Testing Superman's durability against tremendous natural forces...

[Buried Alien]

In most kinds of adventure fiction, however powerful or skilled a hero might be, he/she is generally powerless (or relatively helpless) against natural forces such as wind, water, earth, and the laws of physics in general.

To a large extent, Superman is an exception, but just how far does his durability go against tremendous natural forces? Let's try to speculate on these scenarios to see how the Man of Steel would do.

Conditions:

1). Superman will not simply fly/run away. He must stand there and tank the forces unleashed against him.

2). Superman is at full strength, and his usual weaknesses (Kryptonite, red solar radiation, and magic) will not come into play. In other words, he's in his best natural condition.

OK, now here's what will be unleashed against him, in turn.

1). ALL THE WATER on Earth, from every ocean, lake, river, stream, or in your morning coffee, slamming down on Superman as one huge liquid mass, at three times the speed of sound. Such a force would pulverize any solid matter on Earth, no doubt, but what would it do to Superman?

2). ALL THE SOLID MINERAL AND ROCK on Earth...essentially its entire solid rock mass, slams on Superman at again, three times the speed of sound.

3). A sharp-pointed chunk of pure diamond, equivalent in mass to the Titanic, slams into Superman at three times the speed of LIGHT.

Can Superman tank all of these various forces, or would any of them be too much even for his durability?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Dispenser Of Truth]

The water and rock would do nothing. The diamond just might be able to seriously hurt or even kill him though, given the speed you're talking about.

[Superlad93]

That water would lift him from his feet and toss him around but no damage. The rock would probably just lift him off his feet as well but no damage. He flown through rock and water at much faster speeds than this. But diamond going 3X light speed would probably really hurt him if not kill him to be honest.

[Buried Alien]

It's an interesting thing to ponder, because in various comics, TV series, and films, I've seen flash floods unleashed by broken dams against various powerful entities ranging from Rom: Spaceknight (in Marvel's old 1980s comics) to Godzilla (also in old Marvel comics) to the 1970s super robot Grendizer (from the anime series that bears its name), all acknowledged powerful entities, completely helpless to stop or resist the deluge of water. It made me wonder if Superman would fare any better.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Jon Clark]

It's an interesting thing to ponder, because in various comics, TV series, and films, I've seen flash floods unleashed by broken dams against various powerful entities ranging from Rom: Spaceknight (in Marvel's old 1980s comics) to Godzilla (also in old Marvel comics) to the 1970s super robot Grendizer (from the anime series that bears its name), all acknowledged powerful entities, completely helpless to stop or resist the deluge of water. It made me wonder if Superman would fare any better.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

I think this is a bit different than your original question.

Your first post sounded like "Would Superman be hurt by . . ." with the limitation that he just stand there and take it.
The description above makes it sound more like "Could Superman do something about . . ." with "run away" not being an option.

I agree with the people above in regards to Superman's invulnerability. The diamond moving faster than light being the only real challenge (and even then depending on your definition of stand there, I'm not sure it might not push Superman aside rather than injure him).

But if we have Superman taking an active stance against these forces (heat vision, freezing breath, flying at super-speed around them . . .) the outcomes might be even more in his favor.

[Joe Acro]

I think the water could possibly knock him off his feet. I've seen him struggle against large, high-pressure streams of water directed at him in the past, and that struggle mostly seemed to be about staying on his feet and not getting pushed back. Since this is a blob, we don't really have to worry about much movement, but I feel confident the sheer force could knock him over.

I'd say the same of the all the rock, but with a significant amount of wear. If the rocks are one giant mass, we don't really have to worry so much about him getting many cuts, but the force, weight, and durability of the rock itself suggests to me that Supes would definitely feel it. It'd bowl him over and give him some pain. Maybe kill him, maybe not.

I think the diamond could kill him, depending on where it hit.

[The Beast]

Can Superman tank all of these various forces, or would any of them be too much even for his durability?

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

Nope. All of those scenarios would kill him but if you left his corpse out in the sun, he may resurrect himself.

[JackDaw]

Which era Superman?

[Buried Alien]

Which era Superman?

We'll take out Golden Age, as he's the least invulnerable and likely to fall to these vast forces.

We'll go for:

1). Silver Age, Pre-COIE Earth-One Superman

2). Christopher Reeve movie Superman

3). Post-COIE Superman

4). Superman Prime (Grant Morrison's version from DC ONE MILLION)

5). ALL-STAR Superman (again, Morrison)

6). New 52 Superman

7). MAN OF STEEL movie Superman

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[JackDaw]

Any version of Superman that can sun dip ought logically to be untroubled by any Earth based natural force.

A diamond at three times the speed of light?

Difficult to call...because our own conventional physics suggests that's an impossibility.

But in DC...where a supposedly vulnerable Flash can regularly go faster than light...and presumably throw diamonds at FTL speeds..I'd suggest that the "sensible" thing is to assume that the most invulnerable beings can survive such assaults, otherwise Flash would be too over-powered compared to all other characters.

[Buried Alien]

I think this is a bit different than your original question.

Your first post sounded like "Would Superman be hurt by . . ." with the limitation that he just stand there and take it.
The description above makes it sound more like "Could Superman do something about . . ." with "run away" not being an option.

I agree with the people above in regards to Superman's invulnerability. The diamond moving faster than light being the only real challenge (and even then depending on your definition of stand there, I'm not sure it might not push Superman aside rather than injure him).

But if we have Superman taking an active stance against these forces (heat vision, freezing breath, flying at super-speed around them . . .) the outcomes might be even more in his favor.

I guess it's a two-tiered question, with the first tier being whether Superman can just passively sustain such impacts without being harmed/thrashed and second, to what extent he can avert disaster for those in the path of these forces.

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

[Johnny Thunders!]

Golden Age Superman could take damage, so I am not sure if we should write him off totally. He could move at light speed by the time Mxy shows up. I think any Superman that can time travel under his own steam shrugs off most assaults from the Earth. Bronze Age Superman bragged about swimming through Supernovas against Capt. Marvel. John's Braniac Superman survived a Supernova. He gets tossed around a lot though by everything on the list. The diamonds going to sting.

[Dispenser Of Truth]

1). Silver Age, Pre-COIE Earth-One Superman

2). Christopher Reeve movie Superman

3). Post-COIE Superman

4). Superman Prime (Grant Morrison's version from DC ONE MILLION)

5). ALL-STAR Superman (again, Morrison)

6). New 52 Superman

7). MAN OF STEEL movie Superman

Buried Alien (The Fastest Post Alive!)

1, 4 and probably 5 could handle all of them, no problem. 2 and 6 could probably withstand the first two, but might fall to the diamond. 3 (assuming we're talking about what Byrne set up) and 7 would be killed by all of them.

[GregoryD]

2,3,7 would be in trouble, kinda-sorta. By the end of the Post crisis Supes run, he was slammed by Apokalips and New Genesis so hard that they fused together and only had a concussion. Diamond isn't remotely the hardest element in the DCU... most version of Superman could eat diamonds like candy if they wanted.