Boomstick: Sun Wukong, the Monkey King.
Wiz: Myth has many heroes, but few overcome their past to become legendary.
Boomstick: And maybe inspire some comics and anime, to boot!
In the seventh episode of DEATH BATTLE!'s ninth season, two mythological figures clash in a battle of West vs. East. While both have received their fair number of depictions and imitators throughout various forms of media, this battle will pit the two earliest known original legends against each other, the Greek god from humble beginnings and the Chinese warrior with mystical powers, to see which one has what it takes to win a death battle.
The hosts begin with Hercules, or as he was originally known as by the Greeks, Heracles. The god of lightning Zeus, on one of his many philanderous ventures, disguised himself as Amphitryon, the husband of the princess Alcmene, and lied with her, leading to the birth of the demigod Alcaeus (or Alcides in some tellings). In an attempt to appease Hera, the wife of Zeus who was furious that her husband had cheated on her once more, the infant was renamed by his human parents to Heracles (meaning "Glory to Hera"), though, unfortunately, Hera had already decided on tormenting the young boy. In a bid to protect Heracles from Hera's wrath, a plan was hatched by Athena: Hera would be tricked into breastfeeding the child, and her milk would grant Heracles immense strength surpassing even the gods themselves. And, for as insane as the plan was, it went almost completely smoothly (albeit not without Heracles injuring Hera and causing her breast milk to spray out, creating the galaxy). As the boy grew into a man, he was trained by the finest instructors in Greece, and became one of the land's strongest warriors, naturally gifted in several martial arts, but struggled with the finer arts, even losing his temper and killing his music teacher. Unfortunately, this would be a sign of the troubles that would follow; several years later, when Heracles had gained a widespread reputation as a hero, Hera cast a spell on him that sent him into a murderous rage, and in his blind fury, he killed his wife Princess Megara and their sons. When Heracles regained his senses, he became wracked with guilt over what he had done, and sought aid from the oracle of Delphi, who decreed that Heracles's redemption would see him submit himself to King Eurystheus and perform ten grueling labors.
For Heracles's first labor, he would slay the Nemean Lion, the pelt of which was impervious to any blade. Undaunted, Heracles beat the lion to death with his bare hands and took its pelt for use as armor for himself. Against a flock of the man-eating metal Stymphalian birds, he utilized bronze krotalas so loud no living thing could bear the noise to scare them into the air, then proceeded to shoot them down with a bow. To slay the Lernaean Hydra, which grew two heads in the place of every one that was severed from it, Heracles, with the aid of his nephew Iolaus, cauterized the necks with a firebrand to prevent this, and once he had killed it, he envenomed his arrows with the large amount of its poisonous blood that had been spilt from it, which was powerful enough that even the gods feared it. These poisoned arrows would prove useful in slaying centaurs, titans, and even the sun itself. Details of this last feat differ, but in some accounts, Heracles had grown so annoyed with the heat of the desert that he shot an arrow at the sun, the physical embodiment of the god Helios.
And though he had completed all ten labors assigned to him, King Eurystheus did not accept the slaying of the Lernaean Hydra and the cleaning of the Augean stables within a single day, and so he assigned two additional labors in their place: stealing the golden apples of Hesperides (which belonged to Hera, ironically) and the capture and return of the three-headed hound Cerberus. The former labor saw him temporarily assume the role of the titan Atlas, as bearer of the heavens. While modern depictions portray this as a globe, the original Greek interpretation was of a celestial sphere, which contained not just the planet Earth, but the entire universe as well. With the perception of the time being that the universe was endless, with chaos, the primordial origin of everything, being boundless, this would mean that Heracles held up the weight of conceptual infinity. Fortunately, Heracles has an immense drive of perseverance and will to make amends. One example of this was when he met the king Atmetus. The latter's wife Alcestis was to die in his place, and, not wanting to burden Heracles, instructed his servants to keep this a secret from him, and so the oblivious Heracles enjoyed the hospitality of his servants, drinking and reveling. When one of the servants angrily admonished Heracles, as they wanted to mourn the passing of Alcestis, the shameful Heracles decided to ambush Thanatos by her grave, and wrestled him until he agreed to return Alcestis to Atmetus. Heracles is also smarter than one would think, being able to find creative solutions even in the midst of battle, such as when battling the giant Antaeus, who was invincible while his feet were on the ground; Heracles's solution was to lift the giant and strangle him to death in the air. He was clearly unbeatable in a contest of power, and his ultimate death was a testament to this very fact; his wife Deianira was tricked by the dying centaur Nessus, who had been shot by Heracles with a Lernaean Hydra blood-poisoned arrow, into giving Heracles a tunic soaked in the very same poison, fatally envenoming him when he wore it. As the dying Heracles lied at a burning funeral pyre made of trees he'd uprooted himself, Heracles called to the deities who had watched over him and his feats, and as his mortal body burned, his immortal self ascended to the heights of Mount Olympus as the new God of Strength, where even his former nemesis Hera welcomed him alongside the rest of the Greek pantheon to their ranks.
The hosts then move on to the God of Strength's opponent, Sun Wukong. Born from a mystical rock receiving the energies of yin and yang, the stone monkey respectfully bowed in the four cardinal directions, before shooting lasers from his eyes toward the Jade Palace. He would eventually meet with a group of other monkeys and win a bet to find the source of a waterfall, thus becoming the king of the monkeys and declaring himself their Handsome Monkey King. However, the Monkey King's happiness would not last, for eventually one of his older monkey friends would die of old age. Upset greatly by this, the Monkey King set out on a self-made raft in search of immortality. His travels would lead him to the magical Taoist martial artist Puti Zushi, who would train the Monkey King in advanced Taoist practices and the way of immortality, and give him a new name: "Monkey Awakened to the Void", spoken as "Sun Wukong".
Aside from martial arts, Puti Zushi's training bestowed Sun Wukong with a wide variety of magical abilities, such as riding clouds, making thousands of clones of himself, healing from fatal wounds such as decapitation, and transforming into whatever he pleases, such as a bird, vapor, pitchforks, and an animate temple. His famous Cloud Somersault allows him to traverse great distances with a single leap at incredible speeds, initially being able to somersault 108,000 li (or 500 meters at 54,000 km/s in modern measurement systems), and he would only get faster from there. Sun would do whatever it took to prove himself superior, as seen when he fought Prince Nezha, who transformed into a powerful form with three heads and six arms; Wukong's response was to transform into a three-headed six-armed version of himself to match him. Eventually the Monkey King would return to his subjects and amass a massive army of monkeys, though he felt no weapon they presented himself with suited him. Learning that the Dragon King owned many treasures, he travelled to the Dragon King's palace and demanded a weapon worthy of a king that could match Heaven. After being presented with more unsuitable weapons, Sun would eventually acquire the Ruyi Jingu Bang, a large pillar originally used to measure the oceans' depths that would turn out to be the perfect weapon for the Monkey King. The pillar weighs 13,500 jīn (or 7,960 kgs) and is able to change size at Sun's will indefinitely; while normally wielded as a simple staff, it can become as small as a sewing needle (where Sun stores it in his ear when not in use) or large enough to pierce the heavens. This extortion would not go unnoticed by Heaven, however, as they sentenced the Monkey King to death. But, in defiance of Hell's attempt to collect his soul, he crossed the names of himself and all other monkeys he knew out of the Ledger of Death, thus making himself doubly immortal. Even more brazenly, after being invited to Heaven by the Jade Emperor and granted the title of "Protector of the Horses" (essentially a fancy term for a stable-boy, and the lowliest position in Heaven), Sun set their Cloud Horses free from the stable in retaliation and returned to his own kingdom, proclaiming himself "Great Sage Equal to Heaven". Yet despite his antics, the Jade Emperor was willing to placate the Monkey King, reluctantly ratifying his self-appointed title and making him the "Guardian of the Heavenly Peach Garden". However, Sun eventually learned that everyone in Heaven thought of him as merely an immortal who tended to the peaches, and in defiance, he snuck in during preparations for a royal banquet to taste the food and wine. Tipsily, the Monkey King then found and consumed several of Xi Wangmu's Peaches of Immortality and five gourds' worth of Laozi's Pills of Immortality, further layering onto his immortality, and, once he sobered and realized that he was in serious trouble, then departed to prepare for his rebellious war against heaven.
And indeed, Sun Wukong would prove to be a tough opponent for Heaven, besting their finest warriors and matching Erlang Shen in a battle of transformations before being subdued by Laozi throwing his Diamond Jade ring at him and binding him. Yet despite their successful capture of the Monkey King, no execution they came up with could kill him due to his multiple layers of immortality; not lightning, fire, or Laozi's eight-way trigram crucible which could kill even immortals, the last of which backfired and instead strengthened Sun's body and gave him the ability to recognize evil. Despite this, however, the Monkey King is not invulnerable, as he has been harmed by the Scorpion Demoness's poison. And even after his triumph, Sun still had one contender left to deal with: the Buddha himself, who challenged the Monkey King with the task of leaping out of his hand for the title of Jade Emperor. Smugly accepting, Sun leapt to the edge of the universe, but he had already lost the challenge, as the Buddha, having attained Nirvana, transcended the world and held all of existence, and thus the Monkey King had never left his hand. As punishment for his rebellion, Sun was sealed under a mountain for five hundred years, but even he would find a chance at redemption, as he was eventually tasked with protecting a monk named Tan Sanzang (also known as Tripitaka) on his journey to the West along with his two other helpers "Pigsy"/Zhu Bajie and "Sandy"/Sha Wujing, in exchange for his freedom. And though the trip was tough and grueling, and Sun abandoned it multiple times, he always returned, often acting as the group's muscle and saving Tripitaka's life on several occasions. The Monkey King has cracked apart mountains, slayed hundreds of monsters, and survived the universe-destroying storm of the Yellow Wind Demon King. During the journey to the West, Sun also performed one of his most legendary feats by holding up Mt. Sumeru, which supports the infinite cosmic sky, on one shoulder, while carrying Mt. Emei, one of the Sacred Mountains of China, on the other. And after fourteen years, Tripitaka's group completed their journey, for which Sun Wukong was given a place in Heaven for his strength and service, becoming the Victorious Fighting Buddha.
Both legendary figures have been analyzed, and their battle is now nigh. One advertisement for the second sponsor Babble later, and it's time for a death battle!
The story opens to a scroll depicting a tale of ages past, as the mighty hero Heracles reaches the summit of a mountain, where Sun Wukong sits atop a cloud. Hailing the Monkey King, the God of Strength requests the golden apple he holds. Wukong denies the request, as he needs it for his master, but Heracles draws his blade, now demanding the fruit from him. The Great Sage Equal to Heaven seemingly complies and gives it to the Greek god, but Heracles sees through the ruse and crushes the fake apple in his hand. Laughing at his cleverness, Sun retrieves his shrunken Ruyi Jingu Bang from his ear and grows it into a staff, leaping from the cloud to clash with Heracles's blade...
FIGHT!
...Only for the Greek Champion to follow up with a slash that Wukong dodges before countering with a jab, sending Heracles down the mountain as the two deities exchange blows as they descend, ending with Wukong sending Heracles on his back. Exploiting the apparent opening, the Monkey King raises and extends Ruyi Jingu Bang before swinging downwards, an attack that Heracles tries to block only for his sword to shatter to pieces. Quickly recovering from his weapon's destruction, the God of Strength grabs his foe's own weapon and pulls it towards himself, causing Wukong to be carried forward before being punched into the heavens as he lands on some clouds and as he tries to recover, the Victorious Fighting Buddha narrowly avoids a poison-tipped arrow from Heracles before jumping on a smaller cloud to continue the fight while plucking out and releasing strands of his own hair which turn into numerous clones of himself. Undeterred by the numbers, Heracles quickly fires arrow after arrow that each dispatch a clone before Sun launches a clone towards the Olympian that grabs him by the tail, causing both to turn into birds to pick up speed before turning into snakes to bind his arms as multiple clones get close. Annoyed by the situation, Heracles breaks free from the serpents before clashing his krotalas together, the sound destroying the clones and causing one of the snakes to turn back into a disoriented Monkey King as he falls into the forest below. As Wukong lies on the forest floor he goes into a laughing fit at such a formidable enemy, not noticing Heracles before the God of Strength crushes his head with his club only to be in shock as his now headless foe laughs off the injury before transforming into a larger, six armed and three headed form, causing Heracles to acknowledge the feeling of Deja-vu at facing another multi-headed beast. The two opponents clash weapons before Wukong quickly disarms Heracles and assaults him with multiple strikes with his staves until the Greek Champion takes advantage of an opening to shoot the Monkey King with three poisoned arrows... only for his opponent to dissipate revealing that he was just another clone as the real Wukong is still in the sky, sending Ruyi Jingu Bang towards Heracles before the staff expands to massive proportions just before impact. As the Great Sage laughs at his apparent victory atop the giant staff, he starts losing balance as Heracles lifts Ruyi Jingu Bang off himself, only for Wukong to shrink the staff back down for one final swing as Heracles responds with a punch of his own. At the same time of impact the divine forms of the combatants, who were holding the scroll depicting the fight proceed to join in, Heracles channelling Olympus into his club while Wukong channels power equal to Heaven through Ruyi Jingu Bang. As the two weapons clash it is revealed that Heracles was impaled with Ruyi Jingu Bang, while at the same time his mortal avatar is struck into nothingness by his opponent's own avatar. Wukong chuckles to himself as he reveals the real golden apple he and his deceased opponent were fighting over as he leaves the forest, satisfied with his battle.
KO!
With Greek Mythology now lacking one of its most famous heroes, the hosts explain the outcome behind this "Herculean Matchup". Whilst Hercules would be expected to hold the strength advantage, Wukong actually had him matched, as they both lifted the skies of their worlds, which reflect an infinite version of reality; Wukong via Sumaru and Hercules via the Celestial Sphere. Even with their strength in the same margin, Wukong's superior healing ability and various means of immortality meant he could bounce back from any fatal blows, whilst Hercules lacked a similar means to recover. Even so, Hercules' arrows, the ones dipped in god-threatening hydra venom, gave him the option to incapacitate Wukong, similar to the effects of the Scorpion Sting, even if it wasn't outright fatal. But such an opportunity would only present itself if Hercules could actually hit Wukong. The Monkey King's clones, transformations and spells gave him the options to avoid these arrows, befitting his edge in versatility over the God of Strength and how simply in character it would be for Wukong to sit back whilst his clones fought Hercules for him. Backing all this up is Wukong's incredible speed, as whilst Hercules could potentially shoot the sun down with arrows 100 faster than light speed, Wukong jumped across the universe in one second, putting him 1.4 quintillion times the speed of light, and much too fast. Fitting for some called Heaven's Equal, the Monkey King had everything he needed and more to overcome even the God of Strength himself.
Wiz: The winner is the Monkey King, Sun Wukong.
"Hercules VS Sun Wukong" contains examples of:
- Always Someone Better: As strong as Heracles is, he's got absolutely nothing on Wukong. For starters, Wukong achieved a myriad of different means of immortality, and the pre-battle analysis shows he's accomplished various feats comparable to Herc's own, including holding up a mountain that supported the Infinite Celestial Heaven with nothing but his shoulder, while also carrying another mountain on top of that; while Heracles performed a similar feat by holding the then-supposedly infinite universe by substituting for Atlas, he held it up with his entire back and shoulders.
- Bait-and-Switch: Hercules manages to successfully shoot a 3-headed, 6-armed Sun Wukong with a Hydra poison arrow... and it promptly goes poof, revealing that it was just another one of Sun Wukong's multiple clones.
- Beyond the Impossible: Both Hercules and Sun Wukong have feats that can be interpreted as lifting the weight of the entire infinite universe. These were found to be immeasurable, and as such both combatants were treated as dead even in terms of physical strength.
- Breaking Old Trends: While not the first Death Battle to use characters from the real world (that honor goes to Justin Bieber vs. Rebecca Black), it is the first to use characters from real-world mythology.
- Breaking the Fourth Wall: At one point, Heracles uppercuts Wukong so hard he collides with the unopened part of the scroll the battle is taking place inside of.
- Crippling Overspecialization: The main reason Heracles loses out to Sun Wukong. Both had infinite Super-Strength to boast. But in Heracles's case, this infinite strength is pretty much his only noteworthy ability whereas Wukong had an assortment of Combo Platter Powers like Voluntary Shapeshifting and Self-Duplication to utilize along with the afformentioned Super-Strength.
- Disneyfication: Briefly Discussed. The Death Battle uses the original myth of the Greek God of Strength rather than the more light-hearted Disney depiction people are more familiar with, where Herc definitely had a much harder time in proving himself.
- Double Standard: Rape, Divine on Mortal: Wiz and Boomstick are notably disgusted when talking about how Hercules was the product of Zeus "being a total creep" and disguising himself as a woman's husband to get her to sleep with him.
- Foil: Heracles is a demi-god who was among the greatest warriors of his time, and while he had an unruly temper to match his strength, he was nonetheless dedicated to proving himself. Sun Wukong was born from a mystical rock and possessed mystical abilities with an absurdly large ego. Whereas Heracles' journey was more about recognition and later redemption after accidentally murdering his wife and child in a fit of rage orchestrated by Hera, Wukong's was more about being taught humility as his ego led to him confronting and challenging the very heavens themselves. Heracles' efforts were eventually recognized by the gods and ascended to become a god himself, but only after his death. Wukong, meanwhile, became the "Fighting Buddha" after his journey to the west and well-alive (in no small part to the myriad methods of immortality he achieved).
- Lightning Bruiser: Wukong compared to Heracles. Heracles has infinite strength. Wukong has infinite strength and durability (thanks to his multiple sources of immortality), combined with speed that make Heracles' ability to fire arrows at 90 times the speed of light look like Painfully Slow Projectiles in comparison.
- Linear Warriors, Quadratic Wizards: The outcome of the fight ultimately came down to this. While both were roughly equal in physical strength, Sun Wukong had a plethora of spells and other abilities to choose from while Heracles relied almost entirely on his physical strength and weapons.
- Medium Blending: The combatants are represented as pixelated 2D sprites, while the background is drawn in a much smoother style reminiscent of ancient painted scrolls.
- Mundane Made Awesome: Wukong's staff was originally used to measure the ocean depths and was considered a menial weapon by its original owner. In the hands of Wukong, however, it's a brutal weapon that can not only increase in length, but also in size. Wukong attempts to use the latter function by crushing Heracles in the staff's enlarged state, only to fail due to Heracles' surprising strength.
- Mythology Gag: Literally, in this case:
- At one point, Sun Wukong rips out some of his hair and transforms the hairs into multiple versions of himself, replicating a feat from his source material.
- Near the fight's end, Sun Wukong transforms into a being with 3 heads and 6 arms, as in his battle against Prince Nezha. Heracles remarks on the Monkey King's multiple heads, referencing his own fights with multi-headed foes such as the Lernaean Hydra, Geryon, and Cerberus.
- Hercules' declaration of "I am Heracles!" upon introducing his fist to Sun Wukong's jaw is more than a little reminiscent of Dwayne Johnson's take on the Greek hero shouting "I am Hercules!"
- When Heracles starts shooting hydra arrows at Wukong, the latter throws two of his clones in a similar way as Wukong and MK's "Here comes Monkie Kid!" attack from Monkie Kid.
- "Not Making This Up" Disclaimer: Sun Wukong's bio lists his Japanese name as "Son Goku", appending a "(No, really)" to it.
- Shout-Out: As the fight this time around pits characters from real-world mythology against each other, the Death Battle features clips and images from various media relating to the fighters, such as Hercules, Hercules (2014), Havoc in Heaven, Monkie Kid and the upcoming Black Myth: Wukong video game.
- Spiritual Antithesis: This episode could be seen as a mythological version of Goku Vs. Superman. Sun Wukong was the actual inspiration behind Sun Goku, and Heracles, while not the direct inspiration for Superman, is also a ridiculous strong and iconic hero in his own source material. This is also lampshaded by Boomstick in the opening, see above. The outcome is quite different however.
- Super-Strength: Both Hercules and Sun Wukong are so strong that it literally cannot be calculated; for the record the only other combatants whose strength were considered incalculable were Superman and Popeye.
- Worthy Opponent: To an extent. After having his head crushed to a pulp by Heracles, Wukong laughs and says he hasn't a fight this good since the time he waged war against the heavens.
