So I Was Just Wondering: Who's Stronger - Superman or the Hulk?

OK, really, I never wonder that. It's a silly question, since any competent comic writer could make a case either way and tell a great story in the process. But a non-trivial portion of comic fans really do spend a lot of time, energy and bandwidth arguing issues like that back and forth. And of course that ends up just propagating the stereotype of the comic fan as geeky nerd, perfectly made 'flesh' in the form of the Comic Store Guy on The Simpsons. Not that there's anything wrong with the stereotype - it's probably more accurate, unfortunately, than most cliches - but it's not where I live, at least not to the extent of debating ad nauseum about who'd win in a battle between the Amazing Spoon-Fighter and Darkhood, the Revenger.

Having said all that, the Roger Stern-written, Steve Rude-drawn The Incredible Hulk vs Superman one-shot, from 1999, was pretty nifty. Not because it finally answered the most-asked comic nerd question of all time (I don't recall that it did) but rather in its cool setup for making the tale interesting to folks like me. By setting the story in the early days of each character's history, we were treated to a Superman who was still fairly low on the power scale compared to now (remember that the first year or two of Superman adventures had him able to leap over tall buildings in a single bound, not fly!) and a crafty, somewhat mean-spirited Hulk who was new to the world. It not only made sense that Clark Kent would feel obliged to investigate the news reports of a green monster causing havoc in the American midwest, but actually seemed inevitable, in that context. It was, ironically enough considering it was re-telling an event that had never occurred, nostalgic for the older fans, in a way!

I'd put it around # 3 on my list of favourite Marvel/DC crossovers, behind only the incomparable Superman vs The Amazing Spider-Man and the fans'-dream-made-reality JLA/Avengers mini-series of a few years ago. That's out of maybe a couple dozen inter-company events (so far), so it's saying something!