Thanos (Doppelganger) (Earth-616)

When the Magus, the dark personality of Adam Warlock, sought to conquer the universe, he first paid a visit to Anthropomorpho in the Dimension of Manifestations to create doppelgängers of every superhero on Earth.^[1]

Unlike most of his doppelgängers who were distorted visions of the heroes they were posing as, the Thanos duplicate looked exactly like the real Thanos. The Thanos shade acted as a confidant to Magus as well as one of his foot soldiers. When Magus began his plan to create a massive cosmic containment unit in another dimension and struck down Eternity, he sent the Thanos shade to observe the real Thanos in order to pique his curiosity and trick Thanos into finding the Magus and learn his plans. This was all to send Thanos away to his foe Adam Warlock with a message that he was coming.^[2] The Thanos doppelgänger then observed as the Magus sent doppelgängers after Spider-Man, Mister Fantastic, Iron Man, and Wolverine.^[3] Ultimately the dopplegangers of Mister Fantastic and Iron Man succeeded in replacing their counterparts as part of the Magus' plans to destroy Earth's heroes.^[2]

They then observed how Thanos, Warlock, and his Infinity Watch were attempting to access the Infinity Well in Death's domain. They also slowed a party consisting of Galactus, Dr. Strange, Nova, and the Silver Surfer from locating Magus' hideout by tracing his energy source.^[4] Meanwhile, the evil Reed gathered the members of the both the East and West Coast Avengers, the X-Men, X-Factor, Alpha Flight, the New Warriors, the Hulk, and Daredevil together at the Four Freedoms Plaza to discuss the crisis. The impostors were exposed when both Daredevil and Wolverine outed both Mr. Fantastic and Iron Man as impostors. As a battle broke out between the heroes, the evil Reed finished activated a gamma bomb to try and destroy them all.^[5][6][4] The heroes were rescued thanks to the quick thinking of the Invisible Woman and Thor who were able to deflect the blast into space saving all their lives. The impostors of Reed and Iron Man were rescued by the Magus. Seeing the doppelgänger led the heroes to believe that the Magus was working in league with the real Thanos.^[7][8][9]

As the Magus continued his plans, the Thanos shade informed him of the impending arrival of Galactus and his party, leading to the Magus destroying the ship carrying them. He also informed the Magus that Thanos and the Infinity Watch were en route to their location as well.^[9] The Thanos duplicate also informed Magus of how Earth's heroes who survived the assassination attempt were also tracking their location.^[10] When the Infinity Watch and Earth's heroes all arrived at a crossroads between their dimension and the one the Magus was hiding in, the Thanos shade also unleashed an army of doppelgangers to keep the heroes busy.^[9] Detecting the arrival of Dr. Doom and Kang, the faux Thanos tried to warn his master, but these warnings were ignored.^[11] They later turned their attention to the battle between the heroes and their evil duplicates, until the battle was interrupted by the arrival of Galactus.^[12] The Thanos shade then tried to spy on them locally, but was forced to retreat when the real Thanos almost detected his presence. He returned to the Magus to inform him that they were going to attempt to get the Living Tribunal to allow the Infinity Gauntlet to be active again. When this was done, the Magus and his Thanos duplicate kidnapped Adam Warlock and the Infinity Gauntlet.^[12][11]

Later when the gathered heroes arrived at the Magus' headquarters, Thanos and his doppelganger crossed paths and Thanos soon learned that his shade also inherited his desire for universal conquest. The pair decided to work together to destroy the Magus. However in order to penetrate the door into the Magus' throne room, the Thanosi realized that one had to die in order for the other to penetrate the central chamber.^[13] The two versions of Thanos fought, with the real Thanos receiving secret assistance from the Invisible Woman, leading to his victory.^[14] As he slew his double, Thanos realized that the Magus stole his personal drive and determination in order to create this shade. When the Thanos doppelgänger was reborn as a butterfly, the real Thanos ate it to regain the lost portions of his personality.^[15] Ultimately, the Magus was defeated and expelled into the Soul Gem by Adam Warlock.^[16]