Warning: SPOILERS for A.X.E.: Avengers #1Marvel Comics openly calls out one of the silliest debates that have divided fans of the Avengers for decades: who is stronger, Thor or the Hulk? In A.X.E.: Avengers #1, while Iron Man is haunted by the apparitions of his fellow heroes, he also acts as a sarcastic reminder of this sometimes funny, but also often unhealthy, habit of Marvel fans to obsess over characters’ strength.
Every superhero fan has one or more favorite characters and one of their most common pastimes is to pitch them against each other to see who would come out on top. Fights and battles are still a big part of the genre, so it’s only natural for these debates to exist, but thanks to the internet they have grown to huge proportions, to the point that there are entire websites, forums, and social media channels dedicated to them. One of the most popular pairings in these fantasy battles is Hulk vs Thor. The two are commonly recognized as the strongest Avengers (even if Hulk’s membership in the team was short-lived), and two of the most powerful characters in the Marvel Universe, so fans have been endlessly debating who would actually win in a fight.
Even Marvel Comics is aware of these debates, and how silly they can become, to the point of openly calling them out. In A.X.E.: Avengers #1, by Kieron Gillen, Federico Vicentini, and Dean White, a mixed team of Avengers, X-Men, and Eternals is infiltrating the body of the Progenitor, the Celestial that they recently resurrected and now is about to destroy Earth. The only current Avenger in the group is Iron Man, who is captured by the defense mechanisms of the Celestial’s body, which force him to relive some of the most traumatic moments in Tony’s life. At one point, Tony is confronted by both Thor and Hulk, who verbally and physically abuse him, and he answers: “I get it! ‘Who’s the strongest one?’ I know. It’s not me. It’s never me.“
“Who Is Stronger?” Is The Wrong Question To Ask
In this sequence, writer Kieron Gillen subtly weaves in a story about Iron Man’s insecurities a reference to the debates going on among fans on who is stronger between Hulk and Thor. Besides being a funny nod to the Marvel fandom, it also alludes to how pointless these discussions can be. Iron Man has an inferiority complex towards his “colleagues”. He believes that they are smarter, more powerful, or more righteous, so he keeps building weapons and armors to compensate. This is why Tony’s answer to the vision points out that he is always left out of the “who is stronger” debates. However, the Celestial is trying to teach him that there are more important criteria for judgment, and in the same way, fans should not obsess over how many tons Thor can lift or how fast the Hulk can regenerate, but evaluate the characters in their complexity.
However, this remains a sarcastic nod more than a critique. Superhero fans have been debating the powers and strengths of their favorite characters and they’re not going to stop soon, nor they should, because this is also part of the simple joy and entertainment brought by the genre. Marvel found an interesting way to reference the fans’ debate over who is stronger between Thor and the Hulk, by weaving it into a more complex story about the insecurities of the one Avenger that is always left out of this discussion: Iron Man.
