DCU's smartest?

[Shellhead]

I think that one problem with the industry these days is that the companies take great characters and try to spin them off into their own solo series when there's really no reason to do so. Ie, Thing, Silver Surfer, Robin, Martian Manhunter, Booster Gold, etc.

They may make for great stories sometimes, but the books rarely last and it just helps saturate the market and make the core titles that the characters came from more watered down.

Both the Thing and Silver Surfer were popular enough in the past to sustain long-lasting comics. The Silver Surfer series that started in 1987 lasted for 144 issues, or 12 years. Marvel Two-in-One, a team-up book that featured the Thing plus a new guest-star each issue, lasted 100 issues, and was immediately followed by solo series that lasted 36 issues, for more than 11 years combined total. These are not unpopular characters.

The last time Marvel tried to do a Silver Surfer series, he was practically relegated to cameo appearances while a couple of normal humans took the center stage. This was at a time when Marvel was apparently rationing the appearances of all but their most popular heroes. Remember the Bruce Jones run on Hulk when Hulk rarely appeared? Anyway, it turns out that people who buy superhero comics want to see the superheroes.

The failure of the recent Thing series is more puzzling. The writing was excellent, the artwork was pretty good, and the stories were mostly packed with action. The main difference might be that the Fantastic Four was extremely popular for the first 20 years, making it easy for a spin-off series starring the most popular character. The next 20 years of FF were a time of lesser quality, overall, leaving the Thing considerably less popular than he was in the 60's and 70's.

[Shellhead]

Back on topic, there have been some great common-sense posts in this thread, especially the one that suggested that Mr. Terrific was just joking about being third-smartest.

For the sake of simplicity, we can break the potential candidates down into some categories, in an effort to identify the two smartest people on the DCU Earth. Quantifying their intelligence is difficult, but I would suggest that those who have actually invented things in a variety of fields deserve some respect, with extra weight given to really challenging creations, like time travel.

1. Superheroes
2. Supervillains
3. Famous geniuses from our world
4. Famous geniuses from DCU Earth who are neither superheroes nor supervillains

Possibilities:

1. I just don't see Batman in the top two, because his inventions tend to be merely practical gadgets and not scientific breakthroughs, aside from the plot device situations where he is inventing things to compensate for those JLA situations where he would otherwise be useless. By comparison, John Henry Irons seems more brilliant, working with metallurgy, physics, and engineering. In recent issues of 52, he out-smarted Lex Luthor, defeating Lex's science with his own science. Superman has been known to outwit Lex, but not through sheer inventiveness.

2. DC has had a lot of mad and/or evil scientists over the years. In the course of the 52 series, we have seen all of those scientists kidnapped and forced to work together. Doctor Sivana seems to stand out as the most brilliant of the evil scientists, amidst all the petty one upsmanship that we've seen on that island. Lex is also brilliant, but some of his accomplishments may have been by his employees, and Lex only took credit for them. When evil scientists were getting kidnapped, Lex got skipped. Maybe it was because he was so well-defended, or maybe it was because he doesn't have a great reputation for brilliance amongst his peers.

3. Unless they have actually appeared in DC comics, we can only assume that geniuses like Stephen Hawking exist there. For legal reasons, DC probably tends to avoid using real world characters, so I doubt that we need to worry about them for purposes of our ranking.

4. Will Magnus was also kidnapped during 52, and once he was forced to stop taking his meds, his brilliance seemed to eclipse most of the other scientists on the island. Though not a superhero, he did create the Metal Men. In the real world, artificial intelligence is a challenging problem that scientists have not yet solved, but maybe that is a less impressive achievement in a comic book world where so many robots have displayed artificial intelligence. Will has also displayed impressive achievements working with chemistry, metallurgy and engineering. EDIT: Niles Caulder of the Doom Patrol deserves mention as well. Not exactly a hero, but the Chief certainly applied his scientific genius to a wide range of bizarre situations while with the Doom Patrol.

I have given particular emphasis to the 52 series for a couple of reasons. First it is recent, and things may have changed since that last crisis, so recent means relevant. Second, it represents a collaboration between some of DC's best current writers, so the stories represent a greater degree of consensus than typical stories written by solo writers.

One troubling thing that occurred to me while pondering this issue is the absence of brilliant females in the DCU.

[Jack]

While Batman might deserve to be #2, I doubt anyone in the DCU would actually list him as such, because even though we know how great he is, it's not exactly measurable fact for the other characters. Mr. Terrific has 14 PhDs, and all sorts of other qualifications and tangible evidences for his genius... but Bruce Wayne doesn't have any. He might have the equivalent of twice as many PhDs as Mr. Terrific, but they aren't a matter of public record.

[SuperSince92]

I never realized that the other two were unknown! Everytime I read Justice Society I do wonder who the smarter two they allude to are. The Powers That Be at DC must have established who they were SOMEWHERE, right???

One troubling thing that occurred to me while pondering this issue is the absence of brilliant females in the DCU.

That's because everyone knows men are smarter than women. They are only there for one reason and it sure ain't brains!

[BoosterBronze]

I never dug the idea of Batman as some kind of supergenius.

The guy is brilliant no doubt. But I just can't picture our hard working vigilante siting around studying quantum string theory, mastering the intricacies of the python computer language, or fiddling with cutting edge electro-magnetism. Like Sherlock Holmes, I think Batman focuses on what can make him a better detective/ass kicker.

[dupersuper]

3. Unless they have actually appeared in DC comics, we can only assume that geniuses like Stephen Hawking exist there.

Hawking hasn't physically appeared, but Clark quoted him commenting on the recent temporal upheaval just after Zero Hour (Clark won an award for that article)...I'd assume they got his permission before that. He's been in Star Trek and Simpsons after all; he's a cool geek. Batman also mentioned him when he took down Prometheus. ;)

[van_line]

I never dug the idea of Batman as some kind of supergenius.

The guy is brilliant no doubt. But I just can't picture our hard working vigilante siting around studying quantum string theory, mastering the intricacies of the python computer language, or fiddling with cutting edge electro-magnetism. Like Sherlock Holmes, I think Batman focuses on what can make him a better detective/ass kicker.

that was my biggest problem with the whole OMAC concept, instead of fighting crime on the streets of gotham, the dark knight spent his time and energy to build a satellite that he sent into space. Once in space the satellite programming became sentient. Then the whole thing that he decided that the best agents should be regular people, that would be taken over and coated in a candy shell.

[Shellhead]

Hawking hasn't physically appeared, but Clark quoted him commenting on the recent temporal upheaval just after Zero Hour (Clark won an award for that article)...I'd assume they got his permission before that. He's been in Star Trek and Simpsons after all; he's a cool geek. Batman also mentioned him when he took down Prometheus. ;)

In order to compare him with Mr. Terrific, what degrees does Hawking have? I'm guessing that he has degrees in physics and astrophysics. Anything else? And has he actually invented anything, or is he just famous for his theories?

[dancj]

I never dug the idea of Batman as some kind of supergenius.

The guy is brilliant no doubt. But I just can't picture our hard working vigilante siting around studying quantum string theory, mastering the intricacies of the python computer language, or fiddling with cutting edge electro-magnetism. Like Sherlock Holmes, I think Batman focuses on what can make him a better detective/ass kicker.

Why does everyone seem to assume that you have to be an inventor to be a genius? As I understand it most of Batman's gadgets aren't even invented by him. His genius is more in the tactical/detective side - and that counts just as much as astrophysics

[ZacharyLovesYou]

Why does everyone seem to assume that you have to be an inventor to be a genius? As I understand it most of Batman's gadgets aren't even invented by him. His genius is more in the tactical/detective side - and that counts just as much as astrophysics

Not to mention he's smart enough to find ways to keep up with all of his "superfriends" and villains all of these years.

[Ring Slinger]

Mr. Terrific (Michael Holt) is consistenly identified as the "third smartest man in the world." Who are the smartest and second smartest? I assume the smartest man in the DCU is Lex Luthor-- who's number 2?

[Joe Acro]

Could this topic become stickied or part of the FAQ? Finally? Because I'm tired of these threads. (Heh. I know from X-Books experience that a sticky won't accomplish much.)

--
FAQ is an acronym.

[Detective#27]

In Infinite Crisis # 5, Mr Terrific said that he was the 3rd smartest in DCU. Who are the rest of the top ten? Where is Batman?

[4thHorseman]

Something that has never been said

[chicagokmc]

a few quick thoughts come to mind:

batman, luthor, mr. terrific (probably the top 3). most of the others i can think of are villians:

dr. sivana, braniac, t.o. morrow, doc magnus (metal men), oracle, the calculator

i'm not sure how braniac 5 and his 12th level intelligence fits on the list and more importantly because of jacked up legion continuity, which braniac 5.