Would Superman actually be the Most powerful DC hero if....?

[OopsIdiditagain]

the fastest first man alive was superman, the strongest first man alive was superman, the toughest first man alive was superman. I suppose questions will have to be asked.

Was. But he hasn't been the fastest man for a couple of decades now.

You can argue about Green Lantern kryptonite being dumb but saying Flash and Wonder Woman don't deserve to have a leg over Superman in speed/fighting skill is a reach. The Speed Force has its name for a reason. While Wonder Woman was trained to fight from a young age, why wouldn't she be more skilled than Superman?

[NaVi]

I don't believe Superman was ever as fast as Jay Garrick before the latter was created in 1939. I'm not even sure if he were as fast as Wonder Woman at the start of her publishing career. Obviously, Clark's speed was ramped up as time went on.

Maybe someone like Jim Kelly might be able to elaborate on this.

It was created first and all those powers are original, therefore it was the fastest, then another character will arrive and suddenly it will be faster is something else. It is as if tomorrow they create a hero faster than flash and put him in the JL, surely the flash fans would not like it, or that a valkyrie will be part of the JL and is stronger and more skilled than ww ww fans don't like it either. I'm not saying that superman has to be faster than flash, it is just an example of how superman has been losing ground with others and nothing has happened, but as soon as he tries to recover it, everyone jumps.

[Celgress]

I know it is not a one-to-one comparison but many fans in the Dragon Ball community theorize that Jiren is a Superman stand-in; more precisely he's Super Boy Prime or Golden Age Superman before that character started getting severely nerfed post-Reboots. Goku the main hero (who is in many ways another Superman stand-in with many, many astounding feats of his own) had to use a ridiculously broken previously unseen power-up Ultra Instinct to finally (and barely) defeat Jiren. So, yeah, Sups should be near or at the top of the DC pecking order by a vast margin if we are being realistic.

PS Batman is my favorite superhero/comic book character of all time, but even I call BS on his constant besting of the Man of Steel. It has (and did so long ago) reached comedy meme-level stupidity due to its sheer implausibility.

Edit - It's funny and aggravating, other companies respect the character of Superman or at least the concept far more than DC/Warner does. This respect is evident in their various tributes and downright ripoffs. DC/Warner has the real thing but treats Superman as if he is garbage at worse an embarrassment at best.

[NaVi]

Was. But he hasn't been the fastest man for a couple of decades now.

You can argue about Green Lantern kryptonite being dumb but saying Flash and Wonder Woman don't deserve to have a leg over Superman in speed/fighting skill is a reach. The Speed Force has its name for a reason. While Wonder Woman was trained to fight from a young age, why wouldn't she be more skilled than Superman?

ww was trained and that's why they make a fool of superman when it comes to ability. Superman belongs to one of the most advanced species in the universe, but he doesn't make a fool of ww. if it is very fair.

[I'm a Fish]

ww was trained and that's why they make a fool of superman when it comes to ability. Superman belongs to one of the most advanced species in the universe, but he doesn't make a fool of ww. if it is very fair.

The Amazon's have advanced technology too in the comic books.

[Jim Kelly]

I don't believe Superman was ever as fast as Jay Garrick before the latter was created in 1939. I'm not even sure if he were as fast as Wonder Woman at the start of her publishing career. Obviously, Clark's speed was ramped up as time went on.

Maybe someone like Jim Kelly might be able to elaborate on this.

Since you invoked my name, I guess I have to think up an answer. I don't believe any of them were that fast relative to later powers. But I know that Superman and Flash were both fast enough to appear invisible. However, Jay demonstrated this power first.

Now was Wonder Woman faster than Flash? Well you have the cover of COMIC CAVALCADE No.1 But one could argue this is an exhibition and not a true race. And against that you have the cover of WORLD'S FINEST COMICS 29, where Superman and Batman are clearly giving Robin the win.



Sure Wonder Woman has the powers of the gods--but I just take that as the gods helping her out the way they helped heroes in the Trojan War. So it's up to the gods how fast she can go and maybe they aren't always happy with her so they don't give her as much power on some days.

In the 1940s, they didn't need to be that powerful--because they were mainly in their own stories and they didn't have to compete with others. Was Diana as fast as Johnny Quick and was he as fast as Jay? Johnny had the better artist--Mort Meskin--who would draw multiple images of Johnny in one panel, so it appeared he was in several places at once. Surely he's the fastest.

It's only later in the 1960s when Jay has to be retconned as having a lot more power than he had before, because he has to have the same sort of power as Barry. If Barry can vibrate between worlds, then Jay has to do that, too.

I don't recall either Wonder Woman or the Flash using their speed to travel through time in the 1940s. The Amazing Amazon used a time machine. I think when Jay travelled through time with the J.S.A. it was also with a time machine. Superman was probably the first of them to master this trick when he travelled into the past under his own power in "Autograph Please," SUPERMAN 48 (September-October 1947). When the Marvel Family travelled through time, they used the Rock of Eternity.

[SiegePerilous02]

the fastest first man alive was superman, the strongest first man alive was superman, the toughest first man alive was superman. I suppose questions will have to be asked.

In fairness, that was due to none of these other characters existing yet and the original creators having no way to foresee a shared continuity with all these characters, let alone one as dense and convoluted as the one we have now.

He was originally the fastest man alive, but that was pre-Flash. Being the fastest is literally the Flash's entire deal. Both Supes and WW should be fast, but the speedsters are #1 in that regard. Meanwhile, while it can be conceded that Superman is the most powerful overall physically, WW being almost as strong with less weaknesses and more skill is a fair trade off, at least in theory. They don't actually apply that as well as they should, and they've gotten worse over the years.

[Rightoya]

FYI, I like Bats only a shade more than Superman, since they have been my two DC favorites since The Wild Wild West was still on CBS (yes, I'm old). Now for your question: I haven't been talking about disrespecting anybody. Having one superhero as more powerful than another and writing all of the characters in a respectful way are not mutually exclusive acts. I grew up reading Bronze Age comics and it was done constantly.

Writing characters who got created to be comparably powerful as clearly less powerful is kind of disrespectful.

Superman is clearly #2 popularity-wise. Other than Batman, no other DC superhero sells more comics than he does.

I know, and the way DC acted in the past is barely anything else even possible, but Batman being #1 by far also don't make stories that disrespect Superman for the sake of Batman ok.

[Rightoya]

Superman being the strongest doesnt make the others look bad.

The DCEU Justice League as example shows clearly otherwise, and there is a big difference beween general power and just physical strength.

You only need a powerful enemy that requieres the full team and the spotlight is shared. Superman doesnt even need to be focus.

That is not enough, like at all, especially because jobbing should get avoided.

Im not saying that Superman cant lose just the idea that any other superhero is going to be declared the strongest even if they are a match to him.

Nobody needs to get declared the strongest to begin with, and Superman being physically the strongest isn't any problem, if the other fitting top superheroes are still comparibly powerful

[Rightoya]

When has Shazam been especially vulnerable to the heat vision?

Never, that was just a general example about special defenses being better than physical toughness, because Shazam is typically also not completely immune to Superman's abilities

Because DC has a history of riffing on the meta aspect of the real life lawsuit to present Captain Marvel as the one who is dead even with Superman with no clear cut winner, not WW or MM.

Shazam being dead even with Superman was a thing decades ago by now, like the current Black Adam thing good shows, and in the early post crisis days was Wonder Woman also portrayed like that, and she has even more statements than Shazam, while Martian Manhhnter got later on a bit of a better portrayal.

[Johnny Thunders!]

I am no Golden Age expert by any means but to my mind, even then, it was always in character for Superman to go beyond whatever limits were set before him. I think the Morrison run and even Man of Steel sets that standard.

For my money, the super senses, the super speed, the intelligence, it's all there from the beginning. Even the first time Superman breaks the time barrier, he first comes up with a calculation that helps him land where he wants to in time.

I think we see so many comics where someone beats Superman in a race or fistfight, that's exactly because Superman is the Overdog and people love Underdog stories. It means something to beat Superman and it counts as their Apex Mountain so to speak.

[Rightoya]

I know it is not a one-to-one comparison but many fans in the Dragon Ball community theorize that Jiren is a Superman stand-in; more precisely he's Super Boy Prime or Golden Age Superman before that character started getting severely nerfed post-Reboots. Goku the main hero (who is in many ways another Superman stand-in with many, many astounding feats of his own) had to use a ridiculously broken previously unseen power-up Ultra Instinct to finally (and barely) defeat Jiren. So, yeah, Sups should be near or at the top of the DC peaking order by a vast margin if we are being realistic.

PS Batman is my favorite superhero/comic book character of all time, but even I call BS on his constant besting of the Man of Steel. It has (and did so long ago) reached comedy meme-level stupidity due to its sheer implausibility.

Edit - It's funny and aggravating. Other companies respect the character of Superman or at least the concept far more than DC/Warner does. This respect is evident in their various tributes and downright ripoffs. DC/Warner has the real thing but treats Superman as if he is garbage at worse an embarrassment at best.

Jiren is a terrible character, and a bit like Supeman's equilant of people thinking Wonder Woman would be Xena without even knowing Xena, he is awfully bland with almost zero personality and has many of the traits, that people who want to **** on Superman often accuse him of.

To take inspiration from Jiren for Superman, would be almost as bad as taking inspiration from Homelander in an unironic way.

[Celgress]

Jiren is a terrible character, and a bit like Supeman's equilant of people thinking Wonder Woman would be Xena without even knowing Xena, he is awfully bland with almost zero personality and has many of the traits, that people who want to **** on Superman often accuse him of.

To take inspiration from Jiren for Superman, would be almost as bad as taking inspiration from Homelander in an unironic way.

I meant in terms of raw power nothing else. Jiren is indeed a shell of a character but I've heard he is heavily inspired by Golden Age Superman because they wanted to do Goku v. Superman for the multiverse tournament final but DC said: "no way" (in part because Goku was always going to win with his latest power-up).

[The Darknight Detective]

Writing characters who got created to be comparably powerful as clearly less powerful is kind of disrespectful.

I guess all of the humans without any powers in the comics are the most disrespected of them all.

[SiegePerilous02]

Shazam being dead even with Superman was a thing decades ago by now, like the current Black Adam thing good shows, and in the early post crisis days was Wonder Woman also portrayed like that, and she has even more statements than Shazam, while Martian Manhhnter got later on a bit of a better portrayal.

Wonder Woman being equally powerful as Superman per Marston's intentions is even further decades back, so by your logic shouldn't that be dismissed as well?

Early post-Crisis days gave Wonder Woman flight, but she was otherwise as powerful as she was before. It's just that characters like Superman and Mongul got scaled down compared to what they were before, but the power creep set in again anyway. Captain Marvel got scaled down too, and the fact that it took blowing up the shared universe and stapling it back together again instead of natural story progression should say something.

I guess all of the humans without any powers in the comics are the most disrespected of them all.

It's weird that Superman being the most powerful but otherwise not impacting the stories of other characters in any significant way (because he isn't part of their narratives) is "disrespectful".

Like just existing is an insult