauma on Blind Al and Weasel by putting them in “The Box,” a room filled with sharp objects.

#17: Destroying the Marvel Universe…Twice

Deadpool is a tragic yet funny character, right? Nothing too horrible happens that he can’t recover from? Nope! In “Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe,” DP of Earth-12101 is taken to a psychiatric hospital. Instead of getting treated, a disguised Psycho-Man breaks Wade, causing a new, sinister voice to take over. He goes on a vicious rampage, taking out villains and heroes, even good friends like Spider-Man. Sadly, this isn’t the only time this happened. In “Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe Again,” Deadpool of Earth-TRN664 heard the code phrase by MODOK, releasing his sleeper agent status. While imagining happy scenarios, in reality, he slays anyone in front of him. To make it more disturbing, DP even tries asking for help as he can’t stop.

#16: Killing Versions of Himself

If the multiverse was real and we got into some hijinks where we had to wipe out different versions of ourselves, we would have a long, deep existential crisis. Well, that’s what happened to Marvel’s Deathstroke in 2013’s “Deadpool Kills Deadpool.” Wade teamed up with good Deadpools to battle an evil corp of Deadpools. He witnessed newfound friends perish on the battlefield, such as PandaPool, as well as take the lives of various villainous versions of himself, including Ultimate clear-facemask Deadpool. By the end of the story, Wade was now the only Deadpool in the multiverse. While this made him very unique, it also made him alone, one of his biggest fears.

#15: The Destruction of his Favorite Chimichanga Shop

Beyond his pointy katanas, one of Deadpool’s biggest other loves is chimichangas. At this point, it’s essentially one of his catchphrases since he says it so much. In 2011’s “Deadpool #44,” Wade finds a super-fan who has collected his body parts over the years in her fridge. Very understandably disturbed, he throws them out. However, they regenerate and form into the mismatched Evil Deadpool. A couple of issues later, E-Pool shows how nefarious he is when he arrives at Wade’s favorite chimichanga restaurant in New Jersey. Prime Deadpool was on his way there since he’s been hankering for them. However, when he gets there, Wade discovers his evil counterpart has set the place ablaze, destroying one of his few joys.

#14: Killing His Parents

Oh, boy. So, Deadpool has a very confusing early life when it comes to his parents. But 2014’s “Deadpool #34” gave us what actually happened. As part of the “Original Sin” event, where many secrets of the Marvel universe were exposed, we see Wade under Butler’s command – more on him later. With Sabretooth’s help, he and DP go on a mission to test Butler’s mental control. While Wade is experiencing déjà vu at the location, he doesn’t know why. Later, he completes his grim mission. Deadpool enters a house, drinks, and examines items, all while destroying alarms and cutting the gas. He then sets a fire, causing an explosion, ending his parents’ lives. Even Sabretooth felt guilty about this.

#13: Betrayed by His Hero

Since he was a kid, Deadpool has idolized Captain America, Steve Rogers. Cap has even helped Wade in missions, forming a bond. So, without realizing his hero was turned into Hydra Cap during “Secret Empire,” he sent Wade on a mission to assassinate Phil Coulson. He, sadly, did just that, believing Cap couldn’t possibly be evil. (Xref) After Deadpool took Coulson’s life, this brought him into conflict with his close friend Emily Preston. The LMD SHIELD agent attacked Wade for what he did. During the fight, he got the upper hand and destroyed her, leaving his daughter without a surrogate mom. Deadpool eventually got real Cap to fix Preston, but his association with Hydra and his deeds ruined his reputation.

#12: The Death of His Child's Mother

2013’s “Deadpool” story arc, “The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly,” is one of the best and saddest in the character’s life. Deadpool discovered that Butler, AKA Bartol Utler, who was involved in the Weapon Plus Program that made him the Merc, had abducted Wade’s daughter, Ellie, and her mother, Carmelita. Teaming up with Captain America and Wolverine, the trio helped destroy a North Korean camp where Butler conducted horrible experiments on mutants. During the facility's destruction, Deadpool made a horrible discovery as Logan attempted to deter him. He uncovered Carmelita's body in a pit. Wade got his revenge on Butler. However, he wouldn’t look for Ellie as he believed she was better not knowing him.

#11: Constant Cancer

With a lack of options, Deadpool famously signed up for the Weapon Plus Program to cure his terminal cancer. While he wouldn’t perish from the disease, instead grafting Wolverine’s healing factor into him, Wade never lost his cancer. Essentially, Logan’s mutated cells attached to the cancer cells. When Wade is injured, the good cells are replaced with cancer cells, which then perish and are replaced again. Even with a high tolerance, he's likely in pain constantly. However, those cancer cells seemingly help keep DP’s regenerative abilities in check. In 2008’s “Deadpool #3,” a group of Skrulls were given Wade’s power. However, without the cancer, their cells grew exceptionally. They developed uncontrollable growths throughout their bodies and ended up exploding.

#10: Getting Bifurcated by Thor and Luke Cage

Things can get hectic inside Wade’s noggin, but having another psychopath with regenerative abilities in there just makes it worse. When Wade discovered that he’d been accidentally merged with the supervillain Madcap, who had been whispering in his ear as one of his text-box voices for years, he needed to get him out pronto. There are a few ways he could have gone about this, but his solution was for Thor and Luke Cage to each grab one of his arms and pull. Deadpool got split down the middle, with one half regenerating into Wade, and the other half becoming Madcap. Looks painful, but worth it.

#9: Feeding Archangel with Pieces of his Own Body

Deadpool is known for many things, his sharp comedic timing and impeccable fashion sense among them. Being a team player though? Not so much. But this is one time Wade really took one for the team. While on a mission with X-Force, Wade and Archangel were both attacked by Apocalypse’s horseman famine, who infected them both with a wasting disease. Wade was able to shrug it off, but Angel wasn’t so lucky. In order to keep his teammate alive, Wade started slicing off small pieces of himself and feeding them to his down-and-out colleague. Pretty touching, but in a way that makes us feel a bit ill.

#8: Having a Grenade go off in his Stomach

It’s surprising that the Great Lakes Avengers, a team of lovable losers dedicated to protecting the Great Lakes region using their not-terribly-impressive superpowers, would give Deadpool a run for his money. But during the events of “Civil War”, the team forced Deadpool to get a little creative in his approach, much to his own detriment. During a scrap with the team of underdogs, Wade turned himself into a living bomb by pulling the pin on a grenade and swallowing it. The results were not pretty, with Wade’s stomach getting a short-lived renovation into much more of an “open-concept” kind of organ. And to make matters worse, all it really did was mess up the GLA’s pad.

#7: Breaking his Own Bones and Chewing his Arm Off

Your best bet for getting Deadpool out of your hair for a while is generally to incapacitate or restrain him since we all know how well trying to kill him usually works. When Wade found himself in one such predicament, he had to go to extreme lengths to escape. Chained up and hung in mid-air, Wade’s only solution for escaping captivity was to break each and every one of his bones, allowing him to eventually slip out. For the record, that’s around 206 bones that Wade had to break. But he wasn’t done yet - he also had to bite his own arm off to escape. Yikes.

#6: Regenerating Out of His Right Hand

Growing an entirely new body from scratch is a long and uncomfortable process, even when you have a starting position like a severed hand to start with. After seemingly perishing, Wade’s mortal remains, that being his right hand, were buried. But Death wasn’t ready for Wade to join her just yet, and his hand started regenerating into a new body. Unfortunately, Wade regained consciousness midway through this process and had to wait while his bones, organs and other assorted bits and pieces grew back. The poor guy didn’t even have a magazine to read while it was going on. Uncomfortable and boring is a terrible combination.

#5: Getting Speared by an Elephant

You’d think that hunting down zombified versions of ex-US presidents would be a cakewalk. But it seems everyone forgets about Teddy Roosevelt. While on the trail of the 26th Commander in Chief, Deadpool had the animal occupants of a zoo unleashed upon him. Unfortunately, this led to him getting speared by the tusk of an elephant. Thankfully Deadpool and the elephant were able to put their differences aside and team up to stop Roosevelt...at least until the poor beast got electrocuted.

#4: Getting Atomized by The Hulk

When the Jade Giant hits someone, it’s usually someone tough enough to take the blow without getting instantly reduced to a fine red mist. After all, his sparring partners are usually tougher than normal folk. But this isn’t the case with Deadpool, who demonstrated in gruesome detail what happens when someone as strong as The Hulk takes a swing at someone without invulnerability. As a part of a scheme to end his life once and for all, Wade antagonized the angriest Avengers, eventually leading to The Hulk completely demolishing him in one powerful punch. In another story, he even tore Deadpool apart, but Wade managed to bounce back from both run-ins with the Incredible Hulk.

#3: Getting Dismembered by Carnage

Some things just go together, like peanut butter and jelly or Ryan Reynolds and skin-tight bodysuits. And who better to pair with Deadpool than Carnage, the similarly deranged symbiote who can turn his limbs into a variety of blades and stabbing instruments? Deadpool spent the better part of an entire miniseries battling the symbiotic baddie, and Carnage put Wade’s healing factor to the test time and time again. The worst of the worst had to be when he used his powers to slice and dice the Saskatchewan native into tiny pieces. Of course, Deadpool managed to piece himself together again with the help of four symbiotes, so it wasn’t all bad in the end.

#2: Becoming a Dinner for Zombies

Zombie apocalypses may seem fun at first, but nobody’s more aware of the downsides of having the world reduced to cannibalistic ghouls more than Deadpool. After all, if everyone is a zombie how’s he supposed to get paid to kill people? So when Deadpool had the chance to end the zombie apocalypse, he took it, and in typically gory fashion. After drinking a serum that would cure the undead’s craving for human flesh, Deadpool allowed himself to be devoured by the zombie horde. We’re just surprised that Deadpool would do something so selfless...

#1: The 800 Years he Spent Trapped in a Fridge

As we’ve revealed over the course of this list, Deadpool has had some pretty horrific things happen to him over the years. But this one is particularly brutal even for him. After seeking shelter from a nuclear attack in a large industrial fridge, Wade became trapped when rubble sealed the door shut. Deadpool remained trapped in that fridge for a whopping 800 years, stuck in a cycle of death by starvation, followed by resurrection, and then starving to death again. There’s grievous bodily harm and then there’s knowing that you’ve spent the majority of your existence trapped inside a fridge starving to death. Understandably, it only made him go crazier.