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Comicvine's Deadliest Warrior: Iron Fist vs Spider-man

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Wells its been a while since I've done one of these. I figured I would bring this back. And I figured I would come back and do something a little different than the last couple I did, and instead talk about two characters who are from the same universe rather than different universes. I am going to be talking about Spider-Man vs Iron Fist!

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Conditions

Rules

  • This is 616 Spider-man and 616 Iron Fist.
  • Both have standard gear
  • Both are in character
  • There is no prep time, this is a random encounter
  • Victory can be achieved through any means

Setting

  • They begin 50 feet apart
  • They begin visible
  • Fight takes place in a city at night. Neither combatant is familiar with the city.

Physicals

Now before I begin this section I will be counting iron fist's iron fist in this category since he uses it to amplify his striking. I will talk about some of his other Chi related abilities in the X-factor section but I think it makes sense to discuss the iron fist in this section because that is what he uses for striking. I think it would be misleading to just give Spider-man the advantage in this category without acknowledging Iron Fist's striking potential is far above peak human.

Obviously when it comes to lifting strength Spider-man has the advantage. One character is peak human and the other can lift several tons overhead. Its pretty clear Iron Fist cannot match Spider-man in a contest of strength all though to be fair he probably wouldn't try to. Could lifting strength still prove relevant? Sure I suppose. If they were to accidentally cause a building to collapse and rubble fell on top of the spider-man would have an easier time being able to dig himself out from underneath the rubble. I don't think Spider-man would do something like throw cars at iron fist or would try to hurt him too badly.

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Now as I said above when it comes to striking power I would be counting the iron fist in this category. So can Spider-man with his super strength out damage Iron Fist with his iron fist?

We can see that spider-man can knock out people who are literal giants to him, punch people hard enough where they go flying and he sends nearby cars flying, and can knock scorpion high enough into the air that it takes him seconds to fall back to the ground, and can hit iron man 2020 with enough force where he splits a building in two.

Iron Fist on the other has knocked the hellicarrier out of the sky, caused a temple to collapse in a few punches, destroyed a ship and also destroyed a train. Between the two of them I would say Iron Fist has the advantage when it comes to striking power. His high end feats do seem more impressive. I don't think Spider-man could knock the hellicarrier out of the sky or blow up a train like Iron Fist did.

Both Iron Fist and Spider-man are quite fast as well. We have seen them catch bullets, dodge bullets after they have been fired, we have seen them both move faster than the eye, etc.

However between the two of them which is faster? I would probably go with Spider-man. Similarly to how I am throwing the Iron Fist in this category I will also partially discuss Spider-man's Spider-sense here as well because it does tie into his reaction. As Peter has described in the past it lets him avoid a hit before the person throwing the punch starts punching.

We can talk about the raw combat speed but I think Spider-sense means Peter will always be able to out-react Iron Fist if he is on his A-game. This is something Iron Fist himself has actually talked about in the past.

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Another reason I feel Spider-man would have the advantage is the way other super heroes typically do react to him. I don't think there are as many depictions where other super heroes are basically awestruck with Iron Fist's speed in the same way as Spider-man. Admittedly this could be due to the fact that I have read more of Spider-man's appearance's but it does seem like when spider-man does engage other heroes during events he tends to drop there jaw with his speed. Now regarding the paladin example there is a scene a few issues earlier in heroes for hire where Paladin is watching Iron Fist and Iron Fist does vanish on him. But I think that was more of a stealth feat than it was a raw speed feat. Its a pretty common trope for ninja's in comics to ghost even other people with super speed and just appear behind someone like that. We have seen Batman do that to Jay Garrick for example and Batman isn't as fast as Jay Garrick. Plus they did fight, and while Iron fist did beat up Paladin he did get tagged during the fight which shouldn't happen if Iron Fist were fast enough to move faster than he can see. With the Spider-man example we clearly see Peter did use raw speed.

But even putting that aside or assuming Iron Fist does have showings like this I still think Peter would have the advantage due to spider-sense. Another thing that I do think should be noted is Peter is likely more agile as well. Iron Fist's agility is top tier, no doubt, even amazing the likes of daredevil with his agility. However I would argue Spider-man's agility does exceed Daredevils. He can achieve perfect equlibrium from any position possible, and his tendons and connective tissues are also twice as elastic as a regular human which makes him more flexible.

And finally I am going to talk about durability. Both have some pretty impressive durability. I would say the best quantafiable blunt force durability feat Iron Fist has is when he was hit through Rand Tower by The One.

Do I believe this level of durability exceeds Spider-man's striking power? I am going to say no. As I mentioned this is probably the best visual durability feat iron fist so if we compare it to the best quantafiable striking feat Spider-man has it would be punching iron man 2020 through a building. Another point of comparison between The One and Spider-man is how The One was said to have the strength of 50 men whereas Spider-man has casually overpowered the strength of 100 men.

Now granted Spider-man hitting harder than The One doesn't mean Peter can nessasarily one shot. Because we have seen Iron Fist roll with Spider-man's punches in the past to reduce the impact of there blows. There is also the fact Spider-man likely wont hit Iron Fist as hard as he can in character it is reasonable to say Iron Fist can take a few punches from Spider-man. Some other things about Iron Fist that are worth noting for his durability are the fact that he can deaden himself to pain due to have almost complete control over his nervous system. Not only that but Iron Fist does have a healing factor, which allows him to heal a bullet in seconds. However one draw back to his healing factor is that it does require concentration. Danny has shown the ability to meditate and fight at the same time however he compared it to doing brain surgery and trying to fall asleep at the same time so its not the easiest process.

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Spider-man does also have a healing factor but its not the same as Iron Fist. While he doesn't have to concentrate his healing factor usually takes time. He has healed bullets over night and also has talked about how he could heal broken ribs over night. However since this is a fight and not a gauntlet that doesn't really mean much. In terms of his durability Spider-man has also taken some pretty big hits over the years:

The other thing to think about is how most of the people in Spider-mans rogues gallery are super human with the odd exceptions. Many of them are as strong or stronger than himself and he does not go untagged against them. The above scans are just examples of Spider-man taking some pretty big hits. Do I think Spider-man has durability which exceeds iron fist's striking power? No. "But Jashro you just showed Spider-man taking a hit from the hulk". I did but I mostly try to look at durability feats in a quantafiable way. We do see hulk hit Peter really far which is why I think it is impressive. However similarly to Iron Fist Spider-man has also shown the ability to roll with punches to reduce there impact.

What Spider-man cannot do that Iron Fist can do is, he cannot deaden his body to pain. With that said Peter does have strong will power and pain tolerance. As I showed in the hulk scans above hulk did break a few of his ribs and he did continue fighting afterwards. He also broke his ribs early on in the maximum Carnage story and continued to fight. Plus similarly to how Spider-man will hold back so will iron fist. While Iron Fist has killed in the past it is a lot different to kill someone who is your friend and teammate than it is a villain. So when it comes to durability I am going to say there are to many variables to gauge who would have the advantage. If either got a solid hit in I think they would KO the other. However they both have the abilities to roll with punches and since they both will pull there punches that could lead to the other taking a hit.

So in the end who do I think has the advantage in terms of physicals? I would lean towards Spider-man in the end. I think the clearest advantage Iron Fist has over Spider-man is in terms of striking power due to the iron fist. He can hit harder. However Spider-man can lift more weight, and should be reacting first due his reactions being precognitive due to spider-sense, and also for what is worth Spider-man is also more nimble overall. Now you can argue that lifting strength isn't as important as striking power but since they both have the potential to one shot the other-but both probably wont due to holding back and rolling with each other's blows-you could argue who has the advantage in terms of striking power is less important. The ability to avoid a solid hit is what seems most important to me and it seems like Spider-man's speed and agility are more valuable as far as the physical category are concerned.

Spider-man has the advantage.

Fighting Ability

Now I talked about this in the Deathstroke vs Wolverine Deadliest Warrior but for those who never read that basically the reason I label this category "fighting ability" instead of just skill is because this category does not just analyze martial arts skill but the general way in which characters fight, along with fighting tactics. For example in the case of Spider-man I will be analyzing the creative ways in which he uses his powers to fight.

With that said I think it goes without saying in pure martial arts Iron Fist has the advantage. He has better showings of pressure points, Chi manipulation, better knowledge of the anatomy, better technique. Now I am not going to say that having more and better martial arts knowledge is not an advantage for iron fist but at the end of the day aside from a lot of the technical stuff there isn't a whole iron fist can do with martial arts that Spider-man cannot do with his spider-powers. And when it does come to use of pressure points those are hard to land in a fight against an enemy who is also quite fast, and agile. They require a lot of accuracy with there strikes and its hard to be accurate against a fast moving target.

For example when Black Cat tried to use a judo throw on Spider-man Peter used his agility, ability to cling to walls and spider strength to reverse it on her.

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Now I understand Black Cat isn't as s killed as Iron Fist but that isn't the point I am trying to make. The point is Black Cat tried a martial arts technique, and Peter was able to counter with a combination of his spider-powers.

Now is martial arts all Danny has? Lets take a look at a few of his tactical showings. The first one to talk about is his fight with the iron fist killer where Danny realized that the iron fist killer was reading his Chi so to counter it Danny suppressed his chi and began to fight the iron fist killer. He also used a similar tactic against Mister X.

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Something these showings have in common is that they involve Danny fighting someone who can predict his moves and in order to counter them Danny switched up his tactics. These seem to be the most relevant showings to compare to Spider-man because that is one of Spider-man's biggest advantages in a fight. However both tactics involved Danny switching up the way he would fight. These sorts of tactics would not be effective in countering Spider-sense. Spider-sense works by sensing the future through its connection to the web of life and not by reading chi. So Danny suppressing his chi against Spider-man wont work. Spider-man also isn't reading iron fists mind so using drunken fist also wont work.

Now another notable showing to discuss would be iron fist training Victor. Victor asked Powerman who the one super hero Danny couldn't beat and Danny said it was spider-man. Victor fought Spider-man and managed to tag him with some advice from Iron Fist.

However by Iron Fist's own admission this involved use of Victor's powers which Danny does not have access to. So while Powerman did tag Spider-man using Danny's advice these aren't exactly tips Danny himself can utilize. A lot of the tactical showings Iron Fist has are mostly stuff like identifying the weakness in giant or armored enemies. I don't think that sort of thing is relevant against spider-man because spider-man has a human anatomy. Danny already knows several weak points on the human body. There was one showing where Danny was able to identify where an enemy was based on the angle of his strikes. But I also don't think that matters to much. I would normally talk about stealth but since Danny's enemy has a form of precognition its not something that needs to be talked about. I think the easiest way I can show Danny using stealth and Peter countering stealth is just posting scans of there last fight. There are also a lot of tactics displayed on both side so its something pretty relevant.

Now the firs thing to talk about is Iron Fist had the home field advantage. This took place inside Rand's building. So Iron Fist did know the environment before hand which is why he did do things like roll onto the couch and also activated a booby trap. Other tactics displayed by Iron Fist would be using his friendship with Peter to get close to use a pressure point. Now the issue with this strategy is its dependent on the situation. Sometimes heroes fight for reasons they don't really know about like in this fight. However sometimes they also do fight when both sides know exactly what is happening. Some examples would be Civil War and AVX where heroes fought each other and knew why both sides were fighting. In terms of other tactics iron fist did blow out the candles to try and make the area dark which did give him the advantage. On Spider-man's side of things he was able to assess the situation and determine he was at a disadvantage fighting iron fist inside and did take to the roof tops. He also did come and strike iron fist from below the roof after Danny did hit him using the trap to get him to leap. And when he leapt at iron fist he knew Danny would throw him and took advantage of that.

So overall I would say Spider-man go the better of iron fist in this exchange from a tactical perspective. A lot of iron fists tactics were situational with him knowing the environment or may not be applicable in a different situation. Peter showed good predictions by knowing how iron fist would react and using that to his advantage. And he also was able to assess the situation inside and take the fight to where he would have more of an advantage. In a neutral setting Iron Fist cannot use traps, and he wouldn't know the layout of the city as per the rules in every deadliest warrior I have done. You could argue Spider-man was naive by letting Iron Fist get close but I think that is context based. In the story Iron Fist stole a story from the Daily Bugle and Peter wanted an explanation. If we were talking about something like a civil war scenario where both sides know why there fighting than there is nor reason for Peter to be that trusting.

In general I think Spider-man has a higher tenancy to use the environment to his advantage. I've actually already shown scans of Peter doing that against dock ock. When Dock ock had him pinned Peter picked up a rock with his feet and threw it at Ock to escape.

I know this doesn't seem like the most complex tactic but simple tactics shouldn't be underestimated.For some more fancier tactics I would look at one of his spars with the human torch where we see some creative use of webbing (web bolas, web wings, using camouflage to make human torch crash into a water tower) and also more simple tactics like throwing a garbage bag at Human Torch. And also pretending to fall off a building in order to take human torch off guard, and also knocking a chimney on top of the human torch. Its not a serious fight betwene them but I think it still shows how clever Spider-man is. He uses a lot of the environment to his advantage and a lot of different creative tactics.

Peter has some other basic tactics that he incorporates into his fighting style. An argument could be made this one may not be as effective on iron fist because he isn't a slow brick however the way Peter hops around and uses his wall crawling in combat even when he has little space to dodge actually causes his enemies to get dizzy.

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And other tactics he employs in a fight would be the use of his quips to unbalance his enemies. As we saw when a weakened Spider-man fought kingpin in the classic era. Shang-chi has also noted this as well.

However this strategy can work as a double edge sword at times as Shang-Chi noted when he was training Spider-man. When Peter lost his spider-sense Shang-Chi told him to put all his focus and attention on the fight.

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So I think this is something that could debatable work in Spider-man's favor or against him. Danny is rather disciplined SO he might be able to tune Spider-man out. For example batroc did try to insult iron fist to anger him and while it did annoy iron fist he did manage to ignore it and retaliate with an insult of his own which did what Danny wanted it to do.

However one difference between Spider-man and Batroc is Spider-man is more relentless with his insults. The insult from batroc was enough to make iron fist "seethe" with anger. It is a little different to ignore repeated insults.

I am going to say Danny probably has the mental discipline to not get thrown off balance from Spider-man's insults. This could mean that Peter could get distracted from his banter however Spider-man is also quite use to bantering while he fights so I don't think that will happen for a majority. Overall however I do think Peter has shown to be the better strategist with the way he fights both in general and also against Iron Fist specifically. Most of Danny's strategic showings involve him targeting weak points on enemies, or changing up the way he fights but I don't think something like that will help him against spider-man. Peter on the other hand has shown more creative and unorthodox tactics. Whether is be using his spider-powers and ability to cling to walls to confuse (what he did to Hyde) or catch an enemy off guard (like he did to black cat), or if its simple tactics like throwing random objects he finds at an enemy or more complex tactics like using his webbing as camoflogue. He also has shown the ability to predict his enemies next moves, and even shown that ability against iron fist himself which is a big deal.

Overall I give this advantage to Spider-man. He isn't as skilled in martial arts however his creativity with his spider-powers equals that out and he seems to show better awareness of his environment.

Spider-man has the advantage.

X Factor's

I've talked already talked a little bit about Spider-man's wall crawling and spider-sense above. I'll start this section off by expanding a bit on both abilities. I'll start with the wall crawling ability because its both simpler and its also a pretty underrated power of Spider-man's. The thing with wall crawling is it gives Peter a lot of extra mobility. It lets him strike from different angles as I showed in the Hyde scan. However not only can Peter incorporate it in hand to hand but he can use the ability to maintain distance while he launches webbing (more on that later).

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If Peter needs to dodge a punch from Iron Fist he can jump out of range and with his wall crawling he doesn't need to come back down if it isn't safe to do so. And thanks to his spider-sense Peter could determine that. I already did post a scan from Marvel Knights, where Peter talks about how his spider-sense functions. This is why like in scans above when Spider-man is fighting Iron Fist in the dark he is able to counter Iron Fist despite being unable to see:

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Not only does it help him determine if a situation is safe but it does have other applications. For example during shadowland Spider-man used it to tag Daredevil by sensing which way Daredevil was going to jump. Not only is Daredevil incredibly agile but this version of Daredevil was stronger and faster than normal. In general Spider-sense provides more awareness. During Dan Slotts Spider-man run it was revealed that Spider-sense subconsciously guides Peter's movements even when he is doing something as basic as web swinging. It guided him to not web an area of a building where it wouldn't be able to support his own weight.

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Not only can spider-sense help Peter tag and track Danny's movements however if Peter is tagged Spider-sense can help guide Peter to reduce the level of damage he takes from Iron Fist. During Amazing Spider-man New Ways to Die when Peter was facing Bullseye and some goons, they brought special bullets with them that would lock onto Spider-man specifically. However even when Peter couldn't dodge the bullets he was able to angle his body so all the bullets did his vital organs:

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However Spider-man doesn't just have spider-powers but he also has his webbing which can be quite versatile. I already showed some of its versatility above, how Peter can make different shapes with it and use it for a variety of effects. However I haven't talked about its simpler applications in a fight. For example if Peter is in mid air and doesn't have a building around him to land on and is going to fall near iron fist and risk leaving himself open he can always use his webbing to swing over to a building and regain his footing using his wall crawling ability. However the most common use of his webbing in combat is using it to tag other people. I've already shown a few examples of that however. But even if Peter isn't accurate enough to tag Iron Fist he has very fast reloading speed which can let him cover a large area with his webbing if he has to.

In the above scans after Peter supports a building he covers a large volume of the building with his webbing. Now admittedly blanketing the area with webbing isn't something he does to often but the fact it is always an option on the table is something that should always be considered. Its not something that can be countered. Now you can argue that in the above scans the strength of the webbing is because of the large amount he used that is fair. And when it does come to how strong webbing is exactly it can be inconsistent. On one hand its been broken by Shang-Chi, on the other we have seen Hulk struggle to rip it off from his eyes. There have been a few statements as to how strong webbing is. In AVX it was said to be 2.62X as strong as steel, and in marvel fact files it was said to be 300lbs per square inch. There is also a statement where webbing is said to 120lbs per square millimeter.

For those that prefer showings one showing I have always liked to use would be in Roger Stern's run when Peter tried to use his webbing to stop the juggernaut. It didn't work however the webbing did not actually break, but the supports of the building gave out first. There is also a statement that even a small matt of webbing could stop a speeding car.

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At the end of the day would the webbing be able to restrain Iron Fist? Now before I discuss this further I do want to mention Iron Fist did break Spider-man's webbing in marvel team up 31. However according to the narration after he was webbed up "it took him a couple of minutes to realize he was caught good" and than we just see iron fist break it after. Its kind of a weird showing because it does seem like iron fist was webbed up for a few minutes but than he just broke it. Iron Fist in that fight was the aggressor as well so I don't think he could have escaped whenever he wanted. It does seem like he was restrained long enough to be considered incapacitated.

With that said Iron Fist has gotten more powerful since than. Probably his biggest advantage in this fight is his AOE. One example of this would be when Iron Fist was fighting Elektra he unleahsed his chi and it resulted in elektra being thrown back:

So Danny can create an explosion of energy just by activating his chi. And we have seen Danny channel his chi into range attacks known as chi blasts. These chi blasts have shown to be powerful enough to that it can be lethal as we saw when Danny managed to kill multiple ninjas with a single chi blast:

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Would this explosive force be enough to break webbing? Maybe. We have seen Spider-mans webbing smother the explosions of missiles and grenades.

Even if Iron Fist's chi blasts aren't stronger than the grenade's and missiles an argument could be made he doesn't need it to be stronger than missiles and grenades. He just needs it to be strong enough to where the webbing gets off his body. And even in the above scans, when Peter webs the missiles and grenades, the webbing does smother the explosion but the webbing does still expand, and in the case of the missiles we do see a few holes in the webbing. I think Iron Fist's chi blast can be around the power of a grenade. However some people might think that if Iron Fist does this he might experience a back lash from unleashing his Chi and causing an explosion with his body encased in webbing. However it is important to note that iron fist has the ability to absorb energy.

Another way to think about it would be think of how Danny destroyed the train. He was inside the explosion. Danny doesn't seem to have a problem handling explosions and energy based attacks. He could probably deal with the back lash of his own chi. Now the other argument is iron fist might be able to burn spider-man's webbing. We have seen Iron Fist's chi melt metal before however Spider-man's webbing has allowed him to punch Molton Man who can also melt metal and other things.

However Danny can do more than channel his chi in the form of blasts. When he channels it in the form of a punch it seems to be at its strongest. I have already shown him knocking down the hellicarrier, and destroying a temple in a few punches. Similar to how Spider-man doesn't really web spam often but you can never count it out, Danny does have the potential to create massive AOE damage to his surroundings. That might be something worth keeping in mind if Danny were to get pressured, he could cause a massive explosion to get spider-man to either back off or to knock him back.

Danny does have some other exotic abilities.He can channel his chi into objects and throw them. We have seen Danny throw objects with his chi before. I don't think this ability will matter to much since Danny hasn't tagged someone as agile and quick as spider-man. I have already talked about his healing factor and iron fist does have other abilities like the hypnotic fist but its not something iron fist uses in combat. The last thing that I think I should touch on I guess would be Danny's senses. We kind of saw above in there last fight Spider-man did get the drop on iron fist. This likely wont happen in a rematch. Danny has always had amazing eye sight, however after reading the book of iron fist Danny's senses have improved to the point where he can hear sweat drip down someone's face.

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So even though Danny may not have precognition his senses are quite impressive.

So in the end who has the advantage when it comes to other abilities beyond fighting ability and physicals? Well Spider-man has the advantage of Spider-sense. It will be easier for spider-man to track iron fists movements and with his wall crawling ability he does have an extra advantage with mobility which supplements his speed advantage. Its also easier for him to traverse the environment since he can swing around with webbing he has the advantage in travel speed as well. It will be difficult for Iron Fist to dodge Spider-man if Spider-man can anticipate where he will leap before he does leap. Iron Fist does have range attacks of his own but there pretty limited. There more like mid range attacks but they haven't shown the same range as Spider-man's webbing. I don't think I've ever seen his chi blasts show longer range than about 20ft. Also when it does come to Danny's chi blasts Spider-man can create shields with his webbing to block Danny's chi blasts. So even though it does give iron fist options beyond hand to hand, Spider-man does have the advantage when it comes to long range. However Iron Fist does have raw destructive power with his chi. Webbing might not be able to neutralize Iron Fist because he might be able to blow it away with his chi.

But Spider-man doesn't have to use webbing just for immobilizing Iron Fist. He can swing Iron Fist around with his webbing like he did in there past fight, or he can swing other objects into iron fist like he did against Human Torch. He can even use his webbing as a distraction. If Danny is busy blowing his way out of Spider-man's webbing he might not be able to brace himself quickly enough if Spider-man rushes him. Neither of them can use stealth on the other so that is a wash. Danny could punch the ground possibly to knock spider-man off balance and that could create an opening but with spider-sense Peter might have enough warning to leap back and could jump onto a near by building out of range of iron fist's AOE. I did mention Iron Fist could create breathing room this way but as I said Spider-man has the longer range attacks so Danny would probably want to keep Spider-man close in hand to hand combat. Its also difficult to punch the ground when he is trying to avoid Spider-man.

I'm also going to give this category to Spider-man.

Verdict

Alright so if it wasn't obvious I am giving the win to Spider-man. With that said I would still like to sum up my thoughts because even though I did give Spider-man the advantage in each category I think this is a good fight and I can see why Iron Fist is considered one of the closest street levelers to Spider-man if not the outright closest. I think the biggest elephant in the room is my decision to give Spider-man the edge in fighting ability. Again I have to stress that when discussing that category we aren't just talking about who is the better martial artist. If they were fighting H2H in a cage match and Spider-man couldn't use his wall crawling or webbing than I think it would be a harder category to call. I think Iron Fist has impressive enough speed feats where he can be compared to Spider-man. He is obviously the better martial artist and Peter does have the edge in Spider-sense.

However even in that kind of scenario I still think its debatable looking at there history and Iron Fist's statements. I showed the fight above but when Danny did fight Peter in the dark-which gave Iron Fist the advantage by Peter's admission-Peter still dodged more hits and landed the first strike. Now you can argue that Iron Fist has improved since than but there is also his statement when talking to power man. And for the record this statement can be supplemented with showings involving post book of iron fist Danny. In Amazing Spider-man 653 we saw Smythe give some of his minions there own Spider-sense. The New Avengers had a hard time tagging these thugs which led to Spider-man having to create a device to remove there spider-sense and led to him losing his own Spider-sense. Now admittedly the panel doesn't really show Danny missing or hitting these thugs so there is an element of vagueness to this showing in relation to Iron Fist. However I would say its implied Iron Fist had difficulty tagging them. During the fight Danny makes this comment:

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Danny seemed to be analyzing there movements and dodges and studying them. Likewise the point of the story was that the avengers current plan of attack wasn't working and all they were doing was tiring themselves out because they couldn't tag these thugs due to there precognitive abilities. The other thing I want to point out is you can argue Danny has improved through reading the book of Iron Fist but you can argue the same with Peter going through his way of the spider training. You can argue that Peter doesn't show his way of the spider training and it hasn't made a huge difference in his fights but I feel similar can be said for Danny with the book of iron fist. Danny was a top tier fighter before the book, and after the book he has shown more abilities but he doesn't seem to really defeat any of his previous rivals any easier. The people who were his rivals before studying the book still seem to be competitive with him. I think his showing with Shang-Chi is probably the most blatant example of this. Even as current as 2017 Shang-Chi is still competitive with Danny by his own admission. I think its fair to say Danny was always Shang's rival even before the book.

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So any argument of improvements can be made both ways. Or you can argue the Marvel universe hasn't fundamentally changed in 20 years and the hierarchy is still the same as its always been. I think with either perspective its fair to say Spider-man has the advantage. However as I said what really made me give Spider-man the advantage when it came to fighting ability was just that he is better at using the environment. I probably could find a lot more showings of Peter being clever but I don't want to bombard you with scans. I chose some of the examples that stuck out in my head. I think a lot of the showings with Iron Fist's tactical ability mostly involved him changing up his fighting style or identifying weak points. In my research and reading of the character I didn't find a lot of showings of him using the environment. I don't think Danny is an idiot but I don't think he interacts as much with the environment as Spider-man has been shown to. Simple things like Peter deciding to throw a trash bag at Iron Fist to distract him for a split second could honestly turn the tide in a fight like this. One slip up and either combatant could take the advantage. A lot of the examples of Iron Fist's tactical showings were things that happened more by happenstance than Danny thinking cleverly. During Immortal Iron Fist #23 when Danny overloaded that kinetic absorbing monster it wasn't really because Danny thought to do that but more so because Danny refused to go down without a fight. He did slice its Achilles tendon and had it collapse under its own weight but Danny didn't think to do that.

What I will say that made me hesitate a little bit when deciding that category was Danny's discipline. I think Peter's quips can be effective depending on the enemy but I do think it can be distracting to Peter himself if his enemy can ignore his banter. And we saw Danny show the discipline to ignore that against Batroc. I also think that during this era Danny was more hot headed than he is in recent years. So I do think Danny would be less likely to be distracted by Spider-man's taunts. However I also do believe Peter is good at multi-tasking and his quips are second nature to him. So I don't think they are so big as a distraction that it will make Peter easy to tag. Likewise when Shang-Chi made that statement Peter didn't have Spider-sense, So you could argue Peter had to learn how to focus more during that specific point in time due to not having his danger sense.

Danny is obviously a better martial artist but I also don't think there is much Danny can do with his skill that Spider-man can't do with his spider-powers. Martial artists are trained to read body language to predict enemies movements; Spider-man has spider-sense to do that. Danny uses technique to increase his striking power; Spider-man has super strength. Danny uses his skill to judo throw people; Peter uses his agility to reverse judo throws. The only thing I could think of was pressure points but those tend to matter less against fast and agile enemies because they require a lot of accuracy to pull off. Danny has a hard enough time landing a hit on Spider-man, landing something as precise as a pressure point seems unrelasitc. Also even without talking about way of the spider Peter has displayed some knowledge of the anatomy, obviously not to the point Iron Fist does but still its something. He did try striking Hammerhead in the windpipe for example (it didn't work because of his new enhancements at the time)

Not that it matters.
Not that it matters.

And finally there is the strategy they both displayed in there fight. As I said I think Spider-man comes off as more impressive because Iron Fists strategies were dependent on him having the home field advantage and the scenario in which the fight took place. He doesn't have any more knowledge of the location here in my deadliest warrior scenarios. So there are no couches for him to roll onto to cushion his blows, and he can't activate booby traps because there not fighting in his building. The goal of my deadliest warriors is to try and create as much of a neutral setting as possible. I never defined the scenario here but my default assumption is there are no mysteries why two characters are fighting and both sides know why they have to fight. When judging strategy its important to look at it as a case by case basis. One strategy might work against one enemy/scenario and another strategy might not work in a different scenario against the same enemy.

Iron Fist only got Peter to lower his guard because Spider-man was trying to figure out why Danny stole files from the Daily Bugle. Danny knew why Spider-man was after him, there was nothing for Spider-man to explain but there was for Iron Fist to explain. That kind of strategy only works when one combatant has to explain what is going on. Whereas when it came to Spider-man's use of strategy he managed to lure Iron Fist to the roof tops which was his territory, and he also managed to predict Danny's actions in the end and take advantage of predicting Danny's actions.

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Spider-man clearly had the advantage before the sign started to fall. And it was because he of this move that created that opening. I'm not saying Spider-man will outsmart Iron Fist with this specific move every time. But what I think this does show is Spider-man can read Iron Fist better than Danny can read Spider-man. So if Peter can predict Danny's actions better its easier for Peter to setup his strategies.

I wont go into much detail on the physical section. You could argue speed is pretty even. I gave Spider-man the advantage for 2 reasons:

  1. Spider-man has spider-sense. This gives him the edge when it comes to reactions because he would always be reacting first since he would be reacting before Danny throws his punch, kick, etc. The only way Danny could have the speed advantage would be if he were so fast he overwhelms Peter before he registers the warning of his spider-sense but we've seen Iron Fist interact with Spider-man and other people with similar abilities and he never overwhelmed them with speed like that. It also gives Peter the edge when it comes to striking if he can anticipate where Iron Fist will dodge (admittedly I would also say it requires more focus to use Spider-Sense that way)
  2. I think in general there is more of a portrayal of Peter blitzing more named characters more. This is admittedly subjective so you can ignore this point. Its not really a huge part of my argument. Point #1 is more important.

Feat wise you can argue they have similar feats. We saw Danny catch bullets and we have seen Peter and his clones do the same thing. Both move faster than the eye. However as I said in the fighting ability section in addition to Spider-sense Peter's webbing and wall crawling supplements his speed advantage because it gives him extra mobility by giving him more surfaces to move along and he can swing in mid-air. So even if they were even in speed Peter would have the advantage in terms of mobility. Striking power goes to Iron Fist but I think they both have the potential to one shot each other or not depending on morals how hard they are willing to hit, and also depending on if they can successfully roll with each other's blows.

The X-factor category was another close category and ended up being closer than I thought. Danny's chi is a nice counter to Peter's webbing. Ultimately I gave this to Spider-man largely because of Spider-sense and the mobility stuff along with Danny having less range. Even if webbing probably can't stop Danny I think it can at least be a distraction which is all Peter needs to take the advantage. Once there is an opening Peter just has to keep on the offense. The thing with this fight is, is that if either fighter gets an opening the other fighter likely wont be able to recover to be able to respond. Similar to what happens to a boxer when there cornered. Spider-man would probably be more likely to recover since he can jump higher, has webbing, and his wall crawling. The other thing is Danny's punch is more likely to send Peter flying since its stronger. and Peter does have a chance of taking it due to morals. In there last fight Danny Chi was unfocused which made it hard for him to control his chi. Its why when he does tag Peter with the iron fist he says "No!" because he thinks he hit Peter to hard. Despite Iron Fist showing concern he may have hit Peter to hard, Peter still took the hit:

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With all that said do not confuse me giving Spider-man the advantage in all 3 categories as this being a one sided fight. Its not. For example I was tempted to call the X-factor category a tie and the only reason I didn't was because I consider ties cop outs. Iron Fist absolutely has the means to challenge Spider-man and he does have some solid advantages. I just think Spider-man has more advantages and I think he should win a majority.

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So do you agree or disagree with my analysis? Feel free to agree or disagree below.

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