In the pantheon on uber-villains, Batman and Spider-Man seem to have the most deranged, the most psychotic, and the most tricked out baddies of any other characters. Doc Ock, Scarecrow, Poison Ivy, The Green Goblin, The Joker, Mr. Freeze, Mysterio, and more have thrilled readers for decades, but if we were to lock the villains in a cage, which team would emerge victorious as the most bad-ass of the bad guys?
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Stephen Schleicher
Stephen Schleicher began his career writing for the Digital Media Online community of sites, including Digital Producer and Creative Mac covering all aspects of the digital content creation industry. He then moved on to consumer technology, and began the Coolness Roundup podcast. A writing fool, Stephen has freelanced for Sci-Fi Channel's Technology Blog, and Gizmodo. Still longing for the good ol' days, Stephen launched Major Spoilers in July 2006, because he is a glutton for punishment. You can follow him on Twitter @MajorSpoilers and tell him your darkest secrets...
23 Comments
Batman for sure. Although I really enjoy the wackiness of Spider-Man’s villains, I’d take Batman’s psychopathic nemesises(?)…nemesi? Anyways. They’re way more interesting than the usual “Oh no, there was and accident and now I dress up like an animal and apparently also gained a major case of arachnofobia”
I’ve gotta go Batman. Spiderman is good but doesn’t do it for me.
Why are we having this poll anyways. We know Batman’s gonna win. I voted for Spider-Man villains (not that it matters). ;p
I think Stephen just wanted to give Batman another win. Is the next poll going to be Batman vs Marvel and DC? Cause you know who’s gonna win (with a 15 minute plan). ;p
This poll was like choosing between your children. I ultimately had to go with Batman. I like Spider-Man better as a character, and while he has great villains, they aren’t consistently written as great. Batman, however has such a strong stable of villains that they are hard to “mess up”. Besides, we all know the Flash has the greatest Rogue’s Gallery anyway.
Personally I find Batman Villains are far more interesting and make for better stories… However most of them have no powers, so in a straight up fight i’ve gotta say Spiderman’s evildoers would win easily!
Agreed. Based on the poll question, which villains would win in a straight up fight, Spiderman’s villains are the easy choice.
I didn’t read the poll question too carefully. If was a cage match though, I think Batman’s villains still have a fighting chance. They have Clayface and Bane as heavy hitters, Scarecrow could cause them all to go insane with fear, Ivy could coerce the male baddies. All in all, Batman’s villains are much more lethal than Spidey’s. They wouldn’t waste time with a fight when they could just murder, instead.
The Flash. Oh wait…
The Cap:
Red Skull, MODOK, Arnim Zola, Moonstone, Superia, the Femizons,Madame Hydra, HYDRA, Baron Zemo, the Serpent Squad.
In a straight up fight, definitely Spidey’s gang o’ thugs, but as far as which is better? Bats without question. Most of Batman’s villains are fairly realistic (you know, most of them just being mental patients and all) while all Spidey’s bad dudes are based on a freak accident and a horrible fear of all spider-ish things (good reference Joonas, all credit deserved).
Joker, do I really need to say more?
Straight up fight?
Ras Al Ghul and Bane take all of Spider-Man’s villains out. Joker then defiles them… eww.
Depth, enjoyment, creativity and cleverness-wise?
I’m going with Batman’s rogues here also.
Wait, I didn’t know Batman villains had his 15 minute ability. ;p
If they didn’t it wouldn’t be a fight :D
But seriously Ras is so underrated despite having been shown as just as or more effective than Luthor or any other of the comic book masterminds. Spidey has Kingpin but Ras is DC’s Victor Von Doom.
Actually Batman set this match up to get rid of a chunk of his rogues while he sets up traps to take out those remaining.
if lock in a cage “fair fight”, Spidey’s sinister squad definitely beats Bat’s house of crazies, but out on the streets running amok, most Batman baddies could probably scheme a whole lot of spidey villains into their death.
on shear level of menacing though(so bad that makes your skin crawl), Batman villains are incomparable.
Aren’t the there a whole bunch more Batman villains out there?
Black Mask, Blockbuster, Hugo Strange, Catman, Firefly are some of the better known second tier villains.
I would rather see Kraven vs Bane, Man-bat vs Vulture matchups.
I went with Spider-man. If we’re talking a fight. Venom and Carnage. Joker is a psycho but so is Carnage and Norman Osborn. But yes this is another Batman is great kinda thing. I love some Batman, but meh.
There is simply no way in a fight Spider-man’s Villains would lose. They wouldn’t even need half the people in the image to win the fight.
The fact that people can even argue otherwise is blowing my mind!
Clayface vs Molten Man – Winner: Molten Man seals Clayface inside his own dried husk.
Bane vs Mysterio – Winner: Mysterio and Bane ends up killing half his own team thinking they are enemies
Joker vs Carnage – Winner: No one. These two would probably just team up and kill an entire city for shits and giggles.
Two-Face vs Green Goblin – Winner: Green Goblin. Throws a pumpkin bomb while Harvey is flipping his coin to decide what to do.
Catwoman vs Kraven – Winner: Kraven disembowels her and feeds her to lions
Mr Freeze vs Electro – Winner: Flip a coin.
Riddler vs Vermin – Winner: Vermin. Riddles don’t bother animals.
Man Bat vs Swarm – Winner: Swarm. Man bat can’t eat enough insects before he’s taken down.
Poison Ivy vs Kingpin – Winner: Kingpin. He’ll willpower his way through her seduction and pop her head like a grape.
Harley Quinn vs Sandman – Winner: Sandman. Guns and explosions don’t help against someone who can rebuild themselves.
Killer Croc vs Rhino – Winner: Flip a coin.
Penguin vs Hydro-man – Winner: Hydro-man, penguin can’t breathe underwater or waddle away fast enough.
Scarecrow vs Venom – Winner: Venom, scarecrow will make Venom see his greatest fear, Spider-man and Venom will rip scarecrow’s head off.
Ra’s al Ghul vs Remaining – Winner: As long as there is no Lazarus pits in the fight, Spidey Foes.
Your fanboy is showing ;)
I like how you matched Harley up with Sandman…That says it all. You are basing the fight son match-ups you decide. Match-ups that favours your team. And when they don’t you give them the win anyway. Ras (And his ninja legions) would lose to Stiltman and company? Insert bat rogue..now who would have a chance against that person..That’s how your list reads.
Kingpin, Octavious, Mysterio and The Goblin are the only ones who would pose a threat. All the others are smalltime crooks with superpowers they don’t understand.
/tucks his fanboy back in…
But really I had to counter the DC bias that had been shown so far.
Also how you can leave out Venom and Carnage from the list of threats is odd. Sure they won’t take over the world, and they might self sabotage all the time but they do a lot of damage before they go down.
Its not DC bias its Bat-Bias, delicious, magnificent Bat-Bias. It flows through all living things creating a forcefield…Uh yeah… tugs in own Bias.
Regarding Carnage and Venom. All of the Bat villains are always underestimated because their superpowers aren’t high-tier. But what people seem to forget is that they are pretty much all Kingpin smart. Poison Ivy, Scarecrow, Black Skull, Bane, Deathstroke, Ras Al Ghul..They are all Kingpin and Osborne smart and powerful (And above). In essence Venom and Carnage are just those monsters Ivy throws around constantly. And when fighting masterminds the destructive threats get analysed, broken down and pacified first. Hell some times Bat-villains take down Green Lanterns by Amadeus Cho-ing it. http://www.mensxp.com/UltimateEditorInclude/UserFiles/IdentityCrisis3.jpg
Besides ALL (and I mean all) of the Spidey villains basically just constitute Penguin and his gang. Most people just automatically think of the gang leaders’ when recalling Bat-villains and not remember the gangs (Ninja legions) they run.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gotham_Underground#Penguin.27s_Army
This is a fight Kingpin and the Science goons might take.
The thing about having smart villains take out superheros generally more times than not means the villain has some intelligence on them. Now I’d agree with you 100 percent if they were in the same universe. Sense they are not, and there is no intelligence gained on these enemies.
I don’t see the bat villains winning out. Especially if they’re just looked into some cage. Sorry.