well the thing is…the self sacrificing aspect of spider-man is where his potential genius falls off. many of the geniuses in the marvel universe were building that way for years and had all the tools and means and they didnt get powers til their late 20’s or in their thirties. no one at the time was like peter who was like one of the only teenage heros in marvel.
he sacrificed alot to be the hero. So his potential was never fully developed or realized. he could be 10x smarter than we is…or potenially is. But to be that self sacrificing hero, he sacrificed alot of his education…cutting class to go stop a madman from world domination…tony didnt really have to worry about that in school.
also i know tony’s smart but he had alot of help in his genius…peter was really alone in alot of situations. but tony had help building iron man…as pointed out in this very thread. its not like their was a assiant for peter with alot of shit he went through. he occasionally went to reed or doc connors…i think alot of that though wasn’t nessisarily cause they were smarter but because they had the facility needs. i mean peter broke into nyu all the time for the lab but sometimes he just cant break in and has to don the costume and go “hey lizard man…look at this alien thing cause you got a big giant microscope i can’t afford cause i got rent due this week.”
But potential shouldn’t be a factor in this discussion. We’re talking about who’s smartest based on their accomplishments and what the characters have displayed themselves capable of achieving in comics that have been published in real life.
So, saying that Spidey has the potential to be smarter than Tony Stark but never fully realized his potential because he was too much of a self-sacrificing hero? That’s like saying Kwame Brown has the potential to be Kevin Garnett but never fully lived up to his potential because Michael Jordan and Gilbert Arenas didn’t pass him the ball enough.
Tremendous Upside Potential (TUP) only works with rookies and really raw, underdeveloped young players. Spider-Man’s been around since what, 1962? He’s not just a wily veteran… He’s downright ancient in TUP terms. You might even say he’s past his prime.
Potentials have nothing to do with it though. That’s like saying I’m one of the top 10 MvC2 players in the world… the only reason I’m not is cause I didn’t practice. Or it’s like saying Franklin Richards is one of the top 10 smartest people in the world simply because he’s got the genes but he’s hasn’t even passed grade 6 yet. Potential to do something doesn’t work in an argument vs actually doing something.
And stark only has a bachelor’s in Electrical Engineering. Having the latter, and being just a few credits shy of the former, I’ll tell you the Physic’s degree is harder.
And Spiderman found a way to neutralize the armor stark made for him WHILE he was in it and under constant surveillance. He even laughs at Tony when he does it (much to Tony’s suprise) and says “Now what kind of engineer would I be if I let you outsmart me” or something to that effect. Stop selling Peter short.
With Spidey again, a lot of it comes down to writing and editorial. Bendis writes him like a noob on the current Avengers roster despite him having more experience than the entire team minus Wolverine and Doctor Strange. Marvel constantly makes him look young when it’s very hard to believe he is less than 30 years old. Quesada insists the Marvel Universe is only 7 years old making him 22/23… Yeah I dunno how you finish High School and get a 4 year college degree in only 7 years plus everything that has happened to him since then…
But yeah the way he’s written stops people from giving him credit when and where he deserves it. I still like Bendis on Avengers but his noob Spidey is one of the things I tend to ignore to enjoy the rest of the story, at least he makes Spidey crack some good jokes here and there…
I take marvel ratings with a grain of salt. These are the same people who said wolverine, cable, and sabertooth have mastered EVERY FIGHTING STYLE KNOWN TO MAN.
EDIT: The marvel site says spiderman and reed richards both have 7’s in intelligence where 7 is the max. Iron manis a 6 sooo…
The online ratings are much worse than the ones in the books for some reason. I know they have the fan rating but something is going on with the official ones. I’ve never seen an Encyclopedia or a Marvel Universe comic giving Spidey a 7 in intelligence. That means you are omniscient like The Watcher or somebody. :looney:
Oh yeah after One More Day Marvel let out that Spidey will go back to mechanical webshooters somehow…
Encyclopedias, trading cards, who’s who’s sites…all are based on the comics. Just read and work with what’s in the comics. Go direct from the source - why do you want to trust some silly Marvel intern to interpret the comics and come up with some crazy arbitrary number for you when you can just do it yourself?
What are Peter Parker’s claim to intelligence fame? He built some webshooters and hacked the armour Tony gave him?
Could Tony Stark have built webshooters and hacked a comparable piece of armour? Rather easily, I’d think.
What are Tony Stark’s claim to intelligence fame? Build fifty thousand versions of Iron Man armour that can fight the Hulk, go into space, rollerblade, go invisible, and resist Asgardian magic. He made a form of his arm based on a techno-virus form, that lives inside his own body. Formed a multi-billion dollar company. Become director of SHIELD.
I cannot imagine Peter Parker doing a single one of those things.
It’s a pretty simple test, actually - if you can build some suped-up wrist-based waterguns and have an university degree, then you’re pretty much as smart as Peter Parker.
You guys really think Iron Man did invented all that himself? Did you just conviently skip the part of Civil War where his building gets easily broken into by an ex employee who is disgruntled at the way Stark is using his creations?
So you don’t think that Tony Stark could throw in some impact webbing/stinger type gadgets in his armour next week if he wanted to? You don’t think any of the gadgets Iron Man has ever shown are significantly beyond the scope of those things?
Honestly, you don’t think Tony Stark could figure out to make impact webbing? Seriously?
And if you do think he can, then why even bother bringing it up!?!
He has a R&D department to build his stuff, but it’s silly to think that he doesn’t even understand the technology that keeps him alive minute-to-minute and in fights with supervillains.
Yes, it means that there’s an increased chance/frequency that guys put random sneak bombs into his armour, but it doesn’t mean he couldn’t do any of it himself if he had the time or the inclination to stop banging supermodels, boozing up, and swimming in his giant money bin.
And he gets guys to maybe put it together, but he invents all of it himself. If you guys trust the encyclopedias and wiki entries and all that so much, just look in there - they all say he’s the inventor. There isn’t like an Iron Men 'R Us store he visits, and no it’s not like he puts the stuff together alone in his garage…but he invents the stuff and he’s built a giant company that can put that crazy technical stuff together for him. He’s not going to piece together nanites one-by-one himself. But you can’t switch Peter Parker in his place and still except him to keep pumping armours out.
The times when he does buy or adapt someone else’s technology into his armour are the exceptions.
Armor Wars - that entire story was about how the armour designs that Tony Stark personally designed himself were being misused by the US government and SHIELD and everyone Spymaster sold the designs to. Like the Guardsmen in the Vault, all those SHIELD dudes that looked like Legion from Green Lantern that I don’t remember the names of, that Russian Titanium Man dude…all those guys. Tony Stark invented the armour himself. He got like an Asian assist with the first crappy gray armour…but that’s it. The rest is him.
question: when did stark’s intelligence come into play…cause i dont know about him as a kid or teen…just the adult alcoholic man. was he always this super genius or sumtin he developed more in adulthood?
From Marvel Encyclopedia: