Characters Who Play Way Out of Their League

[Powerboy]

The Silver Surfer thing is overstated imo. Surfer was mindcontrolled and not fighting at his peak, basically just shooting a few generic energy blasts like a zombie.

And all Dracula did was unleash his powerset on Surfer and accomplish nothing. He uses his weather-control to sic a hurricane on Surfer and Surfer no-sells it. He uses his beastswarm control to swarm Surfer and Surfer no-sells it. He punches Surfer and Surfer, who only weighs two or three hundred pounds, is sent flying, but isn't knocked out.

So to the surprise of no one, weather-control, beastswarm control, and punching are no big deal to the Silver Surfer, and Dracula can survive a few generic energy blasts from a sluggish, mind-controlled enemy.

In fact, the one power of Dracula's that might have worked, hypnotism, is never used, probably because it was a one-issue story, and him doing that would end with Surfer switching from being mind-controlled by one guy to being mind-controlled by another.

Yes. The real weakness of the story was that this Satanist, Anton Lupeski. I think, could mind control the Silver Surfer, and operate him like an automaton. That was the unbelievable part. Nothing Dracula did had any affect on the Surfer except hitting him and sending him flying but not hurting him in the least. In fact, Dracula comments that the Surfer is acting like a puppet on strings and that's why he can even hit him.

Dracula versus the Surfer was one of the most believable confrontations between two characters operating on levels of power that were magnitudes apart- IF you can get past the whole mind control thing.

[choptop]

Yeah, the ground level folks are just jokes. The Vulture is my favorite joke as old fart who probably could be eliminated by Farmer Jone with his ol' shotgun.

The only non powered (I include armor as power) viable folks are the 'intelligence' wing - of scientists, computer experts and the like. While we are talking about villians - Batman and Joker are ridiculous - they have to be powered up to be cosmic in super duper chairs, mergers with each other and powered up, etc. Otherwise, someone would just shoot them.

I recall a crime where a car was being broken into. A dude comes down with his hunting bow - Ollie, Ollie! He gets shot dead.

Did I miss something with The Vulture? Why do people keep acting like Jimmy Olsen would stomp him? OK he's not the green goblin but he regularly go's one on one with spiderman it's not CIS/SvF/PIS the guy is trouble for spiderman he has hurt him many times just because he is not a A list bad guy doesn't mean me or you can beat him.

[Jackalope89]

Well, at least one anime, in One Piece, got mentioned. But here's another;
Master Roshi. In the original anime Dragon Ball, and first half of the manga, yeah. He's actually one of the stronger people there is. And usually only fights if he has a chance. However, in Dragon Ball Super, that changed. Much more egregiously in the manga, but still to a point in the anime.

Manga-


Yeah. Toyotaro tried to do the whole "experience closed the gap, for once second!" with this. And what hurt it more, was that the anime had long since ended by this point. Where Roshi had fought a person whose ability allowed them to keep getting stronger, a witch with powerful illusions, and a few others. It was the first one which nearly ended him, but considering the heavy hitters needed to focus on the existing powerhouses from other universes at the time, it was done better. Rather than somehow standing up to Jiren, of all people (the whole arc was weak in the manga).

[Alan2099]

Did I miss something with The Vulture? Why do people keep acting like Jimmy Olsen would stomp him? OK he's not the green goblin but he regularly go's one on one with spiderman it's not CIS/SvF/PIS the guy is trouble for spiderman he has hurt him many times just because he is not a A list bad guy doesn't mean me or you can beat him.

People tend to smack talk the Vulture because he looks old and frail, not realizing that's one of the things that makes him so dangerous. People underestimate him. They don't realize how experienced and outright nasty he can be.

He even whupped Cable's butt the first time they met.

[Dark Soul # 7]

The Circus of Crime occascionally takes on people like Thor, the Hulk and Ghost Rider. They've also fought Power Pack, and even that feels a bit above their pay grade.

[Captain Smith]

Did I miss something with The Vulture? Why do people keep acting like Jimmy Olsen would stomp him? OK he's not the green goblin but he regularly go's one on one with spiderman it's not CIS/SvF/PIS the guy is trouble for spiderman he has hurt him many times just because he is not a A list bad guy doesn't mean me or you can beat him.

Most pictures of Vulture have his head out in the open. Unless he had a bullet proof head, anybody with a rifle can take him down. If his head isn't super - Spiderman could punch it like a watermelon. If I missed a super strong head, sorry.

[Beadle]

The Circus of Crime occascionally takes on people like Thor, the Hulk and Ghost Rider. They've also fought Power Pack, and even that feels a bit above their pay grade.

The Circus of Crime are almost always treated like a joke though.

But thinking about it, Cobra also used to fight Thor. Somehow.

[choptop]

Most pictures of Vulture have his head out in the open. Unless he had a bullet proof head, anybody with a rifle can take him down. If his head isn't super - Spiderman could punch it like a watermelon. If I missed a super strong head, sorry.

I mean he's really fast maybe if you were outside he's house or something but if you just took you rifle and took a shot at him in the middle of a fight with spiderman in NY I don't think you'd hit him same with Dr octopus.

[Alan2099]

Most pictures of Vulture have his head out in the open. Unless he had a bullet proof head, anybody with a rifle can take him down. If his head isn't super - Spiderman could punch it like a watermelon. If I missed a super strong head, sorry.

And Batman's got that big open spot on his mask where half his head is exposed. What's your point?

[Beadle]

The Circus of Crime are almost always treated like a joke though.

But thinking about it, Cobra also used to fight Thor. Somehow.

Cobra and Hyde fill a weird subset of people in the rogues’ gallery of both Thor and Daredevil. That’s a very niche group.

[Sharkerbob]

Always felt silly to see Kingpin actually throw down with Spider-Man. Daredevil and Punisher, sure, but he's really got no business grappling with Spidey. Granted, he's usually got goons hired for that.

[Sharpandpointies]

I mean he's really fast maybe if you were outside he's house or something but if you just took you rifle and took a shot at him in the middle of a fight with spiderman in NY I don't think you'd hit him same with Dr octopus.

People who shoot at Doc Ock tend to end up with their bullets bounced then a car thrown at them.

Or their arms pulled off.

[MorphyVSFischer]

The Enforcers got to be this in spades. These are a bunch off guys Batman could take and there fighting Spidey?

[Powerboy]

Most pictures of Vulture have his head out in the open. Unless he had a bullet proof head, anybody with a rifle can take him down. If his head isn't super - Spiderman could punch it like a watermelon. If I missed a super strong head, sorry.

That's a weakness of all non-powered characters though. Still, the Vulture is fast enough to avoid hits by Spider-Man and tough enough to take hits without being down for the count. Its basically a case of "concept versus feats". There was at least one story where a SWAT team sniper commented that, every time he took aim at the Vulture, the Vulture would move in line with the hostages he had, putting himself directly between the sniper's aim and the hostages, almost as if he knew when someone was aiming at him.

But he's basically the same as any character who should be able to be killed by normal bullets. There's P.I.S. in any of them surviving.

[Captain Smith]

If you do shoot modern rifles, unless the target has speed, some pre-cognitive sense a 'normal' exposed body part is only protected by PIS. That's part of the comic game, I grant you to have some 'normal' folks in play.

That's why I never can take Batman, Robin, the Vulture, Ollie, etc. seriously. It's like the Ollie show where ninjas were going to take over the city and Ollie and friends called out the citizens to help with clubs, etc. Now, if this was in Dallas or Memphis - the turn out would be with AR-15s. There more than 20 million in civilian hands. The last time ninja or traditionally armed folks faced mid 1800's weaponry in Japan, it didn't go well.

Similarly in one of the last Harry Dresden books, Harry was giving out shotguns to plain ol' civilians in Chicago to fight demons. Oh, give me a break. I thought Butcher knew his stuff but that was ridiculous.

However, that doesn't mean I don't like shows like Arrow or a good book with Batman, unless it goes BatGod.