I have to admit, these "versus" Poll Position questions have become my favorites, because they're so easy to write so much fun to see you all debate. I think this week we have a particularly interesting selection for you:
Both possess speed, reflexes, agility, strength, and stamina. Both have survived countless battles against a myriad of foes. Each wields blades that can slice through almost anything (except whatever they make Cloud City railings out of).
Darth Maul can of course bring Dark Force tricks to the table, meaning in theory he could grab Wolverine and throw him around the battlefield from a distance. He also fought two of the greatest Jedis in history to a virtual standstill (make that a literal standstill for all too many on-screen minutes while they waited for various force fields to go down). Plus, cool facial tattoos.
Wolverine, of course, has his ever-loving rapid healing factor. But that's more of a long-term bonus; for the purposes of a single engagement fight, it wouldn't really come into play since, even if he could survive being chopped in half eventually, by the time he was up and about, the fans are already back home and the popcorn is cold.
Maul's twin light sabers give him the advantage of reach, but would be a disadvantage if Wolverine could get in close enough.
I admit, I can't call this one, it's too close. I'll have to see which way the enraged geek spittle flies before I can decide. So have at it, folks!
Wolverine. Because apparently the entire Marvel Universe revolves around him. He is the Alpha and the Omega. He could bring down Galactus, The Eternals and the vastness of the Kree Empire all before lunch, just because he’s the best at what he does. And what he does isn’t pretty.
Wolverine, for sure. I know that Maul has a bunch of fancy tricks but Wolverine is a fighter. Plus, he doesn’t heal that slow. In the movie, he pretty much healed instantly. He also has the whole rage-filled fighting abilities. He even survived having his adamantium skeleton ripped out. Maul has the advantage if it is a long-range attack but short-range, he is a little bit lacking.
You also have to take into consideration that Maul’s saber may not be able to cut through adamantium – there are other metals in the Star Wars universe that are too dense to cut through.
In the end I’d give it to Wolverine. Maul’s a weapon, trained to do one thing, kill Jedi. Old Wolvie has the experience and instincts.
It wouldn’t be an easy fight, the force would give Maul an edge, but it won’t be enough.
It is tricky – seeing as there’s no documented use of a light sabre on adamantium.
As much as I love Maul, he can’t survive basically anything like Wolverine can. It does matter weather durasteel is at the same strength as adamantium, if they are, Maul would lose, but if adamantium is fairly weaker, than Maul wins.
I think they should both get a puppy and calm the hell down. Just sayin’…
On the one hand, Maul gets enormous hype despite the fact that he’s onscreen for a combined 7 minutes or so. However, Wolverine is getting a reputation worse than the goddamn Batman for beating foes that should be out of his league, and… Wait, this poll was about which was more overrated, right?
I guess I’m going with Wolverine because, ummm…he’s Canadian. Oh yeah, and I suspect that Adamantium is actually the metal that the Cloud City hand rails are made out of. Good luck with that, Maulster.
*Sigh* Why do keep doing this? Any time Jeff puts up names like Batman, Wolverine and Deadpool, it’s already a foregone conclusion who the victor will be. Let’s do something different next time. How about any of these competitions:
Green Lantern vs. Nightcrawler
Superman vs. Galactus
Doomsday vs. Juggernaut
The Watcher vs. Waldo (pretty much a game of hide and seek)
The Guardians vs. Black Bolt
Aquaman vs. Namor
The cast of Spongebob vs. a wood chipper
Clayface vs. Sandman
Hawkman vs. Archangel
Wolverine would win because he could probably shear through Maul’s sabre to break his guard, then move in and impale with his claws. Maul may be a Sith, but his powers are not as strong or defined as Vader’s or Tyranus’. He, like Wolverine, leans a bit on brute force rather than agility, but I doubt Wolverine is as overconfident as Maul. Most Sith have some fault or another, usually to do with overconfidence in their abilities or in pride, that cause them to make mistakes that eventually end with them getting killed. Maul was overconfident in his martial prowess and gloated over Obi-Wan instead of destroying him; Tyranus underestimated Skywalker (and put too much trust in his Master); Sidious neglected the possibility of Vader returning to the Light Side of the Force. And if, by some fluke, Maul defeated Wolverine, Maul would probably suffer some pretty severe wounds.
I was just kidding about Wolverine winning. I mean, obviously Maul would win. Why? ‘Cause he’s got a higher midiclorian count! Like, duh!
Those are good ones, McKnight, thanks!
As to why I keep using Wolverine and Batman, the answer’s simple — any poll with them in it gets 50% more responses. UGO likes the eyeballs 🙂
Normally I would side with Star Wars over the most overrated Marvel character ever to molest my eyes with his faux machismo, but Darth Maul appeared in Episode 1 so I have equal contempt for both.
I think the big question here is, can a lightsaber cut through adamantium? (You might think this is a silly question but there are certain metals a lightsaber can’t cut through.)
If it can, Wolverine is screwed. He has no way of defending himself against Maul, whose lightsaber will slice right through those claws and bury itself in Wolvie’s face.
If it can’t, then Darth Maul is boned. Barring a one-in-a-million stab right through the eye and into Wolvie’s brain, Maul has no way to hurt him. If he stabs Wolverine in the stomach he’ll just heal up. If he tries to cut off a limb his lightsaber will be stopped by Wolvie’s adamantium bones, and getting a limb only halfway cut off wouldn’t even faze Wolverine.
“The Watcher vs. Waldo (pretty much a game of hide and seek)”
Truly an epic battle for the ages.
You know in hindsight, I’m giving it to Darth Maul by a mile.
Four words: Force Lightning. Metal skeleton.
Next week I might have to go with “The cast of Spongebob vs. a wood chipper”. That rules.
Plus you have to hand it to me, the image accompanying this post is awesome.
Jeff, you’re welcome.
Jeff (15): You’re welcome for that one. Also, if you have trouble coming up with any more POLL POSITION ideas just let me know. All of those took a combined 3 minutes to think up. Typing it out actually took longer.
I like the Comic Book Universe(CBU) vs. the Star Wars Universe(SWU) Concept in general. Just think of the team ups that could come from it. I read a XMen/Star Trek cross over novel once and it was cool.(Worf and Wolverine side by side kicking butt.)But this could go a lot farther. Chewy vs. Sabretooth, is one that comes to mind. This would be a real fun thing to look into.
I would definitely say Maul. I really like Doornik1142’s point of force lightning: metal skeleton. Also, people keep bringing up, Maul can only win if he keeps Wolverine at close range, but they fail to realized: THE FORCE. Maul can throw Wolverine around like a rag-doll without even touching him. Also, shock someone enough and they fall unconscious, then Maul can just walk up to Wolverine and easily take that one in a million lightsabre stab through his eye and into his brain. The best point as to why Maul wins of course, as said by Jeff, Awesome facial tattoos.
Darth Maul would win. The fight would no doubt happen around either a swirling vortex of energy, a pit of molten lava, or a space station with only conveniently-placed windows keeping the vacuum of space from killing them. In all cases, once Darth Maul realized that his lightsaber was only able to injure Wolverine before the latter’s healing factor kicked in, he would simply force grab/pull/throw the always-charging Wolverine and throw him into whatever local hazard existed. The energy fields/vortex would burn all the flesh from Wolverine’s adamantium skeleton in an instant, the lava would do the same, and the vacuum of space would dispatch Wolverine with equal speed and equally-lethal efficiency.
darkvatican (21): Hate to break it to you, but Wolvie’s come back from being JUST a skeleton on multiple occasions. A little thing like lack of flesh won’t stop him.
Would say Wolverine given the metal and healing, but using the force you could simply rip his bones straight out, no healing from that.
McKnight57 (22)
Eh, it’ll stop him for long enough. Like Jeff said, by the time he’s back on his feet the fans are already back home and the popcorn is cold. Apparently these polls work under the same rules as the Marvel VS. DC comic. Whichever fighter gets “pinned” first is the loser, whether they’re still alive or not.
And even though Wolverine once survived a nuclear blast because his skull protected his brain (shouldn’t that mean his skeleton is now massively radioactive?) a nuclear blast only lasts for a fraction of a second (I would think). The heat from a lava flow or the energy from a science-fictiony reactor thing is a long-lasting hazard. Eventually it’s going to make its way inside Wolvie’s skull and charbroil his brain. And then there’s no coming back.
I searched through the “Poll Position” archives and to my surprise there has never been a dedicated poll where it’s just Wolverine vs Batman.
Only a room full of psychics, straining under the sheer magnitude of what this fight means, is keeping my mind from being blown by asking: Dare we ask Jeff for it?
For all these years, Jeff has merely hinted at the greatest “who wins” question of all time; hints that have keep us satiated. Now I understand why he did it– to ask “The Question” (…and no, it’s not “What’s the meaning of life?”) is to invoke forces of cataclysmic proportions! Jeff’s been like the Grail Knight from Indy/Last Crusade, keeping the question away from prying minds.
But now the threshold has been crossed. So now do we ask for it? Wolverine vs Batman…who wins?
🙂
McKnight57 (22)
Whether it has happened before in a comic or not doesn’t really matter, honestly. No one in their right mind would believe that genetic material spontaneously appears where there was none to begin with. Such would also be the case here, when all genetic material has been burned away completely(the word is incinerated, meaning to reduce to ash {which retains no DNA}). Thanks for breaking it to me soft, though. ;-]
darkvatican (25): I had to come into his corner, despite the frailty of the argument. I had to at least give it a shot.
Joshua (24): Hate to break it to you, but… http://www.heromachine.com/2011/04/26/poll-position-versus/
And it ended in a 50-50 split. So there is no conclusive evidence saying one would definitely pop the other.
@Myro: Oh. Well, consider me relieved. Now all mankind has to do is survive Dec. 12th, 2012 and we’ll be set. 🙂
I’d kind of like to see Maul fillet the flesh from Wolverine’s bones, so I’ll vote for that. Pity that the cauterizing effect won’t stop Wolverine’s healing like it would a D&D troll’s, but I’ll take what I can get.
Wolve-freaking-rine all the way! Just because frankly I like him way better.
@ Jeff: Some versus I’d like to see would be Jango Fett vs Batman, and Predator vs the winner of the Wolvie/Maul match-up. For an awesomely bad clash, let’s say Kevin Costner from Waterworld vs Namor 🙂 Thanks for doing what you do.
I’ve never made it a secret of how much of a Star Wars geek I am. But this pole was easy for me to decide on when I chose Wolverine. Bone claws or adamantium, mutant healing powers or no, Wolverine would easily win this fight.
Darth Maul was awesome…. to see for the first few times. He was sliced in half in his first movie, and tossed down a really deep hole. Let’s take this a step further, break the boundaries of the movie, and reveal that he came back shortly after Obi-Wan moved to Tattooine to watch over baby Luke. Yes, he came back. Picked himself up, and rocked the SWU with the lower half of his body being totally cyborg! And was killed, for the final time, shortly after he attacked Obi-Wan. Greased by the same opponent, not once, but twice! I’m a Sith fan through and through, but Maul was weak up against a real opponent. He kicked butt against space pirates and inter-galactic gangs, but up against his first padawan and he gets deep six’ed!
Wolverine! HOO-HA! When has Logan ever failed so epically? Has he been beat down, yes. Did he get back on the horse, no. He got up, dusted himself off, and turned the horse into a BBQ! I am not really all that familiar with the comic book universes past… I guess… 1994. So I won’t claim to know all of his history. But he’s lived for centuries, and he’s STILL shakin’ things up on the battlefront! -IF- he were ever sliced in half and left for dead… he can regenerate himself via his healing factor. The man truly is a marvel to behold.
Let’s face it, Maul just doesn’t have the drive, ego, ambition, or stamina to keep up with the Wolverine.
Wolverine.
He’s the most popular character overall.
Thus, lightsaber can’t cut adamantium, and the Force either is less efficient, or isn’t used at all.
Thus, the win.
I have an extremely low opinion of Maul. Extremely low. I still say Luke trounces Magneto because of the Force. But Maul looses this one even with the Force.
I thought of some new ones:
Smurfs vs. Can of RAID
Hulk vs Bieber
Doomsday vs Hulk
Bane vs Luke Cage
Captain Atom vs Silver Surfer
Krypto vs Pluto (Marvel IS owned by Disney, after all)
Hell Boy vs Spawn
Superboy vs Invincible
Johnny Sorrow (JSA villain) vs Hall of Mirrors
TMNT (pre Venus de Milo) vs Thunder Cats
Teen Titans (classic) vs Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers (original cast w/ White Ranger)
Oh, one last option:
WildC.A.T.s (original group) vs Avengers (classic)
@McKnight (35)- I do believe Jeff has already covered Doomsday vs Hulk, and the Hulk took it.
From the wikis, there are some lightsaber-resistent materials accepted as canon (see: cortosis) that are “impervious to both heat and energy”. Cortosis alloys were used in vibroblades intended to trump lightsabers and also kill people. The wiki for adamantium also describes it as being heat and energy resistant, saying that “secondary adamantium” was invented to explain instances of adamantium being damaged by energy discharges and such. There’s also a deal in there about it being no longer malleable eight minutes after the alloy is poured, even if it remains liquefied by heat.
So I’m going to call it energy and heat resistant, shorting out a lightsaber blade that would try to cut it. This doesn’t give a 100% victory for Wolverine, but much like Vader’s armor that deflected Luke’s attack at Cloud City, it’s going to keep him in the game. He’s resistant to telepathic attacks as well from his training from Professor X, so Maul’s ability to use the force (which were quite weak compared to others) will not be a huge factor.
It’s going to come down to their combat training, Wolverine’s mutant powers to keep him alive, and Maul’s force abilities that allow him a greater physical capacity then most beings. I’m going with Wolverine, it’s going to be a fight of stamina, who can keep going until one just can’t go any further.
I voted for Darth Maul on the premise that Mr Spock took down Logan with a Vulcan neck pinch. (yep, read the one-shot comic) Should be cake for Darth Maul to Force power Wolverine out an airlock, or something even if somehow the lightsabres don’t penetrate his metal bones. Should.
@John: Of COURSE the Marvel Universe revolves around Wolverine. Sales and advertising numbers have a gravitational pull in universe 616. 😉
Just thought id share this pic i found
http://superherouniverse.com/messageboard/article178.htm
wolverine did get burned up by the sun and live so i dont think force lighting would hurt him
a lightsaber is basically a plasma blade, in theory it’s the same stuff that the sun is made out of.
An adamantium shield can withstand a nuke or likewise the Human Torch’s Nova Blast, both or which produce temps equal to or greater than 1,000,000 deg. Farenhite(it would cook wolvie, but not the skeleton)
Also according to most descriptions the only way to radically damage a set piece of adamantium is through messing with it’s atomic bonding (like Ultron does).
One last thing to remember is that a there are different temperatures of plasma. Effectively you can have cooler plasma (suns surface – approx 10,000 deg. Celcius) or hotter (suns core – approx millions of deg. Celcius).
At the latter temp I am uncertain of the effect but I doubt a lightsabre needs to be that hot – at 20,000 deg. Celcius it would cut through any man made alloy like the preverbial hot knife through butter.
With me I would be like the emperor, lighting, and if that didn’t work; choke em.
But like most polls wolvie wins.
I gotta say the wolverine would come out on top of this one. But he would come out of it a seriously damaged unit.
I’d have to go with Maul all the way. Beyond all the myriad of advantages, Wolverine has one fatal weakness: A cut throat. And before you start claiming he’d heal, or something, he is a direct quote from Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1 #177; Sanction: “He is still vulnerable to a slit throat. ‘No bones to stop my blade. And even your mutant healing factor won’t prevent your bleeding to death.'”
Does seem to be quite the weakness to me…
@ Rodimus Mike (38): Adamantium wouldn’t short out a lightsaber. Alloy can’t short out a lightsaber. Pure cortosis is a superconductor, and overloads the lightsaber for a few minutes. Adamantium would be more akin to SWU Neranium or Phrik; super-tough, lightsaber proof, but not able to short out a lightsaber
@ Waaly1 (42): There is a huge difference between burning and electrocutuion… like the inability to move a muscle with a certain level of electricity flowing through you. IF Wolverine can’t move because of electrical spasms, no matter how tough he is, he’s screwed.
@ rodney (43): A lightsaber isn’t plasma… it’s an exotic energy. And no, plasma isn’t energy, it’s one of the four states of matter. Superhot matter vs pure energy…
I think that, seeing as how the only way to destroy adamantium is to change it at the atomic level, I’m pretty certain that a lightsaber can’t cut through adamantium. I’m pretty certain he’d survive a throat cut (if he bleeds out, wouldn’t his body just keep producing more blood till his wounds heal?). Also, you’re forgetting something. At the back of the neck is the spinal cord. Which is covered in adamantium. It’s possible that he’d live through it. Also, Maul has to get close enough to do a throat cut. Seeing as Wolvie has many years of experience in combat and is a better fighter than Maul any day (hello, Maul got chopped in half by a PADAWAN!), I’d have to give Wolvie the points for the fight. But it would definitely be an interesting fight!
Most of you seem to be forgetting that there is an entire Star Wars Universe (SWU) out there, just as there is an entire Marvel Universe (MU). Star Wars is not limited to just the movies and cartoons. There are volumes, novels, and even a very long-standing comic, plus all of the video games. Darth Maul was actually pretty kick-@$$ in the SWU, as a whole. His ability to use The Force to move objects to his will was almost equal to Magneto’s ability to manipulate metal. I.e., “Strong with The Force, he is.” His Force Choke was stronger than Vader’s ever was. Maul was stolen away as a newborn by Palpatine (while he was still being trained by Darth Plagueis) and trained in every aspect of The Dark Sid of The Force by Palpatine. His skin was red because he was so filled with hatred of the Jedi that his skin became tainted (sort of) by The Dark Side (same with his eyes being such a bright and brilliant yellow), and the black markings all over his body was the result of a swarm of Sith pincerbugs carving his skin black like that, a slow and extremely painful process. The man was birthed into the SWU for the sole purpose of being one of the very few trained in the Dark Side since birth. He wasn’t brainwashed, he was pissed off. Do some research on him @ http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Darth_Maul. We must learn before we speak.
Also, just because Wolverine is “the most popular character overall” doesn’t even factor in as a skill or even a qualification that would count towards a win/fail. Vader was popular and his own kid killed him! (which, by the way, it is Sith tradition for the younger to kill the elder to establish power and dominance). I think the main flaw of Darth Maul was that he had no desire to kill his master (Palpatine), and thus, never had the chance to fully embrace the Dark Side of The Force.
I have to give it to darth maul. even taking into consideration the chance that a light saber couldnt cut though wolvarines adamantium fused skelital system. The dar side of the force I think would give him enough edge to win the fight. Also I think there is a good chance that a light saber could cut though adamantium, but I don’t know since that metal dosnt exist in the the star wars univers.
In many of the comics, Wolverine cannot die as simply as Darth Maul did. Also, just based on how difficult the metal blast doors in Episode 1 were hard to cut, adamantium should be even tougher.
Darth Maul was bretty BA though.