Hulk vs. Thing

[mortari]

Wow. I love this. The longer they fight, the stronger Ben gets. If Ben is then draining the Hulk of his energy, does that make the Hulk that much weaker? Mind. Blown.

they did this in the 70's in reverse. right around 168-170. Early Preze art and either Len Wein or Marv Wolfman story. It lead to a Cured Thing and him using the exo suit.

[kevlon]

Not even juggernaut stands a chance against Hulk now. He's been depowered again and in his mini, Hulk beat juggs like rag doll.

[Cap808]

they did this in the 70's in reverse. right around 168-170. Early Preze art and either Len Wein or Marv Wolfman story. It lead to a Cured Thing and him using the exo suit.

That's too bad. I really liked the idea of Ben being the one Thing...that the Hulk is afraid to fight. Nice equalizer there.

[ChrisIII]

I never considered Thing vs. Hulk much of a battle royale, even before OHOTMU when we finally were given "data" showing that the Thing was far, far weaker and less durable than the Hulk. (Hulk's x-factor didn't help matters.) Writers can pen what they want, but there's only so much you can do with these David vs. Goliath battles to keep them intriguing. Given the Hulk's current power status, I see this as even less of a main event.

Having said that, there's an easy fix. Rock. Paper. Scissors.

Give the Thing an ability that makes the Hulk far less OP. Ben got his power from cosmic rays. Gamma rays ARE cosmic rays. Why not simply establish that the longer that Ben tussles with the jade giant, the weaker the Hulk becomes and/or the stronger Ben Grimm becomes due to Ben's rock form somehow being able to actively "ground" gamma ray/cosmic ray energy? The Hulk can be the Hulk against almost anyone else, but against Ben, Hulk is the scissors and Ben is the rock.

Maybe then these battles will matter. But until then, nope, no one will care. We all know that the Hulk should easily smoke Ben as things are now.

Hulk actually now has some cosmic energy now-at least when Joe Fixit is in control. Basically during a fight with the U-Foes (A group of FF copies which ironically, have never fought the FF) in which they 'killed' him, he absorbed the cosmic energy and became a Red Hulk in the Below Place (Although he appears as a green Hulk with red veins and eyes in the regular plane of existence, since his body is merged with the Savage Hulk's).

[Darkshadow]

I like this if only because we know Ben has to be killed before he will stop. Their fight could degrade to basic humans trading exhausted blows, and we know Ben will win.

[Chris0013]

Hulk and Thing should have always been presented as equals and it should have always been a toss up between who would win.

[davew128]

Hulk and Thing should have always been presented as equals and it should have always been a toss up between who would win.

But they aren't equals and never were, going back to their very first meeting.

[JudicatorPrime]

But they aren't equals and never were, going back to their very first meeting.

The Hulk was weaker when he first saw print, but I agree that I don't think at any point the Hulk was ever considered the Thing's peer except for in the most superficial sense, i.e., they were both strong guys. Namor (in water) was perhaps closer to Hulk in that respect, but he was often written as being more of Ben's equal strength-wise. The Hulk was another beast entirely.

We would see similar mismatches, though, that Marvel tried to prop up as a fair contest that weren't. Hercules vs. Thor comes most immediately to mind. It's not that the Prince of Power didn't exceed Thor in strength (at least according to the myths), it's just that Marvel never really wrote him that way. Perhaps in more recent stories that has changed?

[Gaastra]

Think Thing won at least once. In the 80s the Thing was powered up a bit (The spiky or "Stegosaurus" Thing) and Hulk was powered down, as his grey form/Joe Fixit (Well, at least 80's Joe, modern Joe is a bit different now) isn't as powerful as the green ones.. also I think that fight was during the day, when Fixit, although he suppressed Banner at the time, was weaker.

Not only that thing was fighting both grey hulk and a green hulk robot sent by dr doom to help the hulk!

Didn't thing knock hulk out at the end of hulk and thing big change graphic novel also? Course it was done as a gag to end the book.

[IMG][/IMG]

[ChrisIII]

Sometimes it kind of depends on the Hulk incarnation as well.

Savage, for example, is one of the more powerful Hulks due to his constant rage (He's basically a child with a perpetual temper tantrum). Although smarter, Green Scar is also largely fueled by anger/agression and is also one of the more powerful Hulks (and will possibly be the Hulk featured in the next volume after an Immortal Hulk fake-out of sorts).

[Cap808]

Hulk and Thing should have always been presented as equals and it should have always been a toss up between who would win.

As a young comic book reader, it was always my interpretation that while the Hulk was stronger, the Thing was a better fighter, and could find a way to win. However, I think those are days long gone with all of the Hulk's powering up.

[Dark Soul # 7]

There's a certain power creep when it comes to the Hulk. He's meant to be the strongest one there is, so new writers tend to give him more and more ridiculous feats of strength and power.

Thing on the other hand has remained pretty unchanged for most of his career, with a few exceptions here and there. And his place in most fights against the Hulk is as the underdog.

Basically the stronger the Marvel universe gets the stronger the Hulk will get. The Thing does not have that bonus.

[Cronus]

I'm probably showing my age, but I remember a time when Hulk vs. Thing was the 'battle to end all battles'. Did the Thing fall in the power scales of the Marvel Universe? If it's not these two behemoths, then who would be in the current 'battle to end all battles' for Marvel?

I apologize in advance if this is supposed to be in another thread, but I'm not so much concerned in who would win as much as I'm curious as to the particulars of where the Marvel universe stands.

If you go all the way back to The Superhero Battles, by Stan Lee, Stan's (original perspective) was Thing and Hulk were a closer fight if for no other reason they were both still mortal and raw brute strength was their primary power set (at the time). Thor was originally Stan's be all end all in terms of overall power level. As mentioned, since that time, we have folks like Sentry and Gladiator who are on up the power scale. However, the most often asked fan question back then seemed to be "who was stronger, Thor or Hulk?" In '87, I feel like EIC DeFalco got sick of the same repetitive questions and declared Marvel's official stance on the matter: Hulk is stronger, Thor is more powerful. The basis for this I suppose was/is, Banner's repeated additional mega doses of gamma up to and including the warp core explosion on Sakaar. His bio indicates this alone greatly increased his base line strength. Of course, "the madder Hulk gets...", etc, etc... is still a thing. Marvel's top 10 strongest superheroes/villains (in no certain order) might be something like this:

Thor (I think Thor has the full Odin force now?)
Thanos
Sentry/Void
Hulk
Gladiator
Hyperion
Juggernaut
Blue Marvel
Wonder Man
Abomination

IDK. Something like that now?

[Cap808]

If you go all the way back to The Superhero Battles, by Stan Lee, Stan's (original perspective) was Thing and Hulk were a closer fight if for no other reason they were both still mortal and raw brute strength was their primary power set (at the time). Thor was originally Stan's be all end all in terms of overall power level. As mentioned, since that time, we have folks like Sentry and Gladiator who are on up the power scale. However, the most often asked fan question back then seemed to be "who was stronger, Thor or Hulk?" In '87, I feel like EIC DeFalco got sick of the same repetitive questions and declared Marvel's official stance on the matter: Hulk is stronger, Thor is more powerful. The basis for this I suppose was/is, Banner's repeated additional mega doses of gamma up to and including the warp core explosion on Sakaar. His bio indicates this alone greatly increased his base line strength. Of course, "the madder Hulk gets...", etc, etc... is still a thing. Marvel's top 10 strongest superheroes/villains (in no certain order) might be something like this:

Thor (I think Thor has the full Odin force now?)
Thanos
Sentry/Void
Hulk
Gladiator
Hyperion
Juggernaut
Blue Marvel
Wonder Man
Abomination

IDK. Something like that now?

That's a staggering list of bad dudes, but it goes back to my original regret for this post - that Ben Grimm isn't even in the Top 10 of Marvel's 'strongest' characters. You'd think being stuck with orange rocks, the least he could have is to be in the Top 10.

[Galerion]

The Hulk was weaker when he first saw print, but I agree that I don't think at any point the Hulk was ever considered the Thing's peer except for in the most superficial sense, i.e., they were both strong guys. Namor (in water) was perhaps closer to Hulk in that respect, but he was often written as being more of Ben's equal strength-wise. The Hulk was another beast entirely.

We would see similar mismatches, though, that Marvel tried to prop up as a fair contest that weren't. Hercules vs. Thor comes most immediately to mind. It's not that the Prince of Power didn't exceed Thor in strength (at least according to the myths), it's just that Marvel never really wrote him that way. Perhaps in more recent stories that has changed?

It's funny you talk about mismatches because Hulk vs Wolverine is definitely one of those. Granted nowadays Hulk clowns on him and nobody does anything with it anymore but they did in the past and quite honestly even back then it made zero sense.