@strawberrypimp said:
@underfire47: yeah, it was the "pseudo win" comment that bothered me, but I'm willing to drop the IH talk cause that's not going to go anywhere anyway.
Don't come at me with the "he started it" nonsense, we were both doing fine until we started getting snappy.
To clarify I'm not calling Thing trash or I'm not invalidating his win, I brought up the fight because it basically shows you a significant performance difference between Spider-Hulk and Immortal against the same opponent - The Thing. I didn't bring it up to rub it in your face or to take smack against other thing fans.
This is what I said originally:
We'll get a rematch at some point between Hulk/Thing according to Al's twitter so that'll be that. Also, Banner and peter fearing a possibility does not mean that very thing might come to fruition. Banner was doing ok against a fully powered Hulk with Spider powers given how little juice he had, but even that didn't amount to how much damage Immortal was doing to The Thing during their fight on the beach, which honestly is the only thing you need to look at.
Is this what you meant with "The only thing I'm laughing at is how desperate you are to downplay the fight vs IH as much as possible at every opportunity. It's almost like you're deeply bothered by it?" My point wasn't "Lol Hulk smash TinG," it was a way to compare and contrast Spider-man and Hulk against the same opponent in the same kind of fight: A brawl. Thing easily clobbered spider-Hulk, he did not easily clobber Immortal - that is quite literally all I meant, which is why I started the paragraph with "we'll get our rematch of Hulk and Thing soon enough."
Even this comment:
"Peter's inner child also isn't suppressed seeing as how Spider-man's far more comfortable being a goof-ball. The thing barely won last time, if the fans wanna take it as a win, let me lol - Pseudo/half wins is all they've had for the longest time"
And Honestly, if this was too mean spirited I'm genuinely sorry because it wasn't meant to be malicious - Calling my arguments laughable though based on an interpretation that isn't exactly yours doesn't edge for a peaceful discussion, but I shouldn't have become patronizing, that one's on me, so again, apologies for that.
Either way, I was referring to the Spider-Hulk vs Thing in a sense that no matter how you slice it, It's not Hulk Vs Thing, so him beating this version of spider-man does absolutely nothing for the Hulk/Thing rivalry.
Also, the reason most writers go directly to savage when writing "Hulked-out" characters is that it's really easy - it's a trope Hulk himself falls under. Most writers either ignore or forget that Banner has MPD - to them, he's just either Hulk or not, and even the way Savage Hulk's intelligence is written can be extremely bad because most writers forget that Hulk's a kid, not stupid. Not to mention that even when Hulk has grown out of his Savage Persona, he gets rebooted back to it, and for a one-off series, it's just easy to make Spider-man act like Savage Hulk and slap some unresolved issue like "OSBORN" because it's the most recognizable version of the character. However, what I am trying to tell you over and over again is that THE DUMB HULK trope is just that, a trope - She-Hulk also went through a similar transition where she became a grey Savage version of herself (which carried over to Aaron's Avengers) because of Banner's death, causing an emotional turmoil. The banner is truly the only man who has manifested multiple Hulk's based on different traumas, and it's because years of experiments, mental gymnastic, mystic interventions, etc - everyone else kind of falls under the same category, as you said, most of the characters from WWHs just went savage mode, but those weren't Bruce banner's issue they were trying to resolve, it was their own. Plus, there are always exceptions, depending on how important the characters are, writers can write Hulk in different degrees of stupidity (Ross, Betty, and Jennifer are clear exceptions to the rule.)
However, if you're gonna ignore the lore we can't have this debate because we'll just keep going in circles. If what I told you above does not exist and I'm lying about decades of history, then you'd be 100% right, but Banner's Hulk and Spider-man's Hulk are not the same creatures, and the writer of this very issue, despite the other bullshit, at least acknowledges that through Banner. There was a "You beat him, His Hulk will remember that" line, or something to that effect.
But okay, since that Pseudo comment bothered you so much, let me take a step back here and say this. The Thing won both rounds, right? For whatever happened during the fight, he was last man standing. There, conflict out of the way.
HOWEVER, let's just look at the fights if you wanna compare Spider-man to Hulk since it's more or less a brawl in both cases. Hulk punches Thing's skin off, is clearly toying with him, wants him to suffer, and each punch is clearly leaving a mark whereas Thing is surprised that Hulk is brushing shit off. Then, Ben's winning punch not only knocks Hulk out but Thing as well. And, before everyone arrives, Hulk is soon gone the same evening. Don't get me, I'm not saying Thing lost, I'm not calling him a loser, I'm not saying he sucks nor that Hulk should always wreck him, even though we both know who I'm rooting for. Ben won that fight - fisticuffs and all, fair and square.
The circumstances around the fight, for our analysis, tell a different story for the Spider-Hulk vs Thing fight though. The reason I say this is because, in this one, The Thing is clearly in control from the get-go. He soaks up Spider-Hulk's punches, and then, when he's had enough, lays him out with one single punch, which was nothing like that Sunday slam he delivered on his honeymoon. He even gets spider-man in a head-lock, which Peter only escapes through agility. That's what I'm trying to say because even Regular savage Hulk can dance with the Thing longer than that, yet this Spider-man+Hulk couldn't even KO the twinkie green Banner, and that was before Banner started reabsorbing the Gamma, which I think starts right after the second swing spider-man takes. That one punch should have been enough for Banner right? But it wasn't. That's all I'm trying to argue here. You can't use Spider-Hulk as a measurement for Hulk's abilities, because gamma based powers work differently for a lot of people, because in the Marvel 616 universe it plays off emotions and it manifests what's inside. If we're being completely accurate to spider-man lore, Spider-man should have manifested as a sort of "The Other" spider creature, but that's not as easy as just making him dumb Hulk, because honestly, what's more, recognizable for a one-off, having spider-man say "Hulk Smash?" Or have him become a horror monster (which honestly would have fit the story and tone of IH book better anyway.)
My point is that the writer clearly did not put a lot of thought into this issue, and it was just there to have a sweet moment between Spider-man and Hulk. If you wanna count
.you were talking Savage Hulk and were on about him "being the only Hulk who gets stronger with rage", and I replied with the statement that no, not the only one since other Hulk incarnarions do that as well. I have no idea why are you suddenly bringing up other gamma beings.
Not what I said (or meant at least) - I meant traditionally, Banner's Hulk's (plural) get stronger with his rage, and it's no different for Immortal Hulk - just because the transformation isn't triggered by anger, doesn't mean he can't get stronger with anger, and just because Peter absorbed the gamma radiation, it doesn't mean that he was literally Savage Hulk. Again, this is where lore is important because there is an "in-universe" reason why Banner's transformation may be triggered by night, and it again relates to emotions (particularly shame). Grey Hulk had the same "Werewolf" cycle, and at some point really early on, so did savage Hulk.
As for She-Hulk, she was not always in the Savage-Anger boat. Again, emotions influence gamma people but she was nowhere near hulk's level until recently. Her "bomb-shell" persona was never about the "getting stronger with angry" life and she could never really amp herself that much because she could only get so angry. It's only recently that she flat out became Hulk-She. Could be wrong about her though, but my point about emotions influencing different gamma people differently still stands. For instance, Even Lyra, Thundra's and Hulk's daughter, grows weaker with anger. It all depends on the person.
And ToBA's comment regarding Sasquatch implies the same for him.
TOBA says that Walter didn't know how to use all of his strength properly so yeah naturally the creature who controls all things gamma will be able to utilize Walter's power better, but that doesn't mean "he wasn't angry enough" or anything of the sort. Hell, Ross (Red Hulk) literally flames up when he gets angry, but he doesn't get stronger with anger. He can absorb powers based on radiation, but that's what makes him stronger.
Log in to comment