[williamssl]

THIS POLLS IS CLOSED. Hulk wins.

Our next 2 round 1 matchups feature the #4's vs. the #5's. By NCAA hoops standards, this should be a touch matchup. Here we have Marvel's #4 - the jolly green goliath (Hulk, for those who may live under a rock), vs. DC's #5 - Wonder Woman. And if Lynda Carter is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear that, you're just like me (and sucks to be you).

Cast your vote here....and ridicule everyone else. A great case for and against both has been made in the "Up Next" thread, so if you're sitting on the fence (or on your thumb or on a tack), have a gander over there and be persuaded one way or the other.

Wouldn't be complete without this:

• You're voting for who you think is the greatest superhero, or the greater of the two.
  
• You can only vote once.
  
• The poll will close at noon Eastern on Sat, Nov 4, so have your vote in by then for it to count.
  
• If you're undecided, let people know that so they can try to swing you one way or the other.
  

[williamssl]

Wonder Woman. I've already posted all my pics, er reasons why.

And if you disagree with me and you're not Courtney (although Courtney may agree with my thinking here as well), you're teh gay.

[OpTard]

i'm still completely on the fence here.

[Batman]

I'll summarize my case for the Hulk. Superheroes are often about wish-fulfillment, and Hulk is wish-fulfillment for days (or years) when you are enraged by the restraints of society. He is an archetype of both rage and indomitability. In short, HULK SMASH!

[Evil Scotty]

simple, storm kicked the crap out of wonder woman...Vote: Hulk

[Deleted]

Hulk. He's had 2 different colors (green and gray... may have been more, but I know of only those 2).

Wonder Woman's 2 colors have been pale & tan.

I know, not a logical explanation, really. I thought I'd be more creative that saying "Her weapon's a freakin' ROPE!".

[Loki]

scottdg77 said:

simple, storm kicked the crap out of wonder woman...

And that was TOTAL bullshit, and the person who wrote that should be shot. Toad once beat the crap out of Storm, too. using Toad > Storm > WW, does this suddently mean that Toad could kick WW's ass? Don't think so.

I read all the arguements about Hulk and Wonder Woman. I'm sticking with my main squeeze.

[Lucky]

Storm SHOULD kick WW's ass. Storm should kick a LOT of people's asses. Just because she typically doesn't and most writers keep her lower doesn't change that. Flight and complete control of weather goes a LONG way. WW has what? Super strength and flight (depending on the writer)? Oh yeah, and a lasso of truth. Whatever strength WW has is in her war strategy and leadership. Pure power wise she doesn't bring a lot unique to the table. In the core league I count Supes, Martian Manhunter, and GL at least matching and beating her. Hawkman/woman too, probably. Zatana maybe. Firestorm if you count him (and if he's sober).

And of course Storm is X-Men leader 1B so its not like she's lacking in the leadership skills and strategy.

Storm > WW. Toad has nothing to do with it. Everyone has a good day.

Or how about this? Wonder Woman was once beat by Cheetah. A big cat. Hulk wins.

[The Canadian Content]

Wonder Woman smash!

[salmonjunkie]

I agree with Lucky. Storm SHOULD beat WW. Dude, remember when Storm had a mohawk and no powers? She was so bad ass she was leader of the X-Men and beat up some Morlocks. WITHOUT POWERS!

But yeah, the writers keep her down. If Storm was a villain, she would be mad powerful.

[Courtney]

I'm sorry guys, but I HAVE to vote for Wonder Woman. She is THE woman in comics. Yes, Storm is a badass, but she isn't THE woman.

[Loki]

luckylopez said:

Storm SHOULD kick WW's ass. Storm should kick a LOT of people's asses. Just because she typically doesn't and most writers keep her lower doesn't change that. Flight and complete control of weather goes a LONG way. WW has what? Super strength and flight (depending on the writer)? Oh yeah, and a lasso of truth. Whatever strength WW has is in her war strategy and leadership. Pure power wise she doesn't bring a lot unique to the table. In the core league I count Supes, Martian Manhunter, and GL at least matching and beating her. Hawkman/woman too, probably. Zatana maybe. Firestorm if you count him (and if he's sober).

And of course Storm is X-Men leader 1B so its not like she's lacking in the leadership skills and strategy.

Storm > WW. Toad has nothing to do with it. Everyone has a good day.

Or how about this? Wonder Woman was once beat by Cheetah. A big cat. Hulk wins.

What in blue blazes are you talking about? I won’t try to change your mind about Hulk (no matter how wrong you are ), but I will say you and Sal are all wet when it comes to Storm vs. Diana.

Storm should not kick Diana’s ass. Diana is a goddess. Not a fake goddess, like Storm, but a real honest-to-goodness goddess.

As for being a bad-ass – Diana fought Medusa the Gorgon. Medusa was about to turn her to stone. Diana took one of Medusa’s snakes and used the venom to blind herself. She promptly beheaded Medusa. While blind, she also proceeded to kick the shit out of Zues’s multi-armed 800 foot tall champion monster. AND she fought the JLA (including Martian Manhunter). AND she went into hell and fought the combined forces of Zues, Ares, Neptune and Hades. Did I mention she was blind?

And if any of you have read Sacrifice, you know that the “Supes, Manhunter and GL beating her” statement is wrong.

Flight and complete control of weather goes a long way, yes. But using that criteria, Weather Wizard should be an utter bad ass, and I don’t see anyone anointing him the best villain in the DCU. Besides, while Storm has control of weather, it isn’t complete (how often do her emotions get the best of her, with a raging thunderstorm called up to mirror her moods?) and she tends to use the same bag of tricks. Thunder, Lightning. Winds. Snow. Rain.

So I'll give you a push on the Hulk arguement, but disagree completely with your Storm assessment.

[Evil Scotty]

loki said:

scottdg77 said:

simple, storm kicked the crap out of wonder woman...

And that was TOTAL bullshit, and the person who wrote that should be shot. Toad once beat the crap out of Storm, too. using Toad > Storm > WW, does this suddently mean that Toad could kick WW's ass? Don't think so.

I read all the arguements about Hulk and Wonder Woman. I'm sticking with my main squeeze.

I made this statement over in the UP Next: Hulk/WW thread.

scottdg77 said:

I've always liked the hulk more. I've never collected his comics, I do remember the DC vs marvel cross over and the Hulk losing to Superman which is respectful. But WW losing to Storm? That's down right shame full.

If WW is so well liked then why did she lose to storm?

[OpTard]

loki said:

Storm should not kick Diana’s ass. Diana is a goddess. Not a fake goddess, like Storm, but a real honest-to-goodness goddess.

diana is not a goddess. she's a lump of clay given life and powers by the gods.

she was temporarily made a goddess during i think it was the byrne run, but as far as i can tell that's been reversed and she's now back to being a lump of clay with powers.

[Deleted]

And what ARE her powers? Other than wielding magical twine, of course.

[OpTard]

she can fly and has super strength and speed.

she also has raging orgasms

[Loki]

operationretard said:

loki said:

diana is not a goddess. she's a lump of clay given life and powers by the gods.

Yes she is. She's referred to numerous times as a goddess in Rucka's run by some characters, while others refer to her as her "princess-once-goddess". Use whichever interpreatation you like - she is a current goddess or renounced her godhood to become princess and Ambassador or some mixture of the two - any way you slice it, that puts her above Storm's goddess claim.

[OpTard]

yeah, as i mentioned she became a goddess during the byrne run (the one that introduced the current wondergirl). then when she renounced it she returned to being a plain old princess lump of clay with powers.

final verdict: neither storm nor wonder woman are goddesses.

that being said, i'm with lucky and sal. if allowed to, storm can fuck just about anyone up.

[Loki]

I'll meet you guys halfway. If allowed to, she can go toe-to-tow with a number of people in the MARVEL universe.

But, and I don't care how much of a Storm fan you are, no one can disagree that her latent-lesbo run in XTREME X-Men hurt. Besides story lines that sucked ass, she had to deal with this:



Can you say "Cottage Cheese Butt"? *shudder*

edit to add a bigger picture to show that Baby Gots Back.

[OpTard]

i actually hate storm. i find her obnoxious. i wish she'd die. nonetheless, i can't deny her power.

and wasn't xtreme xmen written by clairmont? it's no wonder it sucked. when not paired with byrne, he's crap.

[Lucky]

Wait, are we arguing that Storm isn't cooler than Wonder Woman? I mean, I'd probably pick Storm in that conflict too but I thought this was a simple issue. You think its a travesty that Storm kicked WW's ass in a fight once. What does Claremont's weird leather and crazy plots that make no sense series have to do with that?

Once a god? Now a god? Hey, pit Storm vs Dionysus I might take the chick on that one. And there's an undeniable god in this tourney that stands a decent chance of losing to an alien. Bottom line? She's strong and flies. End of story. She's smart and has strategy too but Storm has her met there. Storm's been just as ruthless, just as smart, and a leader just as long. As sal said, she lead the X-Men powerless, beat up a powered Callisto in a fight, and won the job by beating up a powered Cyclops in a fight. Storm's no lightweight.

WW = former god doesn't mean she beats Storm. It just means Storm's resume looks better if she does win. And I'd be perfectly willing to see them split 10 fights but why should WW have the edge over Storm? Just because of god status given by one writer? If she ain't a god anymore (and from the little I read leading into Crisis I'm guessing she's not... she seemed mortal fighting Superman, answered to Artemis, and when she blinded herself vs Medusa she turned to the gods for help) then what difference does it make? Spider-Man once had the Cosmic Power. Does that mean he could kick Wonder Woman's ass now? (He might.)

What does Sacrifice prove? Didn't WW get pretty messed up by Supes? Not beat, mind you, but that fight was never allowed to finish. She fought toe to toe with Supes for awhile. Ok. My money's on Superman in fight with a finish. No killing weird characters allowed. If Sacrifice's point is to prove that WW is willing to do what's necessary to win then Storm covered that one already, didn't she? She had her whole "I'll kill you if I have to!" phase.

I can't believe you dissed the whole Marvel universe by acting like Marvel's heavyweights can't hang with DC's.

Besides, if we're debating bad costumes I don't know whether to pull out her "I'm no longer Wonder Woman" Diana one or that weird Hawkman inspired war armor she pulls out from time to time.

[salmonjunkie]

loki said:

I'll meet Baby Gots Back.

That's why Black Panther finally got together with her. Brothers can't resist a rump like that.

[Loki]

Lucky,

First things first – I’m not sure where you’re thinking I’m dissing Marvels’ heavyweights. If it’s the If allowed to, she can go toe-to-tow with a number of people in the MARVEL universe. line you’re thinking of, 1) I was referring to Storm, not WW and 2) I know you guys think that Storm is a Marvel heavyweight, but I don’t. I think some of your arguments are based on potential, instead of the actual storylines. And even considering the storylines I read (which are a lot of the ones you all mentioned) I think Storm is a good strong charcter, but not a heavyweight like I would consider Spider-Man or Thor. Personal opinion there, nothing more.

Second thing – WW never turned to the gods for help when she was blinded. They tried to help, it didn’t work, she shrugged and moved on.

Third – I won’t say “travesty”. I’ve read worse things. New Warriors, Volume 2, for example.

I think the only reason I’m going back to the “Dudes, she’s a freaking GODDESS” argument for WW is that I’m having a hard time with how she’s being dismissed. Again, this is all coming from perception, but I used to think she was nothing more than a second stringer up until a few years ago, and not a very interesting one at that. Read Matt Wagner’s Trinity – that’s a story of Batman and Superman with Wonder Woman thrown in a step way below. But ever since I started reading Rucka’s take on her it completely vitalized (I won’t say re-vitalized because I never thought much of her in the first place) the character. Suddenly she seemed important. She mattered. And it spilled over into other titles, too, like JLA, Flash and Superman.

Most likely this resurgence will last until Rucka leaves and WW will go back to being a second tier character again. At which point I’ll agree with everything you all are saying. But having just read the majority of Rucka’s run I’m defending WW so hard because he’s making the character everything she can be. Does that make sense?

[OpTard]

rucka already left.

alan heinberg (of young avengers fame) writes the new wonder woman series

[Lucky]

It does. And I don't mean to be utterly dismissing WW. I'm perfectly content with her being in that holy trinity of DC. If nothing else I think OMAC and Sacrifice gave me valid reasoning for why she fits there. The three of them are the most respected heroes in their community who combined manage to cover most areas of expertise (Supes = space and might; Bats = deduction, science, and vigilantism; WW = magic and mythology) and who have 3 differing senses of morality. Everyone respects them and looks to them for leadership. And between the three of them they have their own deep disagreements but respect each other as peers so they can deal with it. I think its a nice setup and I'm willing to buy into it. Storm certainly doesn't have that stature in Marvel. But as I said somewhere else, Marvel isn't set up the same way DC is with their pantheon of heroes.

But that's it. I think its a character arguement. Because if you throw Storm and Batman in a room together Storm should win that fight too (ignoring that if Batman had 48 hours to prepare I'd then take him). Purely on might and powers I don't see what WW has over Storm. Does she have higher stature in comics? Of course. But I appreciated that they didn't just hand fights to who was more popular (that was Amalgam, right?). They're both pretty powerful but neither are up in that utter stratosphere of heroes (a week or so ago I was naming off the people who could hang with or beat Thor/Superman and neither should be on it). They seem pretty equal on paper. If we decide that they're evenly matched in the brains department (which I do) then it comes down to strength/invulnerability vs weather powers. I'll take the chick with the long range, high power weapons. But at worst it seems even to me. Like I said, I'd take them splitting 10 fights.

I DID interpret that line as you dissing Marvel heavyweights. I still kind of do. You conceded that she could hang with Marvel heavyweights. That suggests that she can't hang with DC heavyweights. And logically you seem to be putting DC heavyweights above Marvel heavyweights. Maybe I'm misinterpretting that.

Like I said, I'm not much of a WW fan but I'm not dismissing her. I don't care for her but I respect the spot she's got in DC's standings. I don't care for Superman either but I accept him as #1. But just because Batman is up there in the top 3 doesn't mean he can kick Captain Marvel's ass. And just because WW is a goddess doesn't necessarily carry her further in that fight.

I can't recall the details of that blind story. I was trying to work around it. I know she went into Hades for some reason. I know the gods gave her a gift. And I know she opted to save some kid's life or something rather than get her eyes back. Then I think they gave them to her anyway. I don't recall because I didn't much enjoy the stories and I was mostly just reading because of Identity Crisis, Infinite Crisis, Wonder Girl, and Donna Troy (I'm a Titans fan). I guess my point was more that its not like she's some vague idea of a GOD. She wasn't immortal or regenerating parts or warping stuff or anything like that. She couldn't save that kid's life herself (wasn't it a kid who got turned to stone by Medusa?). IF she's a god I don't know what that means. Apparently she's a god with super strength and flight. Ok. And she's the goddess of Truth, right? So does that mean she has a magic lasso that makes you unable to lie?