Poll Prime Superman VS Prime Captain Marvel (25 votes)
Captain Marvel 36%
Superman 72%
- Pre-crisis, Post-crisis, and New-52 Feats allowed
- standard conditions
- Win by any means.
FIGHT!
Prime Superman VS Prime Captain Marvel
@kanyecosby: I'm still looking for my scans, but as it stands, we'll just use the star feats. First and foremost, I do not really give much credence to reality altering feats. Hulk has had feats like that. In fact, so has Superboy Prime - the core point is that it's unquantifable. A feat like moving a planet is much more impressive IMO. Kal L, the Golden Age Superman, has had similar feats of 'breaking time barriers', while impressive is not exactly quantifable.
And I think Infinite Crisis power levels are PIS. There is no way that Kal L is only as powerful as Post-Crisis Kal El, they nerfed him for the purposes of that story. Kal L absorbed sunlight at a slower rate than Kal El so it took him longer to become that powerful, however every Pre-Crisis encounter that Kal L had with Pre-Crisis Kal El firmly established them as equals. While it is true that Kal L's feats may not match Silver Age Superman in terms of sheer ridiculous, I think the fact that he's casually tossing planets and stars is pretty much a firm indication that he's approximating that level. Yes he may not have as many feats of ridiculousness as the Silver Age Superman, but their fight in Justice League #74 was very clear-cut scaling. Both of them fought no holds barred for several pages and both stalemated via exhaustion, it was a clear showing purporting them as equals.
Gallery
Them being equals is reinforced in Superman Family #187 (see below for scan). Now if this mere admission by Kal El was the ONLY statement regarding their power levels, then I'd agree with you that it isn't enough, however it isn't, it's a statement we can use in addition to the fact that they already fought and stalemated. This admission by Kal-El comes several years AFTER the fight that they had, so it is simply reinforcing that initial encounter.
Kal L being equal to Post-Crisis Superman seems more like a throwback to how Kal L was portrayed alongside Pre-Crisis Kal El more than anything. If we take the Kal L from COIE and place that version in COIE, without any PIS, he would be more powerful than Superboy Prime.
I don't agree with your point about 'inconsistency' either - nobody was more inconsistent than the Silver Age Superman. He has a lot of horrendously low end feats too that we could use. In fact, more than any other iteration of Superman, the Silver Age Superman has some ridiculously low end feats...so I don't see why you're clinging to his highest end feats yet discarding the lowest.
As for Post Crisis, Captain Marvel has matched Superman in arm wrestling until he had his power depleted. He has held his own while Superman was possessed by Eclipso. Superman himself has stated in Post Crisis that Billy is exactly his equal. Now do I actually believe this, because of the in universe scaling? No, because Billy doesn’t have feats on the level of Superman.
The arm wrestling feat is nice, but it's not an extensive fight. For an example of an extensive fight, see the scans I posted where Kal L fights Pre-Crisis Kal El. The post-crisis ''fights'' between Captain Marvel and Superman are just merely scuffles. If Captain Marvel fought and stalemated Superman in Post-Crisis (which he hasn't done), then I would accept them as equals...that's how character scaling works, you introduce the character and scale them from other characters. Doomsday didn't need to have feats before he fought Superman. As it stands, Captain Marvel hasn't really had a true fight with Superman in Post-Crisis.
In the case of Kal L, I could accept that in terms of sheer ridiculousness, he hasn't shown feats to SA Superman's level, however he has an extensive body of his own impressive feats (moving stars, planets, breaking time barrier, etc) and his fight with Silver Age Superman was very clear cut and definitive. I don't think Kal L needs to prove that he can do everything SA Superman can before matching him, by that logic every character who fights SA Superman or gives him a hard time has to prove themselves via feats, scaling works just fine, especially considering many famous DC villains were first introduced during the Silver Age era...
@frozen: To be fair though, there’s a differrence to what Superman did and what other characters with reality altering feats have done. Usually with characters like Hulk they give a vague statement of him shattering a time barrier, but we don’t really see much of anything happening. With Superboy Prime, I’d say a large portion of that feat came from the location he was punching. If I recall, Kal L has punched through a dimension, but it’s different from what Superman did.
Superman‘s punches were shown to affect the flow of time itself, restoring all of Earth’s possible futures. Superman doesn‘t really need this feat either way. He still has other feats that are also insane.
My main point about consistency was that it’s generally hard to determine how powerful a Pre Crisis character is based off scaling from the fights they’ve had. Fights in Pre Crisis are practically the definition of PIS and WIS.
You have made some great points about Pre Crisis Captain Marvel. Based off scaling and the intent of the writers, they likely are meant to be equals. However, in the actual battle forums, if Pre Crisis Superman and Captain Marvel we’re to go against each other, I would side with Superman 10/10. This is because Superman generally has vastly better feats. Whether it is, striking, lifting, versatility, or speed, Superman is just better. The reason I’m using these high end feats for Superman is to make the point that Pre Crisis Captain Marvel’s absolute best feats are something that Superman does casually on a regular basis. If we compare their regular feats, or their high end feats, Superman is vastly superior.
The problem with Kal L is that, by feats, his level of power even at his best is no where near Pre Crisis Superman. He generally clocks in around the multi planetary level to star level at best. Pre Crisis literally has better breathing feats than Golden Age has feats in general. It may be PIS that Post Crisis matched him, but if you compare their feats, Post Crisis is closer to Golden Age in power, than Golden Age is to Pre Crisis.
@kanyecosby: The overarching point is that you can't really quantify or categorize a ''reality altering feat''. Yes it sounds impressive, and to an extent it is, but there are so many feats of that type - those types of feats are just very vague and often used for the plot. This isn't to invalidate that SA Superman can do that, just noting that there are many variations of ''reality altering'' that can occur in comics...
My main point about consistency was that it’s generally hard to determine how powerful a Pre Crisis character is based off scaling from the fights they’ve had. Fights in Pre Crisis are practically the definition of PIS and WIS.
You have made some great points about Pre Crisis Captain Marvel. Based off scaling and the intent of the writers, they likely are meant to be equals. However, in the actual battle forums, if Pre Crisis Superman and Captain Marvel we’re to go against each other, I would side with Superman 10/10. This is because Superman generally has vastly better feats. Whether it is, striking, lifting, versatility, or speed, Superman is just better. The reason I’m using these high end feats for Superman is to make the point that Pre Crisis Captain Marvel’s absolute best feats are something that Superman does casually on a regular basis. If we compare their regular feats, or their high end feats, Superman is vastly superior.
The problem with Kal L is that, by feats, his level of power even at his best is no where near Pre Crisis Superman. He generally clocks in around the multi planetary level to star level at best. Pre Crisis literally has better breathing feats than Golden Age has feats in general. It may be PIS that Post Crisis matched him, but if you compare their feats, Post Crisis is closer to Golden Age in power, than Golden Age is to Pre Crisis.
I disagree with the scaling aspect. That's literally how you determine how a character fares against another...
Yes, if they have never fought before (or never had a 'true' fight), then compare and contrast them with their individual feats, but if a certain character has less appearances or some other reason then I see nothing wrong with scaling. That's how characters have been introduced and established over the decades. Superman may be able to move a planet, but if a new villain is introduced in a storyline, the writers simply aren't going to take the time to also show that that villain can also move a planet and thus match Superman, they're going to just have them fight and show how much of a match he is for Superman. Across the medium of comics, that's how characters are introduced - through scaling. To have the best of both worlds and to be reliable, is to have your own feats and have feats through scaling. In the case of Kal L, we already know he had become very powerful a few years after he was initially introduced, to the point of being able to move planets, build entire cities in seconds, etc, and we have his fight with Kal El in addition to those feats.
Now having a 'Silver Age' feat is a pretty broad spectrum, at the high end you've got SA Superman with his most insane feats. Kal L's upper limits may not have been explored to the extent that SA Superman's was, but that doesn't mean he's not capable of those things. Now I don't doubt the examples you've given, but is it really necessary to show that Kal L can also blow away a star just like Kal El can? I don't really think it is, but if you think it is, then Kal L has in fact used his super-breath to blow away a star (see the scan below):
So I simply do not really think it is necessary to have all the feats that SA Superman to show that you're a match for him, the fight he had with Kal L was quite clear and every single instance after that initial encounter simply reinforced the point. At least with Kal L, it isn't just one fight, but their subsequent showings too, so the consistency is certainly there.
Moreover, your point of how inconsistent SA Superman precisely proves my point. Perhaps out of all the iterations of Superman, the SA Superman was the most inconsistent of all. It's easy to take his most high end feats and use that as the basis for what he can do, but it's considerably less tempting than looking at his low end showings, which can get seriously low.
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