DEATH BATTLE

The guys have said they regret Bieber vs Black looking back, and yeah it's easy to understand why. Not just the low quality of the episode itself, but the sheer vitriol towards them is definitely an artifact of the 2000s when that was just how things worked on the internet. These days even people who're still around like James Rolfe and Doug Walker have toned it significantly down. You still get that kind of rage today, but, uh... it's from significantly less-humorous, less-than-savory individuals, like the Critical Drinker and his lot.

Edited by lbssb on Apr 17th 2024 at 11:50:32 AM

I've been thinking of matchups for other Spider-Man characters that haven't shown up yet.

Ben Reilly vs Ted Kord/Blue Beetle II - The first successors of their respective legacies who were known for dying. Also tech geniuses.

Kingpin vs Bane - Criminal masterminds whose cunning is matched only by their size and strength.

Kaine vs Azrael (Batman) - 90s antiheroes whose morality evolved over time and are known for being much more ruthless than the main protagonist of their respective franchises. Both also have biblical-themed names.

Julia Carpenter/Spider-Woman II/Madame Webb vs Jeramie Brasieri/Spider Kumonos (Ohsama Sentai King-Ohger) - Spider-themed heroes with a tendency to be annoyingly cryptic with their allies.

Norman Osborn vs David Xanatos (Gargoyles) - I feel Xanatos fits Norman somewhat better than Joker. Both are New York CE Os who have been written by Greg Weisman. Plus, I wanted to include at least one matchup that wasn't another Marvel vs DC fight.

That leaves Silk, Jessica Drew, Mattie Franklin and Anya Corazon. I'm aware of the webcomic superhero Spinnerette who is very much a send-up of Spider-Man. I'm not sure which of the female Spider-Man characters she should fight, though.

Kingpin vs Bane sounds like it would actually be extremely fun.

Criminal masterminds known for complex manipulations, who back it up with a ludicrous amount of strength under their belt.

I'm baffled it hasn't happened yet.

Despite being strong enough to hold his own against Spidey and DareDevil, to the best of my knowledge then Kingpin doesn't have any feats that even remotely approach Bane's strength on a bad day. Also you wouldn't be able to scale him to Spider-Man (I mean, you could, but it would be wrong) because there have been several instances, most famously Back in Black after Aunt May was shot, when Peter very, very clearly demonstrates that if he ever gets serious then he completely wrecks Wilson Fisk with minimal effort.

Wilson is strong enough to fairly easily slam a vault door shut on DareDevil's head - rude - but I don't think that compares to like, tossing vans around.

Given the popularity of Death Battle I think they could go the indie route if they cut a few corners.

Another character from Spider-Man that hasn't appeared in Death Battle yet is Felicia Hardy a.k.a the Black Cat. Her most obvious matchup is Catwoman from Batman. The connections between Selina and Felicia is that they're thieves with a cat motif who have had a on again off again relationship with Batman and Spider-Man who are both animal themed superheroes.while Catwoman doesn't have any superhuman abilities, Black Cat in some versions either has the ability to cause her opponents bad luck or has been enhanced with the same serum that Captain America was given.

My ideal matchip between Kingpin would be the Penguin: marvel and DC's mob bosses!

I'm sure Penguin has pulled a variety of bullshit with his trick umbrellas over the years... but I can hardly imagine him not being just absolutely demolished by Kingpin's improbable physical strength.

That matchup would be unique in my eyes considering it's comic book's biggest crime bosses and a fight between Penguin and Kingpin would be something not a lot of people thought about.

I think Penguin takes it just using his helicopter umbrella and poison gas/acid umbrella. The Kingpin is strong but I'm seventy percent sure he can't fly or make himself immune to poison or acid.

To be fair, Back In Black is basically the only example of that, and most writers since have more or less ignored it.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 18th 2024 at 8:50:53 AM

There’s counter examples of Kingpin easily opening a very heavy door that Spidey struggled with

Comics contain multitudes.

Generally, we don't scale Kingpin to Spidey.

A lot of Spidey villains don't. Which makes it funnier ome of the few who undeniably scales is Shocker.

Back In Black is really awkward, because it's one writer throwing literally every non-superpowered villain Spider-Man has under the bus for the sake of briefly making Spidey look cool in their comic.

The comics in general pretty much completely ignore it because it would neuter the stakes of any story that included a villain less powerful than, say, the Lizard (IE, 80% of Spidey's rogues gallery), and one writer shouldn't have the authority to do that (even if that writer is JMS), so basically everyone else before or since has treated Kingpin's strength as a genuine threat to Spidey, but fans treat that one story like the gospel sometimes.

Given how Death Battle handles situations like that, always skewing characters' abilities upwards if they can, they would probably just ignore it too.

As for feats, Kingpin's done things like rip apart buildings with his bare hands. If we're talking about how Bane is usually depicted in the comics (and not, like, adaptations like Arkham or The Batman that buff him up to the point of being a totally different kind of character), it's definitely a pretty equal fight - at least on the surface.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 18th 2024 at 8:59:53 AM

Fisk has done what now

Here's a Fisk respect thread.

My favorite Fisk feat has always been that time he picks up an entire staircase, rips it off of its foundation, and swings it at Spidey like a baseball bat.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 18th 2024 at 8:57:34 AM

Penguin wierdly enough does have a few typical Low Street-Tier feats. He has easily knocked out people with only a singular punch which has been described as like being hit with a baseball bat.

And apparently durable enough to survive RPG explosions and when this building was bombed. https://gyazo.com/2b9fe69bd5fce02de563e4a1e5c6d659

Batman has once cited he has amazing speed and agility despite his improbable physique. https://gyazo.com/e980c52003e4a215300f0a269aa715af

Surviving explosions is, like, standard ability for anyone living in Gotham. I think it's something in the water.

My favorite is Black Mask just straight up fleeing so fast that he gets out of a building in the time it takes for a fired RPG to reach its target.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 18th 2024 at 8:59:25 AM

The GCPD did once detain Penguin by literally shooting him with a direct RPG shot because they knew he would survive without any real harm done besides cosmetic damage.

So yeah it really is a prerequisite for anyone living Gotham to shrug off explosions.

Fisk once beat Red Skull in a 1v1. Skull at the time was in a cloned body of Captain America.

I'm not sure if that puts him anywhere near Bane's strength, but yeah he definitely is close enough to "Peak human" strength.

Scratch that, my favorite bit of explosion bullshit from Gotham is in Under The Red Hood where Batman, Jason and the Joker are mere feet from an explosion that takes down an entire building, and all three of them are completely fine.

re: Peter easily kicking Kingpin's ass when he doesn't hold back in "Back In Black"

While not with Kingpin specifically, I am reminded of the moment in Dying Wish where Otto-in-Peter's-body knocks the Scorpion's jaw clean off of his head with just one punch, and mentally remarks that he had no idea Peter even had that much power, then realizing that Peter had been pulling his punches all the time.

If Peter could have done that to Scorpion, who is not only an outright superhuman, but is supposedly even more durable than Peter himself is, without even really trying to, I fully believe that not just easily wreck Kingpin, he could crush the peak-human Fisk's skull like a grape without breaking a sweat if he actually wanted to.

Edited by TrashJack on Apr 18th 2024 at 12:32:36 PM

Maybe that finally makes sense of how Peter beat Firelord, a herald of Galactus, by just punching him harder

But I won’t humor that thought

If I remember the Back in Black fight properly, not only did Spiderman knock Frisk around, but he didn't even let Frisk hit him. On its own, it's a great fight and a jaw dropping moment for Peter.

But, in the greater context of Peter's career it does seem kind of silly. I can understand Spiderman pulling his punches because he wants to take his foes to jail not the hospital. But, was Peter also pulling his agility and speed too? In previous fights, did Peter want to take a few punches to the face for fun?

Edited by Freshwater on Apr 18th 2024 at 11:08:39 AM