Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

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Majin Gojira
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Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Majin Gojira »

This isn't a fight. This isn't about who is stronger.

This is about how superheroes in the west work vs. those in the east (at least, the ones that consciously homage western works in that genre).

In both One-Punch Man and My Hero Academia, the world has a lot of superhumans and has a government organisation that orders and monitors "Heroes" to fight various odd threats and superhuman criminal activity. They are government employees with a high degree of celebrity. They are ranked, classified, and often in competition with each other almost as much as they are working to defend the civilian populous. For rank, prestige, and other things.

This is partly stemmed from Manga drawing more from sports stories than mysteries like western comics do, but it's an interesting distinction.

That and registering with the government is seen as the proper thing to do right out of the bat.

My question is: How do you think Superman, Clark Kent, would react to this sort of system if he found himself in those worlds? And what do you think he might try to change things if he doesn't like what he finds?
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Vendetta »

In OPM the hero association is a well meaning but incompetent bureaucracy that is largely incapable of locating its arse in the dark with a satnav and written instructions.

I don't think Clark would really join them, they're not the sort of structure he fits in.

He's more visible and noticable than Saitama (better fashion sense, for a super, custard is not a strong colour to go heroing in, and less likely to just wander off after beating the monster), so he might attract a new Justice League whilst working outside of the Hero Association.


In Boku no Hero he'd probably co-operate with the rest of the heroes. Again, the hero registration system there is largely well meaning (and more necesssary given that it's a world where almost 80% of people have some kind of superpower.) Heroes there are a recognised part of law enforcement, whereas in OPM they're a private paramilitary organisation which the police don't much care for. It's a little less obviously crap at its job than OPM's hero association. He would rather obviate the plot though, since he'd be a very obvious and even more unbeatable symbol of justice than All Might.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Solauren »

Couldn't Superman basically annhilate all the bad-guys in "OPM" fiction anyway?

By himself?

In a few hours?
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Vendetta »

Solauren wrote:Couldn't Superman basically annhilate all the bad-guys in "OPM" fiction anyway?

By himself?

In a few hours?
He could do that in DC as well.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

Unless the 'monster God' in OPM is something else, the only villain that'd even really make Superman notice is Boros, and he'd win that fight with much less collateral damage.


OPM's hero system, it's way too focused on fame and image and a ton of the heroes are jerks. Intentions are good, but he'd want them to clean up, put an end to 'newbie crushing,' etc.. He'd probably do articles on them as Clark Kent, with recommendations on the reform needed.


Superman would probably like MHA's system. He'd be initially weary of hearing the government ties, but when he sees the agencies working mostly independently, just licensed and such, he'd recognize them as not much different than the JL, Titans, etc.. And after a bit of misunderstanding, get a hero license and do some photo ops with other good heroes.

The My Hero Academia system actually produces a lot of good heroes he'd be happy to be friends with. There's a few jerks- Endeavor- but that's the minority.

Vendetta wrote: He could do that in DC as well.
Superman has plenty of peers in DC that can stand up to him. Either heroes- Wonder Woman, Billy Batson, Green Lantern- or villains, like Black Adam, Brainiac, Darkseid, evil Kryptonians, etc..
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by bilateralrope »

Q99 wrote:OPM's hero system, it's way too focused on fame and image and a ton of the heroes are jerks. Intentions are good, but he'd want them to clean up, put an end to 'newbie crushing,' etc.. He'd probably do articles on them as Clark Kent, with recommendations on the reform needed.
I'm not familiar with OPM. Are any of the jerks likely to try anything against Clark Kent going after their reputation ?
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

bilateralrope wrote:
Q99 wrote:OPM's hero system, it's way too focused on fame and image and a ton of the heroes are jerks. Intentions are good, but he'd want them to clean up, put an end to 'newbie crushing,' etc.. He'd probably do articles on them as Clark Kent, with recommendations on the reform needed.
I'm not familiar with OPM. Are any of the jerks likely to try anything against Clark Kent going after their reputation ?

They're likely to be circumspect because it's a reporter, but yea, definitely, especially if they think he can be intimidated into silence. One tried to publicly crush Saitama's reputation and make people think he was a villain because he was getting more credit than they liked.

I mean, there's good heroes in there too- really good like Mumen Rider, but there's glory hunters, plus some strong individuals who have a twisted sense of justice (Sweet Mask, who's the most popular and doubles as a pop star in his off time, is pretty ruthless [though, to be fair, we've only seen him kill monsters, but he *always* kills them], dismissive of heroes for being too weak, and has influence over the promotion process, using his standards to help decide who gets promoted, though he only cares about the upper ranks).

The top heroes often don't care about rank or image, but there's a fair number who care a lot.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by bilateralrope »

Q99 wrote:They're likely to be circumspect because it's a reporter, but yea, definitely, especially if they think he can be intimidated into silence.
Any of them likely to move from intimidation attempts to something like punching Kent in the face and breaking their fist ?
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by TheFeniX »

Vendetta wrote:In OPM the hero association is a well meaning but incompetent bureaucracy that is largely incapable of locating its arse in the dark with a satnav and written instructions.

I don't think Clark would really join them, they're not the sort of structure he fits in.
I feel a lot of their incompetence comes from their #2 (logistically #1) being so unstable and the apathy of many of their other S-ranks. With someone like Clark far above even Saitama (I don't know if he's physically tougher, but he damn sure has access to a more diverse toolset) who isn't batshit crazy, they might see some serious reforms. It helps that Clark genuinely cares for humanity and will easily put his life on the line and play well with others.

And there's not a lot to lose by getting ranked since the Association (likely out of fear) doesn't seem to place any actual responsibility/liability on S-rank heroes. They are more of a 411 service that pays out to let heroes focus on heroics.

Clark would easily start to form his own cult of personality among lower (and possibly higher) ranked heroes since he's not a snob, just by doing his job.
bilateralrope wrote:Any of them likely to move from intimidation attempts to something like punching Kent in the face and breaking their fist ?
Heroes seem to care more about rank than anything. Considering his intelligence and physical attributes: he'd rank at least as high as Genos. After a few blow-outs, he'd only have trouble surpassing Tornado just in the ease of how much devastation she can cause. Sure, in a one on one, they aren't even close. But she does have the ability to call meteors down from space in the span of a few seconds.

He might also have problems with King. Spoiler
If Clark decides to try his hand at e-sports.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

bilateralrope wrote: Any of them likely to move from intimidation attempts to something like punching Kent in the face and breaking their fist ?
Yes.

TheFeniX wrote:I feel a lot of their incompetence comes from their #2 (logistically #1) being so unstable and the apathy of many of their other S-ranks. With someone like Clark far above even Saitama (I don't know if he's physically tougher, but he damn sure has access to a more diverse toolset) who isn't batshit crazy, they might see some serious reforms. It helps that Clark genuinely cares for humanity and will easily put his life on the line and play well with others.
I wouldn't say #2, Tatsumaki/Tornado, is unstable... she's just a powerful psychic with a bratty personality who spends most of her time squishing monsters. Which also leaves very little reason to care about lesser heroes, outside her sister.

Of all the S-Ranks, only the martial artists with hero students pay much attention to the lower ranks- Atomic Samurai and Tank Top Master and to a lesser extent Bang. Most of 'em are really of the 'absurdly powerful person who does their own thing,' type.

And of course, Amai Mask is *effectively* S-class and does a lot of public-face-of-the-organization stuff.

Ultimately, though, it's not the heroes that run thing, it's a board of directors, rich investors who fund the organization. They've decided the organization, ranking system, and the general approach. Without putting enough disincentives on messing with fellow heroes/too much incentive on being of higher rank (probably because it gets them more donations to fund it because civilians get hyped by the rank changes...).
And there's not a lot to lose by getting ranked since the Association (likely out of fear) doesn't seem to place any actual responsibility/liability on S-rank heroes. They are more of a 411 service that pays out to let heroes focus on heroics.
They do place some responsibility on them, they're expected to respond to calls, but the S-class ones are strong enough that it's a very loose leash and a few get even lighter treatment than the rest (Blast, for example, never responds to calls, and King, similarly, operates on his own schedule, though will show up to meetings and such). The lower S-ranks seem to be expected to respond to more, Metal Bat got bodyguard duty after all.


Heroes seem to care more about rank than anything. Considering his intelligence and physical attributes: he'd rank at least as high as Genos. After a few blow-outs, he'd only have trouble surpassing Tornado just in the ease of how much devastation she can cause. Sure, in a one on one, they aren't even close. But she does have the ability to call meteors down from space in the span of a few seconds.

He might also have problems with King. Spoiler
If Clark decides to try his hand at e-sports.
King's called the strongest human for good reason.

And yea, he'd probably be S-ranked right out the gate, which probably means starting as lowest S-ranked or near it and then rapidly being promoted over the course of a week or two.

Hm, while aiming for A rank gets one targeted by newbie crushers, I don't think anyone would newbie-crush someone who got into S straight out like Clark easily would.... though Amai Mask would come to check him out and judge for approval to be sure, and there could be some conflict if Superman has a problem with Mask's outlook.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by TheFeniX »

Q99 wrote:I wouldn't say #2, Tatsumaki/Tornado, is unstable... she's just a powerful psychic with a bratty personality who spends most of her time squishing monsters. Which also leaves very little reason to care about lesser heroes, outside her sister.
She slammed Genos into a rockface, which could have easily been fatal, for him snapping at her during an argument she started. Have you ever met a stable person who starts arguments, then physically attacked when they were insulted back? I haven't. Those types are wildly unpredictable people and are bad news. I speak from experience. And those jackasses weren't capable of creating world-wide devastation.

This is ignoring the comic where she moves into "Batshit Crazy" territory.
Ultimately, though, it's not the heroes that run thing, it's a board of directors, rich investors who fund the organization. They've decided the organization, ranking system, and the general approach. Without putting enough disincentives on messing with fellow heroes/too much incentive on being of higher rank (probably because it gets them more donations to fund it because civilians get hyped by the rank changes...).
The interactions Genos had during the Dark Matter incident show that there is no operational organization, only administrative: heroes just do whatever they think is best and there's no one even attempting to direct them other than "bad stuff happening in City X, please help."

And this is almost completely due to the fact that someone like Tornado, or any of them, just would not listen.
They do place some responsibility on them, they're expected to respond to calls, but the S-class ones are strong enough that it's a very loose leash and a few get even lighter treatment than the rest (Blast, for example, never responds to calls, and King, similarly, operates on his own schedule, though will show up to meetings and such). The lower S-ranks seem to be expected to respond to more, Metal Bat got bodyguard duty after all.
Responsibility means having consequences for when you fuck up or ignore "orders." They even spend screen-time talking about how many heroes just decide not to show if something is beneath them.

Even still, being expected to be "on call" is like the bare minimum of responsibility. Genos, as a newbie, is left completely up to his own devices and isn't even tracked by the Association (they were surprised to find him at Bang's Dojo). I don't see why Superman wouldn't take advantage of a system such as this. For nearly zero commitment, he could have access to a world-wide monster tracking company service. And then punch said monsters.
Hm, while aiming for A rank gets one targeted by newbie crushers, I don't think anyone would newbie-crush someone who got into S straight out like Clark easily would.... though Amai Mask would come to check him out and judge for approval to be sure, and there could be some conflict if Superman has a problem with Mask's outlook.
This is kind of the thing I recall being weird, but could just be part of the whole genre deconstruction: so much emphasis was placed on Baldy being ranked as C, not what LEAD to him being ranked so low. When told (almost positive he was told) that Saitama scored 100% on the physical exam, Sneck still tried to bash him. That's incredibly stupid on his part.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

TheFeniX wrote: Have you ever met a stable person who starts arguments, then physically attacked when they were insulted back? I haven't. Those types are wildly unpredictable people and are bad news. I speak from experience. And those jackasses weren't capable of creating world-wide devastation.
Hm, a terminology thing maybe. I'd call her a dangerous personality and certainly bad news, but she's predictable in what provokes a response.
And this is almost completely due to the fact that someone like Tornado, or any of them, just would not listen.
I don't think it follows that it's Tornado's fault- I don't think there's mention of them ever trying to do it in a more controlled way, nor would Tatsumaki care if the other heroes were under tighter leashes.
Responsibility means having consequences for when you fuck up or ignore "orders." They even spend screen-time talking about how many heroes just decide not to show if something is beneath them.
How many S-class specifically blow it off, not heroes in general- but ones like Metal Bat do come. I think it's because he and some others care about stuff like money and other benefits, while a fair number of S-class simply do not care about jack except testing their strength or similar.

There's a chapter in the webcomic about how normal heroes often dream of getting to A, but almost never S, because S-class tends to be viewed as weird, inhuman monsters where the normal rules (and I don't mean just hero rules, but rules of common sense and physical ability) don't apply.

This is kind of the thing I recall being weird, but could just be part of the whole genre deconstruction: so much emphasis was placed on Baldy being ranked as C, not what LEAD to him being ranked so low. When told (almost positive he was told) that Saitama scored 100% on the physical exam, Sneck still tried to bash him. That's incredibly stupid on his part.
Yea, true.

Maybe the physical is easy enough that getting 100% isn't *that* unusual (just... Saitama didn't hit 100, he blew past it), so Sneck thought, "Oh, he passed it by a little," ignoring the rest of the guy's warning, or counting on technique to beat strength.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Vendetta »

TheFeniX wrote:I feel a lot of their incompetence comes from their #2 (logistically #1) being so unstable and the apathy of many of their other S-ranks.
Not so much. The non-hero bureaucracy is a source of a lot of the problems, as evidenced by their complete inability to deal with an outside context problem like Saitama. He's so comically far beyond all the other heroes (even Tatsumaki) that they can't actually comprehend what he's doing or that it's him doing it.

The association's management structure itself also has an antagonistic relationship with the police (seen in one of the bonus manga). They're a private organisation which seems to have supplanted national government (though we don't know how that worked in OPM, because its version of Earth is a pangaea style single supercontinent)

The Hero Association is institutionally blind, and not even particularly good at its supposed intent to manage and co-ordinate heroes. It doesn't effectively rank them by ability, hence the wide gulf in power between the various S classes (which is why Amai Mask does what he does, he's not wrong, he's just an asshole), and it's really bad at verifying their activities (see: King.)

It's strongly suggested especially in later webcomic chapters that the hero association just isn't up to the job.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

Vendetta wrote: Not so much. The non-hero bureaucracy is a source of a lot of the problems, as evidenced by their complete inability to deal with an outside context problem like Saitama. He's so comically far beyond all the other heroes (even Tatsumaki) that they can't actually comprehend what he's doing or that it's him doing it.

The association's management structure itself also has an antagonistic relationship with the police (seen in one of the bonus manga). They're a private organisation which seems to have supplanted national government (though we don't know how that worked in OPM, because its version of Earth is a pangaea style single supercontinent)
And I'm not sure if it's good or bad, but I don't think *all* of the management has a problem with the police, it may be one association executive and his cronies who do without the knowledge of the rest. Others seem less ill-meaning- the most common official we see seems pretty focused on taking down monsters and increasing the HA's combat power to do so (he tried to do a thing of offering pardons to stronger criminals in exchange for their help... though that turned out to be a bust).

To elaborate on the antagonistic relationship- the police don't like being shown up by heroes, so the official in question (not the main one) let a smaller monster get to a police station with the intent of making the police beg for help and submit more to the HA's authority, and then jump in and slaughter the monster with a bunch of heroes he had just waiting in range. Foiled a bit because Saitama was there so he dressed up and made it look like an officer took it down.

The Hero Association is institutionally blind, and not even particularly good at its supposed intent to manage and co-ordinate heroes. It doesn't effectively rank them by ability, hence the wide gulf in power between the various S classes (which is why Amai Mask does what he does, he's not wrong, he's just an asshole), and it's really bad at verifying their activities (see: King.)
And even within the lower ranks (since S rank is the "You know what? Screw it, you're *somewhere* off the charts" rank)- Fubuki is easily high in A-class strength but hovers at the top of B to express more political power and everyone knows it. Amai's not just S-equivalent but stronger than many Ss and, again, everyone knows it. Popularity can bump people up and down, and some of the heroes adopt weird gimmicks for visibility that don't actually help them fight.

As for King, keep in mind monsters have publicly surrendered at his presence. And remember that time a huge monster attacked his apartment and just got instantly pulped? Plenty of confirmed wins!

The one thing I'll grant the HA is they're pretty good at locating monsters and informing heroes of them, and encouraging a pretty good number of people to sign up. It's not like all of the power houses would be fighting monsters and criminals if there wasn't fame and a reward.
It's strongly suggested especially in later webcomic chapters that the hero association just isn't up to the job.
There's a rival group forming, especially out of the martial arts community (which is also superpowered). I dunno if it's actually *better*. Well, we'll see.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

Oh yea, and for contrast- in My Hero Academia, heroes are mostly limited to quirk-related crimes, have to get licenses, work with the police who often are involve in the restraint and transport of captured villains, student heroes acting on their own can get in *serious* trouble (vigilante-ism is frowned upon... though there is a spinoff about some minor ones).

The MHA hero community isn't perfect, heroes that don't do well have funding problems and a good number can't cut it and quit, different hero agencies butt heads (though work with each other when situations call for, which is often), commercialization of heroes is a thing, and some heroes are jerks, but frankly most superhero worlds would kill for hero-authority relations like that.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

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Q99 wrote:Oh yea, and for contrast- in My Hero Academia, heroes are mostly limited to quirk-related crimes, have to get licenses, work with the police who often are involve in the restraint and transport of captured villains, student heroes acting on their own can get in *serious* trouble (vigilante-ism is frowned upon... though there is a spinoff about some minor ones).

The MHA hero community isn't perfect, heroes that don't do well have funding problems and a good number can't cut it and quit, different hero agencies butt heads (though work with each other when situations call for, which is often), commercialization of heroes is a thing, and some heroes are jerks, but frankly most superhero worlds would kill for hero-authority relations like that.
Here's the thing, in the MHA world 80% of the population has quirks. Not 80% of the adult population but 80% period. Considering quirks first start manifesting around the age of 4 everyone 3 and under can assume to be quirk free which is a not insignificant part of the population and by the start of the Manga/Anime the world is currently at least four possible starting on the fifth full generation of a world of Quirk using superheroes.

Someone ran the math awhile back and based on the increasing number of people being born with Quirks the chance of being born Quirkless like Deku was is starting to approach the chances of one in X hundred range. To the point we've not even met another Quirkless person besides Deku. In class shots we've seen the entire class but Deku has Quirks and whenever we've gotten background shots of other characters lives they live with people who also have Quirks have parents who have Quirks and are friends with kids who have Quirks. That 80% figure inculdes large numbers of the first generation people who were alive when quirks were rare. But in three generations it's gone from the one in a hundred to the hundred in one flip.

In such a world public regulation is pretty much required because by the time you've hit first grade there's an excellent chance one of your public schools can call down lighting or shoot optic blasts or can frigging FLY.

Think of this kind of thing happening....

Ma'am come get your child she levitate little Timmy because he called her stupid and your daughter won't turn his gravity back on, right now we have him tied to a lead so he won't float into space but she's refusing to release until he apologizes.


If being a teacher was not bad enough you might have to teach to someone who can literally accidentally kill you because they hug you and you exploded because they activated their death touch quirk. It might seem silly but in the manga we've met two people who can literally murder people by touching them.

I mean seriously(Spoilers for anime watchers) if little Johnny Deathtouch can patty-cake-patty-cake-coat the walls in blood on accident your going to have to have some serious government control.

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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

Mr Bean wrote: Someone ran the math awhile back and based on the increasing number of people being born with Quirks the chance of being born Quirkless like Deku was is starting to approach the chances of one in X hundred range. To the point we've not even met another Quirkless person besides Deku.
I can think of two, if we include the spinoff 'Vigilantes'... plus, we wouldn't necessarily know if we have with some background characters, and we're literally at a school for quirk training so Deku wouldn't be in position to run into many. And with the additional note both are older individuals.

In such a world public regulation is pretty much required because by the time you've hit first grade there's an excellent chance one of your public schools can call down lighting or shoot optic blasts or can frigging FLY.
True, though most quirks are pretty darn minor, and even strong quirks often take a lot of practice to use well.

Like, Mei is a quirk haver but her quirk is just good vision. Deku's mom can pull small objects towards her. A lot of people just have some odd physical feature, one famous reporter just has horns, one hero has snakes with good senses. I get the impression most of the population still has very low-level quirks.

I mean seriously(Spoilers for anime watchers) if little Johnny Deathtouch can patty-cake-patty-cake-coat the walls in blood on accident your going to have to have some serious government control.
That is illegal even without specific super regulation ^^
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Mr Bean »

Q99 wrote:
I can think of two, if we include the spinoff 'Vigilantes'... plus, we wouldn't necessarily know if we have with some background characters, and we're literally at a school for quirk training so Deku wouldn't be in position to run into many. And with the additional note both are older individuals.
Exactly both are older, my point is by Deku generation IE kids 4-16 right now not having a Quirk seems to be a very rare thing. Sure most quirks are not all that useful and some are almost disadvantages. But in the current state of things new kids entering school it's not even 80% having quriks but more like 96%-99%


Q99 wrote:
I mean seriously(Spoilers for anime watchers) if little Johnny Deathtouch can patty-cake-patty-cake-coat the walls in blood on accident your going to have to have some serious government control.
That is illegal even without specific super regulation ^^
The point is you having a five or six year old with any potential home life baggage not really understanding their quirk yet and then Sue steals his Teddy bear and lo and behold little Johnny Deathtouch touches again and now your calling the janitor, her parents and the counselors office because stand by because the rest of the kids need some serious therapy.

My point being even if people like Johnny Deathtouch are rare there are enough like him that having a robust goverment framework in place is almost a societal requirement.

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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by TheFeniX »

Q99 wrote:Hm, a terminology thing maybe. I'd call her a dangerous personality and certainly bad news, but she's predictable in what provokes a response.
True, the context of the show tends to ignore the reality. But even still, she's somehow shocked that Saitama called her a lost child in the HA HQ rather than immediately becoming violent. She is capable of restraining herself, but that's also kind of the problem. Would you describe Superman as "capable of restraining himself when needed?" No, "In Control" is his baseline. Letting loose is exceptionally rare for him for reasons he states explicitly: him losing control could literally end all life on Earth. Everything is made of cardboard comparative to him.

Tornado is in the same boat, yet she's very near the opposite end of the "hero" spectrum from Superman. This is an incredibly dangerous person to have around.
How many S-class specifically blow it off, not heroes in general- but ones like Metal Bat do come. I think it's because he and some others care about stuff like money and other benefits, while a fair number of S-class simply do not care about jack except testing their strength or similar.
That's kind of the point though. "Many don't blow it off" is a different story than "they COULD blow it off." Rank Cs have to work to stay on the "job," but S-Ranks just do not. Puri Puri Prisoner is a convicted sex offender and he still gets calls. He's still a listed S-Rank hero. This is almost certainly due to necessity.

This is why I find it hard to see a downside to Clark getting registered and giving them his cell number.
There's a chapter in the webcomic about how normal heroes often dream of getting to A, but almost never S, because S-class tends to be viewed as weird, inhuman monsters where the normal rules (and I don't mean just hero rules, but rules of common sense and physical ability) don't apply.
That level of power messes with people, OPM kind of shows that. I've only seen one hero near Clark's level of morality: Mumen Rider. Even Saitama had to respect the man and that guy is jaded as Hell. In fact, Saitama seems downright ENVIOUS of him. Rider seems to be created specifically to show that when Billy Badass "heroes" are shown the exploits of one relatively normal guy giving it his all, they are better for it. I mean, he's a C-Rank, even if #1, who seems to have a direct line to the higher-ups at HA HQ. They "waste" time during an attack way above his pay-grade to feed him info. They seem willing to support ANY hero at a moments notice, it's just few use them.

What happens when you get an S+++-Rank like Mumen Rider in the form of Superman?
Maybe the physical is easy enough that getting 100% isn't *that* unusual (just... Saitama didn't hit 100, he blew past it), so Sneck thought, "Oh, he passed it by a little," ignoring the rest of the guy's warning, or counting on technique to beat strength.
Considering the gap between certain heroes and the emphasis on physical (or more specifically, the ability to do damage) ability, this is definitely part of the joke. Having tactically minded heroes is a good thing, thus the written test, but being fast and strong enough to kill monsters weighs much more heavily.

Or it should, but then Saitama would be working only to outrank Tornado by the first couple of episodes and we'd lose the potential for a lot of comedy. I mean, he punched through a meteor and didn't rank up enough because there were S-Ranks around and he blew up a large portion of the city. Ignoring that he uppercutted a motherfuckin' boulder to pieces. Even Chris Redfield is jealous.

The explanations on why Saitama is a relative unknown at best, hated at worst, works in the context of OPM. But that's about it.
Vendetta wrote:Not so much. The non-hero bureaucracy is a source of a lot of the problems, as evidenced by their complete inability to deal with an outside context problem like Saitama. He's so comically far beyond all the other heroes (even Tatsumaki) that they can't actually comprehend what he's doing or that it's him doing it.
It gets hard to break "the joke" from the "reality" on this show, which I do enjoy. But them having Saitama on video One Punching Sea King and immediately clearing the weather in the process makes the joke get a bit weirder. I almost assume a Bink (of Xanth) level of "popularity protection" spell on Saitama at this point.

They could literally call Genos and ask "how tough is that guy you keep calling Master?" at this point. Bonus point if Genos' upgrades allow him to record video. Because, if so, he damn sure would have recorded their training session. Sure, Genos would shut his mouth and allow Saitama to give credit to other heroes, but I see no reason he would lie in other areas.
It's strongly suggested especially in later webcomic chapters that the hero association just isn't up to the job.
I can't really find an argument with your post except to say, at some point WRT to this story: "That's the joke." I sometimes find myself thinking about "Police Squad" or "Naked Gun" when I watch/read scenes concerning the Hero Association because they see something, but the reaction is so comically inept, there's no other explanation I can come up with other than "intentional incompetence for comedy."
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

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It's also noteworthy the heroes' association is, what, two-three years old? It does make some sense that they aren't that smooth an operation, they were made with what people thought would work.

Their initial ranking system was more off base and put every day behavior on higher importance, so monsters were often beating their top heroes, and most of the now-current S-class was in C or B.

I imagine they were put together through a combination of hiring people used to handling first-responders (911 operators and ambulance dispatchers- and note, the info side of the HA solidly seems to be the strongest), but for the rest, you had some publicity people have a say, some martial arts people who care about seniority and stuff, and people trying to figure out not just how to fight monsters but to recruit heroes.

Compare to DC, where the hero society formed organically around existing heroes joining and with a immediate short-term purpose behind the first team (original DC, the first team formed around WW2 as a temporary war-time thing mostly focused on stopping saboteurs and side threats, downsized post war, and disbanded in the McCarthy era, with the JLA being a second or third gen team), and even in nu52 had 5-10 years of experience, or My Hero Academia where All-Might studied at the same school Deku goes to and was prestigious then too, even the institutions are decades old.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

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TheFeniX wrote:That level of power messes with people, OPM kind of shows that. I've only seen one hero near Clark's level of morality: Mumen Rider. Even Saitama had to respect the man and that guy is jaded as Hell. In fact, Saitama seems downright ENVIOUS of him.
I'm not sure as he's envious, barring maybe of someone who gets to not be bored by easy victories. He definitely respects Mumen Rider more than he does most of the heroes though.
TheFeniX wrote:I can't really find an argument with your post except to say, at some point WRT to this story: "That's the joke." I sometimes find myself thinking about "Police Squad" or "Naked Gun" when I watch/read scenes concerning the Hero Association because they see something, but the reaction is so comically inept, there's no other explanation I can come up with other than "intentional incompetence for comedy."
Oh yeah, I get that. Incompetent bureaucracy is totally a feature of Japanese media as a satire of the government (see also: Shin Gojira).
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

The bureaucracy in Shin Godzilla wasn't even that bad, just hesitant. I'd more say, *bureaucracy* period, good or bad, is a focus of Japanese social commentary.
TheFeniX wrote:True, the context of the show tends to ignore the reality. But even still, she's somehow shocked that Saitama called her a lost child in the HA HQ rather than immediately becoming violent. She is capable of restraining herself, but that's also kind of the problem. Would you describe Superman as "capable of restraining himself when needed?" No, "In Control" is his baseline. Letting loose is exceptionally rare for him for reasons he states explicitly: him losing control could literally end all life on Earth. Everything is made of cardboard comparative to him.
Sure, but it's not like that the Justice League haven't had members who pick fights and have major tempers. Maxima, Guy Gardner, Hawkman (if, granted, Hawkman letting lose being not nearly as big a problem as Tatsumaki is!)

This is why I find it hard to see a downside to Clark getting registered and giving them his cell number.
Yea, getting involved is likely. While meanwhile investigating the heck out of them as Clark Kent, Reporter.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by The Grim Squeaker »

I blame this thread for making me rewatch OMP. And to finally read the manga. Damn you all!
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

Post by Q99 »

I'll toss in that there's other hero worlds that come in mind for regulated powers.

'Empowered' has heroes that are, if anything, often bigger jerks than OPM's (though in more 'personally assholes' way rather than stuff like newbie crushing), but are better organized (possibly why there's no newbie crushing- they'd come down on stuff like that hard) and better at their job (though sometimes by overreacting to threats).They have something of a high school clique-y thing going on pretty often, and while plenty hate it, it's still a factor. Also, they do have a problem that there's enough heroes in the cape community they can get isolated and detached from people outside their subculture.

Grrlpower is one that has the only superhero team be government-run, and the rules are you gotta sign up if you want to be a hero... but power use is otherwise fine, it's just the 'go out and fight criminals' stuff that is exclusively government property. Though of note, the super community is pretty small (there's also aliens and supernaturals so there's above-normal-human threats other than supers, but supers tend to be on a notably higher level than most of those on Earth), maybe under a hundred in the US.
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Re: Superman "Vs." One Punch Man & My Hero Academia

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Q99 wrote:Sure, but it's not like that the Justice League haven't had members who pick fights and have major tempers. Maxima, Guy Gardner, Hawkman (if, granted, Hawkman letting lose being not nearly as big a problem as Tatsumaki is!)
Don't they (or more likely Batman) have a contingency for dealing with any hero that goes rogue, including Supes? At the least, Superman has a weakness and his team is aware of it. What weaknesses does Tornado have? I think I read her powers don't work on ghosts.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm going off the assumption that if Tornado went rogue the HA is positive they are screwed. The JLA might not be able to take down Clark, but at least they have a chance as there's some other stupidly powerful heroes on the team. And Clark just is kind of their rock either way.
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