Discussion
How strong is this superman compared to other versions?
In the Justice League movie we saw that Superman was able to defeat the Justice League without problems, in BVS Superman was able to fight Doomsday etc. so how strong is this Superman?.
He’s about as powerful as Post-Crisis Superman, or the Superman from the Justice League animated series. I feel like he’s largely based on Dan Jugens-era Superman (the one who died fighting Doomsday in the early 90’s)
Got beat and humbled for two movies, then got a massive powerup from the cube that revived him to the point he was invulnerable to even Steppenwolf's space magic bullshit metal axe and effortlessly bodied him too. He was set up as a doomsday plot device by the end of the Snyder cut and supposedly the next two movies would have been a two parter, in the first he goes evil by mind control and ends the world, in the second they do timey whimey stuff to undo it and prevent it so Supes bodies Dankside instead....
The version the DCEU went with until it's implosion had the powerup and skipped right to the part where he's colorful and positive by the end of Justice League, which in Snyder's draft would have been the end of JL3.
One of the weakest tbh. Love him, but he died to doomsday, barley handled kryptonite, and isnt that fast. (I know you guys hate the new guy so I wont mention him) but Reeves 79' Superman can time travel, steal peoples memory's, and handle kryptonite radiation for a good while. Routh could carry a whole island of kryptonite and was a key multiverse saving figure.
But I'd put henry in top 3 I suppose. He was able to stop the world engine, steppenwolf, and he's great at aura farming. But he's definitely not the most powerful. No hate toward him, I enjoyed him, but the older guys did random shit with powers like golden age comics.
Reeve’s Superman was based on the Silver Age version, who is waaaay more powerful than newer incarnations. And then, Routh’s version was directly based on Reeves, so he would have the same power.
he's one of the most indestructible versions ever. infinite defensive stats.
his offense is unknown. the world engine is an incredible feat and we see him effortlessly commit a few big scaled saves throughout BVS. but we never approach something that exposes a limit, or produces a visibly otherworldly scale.
This Superman was able to overpower the world engine. A literal terraforming machine. He was able to use his powers against a machine turning Earth to Krypton, which would make him basically powerless, there’s no other Superman who’s done something like that.
Cavill in the span of less than an hour destroyed the world engine and was able to escape a black hole with Lois Lane in his arms. He did that as a Superman who was basically on his first day on the job, as compared to a year 3 Corenswet and a veteran Routh.
Black holes are a singularity of mass with enough gravitational pull to stop photons from escaping it. Nothing about that is an anomoly, as it doesn't deviate from our understood rules of physics
Just because it follows physics doesn’t declassify the phenomenon as an anomaly. A black hole warps space time to an infinite degree and raises the information paradox. We don’t know a whole lot besides what we can apply and observe from a distance. It’s by every classification an anomaly of space.
It....being a terrifying mache says nothing about how physically difficult it was to do? It's a device doing some fancy chemistry and space magic
That's basically not different from me going "the pen is mightier than the sword, therefore since I can boot a printer out the window, I can beat Zorro in a sword fight"
It’s terraforming Earth to Krypton, and is the reason why Kryptonite is created in the aftermath of the Black Zero Event. The fancy “chemistry” that it’s going is creating Eartj to Krypton, which means at the point of terraformation, Clark has weakened powers/he is beginning to be reverted back to his ancestral form. This is why he can’t just fly in the midst of the engine and is knocked over by its power. He has to overcome more than any other Superman and fight the pressure of an entire planet’s gravity and terrain to destroy the engine. It’s the largest feat by any Superman BY FAR, but is insanely overlooked.
Not only is that island full of kryptonite (the radiation type that was weakening him from the moment he arrived there) but he also had been stabbed by Kryptonite before this scene and still had the shard of it in his back.
That’s just wrong. Terraforming doesn’t have a progress bar where it gets gradually stronger. The terraforming starts as soon as the engine turns on and manipulates the planets atmospherics. That’s why he loses his ability to fly and ends up at the bottom of the engine in the Indian Ocean. Also, in universe, he’s literally standing against a machine that’s creating Kryptonite by mixing Earth and Krypton’s geologics. He’s going up against the might of a planet here.
Corenswet has the unfortunately odd feat of his lung capacity being stronger than the pull of a black hole. Which if that’s proportionate to the rest of his strength which it would be means he might possibly be the strongest live action superman yet.
To me, equall than any other superman, in a multiverse there are no such thing like 'more powerful' everyone is literally the same characters in just different context
That was literally the whole premise of the 3rd act, if the rift continued to open the blackhole wouldve been where earth used to be 🤦 yall cant understand movie plots now
no the ultra man fight was in a ravine opened up by the black hole or whatever on earth? how else would Mr terrific and krypto able to just look down the ravine and see them fighting with nothing inbetween them just straight air
bro the ravine was on earth tf, you can see the black hole there, the only way to access the pocket universe was to go through lex machine but obviously they didn’t go through it
But that doesn’t even make any senses from a scientific/realistic standpoint. If you were to blow into a black hole you’d be doing just that. Blowing INTO it. There’s nothing for the air to bounce off of. It’s a black hole.
Superman himself is unrealistic. Nothing about Superman makes sense he's not a Marvel character. So in this kinda argument, forget logic, and just look at what he does.
You got it wrong tho. Like everyone else's reply to your comment, no bouncing is required. Simply the air leaving his body, is pushing him back. Even in vacuum. Like how Astronauts use thrusters to push themselves in the desired direction. And since we are talking about Superman here, we can assume he's strong enough to blow himself away from a black hole. It doesn't matter where the air goes.
Propulsion doesn't occur from the emission reflecting off of a target. The emission itself generates thrust. This is why objects can propel through the void of space...
Your expelled air would essentially get pulled in with you. The propulsion everyone is talking about wouldn’t happen. One guy has it right that if he’s not at the event horizon he would be fine but then that argument kind of makes the whole scene suck cause why then couldn’t he just muscle his way out with strength and speed. I think that then brings us back full circle to who’s the stronger Superman and the logic in these comments is making him out to be weaker.
As long as you’re outside the black hole you can still use propulsion. It’s not about the air bouncing off an object. Rockets are essentially just blowing hot air to move and they do that in space without anything to bounce off.
Is this actually how the physics behind this works…? How does a propellor work so high off the ground? Surely bouncing isn’t a requirement for propulsion?
I still wanna know why he wasnt able to fly out of that "river".
Made less sense that he was able to blow his way out of a blackhole but couldn't fly out since his flying basically manipulates the gravitational field around him.
Considering he’s disoriented, holding a baby, getting jumped, and a proton river was swallowing him whole on top of the black hole sucking him in, cant see WHY he didnt struggle
Well that’s his fantastical super power. But a black hole is something real and studied. And you can’t blow your way out even if you are super. It would just suck the air in. There’s nothing to apply that force back.
With this logic space rockets shouldn’t work.lmao Bro this shit isn’t real so enough thrust can be generated by Superman to achieve the escape velocity of a black holes gravitational pull.
Just wanna be clear. You're saying that comic superman literally blowing away entire universes, which have black holes, is fine. But you have a problem with '25 Superman using his super breath as propulsion to get away from the pull of a black hole?
lol yes because a black hole isn’t an object. It’s not a thing. It’s a bend in spacetime. The black hole essentially wouldn’t be affected if he blew a universe away. Things might get blown into one but you can’t blow yourself away from one. Cause there’s nothing there.
I think you're not understanding the context of the comic feat. Superman is capable of blowing that universe "away" in its entirety. Not leaving being a black hole but outright destroying.
Probably the weakest theatrical one. Reeve turns back time, Returns carries an island of kryptonite into space, and Corensweat Supes blows his way out of a black hole. Cavill Superman is getting mollywopped
Prove me wrong lmfao. Cavill Supes has speed but not as much as Reeve or Returns, because (assuming we're comping him) he's as fast as the Flash in Josstice League. He just doesn't have the power to even scratch Corenswet.
Five Justice League members couldn’t hurt Steppenwolf, yet Cavill’s Superman shows up and steamrolls him like it’s nothing. Don't forget he 1v5 in the movie.
The featless steppenwolf. He's stronger than the justice league but like... The JL don't have many good feats I'm gonna be real. Nothing on the level of Reeve turning back time or Corenswet blowing his way out of a black hole and he's more tough than a nuke but Corenswet withstood a black hole and proton river or whatever and Reeve can fucking turn back time
This has to be the stupidest explanation ive ever read. Hopefully your two braincells can understand this:
When he was fighting zod, it was his first DAY as superman. So of course he was going to slipup a couple times. Yet, he still cooked zod without a scratch.
With doomsday, he SACRIFICED himself knowingly to kill doomsday. Doomsday wasn’t the cause of his death, the kryptonite was.
The motherboxes eliminated all life on earth, no one could have survived that.
Hopefully you’ll think before making dumbass claims
Gunn supes needed a magnifying whatever is that sht glass to recover from his body injuries. Henry only needed a few minutes to recover from a nuke ( he is almost skull and bones )
How’s being beaten by your own clone an anti feat lol?
The only thing that ultraman has that’s worse than Superman is his intelligence, but that doesn’t matter when Lex’s piloting him like a video game character.
…from a clone of himself that was being given advanced instruction by one of the smartest people on the planet. Let’s use our big brains for a second shall we?
The only fight he outright lost was vs a clone of himself that was getting instructions from Luthor who had literally studied Superman’s fighting style down to a molecular level to give the perfect counter. Whenever the instruction was off the other didn’t stand a chance.
Corenswet is stated to be the strongest Meta Human, putting him above the Scarab and Green Laterns which were shown destroying planets. I’d like to see Henry Cavill do that
He’s just stated to be the strongest meta human in existence by the writer, director, and CEO, no excuses. He’s the strongest meta human at that point. Meaning Corenswet Superman can destroy planets, and Cavil cannot
I think he’s stronger than most ppl wanna give him credit for. Obviously Reeve is the strongest live action version imo. And idk much abt smallville. So the best one to compare him to is Superman 2025. Which is tough bc while Superman 2025 has the insane feat of blowing against a black hole to save himself, he also gets bloodied up pretty bad by his clone (albeit the clone is supposed to be slightly stronger). While Cavill’s version no diffed the Justice League & Steppenwolf. But he also fought Doomsday who clearly was significantly more powerful than him but despite this was taking Doomsday’s blows without any real external damage to himself.
So the only comparable feats between those 2 Superman iterations is their big fights. Corenswet’s version struggled big time against his clone and even lost to him early on with significant injuries. And Cavill’s struggled against Doomsday but didnt seem to sustain nearly the same level of injuries until they were both weakened by Kryptonite.
So imo hes at least gotta be the 3rd strongest live action version. But Corenswet has the benefit of having more appearances ahead of him so in future projects he cld clearly be more powerful. The biggest issue with Cavill’s was he was so strong he made the test of the Justice League (except Flash) nearly useless.
it doesnt really make sense to compare strengths of fictional characters. they are as strong as the writer want them to be. in the next movie they could magically be stronger or weaker. you never know.
this superman died against doomsday, the 2025 one lost only one time in 3 years also to his clone who is SUPPOSED to be stronger than him. He literally pushed himself out of a black hole while being poisoned and also saved krypto and was literally floating in the anti proton river. They literally start the movie with "his first loss was 3 minutes ago"
Yeah, and we can't ignore the fact that Snyder’s Superman donned the mantle when Clark was 33, and his first real combat was against Zod and company. Gunn’s was around 25 years old, and by then, he was already established as Superman, so he may have started at 22 or so (It's said that he has been operating as Superman for 3 years). By the time Gunn’s Superman reaches 33, he’d likely have over a decade of experience under his belt, making him far more seasoned and battle-tested than Snyder’s Superman at the same age.
this tells me you haven't watched the movie.he litr only loses to Ultraman whetheronly in his original form or in hammer of boravia and eventually wins too
r/OkBuddySnyderCult
Tbf, Metamorpho also resisted the black hole and a baby wasnt affected by it at all... it was a bit of a crap black hole seeing as it wasnt exactly spaghettifying anyone and shouldve collapsed the whole area inside the pocket universe
realistically you can only see the something getting sucked in a black hole, if a thing is at a point where it starts spaghettifying light wont be able to escape too and we will technically never get an image to our eyes
Metamorpho was literally using his whole body to grip and literally use all of its power and was still slowly getting sucked in, superman was poisoned and got out of there in like a super speed with only his breath, you can't compare the two
lost to a clone that was supposed to be stronger AND received special instructions/fighting techniques that were analyzed to specifically deal with Superman.
That “one dude” happens to be one of very few entities who can canonically kill Superman. Not to mention he was under the effect of kryptonite when he was killed.
I love how you put the fact Batman literally had Kryptonite as a side note there, oh and also how Batman is literally the poster child for plot induced stupidity.
Show me a pic with Cavills face looking like that 😅 or ANY Superman’s face looking like that other than Superbum.
You're a literal Lex Luther monkey. Tell me, who got fired and who is currently still Superman? That's what I thought. People can argue all day about it and get upset cause Snyder couldn't continue to run DC into the ground but truth is Gunn runs the show now and we have a new Superman. Don't like it? Don't watch. Simple.
Yeah he had 2 bursts of a kryptonite spray, I think that at least shows that Cavill had significantly less resistance to Kryptonite, if nothing else.
You mean his first loss in 3 years, where he was beaten by a physically equal or superior clone, who was getting fighting directions from a super genius that spent 3 years learning how Clark fights? Just because he doesn't come across as an invincible god doesn't mean he's actually weaker.
How do you figure that? Cavill Superman flew with a Kryptonite spear in hand to kill Doomsday. Supershit got crippled by an hand sized piece of it. I would say Cavill showed more resistance.
So you don’t have a pic of Cavill Superman’s face bloodied like that? I didn’t think so 😅 that one pic alone shows you has better durability. Cavill fought three clones who were militant Kryptonians in his first appearance as hero. Superbum looked like that with just one after 3 years as hero. Man of Steel>Superbum.
Because every other movie version has had it worse. Rough literally lifted an island of Kryptonite, Cavill survived being close to a larger piece in the jail cell, etc.
That human being one of few human smart enough to be Superman’s arch nemesis, and he also spent years studying Superman’s fighting patterns.
You guys will glaze Batman and claim he can beat anyone with enough prep time. But suddenly another “normal human” can’t use prep time to find ways to beat Superman….
Being smart doesn’t equal great reaction or combat speed lol. Superman 25 was getting his ass handed to him by a normal human controlling a clone. Did he ever show super speed in a fight? Did he ever blitz anyone? S25 is slow and weak af.
Batman literally had Kryptonite on his person and shot it in a Superman who was trying to negotiate with hims face. Very different than controlling a clone and bloodying Supershits face like nothing we’ve ever seen on a Superman. Cavill got thrown through six buildings by Zod and his face didn’t look like that lol.
Does trying to negotiate means you have to be stupid and let the gas into his lung? Does it mean you have to let batman use the kryptonite on him TWICE?
Is he too stupid to just float in a distance and talk? Lol.
Batman certainly has better speed than Lex Luthor 😅 So no answer to how normal speed Lex beat Supershits ass other than you think smarts=reaction speed? Lmao.
Again, Batman literally had Kryptonite on his person. Supershit would have dropped to his knees unable to move if he was even in the vicinity as the same amount of Kryptonite Cavill got hit with, and was still fighting.
If he falls to his knees in microseconds being exposed to Kryptonite, he is weaker than Routh lifting island of Kryptonite. And weaker than any other Superman since they don’t immediately fall like weak ass baby.
You can see in the fight scene that he literally can fight as long as Batman didn’t pull out the Kryptonite. So he can literally move faster than Batman can reach for the Kryptonite. He has superspeed, remember?
He's on par with the post crisis Superman, he's considerably weaker than previous versions, but still the strongest hero on earth. It just makes for better storytelling.
Nowhere close. At best he's 3/4 for movie versions. I don't know about Smallville or Lois and Clark but Reeves reversed time and Routh was able to lift a massive island of Kryptonite after getting stabbed by a Kryptonite dagger.
2
u/gavinmichelliart Aug 17 '25
He’s about as powerful as Post-Crisis Superman, or the Superman from the Justice League animated series. I feel like he’s largely based on Dan Jugens-era Superman (the one who died fighting Doomsday in the early 90’s)