Silver Surfer vs. The Avengers & X-Men

[Pendaran]

Honestly, everyone could just sensibly open with mutual area death frags as simplest move, but again, that basically means you have the Surfer, Thor, and mayyyybe She Hulk left standing, and at that point, that's not going to go great as far as that the Surfer can now make with the singularity without problems.

[Captain Morgan]

OK, going to post a counter argument, then another counter argument:

1. Speed equal, Magneto ought to be absolutely capable of stopping Surfer from opening a singularity, or at worst shielding his team from same, given that he has opened singularities before himself while resisting the effects of same trivially, and outright stopped reality warping and dimensional convergences, all be screaming MAGNETS just a little bit louder.

2. If the Surfer goes for that tactic, it's going to let everyone else act, and this means that Classic Thor can set up something nasty.

3. Oh wait, this is CURRENT Thor. Crap.

4. Given that Magneto can stop the singularity technique or at least shield against it, and that Surfer isn't an idiot, he probably WON'T lead with that.

5. Instead, he just turns everyone here into teacups.

6. That probably doesn't work on Thor, given what it takes to transmute him (a vast eldritch machine harnessing the power of the galaxy-busting sword of Surtur, this being quite a bit more oomph than Surfer generally has at his disposal).

7. But now, it's just Norrin against a non-Mjolnir-carrying, Thor-shaped doofus. And that's just not going to end well for the doofus.

Mileage may vary.

When has Magneto mucked about with black holes? That feels like a rather large jump in power for him. I know he's opened worm holes a few times, but there's a lot of blue sky between "a portal between two places that a human can safely walk through" and "a gaping cosmic maw of absolute destruction." What Surfer makes is the latter. And he doesn't even have to do it by getting fancy. In Annihilation, it was a side effect of an energy discharge he unleashed. That level of energy output just feels rather a lot for this gang to handle, at least without prep to set up containment effects or some such.

That also means 'massive AoE death frag" "opening a black hole" are not mutually exclusive openers for Norrin. Doing the former leads to the latter.

[big_adventure]

His wormhole stuff was specifically mentioned as being a singularity, IIRC.

Also, he was Xorn, who had a star for a brain, said energy being verified by the proper amount of technobabble by qualified parties, and he generated and contained such power just fine thanks, without it having any effect on the people around him in close proximity. And a star is a black hole, just young and positive and still believing in care bears and unicorns. It's only after it becomes a bitter old curmudgeon that the light stops shining through.

Anyway, it doesn't ignore that Surfer can do other stuff here that will work better on Magneto, and Mags doesn't have the tools to stop all of them. While I think Mags can fight a singularity, especially given the other stuff he's dealt with, I don't thing he's stopping "I'm now a teacup in a stupid red hat?"

[Captain Morgan]

His wormhole stuff was specifically mentioned as being a singularity, IIRC.

Even if you equate that as being the same as an actual black hole, which seems a stretch, there's still a matter of scale. Magneto makes human sized transportation devices. Surfer creates a black hole that consumes a solar system, up to and including its star, and is visible from a pretty fair distance off in space. Being able to muck about with the former doesn't really equate to mucking about with the latter.

Also, he was Xorn, who had a star for a brain, said energy being verified by the proper amount of technobabble by qualified parties, and he generated and contained such power just fine thanks, without it having any effect on the people around him in close proximity. And a star is a black hole, just young and positive and still believing in care bears and unicorns. It's only after it becomes a bitter old curmudgeon that the light stops shining through.

Wasn't Xorn originally revealed to be Magneto who had been huffing Mutant Growth Hormone, thus powered up, and then later retconned to be Xorn pretending to be Magneto pretending to be Xorn? Neither scenario feels like a feat for normal Magneto.

I don't thing he's stopping "I'm now a teacup in a stupid red hat?"

See, I'd actually disagree with that. If Magneto can combat reality warping, I don't see why he can't combat transmutation. Plus, transmutation involves rearranging the molecular structure of something, and Magneto's powers pretty explicitly extend over the fundamental forces which bind atoms and molecules together. If there was a power he could stop, transmutation would be that power. I suppose Surfer might just be able to over power his transmutation resistance, depending on what his top end power scale transmutation feats are (I think maybe seeding a world with life?) but I don't really see why he would bother trying when he can just overpower Magneto by shooting the guy so hard it destroys the planet, its moon, and indeed lead to opening of a proper black hole that takes out the rest of the solar system.

[big_adventure]

All fair points. At the end of the day, this still comes down to Surfer winning.

Basically, Magneto has this excellent ability to mess with energy and matter manipulation, even on pretty high scales. The best way to fight him for most folks isn't going to be by attacking his strong point. Surfer has ways to attack that Mags won't fight as well.

However it happens, it seems very likely to come down to "bell, Surfer "power-cosmic-that-is-mine-alone-except-for-all-the-other-users-of-said-power-ing" something" Then Thor and mayyyyybe She-Hulk are left standing there, waiting to die. If this was classic Thor with a big-boy-hammer, he might be able to use Surfer's first failed attack as an opportunity to unleash something that garners a victory, but this is NOT that Thor. Thorfus here is just going to whine about his hammer.

[Slade1]

Honestly, everyone could just sensibly open with mutual area death frags as simplest move, but again, that basically means you have the Surfer, Thor, and mayyyybe She Hulk left standing, and at that point, that's not going to go great as far as that the Surfer can now make with the singularity without problems.

If Sufer opens up with just blasting, that gives Thor time to go esoteric.....if this classic Thor that is.

[Captain Morgan]

If Sufer opens up with just blasting, that gives Thor time to go esoteric.....if this classic Thor that is.

Does it, though? Because that means Thor getting blasted with an output that destroys planets, etc. Thor will probably survive that, but I reckon its gonna knock him for a loop just fine, much like it did to Beta Ray Bill. (For the record, Bill has actually survived planetary destruction but been dazed and hurt pretty decently by it, which is pretty consistent with how Surfer beat him up based on the output we have seen from Norrin.)

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Does it, though? Because that means Thor getting blasted with an output that destroys planets, etc. Thor will probably survive that, but I reckon its gonna knock him for a loop just fine, much like it did to Beta Ray Bill. (For the record, Bill has actually survived planetary destruction but been dazed and hurt pretty decently by it, which is pretty consistent with how Surfer beat him up based on the output we have seen from Norrin.)

Surfer just punched the hell outta him. No energy blasts involved IIRC.

[The Arbiter]

Surfer just punched the hell outta him. No energy blasts involved IIRC.

Yeah just straight punching.

It was actually a brilliant scene imo that captured Surfer perfectly. He was apologizing as he laid out the beat down - geniunely distressed that he had to do harm to his friend, his face twisted in remorse/regret.

I loved it.

[Slade1]

Does it, though? Because that means Thor getting blasted with an output that destroys planets, etc. Thor will probably survive that, but I reckon its gonna knock him for a loop just fine, much like it did to Beta Ray Bill. (For the record, Bill has actually survived planetary destruction but been dazed and hurt pretty decently by it, which is pretty consistent with how Surfer beat him up based on the output we have seen from Norrin.)

Fair points.

[Captain Morgan]

Surfer just punched the hell outta him. No energy blasts involved IIRC.

Yes, but the Surfer punches hardest by infusing his fists with the same power cosmic he blasts stuff with. which you can see in the art for those excellent panels. So it comes out about the same.

Surfer is ridiculous.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

Yes, but the Surfer punches hardest by infusing his fists with the same power cosmic he blasts stuff with. which you can see in the art for those excellent panels. So it comes out about the same.

Surfer is ridiculous.

His first punch looks like it's without amping, though there's an ... energy trail ? It's weird.

The "I really am" is an energy blast.

Either way, yea. Surfer is probably in a tier of his own.

[Captain Morgan]

His first punch looks like it's without amping, though there's an ... energy trail ? It's weird.

The "I really am" is an energy blast.

Either way, yea. Surfer is probably in a tier of his own.

It boggles the mind. It is like Jack Kirby created the most powerful hero in Marvel while on the phone with a publisher about a deadline, and he just Kaiser Sosae'd him together because he saw a commercial for the Oscars while ironing clothes.

[Cthulhu_of_R'lyeh]

It boggles the mind. It is like Jack Kirby created the most powerful hero in Marvel while on the phone with a publisher about a deadline, and he just Kaiser Sosae'd him together because he saw a commercial for the Oscars while ironing clothes.

The thing that's the most shocking is how consistent it is. His power-level barring maybe five (?) instances has been consistently at "he makes Thor/Hulk/Superman" types look like punks.

It's always been "yea Surfer is a beast". Even during the Grek Pak Hulk-era, and IIRC Surfer was weaker than normal.

[Shellhead]

Silver Surfer wasn't always portrayed as this fast and powerful. In the silver and bronze age of comics, his travel speed was impressive, but his reflexes weren't fast enough to evade blows from a slow, heavy bruiser like Ben Grimm or the Hulk. This wasn't PIS, this was Surfer failing to show superhuman reflexes nearly 100% the time. Speaking of Grimm, he was depicted as stronger than default Surfer, though Surfer could channel the power cosmic to amp his strength beyond Ben's.