Melinda May vs Black Star

VS

• Both are unarmed
• Takes place in a UFC octagon
• Both are pissed off

Who wins and why?

@the_magister@rbt@danieldaripper@supremegeneration

Thoughts after last nights episode?

Mia is more skilled for sure, but she has next to none stats feats. May wins based on that alone.

May. Stronger, faster, way more skilled.

Her feats against superhumans, established fodder, and skilled opponents are better than beating Nyssa.

She also has way better pain tolerance & durability, and she is physically more of a tank.

How about this? Arguably better than any of May's striking feats?

May stomps

@thesuperor: Lol, I just made that gif.

I think May can replicate the kick. Mia actually has half decent strength and striking feats. But she lacks durability feats.

Edit- I looked a little bit into tempered glass doors and that kick is a lot more impressive than I thought. May likely can't replicate it.

May should clean house if I’m not mistaken...

@rbt: It's definitely impressive, but how do we know the glass wasn't broken already?

@the_magister:

The glass is completely fine here. After this point, only one shot was taken(towards the ceiling so it couldn't have hit the glass) and nothing else was thrown the door's way. It has to do with the fact that they break the glass before the stunt guys hit in during production to avoid injuries.

@rbt: Yeah that makes sense.

@thesuperor:

One feat that I find somewhat overlooked for May is this one:

She sends him into the air, flipping head over heels with a kick that has far less momentum poured into it than Mia's kick. That's a loooot of torque being generated.

Melinda sweeps.

This is probably a better strength feat than Mia's kick

(For context, that door was barricaded from the inside by very thick pillars. Coulson was so unsure about how they were going to get in that he even suggests getting a truck to ram it down. Followed up by May nonchalantly forcing it open with a simple kick.)

May's also way more skilled. I don't see her taking that long to take down an out-of-her-prime Dinah. Plus the other myriad of feats she has against fodder, superhumans, and established foes alike.

@the_magister: Yeah, May can do the ragdolling part for sure. That's why I initially said that May can replicate that striking feat.

@angeljax:Mia also outskilled an armed Nyssa while unarmed. That's the reasoning for me putting her over May in skill, not beating Dinah.

@rbt: Woah, I didn't know she beat Nyssa. Can you shoot the link?

Can't find the video on YT, so I made a gfycat.

May 6/10, all i need are some durability feats for Mia.

@rbt: That's a good feat. Nothing May couldn't do imo, but great for a character like Mia who the show is trying to build up as a competent fighter. Sad that it came at the expense of her clowing Nyssa. Like Diggle, Nyssa was always intended to be one of the most prodigious fighters on Arrow. But they get sidelined in favor of others looking better so they usually get lackluster feats.

Great for Mia, but I wouldn't have that as the thing that puts her over May skill-wise, personally. Hell, tbh I think Daisy was good enough to legitimately challenge Nyssa by S2 and was good enough to beat her by S3's end.

Nyssa got wrecked by someone without nearly as good training as her? Again??

Tbf, Nyssa would be in her 50's and Mia in her 20's with over 15 years of training by Nyssa herself. And it was only a sparring session.

No. Mia has been training since she was a kid.

I don't really want to get into this debate right now. I was just pointing out a feat I thought you weren't aware of. Needless to say, I don't think May is more skilled than Nyssa.

@thesuperor: Nyssa looked young as heck for 50, did she use some of that glorious Lazarus juice?

She's Asian.

CW really hates Nyssa, huh

@arcus1

Do we know if the Al Ghuls are Asian? The actors aren't, not Nable or Law at least.

@anthp2000: Law's mother is Taiwanese and Lexa Doig's mother is from the Philippines. As for the characters, it's more than likely that their mother is intended to be Asian.

I c

May should win this. Mia's gotten some solid feats, and has the training background to justify her being very good, but she doesn't have sufficient showings yet. I'd have her around Nyssa level, and May would beat Nyssa in h2h, imo

Everyone in the flash-forward scenes looks way younger than they should. Like, I think they're saying the flash-forward scenes are 30 years in the future, but it seems more like 15 or so (except for Mia, I guess)

IDK where you come from, that people don't age at all in 15 years

@arcus1: Flash-forwards are officially 21 years in the future. The events are happening in 2040.

May should win this. Mia's gotten some solid feats, and has the training background to justify her being very good, but she doesn't have sufficient showings yet. I'd have her around Nyssa level, and May would beat Nyssa in h2h, imo

True, but Nyssa vs Mia wasn't h2h. Nyssa was armed and Mia wasn't.

If it wasn't for the kids aging, I'd say it was only a few years in the future at most

Ah ok, I thought it was 2049

That's better, I suppose

And yeah, but I could still see May beating Nyssa even if she had a sword (it'd be significantly harder though), and a sparring session in training isn't enough to convince me that Mia's solidly superior to an armed Nyssa

Based on her portrayal, I could see Mia being around May's level, but it's highly unlikely that she's gonna get the quantity of feats necessary to stack up against May, and it also seems unlikely that she'll get feats so outstanding that they outright eclipse May

@arcus1: @rbt: Why do the writers detest Nyssa?

@arcus1: Well, first, I agree that Mia doesn't have feats to beat May yet. She severely lacks any sort of durability feat and she's likely not going to get them either, so Mia likely isn't going to be established enough to take on someone like May, but this is what I wanted to address-

and a sparring session in training isn't enough to convince me that Mia's solidly superior to an armed Nyssa

It wasn't just any sparring session. Nyssa has been training Mia since she was 4. And had not lost a single time. So clearly Nyssa wasn't holding back. That was the first time Mia beat Nyssa and the fact that Nyssa followed that with 'You're ready' kind of implies that she knew she had nothing left to teach Mia. As for the fight itself, Mia redirected two of Nyssa's hits, dodged one, swept her right leg up, got her in a lock and disarmed her. That seems like an awful lot of thing to do and not even get touched. I don't see why Mia isn't solidly superior to armed Nyssa.

And yeah, but I could still see May beating Nyssa even if she had a sword (it'd be significantly harder though),

I don't know if discussing this would really derail the thread or not, but what has May done skill wise that'd imply she can go untouched in a fight against Nyssa? I'm sure you are aware of Nyssa's skill feats, so when has May done something so spectacular skill wise that would imply that Nyssa won't even be able to touch her in a fight despite having a range advantage and speed advantage?

I agree that May would beat Nyssa in h2h, but that's because of Nyssa's lack of stats feats.

Did any writer say that they hate the character?

Nah, they just hate giving her any wins

She's gonna become the new Diggle after a point

@the_magister: That's what happens when a mid-tier character hangs with high tier characters. She's kind of like Ward. Impressive on their own right going by their fodder feats, but regularly lose to anyone of note because everyone else is just better.

@rbt: Ward's lost to May, but the losses were after very hard-fought encounters & with some additional context.

Nyssa's one of my favorite characters, and it blows to see her taking L's left and right. TBH if I was Katrina Law, I'd quit acting after this treatment.

...you'd quit a role because your character isn't getting good feats while others' are?

@rbt: Not really, I was being hyperbolic

Immediately prior to that, Nyssa had Mia on the ground (and deliberately gave her a chance to recover). Nyssa not having much of anything left to teach Mia doesn't mean Mia outright surpassed her, it means they're roughly equivalent

Tbh, I don't really want to get into May vs Nyssa

@arcus1:

Immediately prior to that, Nyssa had Mia on the ground (and deliberately gave her a chance to recover). Nyssa not having much of anything left to teach Mia doesn't mean Mia outright surpassed her, it means they're roughly equivalent

Fair.

Tbh, I don't really want to get into May vs Nyssa

Well, as I said, the entirety of Mia's skill rests on her scaling to Nyssa, at least for now, so she's important to this discussion. But, okay.