Vulture (Marvel Cinematic Universe)


 * NOTE: This article is about the incarnation of Vulture from the Marvel Cinematic film series. The mainstream version can be found here: Vulture.

"You forget any of this happened. And don't you ever, ever, interfere with my business again. 'Cause if you do, I will kill you and everybody you love. I will kill you dead! That what I'll do to protect my family, Pete. You understand?"

- Toomes threatening Peter, should he stand in his way. "Those people, Pete. The people up there. The rich and the powerful. They do whatever they want. Guys like us, like you and me, they don't care about us. We build their roads. We fight all their wars and everything. They don't care about us. We have to pick up after them. We have to eat their table scraps. That's how it is."

- Toomes to Peter.

Adrian Toomes, also known as Vulture, is the main antagonist of the 2017 film Spider-Man: Homecoming.

He was the CEO of Bestman Salvage until he was driven out of business when Tony Stark and the U.S. Government founded the Department of Damage Control, so he used the remains of Chitauri and Ultron Sentinel technology to become a black market weapons dealer and obtained a vulture-themed flying suit.

He was portrayed by Michael Keaton, who also played Betelgeuse, Carter Hayes, Chick Hicks in Disney/Pixar's Cars, Ken, Raymond Sellars, and V.A. Vadevere.

Personality
Adrian Toomes was apparently a kind and hardworking man who did what was best for his family. However, after losing his job, he became poor, calculating, disgruntled and a salvaging shop owner based in New York City who arms himself with dangerous Chitauri technology, specifically a pair of mechanical wings for his revenge on Tony Stark for muscling him out of his government deal and for other criminal purposes. He comes into conflict with Spider Man in the film and whilst simply seeing him as a nuisance initially he began to show a slight bit of respect for him after the latter saved his daughter's life (despite still threatening to kill him for intervening with his work). Even after being defeated by the hero, Toomes chose not to give away Spider-Man's secret identity that he deduced since Peter Parker had saved both his daughter and himself.

Powers and Abilities
Toomes is a normal human who lacked superpowers of his own, but makes it up with his Vulture Exo-Suit which granted him ability to fly, superhuman agility, superhuman speed, superhuman strength, and superhuman durability which created with help of Phineas Mason aka. Tinkerer. The suit consists of bomber uniform, and metallic body armor, outfitted with a pair of talons on the feet, a winged detachable steel harness to fly, and a pair of controllers with magnetic lock device to manually control the wings, and modified flight helmet that possesses HUD system. The suit also have decoy drones that can distract radars, remote control system to control the suit without need to wear it, claws on the feet harness to carry heavy objects, and feather blade on the wings.

The Vulture suit that Toomes wore however, had one weakness: Alien technology within the suit is known to become volatile and malfunctioned when exposed to high levels of radiation or electrical power, including the kind emitted by arc reactor cores.

Reception
Most critics and fans have considered Michael Keaton's Vulture to be one of Spider-Man Homecoming's biggest strengths. Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called Michael Keaton's performance as the Vulture "one of the strongest, most sympathetic villains of the entire series". Tufayel Ahmed of Newsweek stated that the Vulture is "robustly served in the script" and that Michael Keaton "elevates the part with a deft balance of considered dramatic choices and zany comic book fun". TT Stern-Enzi of CityBeat "Keaton’s sneaky and thoroughly menacing performance is what’s needed for this film". Kristy Puchko of Comic Book Resources praised the Vulture as "the best MCU villain” since Loki.

Tim Brayton of Alternative Ending called the Vulture "the best villain in any E-ticket comic book movie since at the very least Tom Hardy's Bane in The Dark Knight Rises". Matthew Pejkovic called the Vulture "as domineering and intimidating a villain as seen in the Marvel Universe yet." and stating this is "thanks to Keaton’s menacing performance." Linda Cook of Quad City Times stated "Keaton is superb as a super-villain whose motives are complex but understandable." Allyson Johnson of Cambridge Day called the Vulture "the best villain of any Marvel film since Loki". Kyle Anderson of Nerdist said "Keaton as the Vulture is perhaps the best villain in the entirety of comic book movies, up there with Tom Hiddleston’s Loki or Heath Ledger’s Joker."

Robert Roten of Laramie Movie Scope called the Vulture "a more complex, believable villain than one usually sees in these kinds of films". IGN stated that the Vulture is "quite a timely villain" and that he "can be, in his own way, as relatable as Peter". However they also stated that the Vulture is "never really as fully fleshed out as he could have been", but finally stated that he "does manage to elude the Marvel movie villain streak of hampering a fine actor with a weak role".

Mike Ryan of Uproxx stated "Michael Keaton is at his villainous best" and says that "What’s interesting about Toomes is that he knows he’s a low-rent criminal that is under the radar of The Avengers. He’s not trying to take over the world, he just wants money so that he can buy his family nice things. That’s really it."

Screen Rant ranked the Vulture as one of the 8 Best MCU Villains, calling him a "criminal genius" and "a common man with a backstory that most can relate to". They also praised how "he has a personal connection to Peter Parker", Keaton's "menacing performance" and his "very cool costume".

WatchMojo ranked the Vulture as #2 on their "Top 10 Things Spider-Man: Homecoming Got Right" list.

Trivia

 * Keaton appeared in movies from both Marvel Cinematic Universe and DC thus far, having played Vulture and Batman, respectively.
 * This role is one reason why Keaton didn't reprise his role as Chick Hicks in Cars 3.

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