Is the flash faster than Nightcrawler

[Kithelle]

It's a problem in general with DC, IMO. They power up their guys so ridiculously high that you can't fight them. So then they get an equally-powered baddie.

Even Batman suffers from this a bit, with the whole "I'm smarter than everyone forever and already planned for everything fuck you" plot armor.

Marvel's key success is ensuring that each hero is weak, in some significant way. Spider-man lacks confidence. Iron-man has control issues. Thor's arrogant. Hulk is, well, Hulk. Etc.

DC heroes only "weaknesses" are usually the specific thing that enemies can use against them. Kryptonite, for all the Kryptonians. Yellow stuff/wood, for Green Lantern. Other speedsters, for the Flash. They don't have real weaknesses character-wise, so one has to be invented, rather than integral to the character.

Not that Marvel hasn't had stinkers or DC hasn't had great storylines, but I generally prefer Marvel. As someone once put it, DC is about gods that want to be men. Marvel is about men who might become gods.

Never heard that before....kinda clever.

What you said is a one of the main reasons I prefer Marvel...plus the fact the DC movies these days seem to be nothing but intense grit.

[TheDestinatus]

They're not real

First intelligent response so far.

[spanishninja]

Never heard that before....kinda clever.

What you said is a one of the main reasons I prefer Marvel...plus the fact the DC movies these days seem to be nothing but intense grit.

I don't know about that. I've always seen DC heroes as lofty goals for ordinary people to aspire to, while in the case of Marvel, just because you have superpowers doesn't necessarily make you less of a person.

[Mormolyce]

If you're asking "is the Flash fast enough to...", just stop. The answer is yes, okay? No matter how ridiculous that is.

DC's strength are their villains and my opinion a story is only as good as it's main antagonist.

Marvel has some great villains too.

It's just that the MCU can't use them because they're mostly Spider-Man, Fantastic Four or X-Men villains...

[Evil Midnight Bomber]

Whenever i see a question about how fast the Flash is this is what i think of:




and yet somehow things like this happen:

[ohiostate124]

Gonna go with Flash because Speedforce.

[The Stormbringer]

depends on how far nightcrawler can teleport, Im not aware of his power potential like I am with the flash, but if he can teleport across galaxies then obviously teleport would win.

Flash can run around earth multiple times in a second so anything sort of galaxy travel would fall short.

More news at 10

I'm sure it's been brought up, but at one point the Flash raced a being that possessed the power of Instantaneous Movement, i.e. being able to go from one place to the next in an instant. Flash beat him. How? Because the Flash is conceptually the fastest thing ever, because he gets his powers from the Speed Force, the literal concept of speed itself given form and power. He is infinitely fast and as fast as he needs to be for any given circumstance. He's so fast that he's faster than something that's instantaneous. That's how fast the Flash is.

But yeah, he still fucks up because the comic book writers need him to.

[Mormolyce]

Scientists need to stop naming things that big or small or powerful, because as soon as they hear those words comic book writers start making patently impossible statements with them.

- - - Updated - - -

I'm sure it's been brought up, but at one point the Flash raced a being that possessed the power of Instantaneous Movement, i.e. being able to go from one place to the next in an instant. Flash beat him. How? Because the Flash is conceptually the fastest thing ever, because he gets his powers from the Speed Force, the literal concept of speed itself given form and power. He is infinitely fast and as fast as he needs to be for any given circumstance. He's so fast that he's faster than something that's instantaneous. That's how fast the Flash is.

But yeah, he still fucks up because the comic book writers need him to.

Technically "instantaneous" means "at the speed of light" in the real world, which Flash is somehow faster than... so it "makes sense" :P

[Ivanstone]

Nightcrawler doesn't have the superhuman level of perception to travel genuinely fast. Flash does.

Even if we consider a Flash that isn't ridiculously fast, the level of perception needed to travel at great speeds is still superhuman. Superman, Silver Surfer are similar.

Quicksilver's level of perception is so high he it has essentially turned him into a dickhead:

[Deleted]

Laughed at the 'science' part.

[Yvaelle]

DC's strength are their villains and my opinion a story is only as good as it's main antagonist.

Part of the reason for that is actually because of all the overpowered bullshit heroes DC makes.

I mean, think of it from this perspective. You live in a world where fucking Superman exists. Imagine if that was a daily occurrence in your city. A skyscraper is collapsing downtown, and suddenly Superman just appears and pushes it back into place and holds it up while the construction crews show up to fix it.

You are Lex Luthor, an essentially ordinary human, and you decide to be a super-villain, in Supermans city - despite his existence. <--- That sentence already makes Lex Luthor more interesting than Superman has been in all his movie iterations combined (ignoring his comic iterations, because there are actually some good superman comics out there, but his typical movie persona is his worst).

The same applies to Joker. Batman is in your city, and he's essentially so rich, brilliant, etc - that he can break the fourth wall and construct his own plot armor. You decide that not only are you going to be a super-villain in his city, after Batman's rise to power - but you actually often succeed at it. Not only is Joker a villain in a world where Batman is a thing, Joker kind of wins most storylines - as essentially just being a dude. He usually wins by redefining the finish line 3/4ths of the way through the story - but a win none the less.

Even take this Wonder Woman movie as example (best DCU movie so far, top 5 comic movies IMO). You know why Ares was pretty compelling in this movie? Because he's kind of the underdog, technically. Sure, he's the full-fledged god of war and Diana is only a demi-god, but Diana was literally created to kill gods: she is the godkiller. She doesn't know her power, she doesn't know how to wield it, she doesn't know that she's the godkiller - but the audience knows this pretty early on. Even if you go in not knowing her backstory, you still are told the sword she wields is the Godkiller Sword. It doesn't matter that Ares is a god, when Wonder Woman and/or her sword were created expressly to kill gods (and specifically, Ares himself, not just any old god).

Good story-telling requires a challenge to overcome, a struggle against destiny, improbable odds, fierce determination, winning through guile not force, etc - that doesn't describe Superman, Batman, or Wonder Woman. The elements of good story-telling describe Lex Luthor, Joker, and Ares.

The Dark Knight is compelling because the Joker kind of wins the whole movie. The bank robbery is a success. The Joker then financially ruins every other gang in the city, something Batman has been trying to do for years. Batman's strategic plan is to replace himself with Harvey Dent, Joker succeeds in corrupting Dent into Two-Face: ruining Batman's long-term strategy for normality in an insane world. The Joker succeeds in showing Gotham it's true self, though it's not quite as insane as he hoped (at least, not quite as insane as he is). Even the ending is essentially a Pyrrhic victory for Batman - he caught Joker - but Joker makes him realize the extent he needed to go to win meant violating the privacy of every person in the city and becoming a technological dictator. Joker is caught, but Batman's unerring conviction to justice also makes him a brutal violent criminal willing to do anything: Joker wins the argument.

Despite everything that Batman is, The Dark Knight is a story about a plucky human villain overcoming the odds to beat a superhero renowned for being unbeatable (ex. "...because I'm Batman!"). Not only did Joker beat Batman, but by doing so he humanized Batman for us - he can be beaten. That is what made TDK the best super hero movie to date.

[Pawstruck]

Part of the reason for that is actually because of all the overpowered bullshit heroes DC makes.

I mean, think of it from this perspective. You live in a world where fucking Superman exists. Imagine if that was a daily occurrence in your city. A skyscraper is collapsing downtown, and suddenly Superman just appears and pushes it back into place and holds it up while the construction crews show up to fix it.

You are Lex Luthor, an essentially ordinary human, and you decide to be a super-villain, in Supermans city - despite his existence. <--- That sentence already makes Lex Luthor more interesting than Superman has been in all his movie iterations combined (ignoring his comic iterations, because there are actually some good superman comics out there, but his typical movie persona is his worst).

The same applies to Joker. Batman is in your city, and he's essentially so rich, brilliant, etc - that he can break the fourth wall and construct his own plot armor. You decide that not only are you going to be a super-villain in his city, after Batman's rise to power - but you actually often succeed at it. Not only is Joker a villain in a world where Batman is a thing, Joker kind of wins most storylines - as essentially just being a dude. He usually wins by redefining the finish line 3/4ths of the way through the story - but a win none the less.

Even take this Wonder Woman movie as example (best DCU movie so far, top 5 comic movies IMO). You know why Ares was pretty compelling in this movie? Because he's kind of the underdog, technically. Sure, he's the full-fledged god of war and Diana is only a demi-god, but Diana was literally created to kill gods: she is the godkiller. She doesn't know her power, she doesn't know how to wield it, she doesn't know that she's the godkiller - but the audience knows this pretty early on. Even if you go in not knowing her backstory, you still are told the sword she wields is the Godkiller Sword. It doesn't matter that Ares is a god, when Wonder Woman and/or her sword were created expressly to kill gods (and specifically, Ares himself, not just any old god).

Good story-telling requires a challenge to overcome, a struggle against destiny, improbable odds, fierce determination, winning through guile not force, etc - that doesn't describe Superman, Batman, or Wonder Woman. The elements of good story-telling describe Lex Luthor, Joker, and Ares.

Thank you, O WISE ONE, for looking into your crystal ball of objective purity to tell us what good storytelling is!

-_-

Use your brain for half a second and think outside the 21st century. Great works of literature often include stories of unbelievably powerful heroes simply accomplishing great things - and that's fucking great. I'm so tired of this myopic "DC HEROES TOO STRONK" argument. Just off the top of my head:

Heracles (Greece) - Good at everything. Strong, smart, etc. Accomplishes insane feats. End story.
Sampson (Bible) - Basically invincible. Gives away his invincibility, then gets it back to perform a heroic sacrifice.
Achilles (Greece) - Raging invulnerable badass whose heel is literally the inspiration for Kryptonite.
Roland (Frankia) - Paladin with a leggo weapon who does finally die, but defies an awful lot of attempts on his life. Also Archbishop Turpin.
Beowulf (Old England) - Legendary knight who defies death countless times.

Could go on, but no need. History has shown us that, truthfully, the "tragic" or "flawed" hero is really a modern creation. Previously, the idea of heroic literature (and the idea with DC comics, I think) is to portray Good and Evil in their strongest, starkest terms and their greatest conceivable forms. This doesn't preclude the idea of sacrifice or mean that your good-guys are totally invincible. Still, I think the post-Christian love affair with anti-heroes (and that's really what it is) is a reflection on how society views the world... and I think it speaks volumes.

[Ivanstone]

I'm so tired of this myopic "DC HEROES TOO STRONK" argument. .

I think there's a time and place for heroes big and small.

Grant Morrison's All Star Superman is a great story of an extra powerful Superman.

When Silver Surfer was given his own ongoing series in the '80's they immediately put him in outer space. Where stuff is actually dangerous to him. Like the In-Betweener and Galactus fighting in the middle of a black hole dangerous. Definitely won't see that in the new issue of Punisher.

[Yvaelle]

Thank you, O WISE ONE, for looking into your crystal ball of objective purity to tell us what good storytelling is!

-_-

Use your brain for half a second and think outside the 21st century. Great works of literature often include stories of unbelievably powerful heroes simply accomplishing great things - and that's fucking great. I'm so tired of this myopic "DC HEROES TOO STRONK" argument. Just off the top of my head:

Heracles (Greece) - Good at everything. Strong, smart, etc. Accomplishes insane feats. End story.
Sampson (Bible) - Basically invincible. Gives away his invincibility, then gets it back to perform a heroic sacrifice.
Achilles (Greece) - Raging invulnerable badass whose heel is literally the inspiration for Kryptonite.
Roland (Frankia) - Paladin with a leggo weapon who does finally die, but defies an awful lot of attempts on his life. Also Archbishop Turpin.
Beowulf (Old England) - Legendary knight who defies death countless times.

Beowulf is the youngest example on your list and he's 1000 years old. Essentially every attempt to bring these old heroes to the modern world has failed. Their historical significance in literature doesn't automatically mean they are examples of good storytelling.

Could go on, but no need. History has shown us that, truthfully, the "tragic" or "flawed" hero is really a modern creation. Previously, the idea of heroic literature (and the idea with DC comics, I think) is to portray Good and Evil in their strongest, starkest terms and their greatest conceivable forms. This doesn't preclude the idea of sacrifice or mean that your good-guys are totally invincible. Still, I think the post-Christian love affair with anti-heroes (and that's really what it is) is a reflection on how society views the world... and I think it speaks volumes.

Because it's a more accurate portrayal of the way the world really works, that's also why it's good story-telling. Heroes who are just immutable, unstoppable forces for good don't explain the problem of evil: and essentially all heroic stories relate back to this problem. Anti-heroes do.

Achilles sounds pretty heroic when you are on the side of Greece, he's probably a lot less glossy when you view him from the side of Troy. He's an invulnerable weapon of mass destruction that showed up on our shore and started murdering our city. Hercules sounds pretty cool when he's slaying monsters - but what did that poor Hydra ever do to him? He was just chilling in his cave until some home invader broke in and started stabbing him in the night.

Also, your synopsis is intentionally avoiding the old heroes character flaws: I'm sure you realized. Hercules like most Greek heroes sleeps around - he also dies because his wife gets fed up and poisons him so badly he eventually self-immolates because the poison isn't enough to finish him and the agony is unbearable. The dude had a flaw, and it killed him. Ditto for Achilles - the entire Illiad is essentially about the flaw of pride/arrogance: every single incident is a different short-story on pride/arrogance, including Achilles's death.

I agree that there is a marked difference between the old heroes and the modern variety, but there is a Chekov's Gun in every old hero too: that usually leads to their downfall. We've just gotten better at incorporating their flaws into their lives, rather than hinting at them occasionally and then only reintegrating their flaw into their death.

[eschatological]

Thank you, O WISE ONE, for looking into your crystal ball of objective purity to tell us what good storytelling is!
Heracles (Greece) - Good at everything. Strong, smart, etc. Accomplishes insane feats. End story.
Sampson (Bible) - Basically invincible. Gives away his invincibility, then gets it back to perform a heroic sacrifice.
Achilles (Greece) - Raging invulnerable badass whose heel is literally the inspiration for Kryptonite.
Roland (Frankia) - Paladin with a leggo weapon who does finally die, but defies an awful lot of attempts on his life. Also Archbishop Turpin.
Beowulf (Old England) - Legendary knight who defies death countless times.

For every one of your examples, there's generally a counter example. Odyssus, for one. Oedipus. Icarus, for the Greeks. The Odyssey was a much more important work in Greek literature, and it was entirely about a flawed hero trying to stumble his way back home.

The Bible? Oh man, Job? Jonah? So many flawed sinners in that book, who were heroes. The greatest king of Israel, David, murdered his friend so he could sleep with his wife.

It's kind of disingenuous to suggest that the archetype of the "flawed hero" is a modern invention.

[Spiffums]

He has a limited "spatial awareness" mutant ability that prevents him from teleporting into objects in his immediate vicinity, but it diminshes the greater distance he tele's.
He prefers to only teleport (at distance) to places he's seen and can visualize.

- - - Updated - - -



Yeah, Flash is super boring. Wish they hadn't done all that "hurr durr he's even faster than light!" crap later on in the stories and made him something akin to superman, i.e not interesting because he's too powerful. We won't even get into how he could race from the "edge of the known universe" under his own power in the first place (Oh wait! The writers decided it was a special parallel dimension, so he COULD run the whole time! Of course *eyeroll*)

Bleh.

That's what I got against DC as a whole. Marvel is basically humans that have an mutation with exception of a few characters(Thor, Loki, ect) where as DC has mostly gods or god like aliens and the occasional rich dude with toys.

[KOMO1211]

Thank you, O WISE ONE, for looking into your crystal ball of objective purity to tell us what good storytelling is!

-_-

Use your brain for half a second and think outside the 21st century. Great works of literature often include stories of unbelievably powerful heroes simply accomplishing great things - and that's fucking great. I'm so tired of this myopic "DC HEROES TOO STRONK" argument. Just off the top of my head:

Heracles (Greece) - Good at everything. Strong, smart, etc. Accomplishes insane feats. End story.
Sampson (Bible) - Basically invincible. Gives away his invincibility, then gets it back to perform a heroic sacrifice.
Achilles (Greece) - Raging invulnerable badass whose heel is literally the inspiration for Kryptonite.
Roland (Frankia) - Paladin with a leggo weapon who does finally die, but defies an awful lot of attempts on his life. Also Archbishop Turpin.
Beowulf (Old England) - Legendary knight who defies death countless times.

Could go on, but no need. History has shown us that, truthfully, the "tragic" or "flawed" hero is really a modern creation. Previously, the idea of heroic literature (and the idea with DC comics, I think) is to portray Good and Evil in their strongest, starkest terms and their greatest conceivable forms. This doesn't preclude the idea of sacrifice or mean that your good-guys are totally invincible. Still, I think the post-Christian love affair with anti-heroes (and that's really what it is) is a reflection on how society views the world... and I think it speaks volumes.

the Greeks literally invented the word "tragedy" in reference to the tragic hero trope.

[Fencers]

No one and nothing is faster than The Flash: Barry Allen. He is the speed of thought and idea- he is supposed to be comic books.

[Jotaux]

Night Crawlers teleport is not instaneous, he crosses into another dimension and the delay is perceivable to everyone else.