Thing, Iron Fist and Carol Danvers - Gladiator already one-shotted Thing and Ms.Marvel. Adding Hyperion is overkill.
Pictured: Gladiator one-shotting Thing.
Also lol at Gladiator being above Hulk or Beta Ray Bill. Or Spectrum not doing shit to them. They get stomped hard at 6, Hulk solos. But then again, they won't even pass 4, since Rogue has Wonder Man's powers and will body Gladiator and Jean can TP Hype.
@aqualion0: ah yes, he was holding back so much that he accidently got his ass kicked. "Obviously holding back". Oh yeah, of course, because we know how much he tends to hold back in situations like this.
Just like he was "holding back" against Wonder Man and Masterson, or how he was "holding back" against Hyperion, or how he was "holding back" against Hulk, or like he was "holding back" literally every time something didn't go his way.
You can't use "holding back" as an excuse if the character in question has as much restraint as a rabid dog.
@aqualion0: ah yes, he was holding back so much that he accidently got his ass kicked. "Obviously holding back". Oh yeah, of course, because we know how much he tends to hold back in situations like this.
Just like he was "holding back" against Wonder Man and Masterson, or how he was "holding back" against Hyperion, or how he was "holding back" against Hulk, or like he was "holding back" literally every time something didn't go his way.
You can't use "holding back" as an excuse if the character in question has as much restraint as a rabid dog.
Gladiator was evenly matching Sue even though Uni-power is walking plot device designed to beat high-tiers. Btw it's explictly implied that Kallark was holding back as he was in rush and his purpose was to attain Uni-force. First scan doesn't refute my claim : Fighting =/= Being morals off and second one is when he was facing Phoenix which has to do nothing with my post. I don't care about other showings or what people say about it because we're only talking about this instance.
Just try to forget your hatred towards Gladiator , why would he say things like that if he was certainly bloodlusted?
''I don't wish to engage you in combat'' - Says a guy who previously trashed same team and comic even referenced it.
''I apologize if my actions are rash , but every second counts.''- Show me any bloodlusted character apologizing how they're not careful.
Towards the end he even cares about that he injured Sue with his punches.
Gladiator being above Savage Hulk is silly to me, seeing as Gladiator already lost to a weakened pre-core breach Savage Hulk in Incredible Hulk annual 1997
This was back in the period of time where Hulk served as the nexus of the 2 flowing energies of the universes. Because of this, Hulk was literally dying due to how intrusive and powerful those energies were and his powers were seriously fluctuating from that point as it is explained in Incredible Hulk #460...
In this issue Hulk actually dies and revives almost instantly when Banner was reincorporated into Hulk's persona, this happened many issues after Hulk and Gladiators fight, in other words, Hulk was at the very bottom of his potential. Moreover, Hulk was trashed by a giant T-Rex previously to the encounter with Gladiator, and yet Gladiator lost to this Hulk.
And yes the dates support this conclusively.
Incredible Hulk annual 1997 came out in May of 1997 https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Incredible_Hulk_Annual_Vol_1_1997
Incredible Hulk #460(when Hulk finally regained Banner and his strength) came out in January of 1998 https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Incredible_Hulk_Vol_1_460
On top of that we even have a direct comparison between Gladiator and Savage Hulk vs the same foe under the same writer when they faced an amped Annhilius
His fight with Gladiator
His fight with Hulk
In this fight Hulk lasted longer, did more damage and took more punishment than Gladiator to the point where even Annhilius himself acknowledges this. I have no idea how anyone can justify Gladiator being above Savage Hulk. Even if we look at Gladiators highest feats like 3-shotting a planet, tanking half a solar system explosion, etc... it all still pales in comparison to the highest one Hulk has like infinite strength, causing infinite earthquakes across infinite dimensions, tanking an explosion that was amped nigh-infinitely, etc... Obviously we shouldn't use or even consider these since they are nonsense but i am genuinely trying to figure out what the hell is the justification for Gladiator being above Hulk or BRB. Bill also has way better and consistent feats than Gladiator, Donny Cates writing a comic where Gladiator beats Bill supposedly off-panel through unknown means doesn't change this.
They stop at 6, period. Both are outmatched by either BRB or Hulk.
@aqualion0: How Hulk knew about Gladiator weakness was never explained, it wasn't the best writing, but then again it doesn't matter how he knew it, he did. Maybe Banner read some files on Gladiator at some point or who the hell knows, let's say it's bad writing. Yea when he was flying across those galaxies he wasn't carrying a giant green rage monster with him. Ok this is the same faulty logic that Helion used that simply is not true. Gladiator did not EASILY burn through Hulks insides, he actually burned through Hulks skin and just had gotten to his insides but didn't burn them away, otherwise it would have killed Hulk there, in fact he burns through Hulk with his HV for 3 panels as Hulk walks slowly towards him
and in that time he didn't manage to burn through Hulks organs to kill him. So it wasn't easy, secondly you and Helion seem to be confused if he was able to burn through Hulks skin and get to his insides in those 3 panels why didn't he burn through Hulks hand and i still don't understand how i have to explain this. But take a piece of wood or better yet a book, which burns incredibly easy, take a blow torch hold it at a normal distance and you will burn through that book fairly quickly and easily, now imagine if you turned on that blowtorch or a flame thrower and instantly shoved a book at the end of the muzzle, the book wouldn't vaporize in 1 second, what would happen is you would instantly get a feedback because the fire can't burn to the book so quickly and some of it will go to the side of the book or even back into the muzzle, there is a chance the fire would go out completely, this is simply what happened here, it's the same principle. If Hulks hand was 3 meters away from Gladiator and he used his HV he'd probably burn through Hulks hand before he put it on his face but considering Hulk put it instantly on his face at point blank range there was no time to burn through it. i am sure Hulks hand was singed and burnt but he can ignore that burn while Gladiator can't ignore the feedback to his brain. Yea because Hulks power fluctuated back then, he was hurt by some things more easier than others, he would sometimes experience literal heart attacks out of nowhere and sometimes wouldn't, the whole point of Hulk back then is he wasn't exactly stable. He kept repeating how he never felt stronger than before, but was literally dying. I also don't get where people got the idea that the whole battlefield was filled with radiation after they fell from orbit, it wasn't. Them falling through the orbit just caused a nuclear reactor to go critical, nowhere did it spill radiation to the outside.
How on Earth is a fight where Gladiator can't beat a near dying pre-core breach Hulk something you can put a positive spin on is beyond me.
Yea except it was literally clear as day that he overcame the fear ray. In fact he went as far as to literally state to Annhilius that he will fall before Gladiator no matter what
I am not sure where you got what from a facial expression, when Gladiator literally figures out the whole thing is a trick from Annhilius and that it wont deter him from finding him and beating his ass. So are you saying Gladiator was faking being confident there? If the fear ray worked on him like it did with everyone else(including Hulk) he would have ran away and be the most scared person in the world, his confidence would be non-existent at which point he would not be a threat to anyone(let alone a Thanos level Annhilius) and even something like this could casually knock him out
Also Gladiator literally got floored(and possibly KO'd) from a single kick, energy blast and clawing. Hulk took 1 punch, 2 slams to the ground, 1 clawing and 2 energy blasts(go back and count them if you don't believe me) and was still not downed let alone KO'd at by any of those, even though Starlin literally ignored that Hulk has a healing factor in that run.
And was also under fear from the fear ray so basically at the bottom of his anger during half that fight. Also what experience? What did experience have to do there? It doesn't change Annhilius damage output, not that he was anymore experienced against Gladiator then against Hulk, the only fight he had up until that point was against Hulk, against who he was bloodlusted as well for half the fight unlike with Gladiator. So what are we to infer from Annhilius words here?
But you think this instances are unreasonable? Ok, let's try a few others, how about the time where Gladiator and Hulk fought Colossus under the same writer(Gladiators creator), lets see how that goes.
Gladiator vs Colossus
"They stand toe to toe, neither yielding an inch, as they trade punch after punch"
"The fight is brutal a clash of modern titans"
"One an irresistible force, the other an immovable object, battling without letup"
The entire comic treats them as equal or at least near equal, they go blow for blow and neither KO's the other, it's actually the ancient building falling on them that KO's them and Gladiator just manages to recover faster than Colosuss after several minutes, in visibly bad shape.
Ok lets see how Hulk does against a pre-core breach Savage Hulk.
"The harder i hit him the less he seems to notice"
"None of my punches seem to have any effect"
Hulk literally 1-shots Colossus here. He catches his elbow and KO's him, the comic showed a massive difference between the 2 unlike with Gladiator and Colossus(under the same writer).
That's probably the most definitive showing of the differences between Hulk and Gladiator and how well they fared against the same opponent, under the same writer.
How about vs Heimdall? This is gonna be brief
Gladiator had a pretty lengthy and difficult fight against Heimdal on the rainbow bridge where he came out victorious but bloody in the end
Hulk on the other hand swatted him casually
I guess this is also pretty unfair somehow... I mean the only lucky thing in all of this is that we are comparing only Savage Hulk to Gladiator, if i got to use Immortal Hulk or WWH, this would be an embarrassment for him, considering how well either fared against the same opponent.
Gladiator was evenly matching Sue even though Uni-power is walking plot device designed to beat high-tiers.
He wasn't evenly matching her, she stomped him after two pages of fighting.
I'm not even exaggerating, that was the entirety of their fight:
And that wasn't even a full power Uni-Power, it was repeatedly said in this series that UP was weak and needed to copy powers of Hulk and Daredevil to compensate:
So that was basically Sue with Hulk's powers wrecking Kallark.
Btw it's explictly implied that Kallark was holding back as he was in rush and his purpose was to attain Uni-force.
The fact that he was on the clock and needed to attain UP as soon as possible (since, from what he knew, any kind of hold up could result in a huge body count) actually implies the opposite. Him pulling punches when tons of lives were at stake and he had no time to waste makes 0 sense. Especially considering he didn't give two shits about blowing the FF up in that very issue. "I'm sorry I almost blew you up. Happpens to the best of us".
First scan doesn't refute my claim
Wasn't meant to. I brought it up in comparison to a situation that was pretty much identical (except with Phoenix Force instead of Uni-Power) where Kallark was not bothering to hold back.
Fighting =/= Being morals off and second one is when he was facing Phoenix which has to do nothing with my post.
Oh, it has everything to do with it. Because it gives a good look at Gladiator's character and how handles 100% of problems coming his way. By hitting them as hard as he can.
And the situation was pretty much identical too. Gladiator's supposed allies? Check. Posessed by a superpowered entity? Check. Gladiator thinks that said entity is dangerous to untold amount of lives and needs to be taken care of as soon as possible? Check. Gladiator decides to solve the problem by throwing fists? Check. If his mindset in one situation was to "hit the problem as hard as possible", then it would be the same mindset in the other situation.
I don't care about other showings or what people say about it because we're only talking about this instance.
See, that's your problem. You want to take this issue alone and completely ignore Gladiator's character and behaviour from the rest of his career just in order to prove your shaky point. But it doesn't work that way.
Just try to forget your hatred towards Gladiator , why would he say things like that if he was certainly bloodlusted?
There's a difference between being bloodlusted and just not holding back. I wouldn't say that Gladiator is bloodlusted 24/7, but he does go around punching people with intent to kill the second they start becoming a hindrance to him, and that's a regular thing for him. He went full power against Hyperion off the bat:
He was about to kill Cannonball when he started annoying him:
He was fully intent on killing Nova if the latter didn't surrender:
He was trying to kill Wonder Man and Erik Masterson too, he tried killing Hulk, he was going full power against Colossus, he had no qualms about killing this Nova Corpsman, he tried killing Phoenix Five... What's my point? That Gladiator has no morals to speak of. This panel describes his moral outlook perfectly:
Remember what he said to Heimdal?
Look at this attitude.
He doesn't give two shits about collateral damage or people dying if that's needed for him to complete his objective. In most of his appearances, he starts going all out the very second something doesn't go his way, and he clearly cares very little if anyone happens to die from his hits.
You can also remember that Gladiator currently leads a "Gamora Kill Crew", whose explicit purpose is to kill Gamora to save countless lives [from Thanos]. Gladiator's whole modus operandi can be described as "kill first, ask questions later".
''I don't wish to engage you in combat'' - Says a guy who previously trashed same team and comic even referenced it.
And then engages them anyway.
''I apologize if my actions are rash , but every second counts.''- Show me any bloodlusted character apologizing how they're not careful.
Irony of that apology is that he almost blew up Fanatstic Four a panel prior to it and didn't seem particularly bothered by that. That sounds pretty much like "Sorry I almost killed you, but I have more important things to do".
Towards the end he even cares about that he injured Sue with his punches.
Yes, because he screwed up, got his ass kicked and made himself look like an idiot. Hence him being more... linient than he was at the beginning of the issue.
I'm well aware of Gladiator's character and every single thing you posted. But all he did was to crush Ben into force field and then casually swat him away in order to get rid of him. Thing's powers weren't really increased compared to classic age and writer knew about their last encounter , so he wouldn't be dumb enough to completely ignore outcome of last fight. There's no way to measure how hard Kallark was punching unless we ask writer but one thing is clear. When Gladiator one-shotted Thing he was literally bloodlusted while in this showing he is in rush and only serious. Yeah , he goes for kill in-character but not at first blow.
I'm well aware of Gladiator's character and every single thing you posted. But all he did was to crush Ben into force field and then casually swat him away in order to get rid of him.
Punch him away, if we're being completely honest.
Yes, all he did was ram Ben into a forcefield and punch him.
Thing's powers weren't really increased compared to classic age
They increase all the time. It was said many times that he is continously getting stronger.
The gap between Ben's first fight against Gladiator and this one is 23 years. He did indeed get stronger. Just during that gap he gained his spiky upgrade, then lost it, then just a year later after the Captain Universe comic showed feats superior to the ones of his upgraded spiky self. So yes, Ben did indeed get stronger.
And he continues to get stronger. It was strongly implied in new FF series that he got another upgrade, since Doom somehow managed to grossly underestimate his capabilities two times in the row despite regularly facing him and FF for many years. Which explains why he took that blast from Galactus so well and how he is going to give Immortal Hulk a good fight in July.
and writer knew about their last encounter , so he wouldn't be dumb enough to completely ignore outcome of last fight.
I wouldn't say that it's a good guarantee. Every writer remembers that Wrecking Crew are supposed to be Thor villains and still makes them job to street levelers.
There's no way to measure how hard Kallark was punching unless we ask writer but one thing is clear. When Gladiator one-shotted Thing he was literally bloodlusted while in this showing he is in rush and only serious. Yeah , he goes for kill in-character but not at first blow.
We can estimate how hard Gladiator was hitting him, since we know how quick Gladiator is to resort to force. Yes, he was in rush, he was serious, and that only makes the case worse because the FF were standing between him and his objective, and we both know how Gladiator usually treats those who happen to stand in his way. The whole point of the fight was to get through FF and secure Uni-Power. He needed to beat them as fast as possible, since he was on the clock and, from what he knew, risking untold lives. He had no leeway to intentionally pull his punches. And yet Ben just shrugged his hits off.
@aqualion0:I literally said it's was bad writing that was never explained and i just randomly threw in some ideas and concluded that it was probably just PIS, how the hell did you infer from that, that i was presenting it as fact is beyond me, but you see what you want to see i guess. Where is the explanation or even the hint that the reactor weakened Gladiator before Hulk threw him into the reactor? The colorist you mean, the artist doesn't color his art, another person does that. Yea lets use that feat that happened 2 decades later of Gladiator flying across galaxies in under 1 second and bullrushing Heimdal and not even taking him out with said bullrush as proof that he 20 years ago he could have flown Hulk out of Earths atmosphere in less than 3 seconds. Hulk weight is not the issue here, the issue is the fact that he isn't preforming a pure travel feat, he is carrying a being that is much larger than him so it's awkward to hold onto him and a being that is stronger than him, he had to focus on holding Hulk as well as carying him into space and it's not like it took him half a minute it took him 3 seconds which is WAY better than the vast majority of Gladiator speed feats. Yea that's actually a PIS that worked against Hulk, he clapped his hears with a thunderclap he should have straight up killed Gladiator there, but he didn't he just stunned him, also how the hell is that a weakness for Gladiator in the way you are making it out to be? Lound sounds screw up Gladiator so every time there is one he is now completely weakened in his strength and durability as a result or what exactly? I am still not convinced Gladiator was weakened in that fight, until Hulk threw him into the reactor and even before that the fight was pretty much over. I love how everything else is ass pull to grant Hulk the win when the writer could have literally just had Hulk one-shot Gladiator at the start of the fight or do anything else to him and nobody could stop him from it, but he went for the choices he did because he couldn't find a way to justify Hulk beating Gladiator, is that the claim you are trying to make? There have been literal instances of street level characters beating up high-tiers and heralds and the writers didn't even add any context to it and nobody could do a thing about it, Gladiator lost to Hulk, get over it. He isn't on Hulks level, he certainly isn't on post core breach Hulks level, which is basically Indestructible Hulk who has feats better than Gladiator in every category imaginable. LOL, so every time Gladiator gets floored his confidence wavers so he never really truly loses any fight, ok so what does that make any difference here? Hulk floors him here, he loses his confidence and the fight is over? That's an integral problem with Gladiator not with his opponents. Starlin made him the strongest member of Annhiliators in what way? Because Thanos made an off-handed remark about Gladaitor being the most dangerous of the bunch? A statement? Oh man do i have to tell you a few things then about Jim Starlin, Thanos, Hulk and statements...
https://www.cbr.com/intergalactic-titans-tussle-in-starlins-thanos-vs-hulk/
Q: How do your title characters regard each other when this story starts? Does Thanos truly understand what the Hulk is capable of? Or does he sort of look down on the character because of his intellect?
Jim Starlin: On Thanos' side I imagine it's a mix of respect and distain. He would somewhat respect Banner for being one of Earth's premier minds. But on the other hand the Hulk's lack of intellectual curiosity would quickly bore the Titan. But he'd be wary of the brute because of that infinite rage thing he has going. Banner would think of the Titan as nothing but a menace, to be defeated or escaped from.
You know how seriously i take this statements? About as seriously as the one with Gladiator. Thanos and Jim can say anything they want about Hulk or Gladiator it doesn't change the results in any way. Thanos would fodderize Hulk and he would fodderize Gladiator as quickly as Annhilius did. The one thing i can't understand is why you would ever think Gladiator is a low end herald tier character, by statements he could be galaxy level or omnipotent for all i care like Sentry has been called in some instances, his feats however paint a completely different picture. Because he is getting slammed into it by Annhilius. Characters get slammed into the ground and get hurt and even knocked out all the time, even though they are obviously way more durable than the dirt they are slammed into, but it's not something the writers really think about much. No it's not a fear wave, Annhilius released the fear wave already and Hulk hitting him back was stated to have actually interrupted his fear blasts which is why Hulk was no longer afraid, so Annhilius laid out into him with energy blasts which there were at least 2 and possibly more given Pips narration
Gladiator maybe lost his confidence after he was already beaten and that's a big maybe so either way it wouldn't have mattered. Secondly Hulk was running scared his anger was at its bottom levels if not non-existent at that point, he was just lashing out as a scared cornered animal as Pip said and he still damaged Annhilius. What did Colossus do back then that made him a powerhouses on the level of guys like Hulk and Thor? Also how did the same writer fathom that in but also decided to change his mind when he had him fight Hulk? Also i have no clue how you got the idea that Colossus was going toe-to-toe with Juggernaut and whistood his blows. He literally got one-shot for half an issue by Juggernaut
and then later came back and didn't even get hit by Juggernaut once until the walls collapsed on them and Juggernaut casually KO'd him while being completely unharmed himself
In fact in the next issue Colossus tries to face Juggernaut again and is completely irrelevant and Juggernaut goes through him and the rest of the X-men like they are pinballs
In fact in one of the previous issues, Claremont had Colossus go to go punch for punch with Grot
a character that got KO'd by Wolverine and Nighcrawler punching him after Storm zapped him
Later on he literally got overpowered by Eric the Red who told him to his face his strength is not enough for him
Which is funny because Eric the Red is classified as a 25 tonner at most
In later issues he needed help getting up after a steal beam fell on his head
By his own admission couldn't break out of a glue like substance
He literally went blow for blow with Magneto of all people(who wasn't even using magnetism on him at the time) and didn't KO him
Sasquatch was mocking his best punches
He got emberassed by Shaw and knocked out by getting tossed into a wall
Or was getting tossed into a wall not suppose to hurt beings on Colossus level? Since you said Hulk shouldn't be bothered by being slammed into the ground?
Got casually one-shot by Doom
He got physically fodderzied by Dracula
He almost got choked out by S'ym if it were not for Wolverine saving him
Blob casually stopped his blow with his hand and slapped him away
Honestly i went through dozens of issues prior and after Colossus fight with Gladiator all under Chris Claremont and not only can i not find ANYTHING that supports Colossus being a legit powerhouse, everything i find points to the opposite, in fact let me give you Colossus himself says about himself under Claremont
Which isn't really a surprise since Claremont didn't have that much of a high opinion on Gladiator either, since he had him get one-shot by Corsair.
The only time Colossus stunned pre-core breach Hulk was after Hulk was weakened, dazed and confused and Colossus had to keep hitting him and spinning him around to keep him disoriented and not recover
that's really not the argument you are looking for, especially since prior to that Colossus got one-shot and by his own admission his punches had no effect on Hulk.
Colossus being made of metal rarely if ever shows any visible damage on himself when others hit him, he has been one-shot and hasn't shown any visible damage to himself, WWH didn't show any visible damage on Beast that he hit several times before Beast went unconscious, that doesn't change the fact that once Hulk faced him 1v1 he absolutely fodderized him by snapping his arms backwards, that's good visible damage on Colossus if you ask me. He fought Phoenix powered Colossus for like 1 panel and then got stomped by PF Namor and PF Colossus until he looked like roadkill. Really? That's your excuse? The reason Colossus and Gladiator stalemated each other there for so long was because of dramatization? Wow.... that's such a bad excuse. Imagine thinking every time someone does poorly it's because "dramatization", that's really a bad argument. How does one hold back a lightspeed blitz? He hit Heimdall with lighstpeed(actually much faster than that if we take his traveling the galaxy in a blink of an eye thing seriously) and yet Heimdal was fine. Nowhere does Gladiator say he was holding back, literally nowhere, in fact he tried to kill burn Heimdall
This is such a poor and lazy excuse that i heard from Helion and i wish to never hear again so let me tell you something obvious. If Gladiator could he would have ABSOLUTELY one-shot Heimdall there because his purpose was to kidnap Jane Foster, why on Earth would he hold back on Heimdal there who stands in his way after going for a galaxy long blitz and specifically waiting for Heimdal to blink to hit him only to not try and knock him out? That makes no sense, he wanted just to piss of Heimdall then? Blitz and hit him aside and then try to talk him down into letting him pass the gate(something Heimdal doesn't let anyone outside Asgard or without permission do) and let him kidnap Jane? Do you know how silly all this sounds? He didn't try to take him out with the first blitz but then tried to burn him into ash immediately after with HV and this makes sense to you? What does Heimdall sword and bridge being magical have to do with anything here? What does weakness against magic have to do with anything either? Gladiator has about as much weakness to magic as Hulk did back then. Yea Hulk casually slapped Heimdall away, while Gladiator couldn't and had to fight a long and tough battle until he came victorious and bloody and his clothes torn and i have no idea how you concluded that he took him out with a one-shot since we don't even see how he hits Heimdall all we see is a bloody and torn Gladiator which indicates the 2 had a long and tough fight
Dude seriously... Think for yourself don't try and copy Helion, Gladiator is clearly not as impressive as you want him to be. Some of it is that his creator fault who didn't really establish him as a powerhouse on Hulk/Thor level, some(most) is the fault of him not really having his own series ever and usually being a guest star in random books and at best being one of the main characters in small mini-series runs. It didn't do him any good over the years and it certainly didn't put him above Savage Hulk, at least not post-core breach Savage Hulk.
Log in to comment