That's pretty much all storytelling. How does Batman beat Superman? How does Punisher beat Spider-Man and Wolverine? How does Jar Jar Binks become a Senator?
Because the writer made it so.
I would've agreed but. Jar Jar is a master manipulator who has been around longer than any other character we see on screen. Jar Jar is a pure embodiment of the dark side. Case closed
Well Superman has written in weaknesses, it’s not hard for a writer to come up with scenarios for Batman, who specializes in exploiting weaknesses to beat Superman, a superhero with easily exploitable weaknesses.
People who complain about that are like people who would complain that there’s a guy who is a sniper who never misses but damnit how the hell does he keep beating Achilles?!
And Valeria accurately called out that solving some puzzle made by a guy who isnt the smartest doesnt make you the smartest and that she and her father werent even on earth when the puzzle told Moon Girl she was the smartest person on earth.
I think he's even said he would defer to Banner about radiation. He knows some people are better than him in specific areas. He he's a polymath but he still appreciates expertise.
That part has always felt like a load of bs cuz that was something they kept pushing before she even appeared and it happened at the same time Disney wanted to devalue the Fantastic Four. I don’t doubt Moon girl is a child genius, Valeria alone has made me fine with that idea. I just wish Marvel actually proved it besides that one Moon girl issue that felt really petty again Reed right when he came back from post-Secret War
Nah he's not the smartest, he's ruthless and an opportunist, it's why he keeps getting away with stuff against heroes, he's literally locked in a standoff of a thousand years against Howard rn because he's not as smart as he thinks he is, and keeps underestimating his own self, just like 616 reed underestimated him.
Moon Girl's creator wrote in the Moon Girl book specifically that she was the smartest character in the Marvel Universe, so it's as a result "true" because Marvel printed it so it's canon.
Kinda? I feel like they constantly call different people the smartest or top 5 etc. there’s also the whole Pym scientist supreme stuff that could maybe put him above Tony but feats probably support Tony. I also feel like that’s a bit high for Spidey and there’s def more minor characters with better intelligence feats. Also a lot of these guys are smart in their respective fields. Like Bruce is a gamma radiation expert but not as well rounded as some of the others
Yeah specialization is a pretty relevant factor that you'd have to consider for all of these. Like I doubt anyone here has a handle on genetics/cloning/biology more than Mister Sinister even though he isn't considered one of the top five Marvel geniuses.
I feel like he’s definitely smarter than beast but also isn’t his brain augmented. I feel like including people with heavily augmented brains would be an entirely different list because dudes like Sinister, Leader, and MODOK would definitely be in the top 10
Yeah augmentation is a great example of what makes intellect difficult to rank. There are definitely a lot of augmented villains that should rival anyone on that list. The High Evolutionary and the Maker come to mind as well.
I also wonder how certain characters with a cosmic level consciousness would rank, like Silver Surfer or Terrax. Or even Dr. Strange, is he a magical genius?
Personally I felt like a lot of these people were top of the line in their own field.
Like Reed and Doom are unmatched at physics, Tony is top at Engineering, and Spidey is unrivaled in “gureilla science”
Spidey is probably the fastest at more “basic” equations (and by “basic” I still mean more advanced than anything you or I could probably understand), but he probably falls short on more advanced stuff. Like, there’s no way Tony or Reed could calculate every web swing with the speed and consistency Peter does, but nobody’s gonna deny that the two outclass him beyond that.
Peter understands kinetic energy and geometry in the way a dancer knows to dance. He's not calculating this sh*t at a blackboard. He knows where to be without even thinking about it.
Reed is so intelligent he is a threat to the multi-universe. You don't see King Tachala opening a portal to the zombie universe for fun. So Reed may be brilliant, but as far as common sense, he's lacking.
IIRC there's a point in the comics where Peter loses his powers temporarily and is able to still use his Web Shooters to websling because he's actually doing calculations on the fly
Yeah but there's also comics that showed a lot of it was his spidersense doing a lot of the work, where he would automatically know where to anchor his webs
I mean Reed gets punished in ways Tchalla doesn't.
If Reed had tried to use time travel to create an Intergalactic empire of Baxter Building then I'm sure that story would go in a direction that shows that as a bad idea.
I believe officially peter's area of specialty is chemistry(think webs and other stuff he created to fight his rogues), though in one of the spiderman/fantastic 4 crossovers, reed notes that peter has a more "biological" inclination when looking at a problem, where he is more physics minded.
Peter Parker is canonically a Bio-physicist. That's what he went looking for jobs in at the end of the original Clone Saga. Where he met the guy who worked security at a lab who had basically been "bitten" by a radioactive jackrabbit and pointedly did NOT put on a mask and be a superhero.
Don't remember if that's what Doc Ock "Peter's" doctorate in.
Pym I can view as scientist supreme because he's the most well rounded. Off the top of my head he excels at both engineering and molecular stuff, using Ultron, tech he invents as ant-man, and discovering pym particles as examples. Physics kind of goes along with pym particles. Not sure about genetics related stuff tho.
If I recall correctly, Eternity agrees with Hank that Reed is technically smarter (which is interesting because Hank mentioned both Reed and Tony). But Eternity says that Hank is the most purely devoted to exploring and expanding the nature and boundaries of science for its own sake. Tony is an engineer who uses science to build the devices and the future he envisions. Reed is an explorer who uses science to open new vistas to explore and learn from. But Hank creates and expands new fields of science for the love of science itself, and then turns his eye toward doing good with it. That makes him the scientific equivalent of Doctor Strange, as that deep connection to the thing itself is needed to really be right for the role.
Banner was really smart for a time and making gadgets that would rival anything Tony and others made. He also made fun of Tony for being more of an Edison, rather than being a real scientist like banner himself.
But he got dumbed down since then
I agree plus there's been times that T'Challa has shown to be up closer to Mr. Fantastic and yeah once we take specialities on, they're all top of their field but some don't have the foundation the others do to cross over as easily.
I personally liked it when Pym was all in the AI and Biology fields the kater shared with McCoy, Tony cybernetics, Banner radiation, Reed the super Sci fi type of science, etc...
Loki *said* it was, but Loki at the time was God of Lies and Mischief. So, y'know, he could have been lying.
Also, the things Loki says don't really reflect him being privy to the conversation between Eternity and Pym, so it seems likely he was lying to undermine Pym's confidence. And there was nothing about Eternity telling Pym he was Scientist Supreme that aided Loki, so why would he take the risk that Eternity (who is aware of everything in the universe (which is himself)) would notice him pretending to be Eternity and decide He didn't like it?
Intelligence is really impossible to quantify or rank. Each of the top 10 are the world experts in their respective fields but I don’t think that any of them are really “smarter” than the others. Reed still usually defers to Bruce for anything involving radiation.
Kids are usually more ignorant than adults given they are of similar intelligence. Just a fact of life. They have lived less of it and have less of a chance to learn in general. That’s why when you start getting older your parents usually don’t seem as unfair and you can grow to see their point of views on things (I know this isn’t the case for everyone).
Maybe so, but she's more devious and willing to think outside what she's comfortable with than Reed is. There's been multiple occasions where she's solved something Reed couldn't due to a different perspective or method.
It's not that complicated but it's a good example of using game theory for an engineering problem. When it became clear that the Incursions weren't solvable, she told him to pivot to 'not losing' instead of 'winning.' Thus the multiversal life raft was born.
Curing Ben Grimm is another. Reed had been aiming for a complete transformative cure and missed whatever method made the 'week a year' serum work.
Ish.
Valeria is not on the list and she has to be top 3.
I think Spider-Man is overrated at 11.
T’Challa is underrated at 6.
No Mad Thinker
No Wizard
No MODOK
No Tinkerer
The literature is telling me Moon Girl is the smartest, which, cool. But I’ve been deep into comics for a lot of years and I can’t think of a single story I have read that features her. So I do t rate her at all.
Hard disagree on T’Challa being under rated. If anything, due to people missing on the list, he’s over rated. There are no comic feats to show he’s smarter than Beast, Pym, Richard’s, Doom or Moon Girl. And of people missing from the list, he’s also not as smart as Sinister, High Evolutionary, Shuri, Mad Thinker, Wizard, Modok, or the Maker. At best, he’d realistically be #13
Saying T’Challa is not as smart as Shuri invalidates this entire comment. Shuri wasn’t pushed as a super genius until the first BP movie came out in 2018. Before that she had a degree in nuclear physics but was barely shown in a lab and was more of a warrior.
She’s largely done nothing besides crunch numbers in modern BP books to justify being his peer while T’Challa has created multiversal lifeboats, invented entirely new fields of science, and built weapons out of scraps that have rendered Thanos brain dead.
I think he’s appropriately placed on this list but the idea he’s not in the top 10 of most intelligent heroes has no basis when every major writer from Hickman to Jason Aaron have written him as a peer to the likes of Tony, Pym, and Reed.
I mean, there is actually a lot of stuff with Black Panther being a direct peer to Reed and Tony.
Hickmans run on the Fantastic Four and the Avengers puts him in that weight class.
But this is like arguing how many angels could dance on the head of a pin.
I always go, what makes the most sense for the story? And if I enjoy the read it makes no difference to me if Spider-Man is a super genius or just a regular genius.
T’Challa built a device out of a garbage dump that one-shot Thanos. Im yet to see Beast, Pym, Shuri, Modok or most of your list accomplish that. Reed repeatedly comes to Tchalla for help and Stan Lee himself said he’s Reed’s intellectual equal
Which is weird because I remember him being consistently listed as the sixth smartest person in the world (back before Moon Girl so I’d imagine seventh now). He and Moon Girl are the only two I ever remember being ranked.
Personally, this whole process is a waste of time. There are a ton of unquantifiably smart people in the Marvel universe.
I really dislike Moon Girl being the smartest person on Earth. She's way too young to have accumulated enough knowledge to surpass people like Stark, Doom, and Richards who have spent decades perfecting and innovating in their fields.
No it should be 3 moon girl(she's smart but she's a kid give her some time she needs her stripes
2 doctor doom reason it's doctor doom
1 Reed Richards reason he's smarter the doctor doom
I did some extensive research on my own once and came to the conclusion that the smartest people in the marvel universe are
1.) Mr. Fantastic
2.) Iron Man
3.) M.O.D.O.K.
The girl who opted to run around on the night of a full moon when she knew her mind swapped with that of a dinosaur during a full moon...sorry not top intellect work there.
I havent even read a single comic with moon girl in it to know who or what she does lolz
i went to fandom, and she only has 131 comic book appearances hahaha
while reed has over 2k, and spiderman over 4.5k
well, that explains it :P
In my head cannon there's like 20 people scattered through this list in regular life and industries that the superheroes basically ignore because there's little overlap with their specialties and interests. I also never thought of Peter as a world class intellect: it sort of messes with the everyday vibe. He's smart for sure, but he's more clever and scrappy in a way many of the big brains have never had to be, except for maybe Tony.
Doom and Reed are tied for first in my opinion. Doom might even have the edge with all his occult knowledge and being the first person to create time travel. Moon girl and Valeria could surpass them but they are still kids with a lot to learn. Blue marvelvis probably close behind doom and Reed.
Man, I don't know how accurate it is. But back in the 90s there were baseball like cards with the different characters on them that gave you Stats like strength and intelligence. If someone in the group had those cards still, we could ask them.
I thought the idea with Moon Girl is that she's so smart already that when she grows up she'll be the smartest. Am I wrong? Also, Valeria should be on here.
Where's Rocket? As he reminded Tony, "You're only a genius on earth. And Amadeus Cho is definitely smarter than Parker. Smarter than Stark. This last is whack and incomplete.
No, Marvel writers treat the “intelligence ranking” the same way they treat Eternity. It’s only used as a cheap springboard to establish another character’s value.
Someone is smarter than Reed because everyone knows that Reed is the smart guy… so this person must be super duper smart!
Someone beat up Eternity… so that means this guy is more cosmically powerful that a cosmic person could even cosmic!!
Go by in comic feats. Everything else is a losing game.
I think it's difficult when there are so many characters that are introduced or explained to be geniuses at some point but the focus of their character lies elsewhere (ie Moon Girl). Some characters that would crack top 20 imo are Kid Omega (his mutation is his advanced mental capabilities), Doc Ock (PhD in Nuclear science among many other things), Dr Strange (gained knowledge of all previous sorcerer supremes when he was already a top neurosurgeon) and the High Evolutionary. Notable mentions to Shuri, Ironheart and Valeria. All clearly geniuses at young ages, probably not yet reached full potential.
I think unlike other stats, it's really impossible to rank intelligence in any ordered sense.
Almost all of these characters would be ranked super genius in Marvel's official power grid which is the highest level of intelligence below omniscient. The exceptions would be Beast and Black Panther. I don't recognize #12 so can't speak on it.
But more importantly, the characters who are super-genius on this list, are not the only ones. There are probably like 50 people all within this tier of intelligence in the Marvel universe.
I’m pretty sure most people agree that the Top 5 are usually a configuration of Reed, Valeria, Tony, Doom and Amadeus. Sometimes T’Challa or either of the Hanks are there too.
Iirc, wasn't there a canon list of the 8 smartest at some point? I remember it in a comic I read.
Them being Reed, Doom, Pym, Tony, Beast, T'Challa, Cho, and Banner. I don't remember if they were in an order or not.
Pym is higher than Stark—-Tony is a very good engineer and builds very good machines
Hank Pym——made particles which can access other dimensions to shift mass and energy between them, created sentient AI and built technology to speak to animals….amongst other things
Cho and moongirl (don't want to butcher her name trying to spell it) have had a ton of arguments about being the 5th smartest person in the world so her at number 1 seems crazy.
Wasn't Blue Marvel described as being as smart as Reed and Doom? Also where is Riri? I believe her creator said that she's smarter than Tony. I don't read comics very much so I could be wrong.
i dont care what they say, moongirl doesnt belong on this list, we keep being told she's a genius and "smarter then anyne" yet her tech is worse then anyone else both on and off the list, she's repeatedly making stupid ass decisions, and 9/10 times her attempt to outthink a situation fail spectacularly and is solved by devil dinosaur using brute force
It's stupid if it is. Take a minor character like the Wizard. The Wizard gets beat by the Fantastic Four, but he still can hang with them based only on his inventions and he's not listed. So that supposes that if Peter Parker had no spider-powers, his level of intelligence and invention would be enough to combat the Fantastic Four. That feel right to anyone? And what about Doctor Octopus? Didn't he always feel Peter Parker's intellectual equal or better? Wasn't one of the plot threads in Superior Spiderman that Octavius applied more science to the role?
Where's Valeria Richards? In FF books she's portrayed as Reed and Doom's equal. Dinosaur Girl is smarter than her? Where's Ironheart? Isn't she pushed as Tony's equal?
1) The list doesn't feel right to me at all. 2) Any list is somewhat pointless because too much comics history to make any argument you want. 3) list is clearly biased to push popular characters and characters they wish would be more popular.
I love DOOM but he isn't number one, though I think it's cool to point out that he's also a master of sorcery. Seeing the way most of Marvel's big brains act towards it, I assume it operates in a completely different sphere to science. Kinda like how emotional intelligence and raw intelligence are completely different things.
Though he is rock bottom for actual emotional intelligence
me and my friend had a very deep discussion once about this, he came to convince me to believe that spider man is actually the most intelligent character in the Marvel Universe, as he’s got knowledge in more areas than any of the other characters, lacking only in economy.
First, no mention of The Leader anywhere in this thread. He's the Hulk of brains! Second, intelligence can't be ranked like strikeouts thrown or fastest lap. It's gonna vary in a lot of ways, like in how you define it (IQ is an extremely poor metric that is trusted far beyond its value), or how the characters apply it (inventions or problem solving or philosophy). Thirdly, lots of extra-terrestrials would be on the list, like Contemplator the Elder of the Universe or Supremor the Kree Leader.
Lastly and most importantly, the list has whoever the writer says it has. There's no fixed rules or permanent truths in the Marvel Universe. Anything can change in order to tell the story the writer wants. And there's been thousands of writers, contradicting or supporting each other at will.
It has all the right people just not necessarily in the right order.
That you put Spiderman at 11 is a travesty. Doom is damn smart but not above Tony Stark.
All I know, it’s pretty impressive for a bio-chemist to make one of the worlds most powerful AI, discover a particle of physics, discover a new dimension and be an expert in cybernetics.
I don't think there's a super accurate way to number who's the smartest because each one of them is great in a field while not so great in another field
Kinda. I’d 100% ignore moon girl as her being the “smartest” is just kinda thrown out there. She’s never shown that level of intellect, and she’s clearly more of a for fun character.
Other than that it looks fine.
The moon girl thing is stupid. It be like saying this is Bob he is stronger than the hulk but all bob does is work in a cubicle and answer people's questions about their insurance policy.
Valeria is missing, she’d be top 3 easily since she has both Reed and Dr Doom teaching her. I hate that Moongirl is considered the smartest when she’s a literal child who wasn’t taught by any of the actual smartest people in the marvel universe.
But besides that I wouldn’t have Peter on the list, he is very intelligent in his own right but not near the top in the whole world, I’d put Hank Pym at number 7 and have Bruce and Beast moved up by a place. Iron man feels fine in that position, though it’s kind of iffy, then Dr Doom, Reed Richards and Valeria are top contenders for number 1, all three changing constantly.
It’s never exactly consistent, we could argue half this list should be higher, lower, or not even on it but, the only thing I’d push for is like Valeria being some where on the list probably where Peter is and he could be moved down
I don't know who #1 is but the rest seems accurate. The top four can switch out one way or the other (Tony Stark, Hank Pym, Reed Richards, and Victor Von Doom).
I’d drop quite a few characters from this list. Hickman was right when he said something similar to “Canon is the comics people read”. But comics also need to be resolved. I would drop Peter Parker and Bruce Banner from the list, as I consider them average scientists in the world. I also would drop Iso, as she hasn’t appeared in any major capacity for quite a while. One character I think should be moved higher is Blue Marvel. Some others may know more about the multiverse, but Al Ewing has established that few know the layers of Universe 616 and how to travel between them as well as he does. Ultimates, Defenders and Resurrection of Magneto are the runs people should go to if you haven’t encountered him yet.
Moon girl is smarter than Reed?
Marvel likes to tell us that she is, but haven't really shown anything that would prove it
She's has "gag intelligence" like One Punch Man has gag strength. When the plot dictates they pull an impossible feet from out of their ass.
That's pretty much all storytelling. How does Batman beat Superman? How does Punisher beat Spider-Man and Wolverine? How does Jar Jar Binks become a Senator? Because the writer made it so.
☝🏿This is the way
Mesa thinks it's da way!
Beltalowda!
Jar Jar wasn’t a senator he was a representative
I would've agreed but. Jar Jar is a master manipulator who has been around longer than any other character we see on screen. Jar Jar is a pure embodiment of the dark side. Case closed
>How does Jar Jar Binks become a ~~Senator~~ sith lord? Because the fans made it so. It's one of my favorite Star Wars conspiracy.
Well Superman has written in weaknesses, it’s not hard for a writer to come up with scenarios for Batman, who specializes in exploiting weaknesses to beat Superman, a superhero with easily exploitable weaknesses. People who complain about that are like people who would complain that there’s a guy who is a sniper who never misses but damnit how the hell does he keep beating Achilles?!
Their
Feat
She
And Valeria accurately called out that solving some puzzle made by a guy who isnt the smartest doesnt make you the smartest and that she and her father werent even on earth when the puzzle told Moon Girl she was the smartest person on earth.
Unironically Reed doesn't care about ratings, just about helping the world with his intelligence
I think he's even said he would defer to Banner about radiation. He knows some people are better than him in specific areas. He he's a polymath but he still appreciates expertise.
This makes me feel better. Valeria >Reed>Moon Girl imo
That part has always felt like a load of bs cuz that was something they kept pushing before she even appeared and it happened at the same time Disney wanted to devalue the Fantastic Four. I don’t doubt Moon girl is a child genius, Valeria alone has made me fine with that idea. I just wish Marvel actually proved it besides that one Moon girl issue that felt really petty again Reed right when he came back from post-Secret War
If Marvel themselves tell us she is, then she is. Maker is the smartest character though by far.
Nah he's not the smartest, he's ruthless and an opportunist, it's why he keeps getting away with stuff against heroes, he's literally locked in a standoff of a thousand years against Howard rn because he's not as smart as he thinks he is, and keeps underestimating his own self, just like 616 reed underestimated him.
Yeah. Her entire thing is high INT low WIS.
Same with Reed. He's killed his family in like half of all the universes.
Tbf that's more so cause in most universes he doesn't have a tether to humanity.
Moon Girl's creator wrote in the Moon Girl book specifically that she was the smartest character in the Marvel Universe, so it's as a result "true" because Marvel printed it so it's canon.
Kinda? I feel like they constantly call different people the smartest or top 5 etc. there’s also the whole Pym scientist supreme stuff that could maybe put him above Tony but feats probably support Tony. I also feel like that’s a bit high for Spidey and there’s def more minor characters with better intelligence feats. Also a lot of these guys are smart in their respective fields. Like Bruce is a gamma radiation expert but not as well rounded as some of the others
Yeah specialization is a pretty relevant factor that you'd have to consider for all of these. Like I doubt anyone here has a handle on genetics/cloning/biology more than Mister Sinister even though he isn't considered one of the top five Marvel geniuses.
Unless you ask Mister Sinister.
I feel like he’s definitely smarter than beast but also isn’t his brain augmented. I feel like including people with heavily augmented brains would be an entirely different list because dudes like Sinister, Leader, and MODOK would definitely be in the top 10
Yeah augmentation is a great example of what makes intellect difficult to rank. There are definitely a lot of augmented villains that should rival anyone on that list. The High Evolutionary and the Maker come to mind as well. I also wonder how certain characters with a cosmic level consciousness would rank, like Silver Surfer or Terrax. Or even Dr. Strange, is he a magical genius?
Personally I felt like a lot of these people were top of the line in their own field. Like Reed and Doom are unmatched at physics, Tony is top at Engineering, and Spidey is unrivaled in “gureilla science”
Spidey is probably the fastest at more “basic” equations (and by “basic” I still mean more advanced than anything you or I could probably understand), but he probably falls short on more advanced stuff. Like, there’s no way Tony or Reed could calculate every web swing with the speed and consistency Peter does, but nobody’s gonna deny that the two outclass him beyond that.
Peter understands kinetic energy and geometry in the way a dancer knows to dance. He's not calculating this sh*t at a blackboard. He knows where to be without even thinking about it. Reed is so intelligent he is a threat to the multi-universe. You don't see King Tachala opening a portal to the zombie universe for fun. So Reed may be brilliant, but as far as common sense, he's lacking.
IIRC there's a point in the comics where Peter loses his powers temporarily and is able to still use his Web Shooters to websling because he's actually doing calculations on the fly
The fact that he can shoot webs at all requires at the very least a thorough comprehension of university level biochemistry, to boot.
Not to mention his specialty webs, like acid, concrete, ice etc
He’s a chemist by trade. That’s where the photography comes from as well. He’s a great mathematician with a lot of chemistry experience
Yeah but there's also comics that showed a lot of it was his spidersense doing a lot of the work, where he would automatically know where to anchor his webs
I mean Reed gets punished in ways Tchalla doesn't. If Reed had tried to use time travel to create an Intergalactic empire of Baxter Building then I'm sure that story would go in a direction that shows that as a bad idea.
Mr Fantastic himself was impressed by his whatever we are calling superscience. He wasnt part of the fantastic four because of his web slinging.
I believe officially peter's area of specialty is chemistry(think webs and other stuff he created to fight his rogues), though in one of the spiderman/fantastic 4 crossovers, reed notes that peter has a more "biological" inclination when looking at a problem, where he is more physics minded.
Peter Parker is canonically a Bio-physicist. That's what he went looking for jobs in at the end of the original Clone Saga. Where he met the guy who worked security at a lab who had basically been "bitten" by a radioactive jackrabbit and pointedly did NOT put on a mask and be a superhero. Don't remember if that's what Doc Ock "Peter's" doctorate in.
Yeah, that guy was 100% not down for playing superhero. He especially was not down for dressing in anything bunny-themed.
Pym I can view as scientist supreme because he's the most well rounded. Off the top of my head he excels at both engineering and molecular stuff, using Ultron, tech he invents as ant-man, and discovering pym particles as examples. Physics kind of goes along with pym particles. Not sure about genetics related stuff tho.
If I recall correctly, Eternity agrees with Hank that Reed is technically smarter (which is interesting because Hank mentioned both Reed and Tony). But Eternity says that Hank is the most purely devoted to exploring and expanding the nature and boundaries of science for its own sake. Tony is an engineer who uses science to build the devices and the future he envisions. Reed is an explorer who uses science to open new vistas to explore and learn from. But Hank creates and expands new fields of science for the love of science itself, and then turns his eye toward doing good with it. That makes him the scientific equivalent of Doctor Strange, as that deep connection to the thing itself is needed to really be right for the role.
That's a good point. I didn't remember thst specifically but it makes sense.
Banner was really smart for a time and making gadgets that would rival anything Tony and others made. He also made fun of Tony for being more of an Edison, rather than being a real scientist like banner himself. But he got dumbed down since then
I agree plus there's been times that T'Challa has shown to be up closer to Mr. Fantastic and yeah once we take specialities on, they're all top of their field but some don't have the foundation the others do to cross over as easily. I personally liked it when Pym was all in the AI and Biology fields the kater shared with McCoy, Tony cybernetics, Banner radiation, Reed the super Sci fi type of science, etc...
Didn’t T’Challa create a new branch of science called Shadow Physics? I think he deserves to be ranked higher on this list. At least Top 5.
I thought the "Scientist Supreme" thing was revealed to be Loki messing with Pym
Loki *said* it was, but Loki at the time was God of Lies and Mischief. So, y'know, he could have been lying. Also, the things Loki says don't really reflect him being privy to the conversation between Eternity and Pym, so it seems likely he was lying to undermine Pym's confidence. And there was nothing about Eternity telling Pym he was Scientist Supreme that aided Loki, so why would he take the risk that Eternity (who is aware of everything in the universe (which is himself)) would notice him pretending to be Eternity and decide He didn't like it?
Intelligence is really impossible to quantify or rank. Each of the top 10 are the world experts in their respective fields but I don’t think that any of them are really “smarter” than the others. Reed still usually defers to Bruce for anything involving radiation.
Yeah, Doom is almost as smart as Reed in the area of science but Doom knows a lot about magic, so overall is he smarter?
Yes, obviously. Bow before DOOM.
Remember ALL CAPS, when you spell the man name…
Isn't Valeria smarter than Reed?
I think that officially she will be smarter than read in the future
Higher potential than Richards. Butt she’s still a brat, so she’s yet to reach her full potential.
Kids are usually more ignorant than adults given they are of similar intelligence. Just a fact of life. They have lived less of it and have less of a chance to learn in general. That’s why when you start getting older your parents usually don’t seem as unfair and you can grow to see their point of views on things (I know this isn’t the case for everyone).
Maybe so, but she's more devious and willing to think outside what she's comfortable with than Reed is. There's been multiple occasions where she's solved something Reed couldn't due to a different perspective or method. It's not that complicated but it's a good example of using game theory for an engineering problem. When it became clear that the Incursions weren't solvable, she told him to pivot to 'not losing' instead of 'winning.' Thus the multiversal life raft was born. Curing Ben Grimm is another. Reed had been aiming for a complete transformative cure and missed whatever method made the 'week a year' serum work.
I’m pretty sure I’ve read some FF comics that said this.
Ish. Valeria is not on the list and she has to be top 3. I think Spider-Man is overrated at 11. T’Challa is underrated at 6. No Mad Thinker No Wizard No MODOK No Tinkerer The literature is telling me Moon Girl is the smartest, which, cool. But I’ve been deep into comics for a lot of years and I can’t think of a single story I have read that features her. So I do t rate her at all.
Hard disagree on T’Challa being under rated. If anything, due to people missing on the list, he’s over rated. There are no comic feats to show he’s smarter than Beast, Pym, Richard’s, Doom or Moon Girl. And of people missing from the list, he’s also not as smart as Sinister, High Evolutionary, Shuri, Mad Thinker, Wizard, Modok, or the Maker. At best, he’d realistically be #13
Saying T’Challa is not as smart as Shuri invalidates this entire comment. Shuri wasn’t pushed as a super genius until the first BP movie came out in 2018. Before that she had a degree in nuclear physics but was barely shown in a lab and was more of a warrior. She’s largely done nothing besides crunch numbers in modern BP books to justify being his peer while T’Challa has created multiversal lifeboats, invented entirely new fields of science, and built weapons out of scraps that have rendered Thanos brain dead. I think he’s appropriately placed on this list but the idea he’s not in the top 10 of most intelligent heroes has no basis when every major writer from Hickman to Jason Aaron have written him as a peer to the likes of Tony, Pym, and Reed.
I mean, there is actually a lot of stuff with Black Panther being a direct peer to Reed and Tony. Hickmans run on the Fantastic Four and the Avengers puts him in that weight class. But this is like arguing how many angels could dance on the head of a pin. I always go, what makes the most sense for the story? And if I enjoy the read it makes no difference to me if Spider-Man is a super genius or just a regular genius.
T’Challa built a device out of a garbage dump that one-shot Thanos. Im yet to see Beast, Pym, Shuri, Modok or most of your list accomplish that. Reed repeatedly comes to Tchalla for help and Stan Lee himself said he’s Reed’s intellectual equal
Intelligence rankings are all kinda vague, but this seems mostly accurate. I’m sure there’s a bit of wiggle room between positions.
I always have Reed at #1
DOOM humbly disagrees
DOOM would never be humble
Don’t tell him that, he’s the most humble man in 616, at least that’s what I’ve heard him say
Doom doesn’t do anything humbly
And Doom is also the most Humble person on Earth 616,Compared to that Accursed Richards
Where would Amadeus Cho rank?
Cho is the one displayed at 10th place
Admittedly he isn't being totally awesome in the picture.
Which is weird because I remember him being consistently listed as the sixth smartest person in the world (back before Moon Girl so I’d imagine seventh now). He and Moon Girl are the only two I ever remember being ranked. Personally, this whole process is a waste of time. There are a ton of unquantifiably smart people in the Marvel universe.
I really dislike Moon Girl being the smartest person on Earth. She's way too young to have accumulated enough knowledge to surpass people like Stark, Doom, and Richards who have spent decades perfecting and innovating in their fields.
Education isn’t equivalent to intelligence.
No it should be 3 moon girl(she's smart but she's a kid give her some time she needs her stripes 2 doctor doom reason it's doctor doom 1 Reed Richards reason he's smarter the doctor doom
Unless you tell Doom that Reed couldn’t do it, then Doom will have it done asap
He has a PhD in spite which is a real blind spot for Richards
I don’t like that they just made this character and say she’s the smartest Marvel character and I’m just meant to accept it with no proof
They just made all of them, bro. And like *they* made them so like they’d know.
I did some extensive research on my own once and came to the conclusion that the smartest people in the marvel universe are 1.) Mr. Fantastic 2.) Iron Man 3.) M.O.D.O.K.
Random question but who’s smarter as of right now, Hank Pym or Peter Parker?
Hank, I’d say. Peter has always been incredibly smart but never build fully working and sentient robots and dimensional travel smart.
Tbf, neither have I
But we believe in you champ! Now get back in that lab and invent
isn’t BP confirmed as the 8th smartest person in verse? And imo, Banner and Pym are smarter than Tony but not sure on that
No, that's Amadeus Cho. That's like the one thing he's known for. Mostly because he keeps telling everyone that
Who is that in #1
Lunella Lafayette/Moon Girl
The girl who opted to run around on the night of a full moon when she knew her mind swapped with that of a dinosaur during a full moon...sorry not top intellect work there.
Oooooh ok. Thanks!
I miss iso and the inhumans but yes is accurate.
Who are 8/10/12?
10 is Amaedus Cho 8 is Blue Marvel 12 is Xiaoyi Chen
In a way, that doesnt explain it at all. Unfortunately i only know who Cho is cause of Old Man Logan
I havent even read a single comic with moon girl in it to know who or what she does lolz i went to fandom, and she only has 131 comic book appearances hahaha while reed has over 2k, and spiderman over 4.5k well, that explains it :P
Tony is too high and Amadeus should be 8th place.
In my head cannon there's like 20 people scattered through this list in regular life and industries that the superheroes basically ignore because there's little overlap with their specialties and interests. I also never thought of Peter as a world class intellect: it sort of messes with the everyday vibe. He's smart for sure, but he's more clever and scrappy in a way many of the big brains have never had to be, except for maybe Tony.
I don’t think Moon Girl has enough feats under her belt to be placed as number 1.
Word of author (known as “word of god” in literary analysis) takes priority over feats. That’s inarguable
No
Doom and Reed are tied for first in my opinion. Doom might even have the edge with all his occult knowledge and being the first person to create time travel. Moon girl and Valeria could surpass them but they are still kids with a lot to learn. Blue marvelvis probably close behind doom and Reed.
No Otto Octavius
I'm curious where Forge would fall on this list if it were extended.
No love for Amadeus Cho?
I don't visualize any1 smarter than Reed
Man, I don't know how accurate it is. But back in the 90s there were baseball like cards with the different characters on them that gave you Stats like strength and intelligence. If someone in the group had those cards still, we could ask them.
I thought the idea with Moon Girl is that she's so smart already that when she grows up she'll be the smartest. Am I wrong? Also, Valeria should be on here.
Where's Rocket? As he reminded Tony, "You're only a genius on earth. And Amadeus Cho is definitely smarter than Parker. Smarter than Stark. This last is whack and incomplete.
I'm shocked Black Panther is that low! 10 or 15 years ago he was considered top 3. Some even argued number 1.
Moon girl way too high wtf
Marvel keeps TELLING us that Moon Girl is the smarter person in the Marvel Universe, but haven't really shown us much to prove it.
No, Marvel writers treat the “intelligence ranking” the same way they treat Eternity. It’s only used as a cheap springboard to establish another character’s value. Someone is smarter than Reed because everyone knows that Reed is the smart guy… so this person must be super duper smart! Someone beat up Eternity… so that means this guy is more cosmically powerful that a cosmic person could even cosmic!! Go by in comic feats. Everything else is a losing game.
I think it's difficult when there are so many characters that are introduced or explained to be geniuses at some point but the focus of their character lies elsewhere (ie Moon Girl). Some characters that would crack top 20 imo are Kid Omega (his mutation is his advanced mental capabilities), Doc Ock (PhD in Nuclear science among many other things), Dr Strange (gained knowledge of all previous sorcerer supremes when he was already a top neurosurgeon) and the High Evolutionary. Notable mentions to Shuri, Ironheart and Valeria. All clearly geniuses at young ages, probably not yet reached full potential.
Dang Amadeus got moved down the rankings? He used to be #8. Moon Girl since fuckin when?
No.
Valeria Richards and Amadeus Cho should be on here
Isn't Valeria Missing in this list?
I think unlike other stats, it's really impossible to rank intelligence in any ordered sense. Almost all of these characters would be ranked super genius in Marvel's official power grid which is the highest level of intelligence below omniscient. The exceptions would be Beast and Black Panther. I don't recognize #12 so can't speak on it. But more importantly, the characters who are super-genius on this list, are not the only ones. There are probably like 50 people all within this tier of intelligence in the Marvel universe.
I’m pretty sure most people agree that the Top 5 are usually a configuration of Reed, Valeria, Tony, Doom and Amadeus. Sometimes T’Challa or either of the Hanks are there too.
Dude. We all know Amadeus Cho is the 8th smartest man on earth. He literally says it all the time. And moon girl ain’t shit
Iirc, wasn't there a canon list of the 8 smartest at some point? I remember it in a comic I read. Them being Reed, Doom, Pym, Tony, Beast, T'Challa, Cho, and Banner. I don't remember if they were in an order or not.
Valeria Richards?
Pym is higher than Stark—-Tony is a very good engineer and builds very good machines Hank Pym——made particles which can access other dimensions to shift mass and energy between them, created sentient AI and built technology to speak to animals….amongst other things
Nightshade should be on the list.
no bm is top 5 and valeria is number 1
Cho and moongirl (don't want to butcher her name trying to spell it) have had a ton of arguments about being the 5th smartest person in the world so her at number 1 seems crazy.
They are showing Tony in his extremis armor during that time he was supposed to be smarter than Reed
Shiiiii,imagine if marvel just decided to never give up Peter company and let him keep it so he could make more tech
I'm curious where Shuri and Nadia would fit. Both seem on par if not smarter than their comparable (Tchalla, Pym).
It’s fun to see some recognition for Iso
Valeria at #1
I kinda agree with the top 4. But everything else is… iffy.
The One Above All is smarter than everyone else in this list. Combined.
Wasn't Blue Marvel described as being as smart as Reed and Doom? Also where is Riri? I believe her creator said that she's smarter than Tony. I don't read comics very much so I could be wrong.
How about maximus? And Valeria!??
Valeria Richards should be someplace on this list. It’s been suggested by Reed himself that she may even be more intelligent than he is.
Where’s Valeria?
Screenshot of a screenshot of a screenshot of a screenshot of a screenshot
Who is on 1. Panel
Shouldn’t prodigy be on that list somewhere
I think ranking intelligence, like its one number, leads to bad writing and worse politics.
i dont care what they say, moongirl doesnt belong on this list, we keep being told she's a genius and "smarter then anyne" yet her tech is worse then anyone else both on and off the list, she's repeatedly making stupid ass decisions, and 9/10 times her attempt to outthink a situation fail spectacularly and is solved by devil dinosaur using brute force
It's stupid if it is. Take a minor character like the Wizard. The Wizard gets beat by the Fantastic Four, but he still can hang with them based only on his inventions and he's not listed. So that supposes that if Peter Parker had no spider-powers, his level of intelligence and invention would be enough to combat the Fantastic Four. That feel right to anyone? And what about Doctor Octopus? Didn't he always feel Peter Parker's intellectual equal or better? Wasn't one of the plot threads in Superior Spiderman that Octavius applied more science to the role? Where's Valeria Richards? In FF books she's portrayed as Reed and Doom's equal. Dinosaur Girl is smarter than her? Where's Ironheart? Isn't she pushed as Tony's equal? 1) The list doesn't feel right to me at all. 2) Any list is somewhat pointless because too much comics history to make any argument you want. 3) list is clearly biased to push popular characters and characters they wish would be more popular.
the rocket erasure..
1. Reed 2. Doom 3. Pym After that it doesn't really matter
I love DOOM but he isn't number one, though I think it's cool to point out that he's also a master of sorcery. Seeing the way most of Marvel's big brains act towards it, I assume it operates in a completely different sphere to science. Kinda like how emotional intelligence and raw intelligence are completely different things. Though he is rock bottom for actual emotional intelligence
me and my friend had a very deep discussion once about this, he came to convince me to believe that spider man is actually the most intelligent character in the Marvel Universe, as he’s got knowledge in more areas than any of the other characters, lacking only in economy.
Isn’t spidey top 3 excluding the kids
Yeah, nah.... the only person who's smarter than Reed might be Valeria Richards.
Nah my boy Doom needs more respect
First, no mention of The Leader anywhere in this thread. He's the Hulk of brains! Second, intelligence can't be ranked like strikeouts thrown or fastest lap. It's gonna vary in a lot of ways, like in how you define it (IQ is an extremely poor metric that is trusted far beyond its value), or how the characters apply it (inventions or problem solving or philosophy). Thirdly, lots of extra-terrestrials would be on the list, like Contemplator the Elder of the Universe or Supremor the Kree Leader. Lastly and most importantly, the list has whoever the writer says it has. There's no fixed rules or permanent truths in the Marvel Universe. Anything can change in order to tell the story the writer wants. And there's been thousands of writers, contradicting or supporting each other at will.
This is not even close
i personally dont know if tony should be above hank, also where's valeria and nadia?
Switching 3 and 1 "No one is over Doom, Doom is above God's, if someone's takes my place- that means I am dead."
I think Amadeus Cho is smarter than T'Challa. He was "7th smartest" before Moon Girl and Blue Marvel came on the scene.
No it's not accurate
The best evidence of a lesser intelligence is an attempt to rank intelligence.
It has all the right people just not necessarily in the right order. That you put Spiderman at 11 is a travesty. Doom is damn smart but not above Tony Stark.
No
Who tf is #1
I also feel like in some story lines Banner is up in the top three or four
Moon girl is absolutely not smarter than Richards
Nah man. Smartest character is Shocker. Shocker never thought building a clone Thor robot slave was a good idea.
I always considered the people in the Illuminati and in Intelligencia to be the smartest ones.
No.
Moon Girl at 1 is stupid, and Spider-Man should be at least 8 or 7
It’s accurate if they tell us it is
All I know, it’s pretty impressive for a bio-chemist to make one of the worlds most powerful AI, discover a particle of physics, discover a new dimension and be an expert in cybernetics.
Spidey should be higher on the list, top 10 at least.
Everybody here is forgetting the Maker…
I don't think there's a super accurate way to number who's the smartest because each one of them is great in a field while not so great in another field
Kinda. I’d 100% ignore moon girl as her being the “smartest” is just kinda thrown out there. She’s never shown that level of intellect, and she’s clearly more of a for fun character. Other than that it looks fine.
The moon girl thing is stupid. It be like saying this is Bob he is stronger than the hulk but all bob does is work in a cubicle and answer people's questions about their insurance policy.
I think T'Challa should be a little bit higher. 7-5 at most.
I do feel like Spider-Man is smarter then Beast but at the same time I have no examples of that being the case
I though Peter Parker was considered top 5 at least? Am I wrong?
Black Panther created an entire Periodic Table!!!!
What about Amadeus Cho? Isn't he supposed to be the 7th smartest person in the world?
Valeria is missing, she’d be top 3 easily since she has both Reed and Dr Doom teaching her. I hate that Moongirl is considered the smartest when she’s a literal child who wasn’t taught by any of the actual smartest people in the marvel universe. But besides that I wouldn’t have Peter on the list, he is very intelligent in his own right but not near the top in the whole world, I’d put Hank Pym at number 7 and have Bruce and Beast moved up by a place. Iron man feels fine in that position, though it’s kind of iffy, then Dr Doom, Reed Richards and Valeria are top contenders for number 1, all three changing constantly.
The sheer brain power of the Geniuses in the Marvel universe is terrifying!
Valeria Richards isn’t on here?
How is the Maker not #1? By like a mile?
It’s never exactly consistent, we could argue half this list should be higher, lower, or not even on it but, the only thing I’d push for is like Valeria being some where on the list probably where Peter is and he could be moved down
None are smarter than Howard The Duck
I would move Banner up the list, above Tony Stark. Tony is gifted but he's not a supermind. Pym right under Banner, then Tony.
It’s also been strongly implied that Valeria Richards is smarter than her father.
Valeria isn’t included so I’ll say no
Spider-Man should be right behind Iron Man, and the list is missing the Leader.
Who is that over at #12? Don’t recognize her at all.
I don't know who #1 is but the rest seems accurate. The top four can switch out one way or the other (Tony Stark, Hank Pym, Reed Richards, and Victor Von Doom).
Bruce Banner is ranked a little high. All reports that I have seen show him as the 4th smartest person on Earth.
I’d drop quite a few characters from this list. Hickman was right when he said something similar to “Canon is the comics people read”. But comics also need to be resolved. I would drop Peter Parker and Bruce Banner from the list, as I consider them average scientists in the world. I also would drop Iso, as she hasn’t appeared in any major capacity for quite a while. One character I think should be moved higher is Blue Marvel. Some others may know more about the multiverse, but Al Ewing has established that few know the layers of Universe 616 and how to travel between them as well as he does. Ultimates, Defenders and Resurrection of Magneto are the runs people should go to if you haven’t encountered him yet.
Moon Girl even being on the list to begin with makes no sense. She ain't even close to being as smart as the rest of these people.