Comic Vine Battle of the Week: Moon Knight vs. Black Canary

We're now entering the third week of Moon Knight Month and it is time once again to test Marc Spector's abilities as a combatant. He's been able to defeat Green Arrow and Ra's al Ghul, but will his winning streak stop here? Will Black Canary's hand-to-hand abilities and Canary Cry keep Marvel's anti-hero down for the count? Or do you think Moon Knight's armor and skill is enough to defeat the challenger from DC? Read the rules, give it a proper amount of thought and then cast your vote!

READY TO VOTE? CLICK HERE!!!

Match Rules

• Combatants are in character.
• This is a random encounter (aka no prep for either team).
• They're fighting in a generic downtown city setting. It's unpopulated, at night and all standard city lights remain on. Assume they start roughly 15 feet apart and visible. There's a fair amount of cover in the location (parked vehicles, bus stops and such). The entire area is on limits. This means alleys, rooftops, building interiors, the sewer, etc.
• Moon Knight has his current gear. No vehicles, obviously.
• For simplicity's sake, Black Canary is current but pre-52 feats are applicable. And no, she doesn't have a motorcycle.
• Incapacitation, knockout or death all count as elimination. Making a tactical retreat counts as a loss, too.
• Hey, you know what would be really cool? Treating everyone else in the debate with respect. If you think someone's saying something that just isn't true, go ahead and stick to the facts to point out why. There's no need at all to drop insults just because you disagree with someone. Seriously, this is just talking about a fictional fight, there's no need for immaturity and mudslinging.
• If you think the poll isn't going how it should, making an informative post about why a character is being underestimated and spreading the word is far more useful than complaining. Just saying.
• One more thing: you don't need to write an essay to be selected as the Viner Argument of the Week. Sometimes concise posts can be way more effective than a flood of paragraphs.

Viners, you have the week to research, debate and vote! This means there's no reason to vote right away if you don't have all of the info you need to make an educated decision. Check the homepage Friday for an updated article with the following:

• Thoughts from the staff.
• A Viner Argument for both characters (can't include scans and must be in the poll thread).
• If we're lucky, blurbs from industry talent.

Next week, Moon Knight will enter the Batman Battle of the Month! He's already faced Nightwing and Red Hood, but if you want to make a match suggestion, let us know below or via Twitter! Want to continue celebrating Moon Knight? We've posted his Best Covers, Best Battles, he'll be the topic of tomorrow's Question of the Week, and his must read stories will be posted on Friday.

I am going for Black Canary.

praise the khonshu

Why are we going moon knight crazy?......... change the record!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

moon knight wins big time, bu the battle will be tough though. if they where to fight in the night, which moon knight at that time is at is strongest will defeat her. moon knight endures pain more than batman himself. is bones have been broken and yet he still continues to fight. black canary won't long in this fight. her screaming will do damage to moon-knight, but moon knight will get back up and continue is battle until black canary is worn out.

Please read the first sentence.

@k4tzm4n:

Ahhh!!! My mistake, only read the title-okay fair enough, ill have to go with moon knight then.

This is hard. I believe Canary is more skilled but that's not enough to beat MK alone. With the addition of her cry, I'm leaning more at BC.

Yay! I suggested this fight! :)

That Canary Cry is capable of incapacitating heavy hitters like Aquaman, Amazo, and Wonder Woman. No amount of pain tolerance is gonna save Moon Knight if she chooses to unleash it on him at close range. There is a big difference between shrugging off arrows and shrugging of a scream that wreaking havoc on your internal organs.

black canary all day. a waaay better fighter

@medulaoblaganda: he no longer has his moon powers so...that arguement loses out. he might win cause he's super crazy and unpredictable but canary is far more skilled and has the upper hand

Moonie may be able to KO ONLY if he gets first hit. Moon Knight vs. Beast Boy. Put Marc out of his comfort zone a bit katz.

Really leaning towards a stomp in Canary's favor. She's more skilled, so while she could not outright win in an H2H encounter, she wouldnt hesitate to unleash her voice once she realized Mk's battle soak gives him too big an edge. Honestly, don't see how MK can take this.

As much as I love Moon Knight, I think Black Canary will win this.

Sure, at long range, Moon Knight has more gadgets and options. However, there's plenty of cover for Black Canary to hide behind as she closes the distance or forces Moon Knight to come closer.

At mid-range. Black Canary has the advantage because her Canary cry becomes useful. Because the Cry is a sound attack, Moon Knight's becomes drastically more ineffective and, due to the battle being random, he's had no chance to prepare for it. What's more, the Canary Cry can incapacitate even the greatest of heroes (like Wonder Woman) at this range.

At short-range, it'll be a tough battle. Moon Knight's stronger and more durable, but Black Canary seems more proficient and skilful. Non-powered, it could go either way depending on who gets a few lucky hits first. However, Black Canary's sonic scream is once again a decider. It has been shown to kill at point blank, so at the very least it will knock Moon Knight unconscious at this range.

Finally, Black Canary has the advantage in a myriad of other ways. She's got darker, more camouflaged clothes, whereas Moon Knight's white will make him obvious to spot. Her sonic abilities have been used as mind reading in the past (although how effective this may be against Moon Knight's multiple personalities is unknown.) Finally, she has the best mobility, her sonic scream allowing her to launch herself great distances.

To conclude, it's a pretty close match-up (Moon Knight maybe winning) without Black Canary's powers. However, Black Canary's powers give her a huge edge that makes her victory likely. It's a shame, I really like Moon Knight.

I have to go with Canary on this one.

She is easily one of the most experienced and skilled hand to hand combatants in the DCU and with the canary cry in her arsenal (and this being a random encounter) I think she'll easily take the edge.

Close or long range the canary cry is a brutal power that has taken down some of the DCU's biggest power houses and up close in personal will send Moon Knight running back to Konshu with his moon tail between his legs.

Team Dinah all the way on this one!

See I am a huge MK fan, and legitimately thought he had more than what it took to beat Ra's last time. However this time I'm leaning more towards Black Canary.

Why? Because fights aren't a simple rock-paper-scissors thing. Just because fighter A can beat fighter B, and fighter B can beat fighter C, DOESN'T necessarily mean that fighter A can always beat fighter C. Differences in HOW they fight, and in this case big game-changing powers, have a huge impact.

And I think that both fighters, being incredibly skilled, are on a similar level in terms of killer instinct, but BC's cry is a real game changer. I sincerely think that MK could beat most people you put him against, as long as he wasn't completely and totally outclassed power level wise.

But that doesn't mean he will.

@perfect_10: moon knight has more pain tolerance than black canary so he has the upper hand. he could withstand canary's scream's

@mr_athrilla: without the cry me a river scream lol moon knight will defeat her hands down. you do know that moon knight has a healing factor too right?

Oooohhhhh....... I really ,really like moon knight, and if it was against new52 version I'd say he'd win, but if Canary's old feats count..... then I'm sorry but she was one of the most formidable character in old dc for awhile. A sonic scream with the potential to kill heavy hitters like Wonder Woman and Superman, and martial arts skills so advance that if she didn't beat Batman, it would be a draw.

Pre-52, Canary was trained to replace Lady Shiva, lead the Justice League, and managed to be one of the most big hearted heroes in Dc at the same time as the most terrifying. She has fought a third world country type army, all the top martial artists except Batman, but I might have missed that issue( not that I said fought and survived, not defeated. She has trained with Cassandra Cain, Richard Dragon and connor hawke, yet never deafated them in combat. At least, not without her powers.) and she is talented enough to lead most super teams with her charm and strategic skill.

Black Canary 7/10

She's more skilled (though he is no slouch), her scream gives her great damage output, and despite liking the character I can't see how Marc overcomes one of the most skilled H2H combatants DC has to offer.

Bravo, way to go with those insults. Real classy. And if you think Moon Knight would have an easy fight if she didn't use sonics you haven't read enough DC.

Healing factor doesn't matter much when sonics can liquify organs including the brain. He might not die but he'd be incapacitated, which counts as a loss for him. If Black Canary wanted to merely disable Moon Knight she could use ultrasonics to interfere with his brain waves, inducing unconsciousness. Or if she were feeling cruel, pop his eyeballs and rupture his eardrums over and over again from afar.

@golden_cod: well, honestly i won't lie to you, lol i don't read DC comics. i really need to start reading it. who as she defeat in DC?

Black Canary is a more skilled combatant with experience with pain immune opponents. Her Canary Cry would severely hamper Moon Knight at the very minimum.

Honestly, Moon Knight's best chance is with a throwing crescent and it's not a very good chance at all.

@conorhamilton42:

Her sonic abilities have been used as mind reading in the past (although how effective this may be against Moon Knight's multiple personalities is unknown.) Finally, she has the best mobility, her sonic scream allowing her to launch herself great distances.

Not to mention that she has "lullaby", a "Jigglypuff"-type attack that can lull him to sleep in seconds without her having ever thrown a single punch.

Moon Knight's cool, but he'd go down here without PIS.

At least ban her Canary Cry because if things go bad for her, she can pull that off and win.

@nukea6: Black Canary without Canary Cry and Moon Knight without gadgets/armor?

I'd still give the slight majority to Black Canary.

Physically speaking, Moon Knight outclasses Dinah in all aspects except maybe agility. Her output however (ignoring her Cry, which I'll get to) is pretty high. She's a very skilled fighter, easily in DC's top tier of fighters, who's done well against the likes of Bronze Tiger and Lady Shiva and even metahumans like Deathstroke. She's taken beatings from some of these characters as well, so she can take what she can dish out and is no glass cannon. But, he damage threshold isn't anywhere near Specter's. Moon Knight has ludicrous pain tolerance and durability for a street guy with no healing factor, and while he is not as skilled as Canary he is no slouch in the hand to hand department either. He's more versatile with his gear and armor, but the wildcard here is Dinah's Canary Cry. She's hurt enemies outside her weight class with it in the past, and she can fluctuate it from a disorienting level (like a flashbang) to an outright KO. Now in character she isn't going to open hard and blast Marc into unconsciousness, but as the fight progresses and she sees how much punishment this man can take I think she'll amp the decibels a bit. It could even be a game changer and clinch victory from the jaws of defeat. Still, Specter has won uphill battles with nothing but determination and grit; it'd be unreasonable to think Dinah sweeps him clean. I'd back the Canary 6-7/10 though.

This.

Hey man what's good brother? haha.

@medulaoblaganda:

Across DC's many retcons Black Canary has been portrayed as discovering her sonic power after starting her superhero career. She fought using melee before that like her mom, the first Black Canary, though DC's recent retcon changes her origin to that of a gun-wielding spec-ops soldier.

Her best melee feat would be sparring with Lady Shiva and switching lives with her for a brief time. Canary was forced to relive Shiva's training and subsequently fights against the martial artists Twelve Brothers in Silk and White Canary, who are described as being near Shiva's level if not above.

That said, if Black Canary has no access to her sonics I think Moon Knight would win. She doesn't have superhuman endurance / stamina so if Marc drags it out into a battle of attrition his damage soak will trump her skill.

Tie.

BC

@golden_cod: does all the canaries have the cry me a river screams?

Moon Knight is pretty much toast once she whips out the Canary Cry. How good is his healing factor I don't know about?

Gotta go with Moonie. And I like Black Canary, especially pre-New 52, trained by one of my fave DC characters, Wildcat(thanks for taking him away, DC). Still, a lot of heavy hitters have come off as second best to Moonie. The guy has fought Ultron, Taskmaster, Doc Doom, and fights a slavering werewolf on multiple occasions, in various forms of ferocity, from the Lon Chaney look to pushing 7 foot with the elongated snout. He's a trained fighter with a past as a merc/soldier of fortune. He has amazing pain tolerance and a moral flexibility that the Canary doesn't have. It won't be easy definitely- he won't stomp Canary, she'll put up a helluva fight and he'll have plenty of wounds to heal- but I still gotta go with the silver-and-jet-black avenger.

@medulaoblaganda: you do know that canary's cry isnt just loud noise? she can destroy buildings with that scream, moon knight isnt invulnearable but that is kind of a mute point cause as any canary fan knows she rarely uses it as she prefers to fight hand to hand (like psylocke) which is her great weakness. plus moon knight would fight to kill where canary would hold back, that's why i say its possible that he could win because of his mental state versus her's but if she knew what she was up against, relied on her powers more and had no problem killing i would say 100% she would win but for now im saying there is a 60% chance she would win, that extra ten is pure fan love

@perfect_10: canary would win because if she sees that moon knight is pommeling her to the ground, that is when she will use her cry me a river scream on is face point blank. that might be the end for moon knight. lol.

I am going with Moon Knight. He is far more skilled than people credit him for and has more experience in battle than BC does. He's also fought more than his fair share of metahumans. Including Venom and other members of the Thunderbolts at the time.

Moony's arsenal isn't just for long range. He can use his shuriken in close range and has an assortment of close-range weapons, such as a collapsible staff and even a katana. If Marc Spector is willing to kill, then Canary may find a crescent dart in her throat very early on. As well as anywhere else he can hit. A Moon Knight without morals is a frightening thing. When he learned he couldn't actually kill Deadpool, he started fighting as he would when trying to kill someone. And that left even Wade Winston Wilson scared.

Moon Knight does have an absurd level of pain tolerance, having literally withstood cyborgs playing Operation with his spine. He's been injured in just about every way you can think of, and has even been hit by the Hulk a few times. Once early on in his career.

If Canary uses the cry, she stomps.

If not, she should win after a very tough fight.

Only the second/current Canary.

@cdw101: it's Moon Knight month. Last month was Spidey month. And I'm a huge MK fan but due to that extremely powerful canary cry, Black Canary whoops his butt bad.