Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

That's actually All Star Superman. He's a bit over the top, but it was so well written and drawn, it worked.

 

~Rex

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Well, mentioning Broly, I think DBZ characters would probably max out at your level 9 maybe level 10. Their big danger is there ability to blast the planet into scrap. THough, I also admit I didnt watch GT or the movies past the 9th (the one I believe between Broly's first and second appearance).

 

Personally, increased power levels didnt look all that more powerful after Freeza got killed off. And Freeza at least show some crazy TK abilities at times, so it could be questioned whether his STR was physical or TK-enhanced I suppose.

 

Course, I always wondered What if Superman vs. DBZ character (hard to see a scenario Goku would fight him, so we'd have to ask Vegeta, Freeza, Cell, Buu, Broly etc) would be like. I am just not sure lifting a planet is so effective when your opponent is likely gonna just explode it in your face. Just saying.

 

There's a scene of a unpowered Goku training with 40 tons of weights (10 per limb). He's struggling until he goes SSJ and then has no problem. Vegita would regularly train in the 100 G room, which meant he weight roughly 15,000 to 17,500 pounds and was still able to move, punch, kick, and so on (not to mention breath and simply stand up!)

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Certain characters in Battle Angel: Last Order have stuuupid levels of STR, and I think Seperoth from Final Fantasy VII was supposed to be really, really strong. Not sure about other anime series. Most of the super strong characters are only 30-40 in HERO terms.

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Except for, Ultra Man, The Guyver, and A-ko.

 

~Rex

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Except for, Ultra Man, The Guyver, and A-ko.

 

~Rex

 

*BANG**BANG**BANG*

 

That's me slamming my head on my desk for forgetting A-ko.

 

Okay, Ultraman doesn't count as he's a live-action character, not anime. Oddhat knows those better. What little I know of Guyver says yeah. he's like Battle Angel strong. And I gave A-ko a 75 STR since she tosses MBTs around like I'd toss an empty shoebox.

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Ultraman counts. He's had several Anime's. The Ultraman was the first one and ran 50 Episodes from the middle of 1979 to 1980. And you Forgot A-Ko?! For Shame. How could you forget the Daughter of Clark Kent and Diana Prince?

 

~Rex

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

I know... I know.

[Bloodstone]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Yeah! Spit it out!! Superman isn't the only one who wants to know!

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary adds - and while you're at it, who the heck are you and these other people? and are you going to shut the machine off or just leave Superman standing there holding it all day?

 

This is from All Star Superman #1. It's a series of 12 tales set in it's own continuity. It was written by Grant Morrison and the art is by Frank Quitely. Very modern Silver Age stuff.

 

In this scene, Superman is being tested at P.R.O.J.E.C.T. The man in the technicolor labcoat is Dr Leo Quintum.

 

Superman has just come back from outer space, where he saved the good Doctor and his crew during the first manned mission to the Sun.

 

Lex Luthor was using this historic event as a trap to kill Superman.

 

Dr Quintum is about to tell Superman that Lex's plan worked. He's dying and only has about a year to live

 

And no, they don't really have to shut off the machine. As you can see in the second panel, Superman overloaded it and broke it when he straightened out his arm

[lemming]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

I know... I know.

 

Your fine is 12 cat girls.

[Enforcer84]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Am I mistaken or are all of these characters riffs on Superman of some stripe or other? Kind of funny.

 

For top brick, I'd call it a tossup between Superman and the Hulk.

 

yeah, or Captain Marvel.

You can say that Supes had his roots in the Gladiator character.

Captain Marvel may have flown first...which in some eyes seperates Supes from Gladiator, so the "Superstrong, invulnerable, fast guy who can fly" was actually the big red cheese and that everyone since has been riffing of him.

[Enforcer84]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

I'd go with Superman. Hulk never chucked around planets (at least that I remember). Course' date=' Marvel seems a bit less amped on the STR scale overall.[/quote']

 

We could point out that Marvel was never so daft as to allow someone to 'grab a planet'; but you're right.

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Your fine is 12 cat girls.

 

Over my dead body!

 

(looks out window)

 

Or totally snowed in body....

[Matt the Bruins]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

That's actually All Star Superman. He's a bit over the top, but it was so well written and drawn, it worked.

 

Heh. Not as over-the-top as the Silver Age version of Superman though. He occasionally moved weights about 35 times as large as the mentioned value.

 

I seem to recall the Spectre throwing a star at an opponent in one of his 1970s stories, but despite being drawn as if he were a baseball pitcher flinging a fastball that really falls under the cosmic power heading rather than simple brute strength.

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Heh. Not as over-the-top as the Silver Age version of Superman though. He occasionally moved weights about 35 times as large as the mentioned value.

 

I seem to recall the Spectre throwing a star at an opponent in one of his 1970s stories, but despite being drawn as if he were a baseball pitcher flinging a fastball that really falls under the cosmic power heading rather than simple brute strength.

 

Again, this is why I avoided DC like the plague back in the day. Marvel might have Galactus, Phoenix and other cosmic being who have this level of power, but they used more "realistic" means to show what they could do.

[Checkmate]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Again' date=' this is why I avoided DC like the plague back in the day. Marvel might have Galactus, Phoenix and other cosmic being who have this level of power, but they used more "realistic" means to show what they could do.[/quote']

Yeah I suppose, but what really bothered me about Marvel, wasn't so much about the muscles but the Mental powers. For example you mentioned Phoenix. During the Mutant Massacre, there was this Morlock that was possessed by Malice. He had the power to absorb other people into his body. It was gross and made him powerful yadda yadda yadda. Marvel Girl (without the Phoenix power) read his mind and discovered that if the bodies stayed in him a few minutes longer, all those people would die and be part of him forever, so she reached out and killed him by shutting off his mind. Now if she, and all the psi's as strong or stronger could do the same thing, yet no one does. I dunno there are things like that on both sides I just sort of overlook them as part of the genre

[lapsedgamer]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Yeah I suppose' date=' but what really bothered me about Marvel, wasn't so much about the muscles but the Mental powers. For example you mentioned Phoenix. During the Mutant Massacre, there was this Morlock that was possessed by Malice. He had the power to absorb other people into his body. It was gross and made him powerful yadda yadda yadda. Marvel Girl (without the Phoenix power) read his mind and discovered that if the bodies stayed in him a few minutes longer, all those people would die and be part of him forever, so she reached out and killed him by shutting off his mind. Now if she, and all the psi's as strong or stronger could do the same thing, yet no one does. I dunno there are things like that on both sides I just sort of overlook them as part of the genre[/quote']

 

Oh, Marvel has its moments too. The thing with comics is that it is hard to have a consistent read on a character's power levels because the writers often get carried away. They go and write something that conforms to the rule of cool , but totally changes the scope of the character. At that point, subsequent writers can either ignore what was written or use it as a new set point. As time goes on characters get more and more powerful until someone says enough and there's an Infinite Crisis on Multiple Earths, or some such, to hit the reset button.

 

To address your point more directly, Professor X was always supposed to be capable of this level of power, but he always took the high road. Theoretically, he could have probably solved a lot of the X-Men's problems by himself, but he and Magneto chose to fight it out through proxies for the most part. A very 1960s conceit, which is probably understandable considering when Stan Lee came up with all this.

 

Also, I haven't followed X titles with any consistency since the late 1980s. In my casual reading, I have noted that Jean Gray has gotten a lot more powerful over time. She would not have been capable of that kind of thing back in the Bronze Age heyday of the book. Things change I guess.

[Bloodstone]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Heh. Not as over-the-top as the Silver Age version of Superman though. He occasionally moved weights about 35 times as large as the mentioned value.

 

Depends on if we're using using short or long scale

[Bodkins Odds]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

*BANG**BANG**BANG*

 

That's me slamming my head on my desk for forgetting A-ko.

 

How could you forget the only child of Clark Kent and Diana Prince?

 

EDIT:Oh, RexMundi already said it.

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Well remember. Marvel wanted the Scale, of "World Outside your Window". DC basicly went for, "No Limits." Currently Now, within their Respective Scales they are pretty comparable. Silver Age, was a bit wonky for DC, but that's because they wanted Over the Top.

 

Mad Props to my Fellow Big Red Cheese fans out there for remembering Captain Marvel beat Superman to flying (Whiz Comics #5 1940, as opposed to Action Comics #65 1943 for Superman), however, not long after Superman learned how to fly he was shoving planets around (1949, Superman #58). So even in the Golden Age, Superman was flexing his Silver Age Muscles. Any version of the Spectre, other then Ostrander's more, "marvel like in scope" run, is pretty much a force of Nature and shouldn't be counted in a battle of Brawn.

 

The 200 Quintillian Tons pushed by Big Blue in All Star Superman #1 there was also stated as three times his normal Strength for that Continuity. Don't recall if they stated Long or Short Scale for that number though. "The exact magnitude of Superman's strength is unknown." is the current write up for the mainstream continuity superman. Superman has been gradually moving back into that "Class of 1" scale again.

 

~Rex

[Susano]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

How could you forget the only child of Clark Kent and Diana Prince?

 

I didn't get up and look at my movie collection.

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

And to think, Project A-Ko was slated to be Hentai originally, heh.

 

~Rex

[bigbywolfe]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

And to think, Project A-Ko was slated to be Hentai originally, heh.

That explains so much...

[Lucius]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Lex Luthor was using this historic event as a trap to kill Superman.

 

Dr Quintum is about to tell Superman that Lex's plan worked. He's dying and only has about a year to live

 

 

Let me guess - dying of an overdose of yellow sun radiation?

 

You don't have to tell me how well that worked out for Lex Luthor.

 

Lucius Alexander

 

The palindromedary wonders what a country would be like if their greatest hero was the "smartest Man in the World" and his greatest enemy/archvillain was the Strongest Man in the World.

[Bloodstone]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Let me guess - dying of an overdose of yellow sun radiation?

 

You don't have to tell me how well that worked out for Lex Luthor.

 

Got it in one.

 

It probably doesn't end quite how you think it would though...

 

The palindromedary wonders what a country would be like if their greatest hero was the "smartest Man in the World" and his greatest enemy/archvillain was the Strongest Man in the World.

 

Superman: Red Son

 

Though Lex certainly doesn't start off as an American hero, nor does Superman start of as a Communist villain...

[RexMundi]

Re: Physical might: Strongest characters in comics and other media, and benchmarks

 

Red Son is actually a very good Read.

 

~Rex