you
Dynamic Dual Podcast, a weekly show where we review superhero films and debate the superiority
between Marvel and DC by comparing their characters in stat-based battle simulations. I'm Marvelous
Joe. And I'm his twin brother Johnny DC. And in this episode, it's a Halloween themed episode,
we're going to find out who would win in a fight between the Batman villain, Man-Bat, and the
Spider-Man villain, Morbius. Yeah, Morbius is like a vampire and Man-Bat is like this man
that's a bat.
It's spooky. Yeah. Morbius isn't strictly a vampire. He's like a pseudo vampire. Basically
he did some experiments with vampire bats and became not a supernatural type of vampire but
like a scientific type of vampire. That was all done due to the Comics Code Authority because
they couldn't include actual vampires in the comics at the time. Yeah, so glad that the
publishers got away from using that. Before we gather statistics on these characters. and
run them through 1,000 simulations to find out who would win in a fight, we're going to go
over the comic book movie news from the past week. There wasn't too much news to come out
this past week, basically because DC is gonna save all their headlines for the upcoming DC
fandom event that's coming out on October 16th. And basically Marvel is holding on to their
news so that they can release it right after the event so that they can poach all the headlines.
What? But we will be discussing the upcoming full celebrity guest list that will be at the
DC fandom event. Marvel totally would pull a dick move like that. I can't wait for them
to pull that dick move just so I could call them out on pulling that dick move. And then
what are you gonna do about it? Call them dicks. As always, we list our segment times in our
episode description, so feel free to check out our show notes if you wanna skip ahead to a
particular topic. And just a reminder, only the four most recent episodes of this podcast
are available to the listening public. If you guys want access to over 200 episodes of archived
content, including Batman versus Moon Knight, The Lego Batman Movie Review, Asriel vs. Blade,
Our Blade 2 Review, Two-Face vs. Jigsaw, or our Batman The Long Halloween Review. Be sure
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episodes, access to our Discord server, blooper reels, and more. It's only $2 a month to subscribe
on Spotify or Patreon. And you could do so by visiting dynamicduel.com slash subscribe, which
is linked in our show notes. And with that out of the way, quick to the No Prize. A No Prize
is an award that Marvel used to give out up until the 90s to fans. Our version, the Dynamic
Duel No Prize, is a digital award that we post on social media that I personally draw for
those who we feel gave the best answer to our question of the week. For last week, we asked,
who is your favorite Marvel or DC character created or partially created? by Jack Kirby
and why. Of course, Jack Kirby was one of the most prolific comic book creators back in the
golden age and silver age of comics. He created a ton of Marvel and DC's beloved characters
and a lot of you guys responded with your favorites. Let's go ahead and run down our honorable mentions
as well as the no prize winner. Our first honorable mention goes to Nate who said, Hey guys, it's
Nate here and for the question of the week, could you ask a more vague question? I mean,
honestly, you could say any. one of your favorite characters and chances are, Jack the King Kirby
has made it. But in all honesty, I gotta go with my favorite character by him is Galactus.
To this day, his design holds up and it is fantastic. No pun intended, I guess. Well, to answer your
question about whether we could ask something more vague, the answer is yes. Yes, yeah, totally,
we could have. But to respond to the second part of your answer. Yeah, when it comes to
Jack Kirby's character designs, I think Lactis is the epitome of his complex style of line
work and tech-like embellishments, similar to how he designed the Celestials or the New Gods
over on DC. And it's so strange because it's like the complete opposite of the Silver Surfer
character who's very stripped down, basically just like this naked silver dude without any
embellishments. Right, very streamlined. Yeah. The silhouette of Galactus, I think, is one
of the most iconic and striking designs in comics. There's like nothing else like it. Oh, definitely
not, yeah, and I really can't wait till we see him in live action. Like, properly? Right,
yeah, yeah. Because I've seen him show up in like some video games and stuff and he just
looks so epic. And it's gonna be awesome when he eventually rears his head in the MCU. Our
next honorable mention goes to Michael Haggerty, who said... Hey guys, Michael Haggerty here.
So uh... My favorite character by Jack Kirby, there's only one real way to bring him out,
to announce him like a wrestler. And it's this, gone the form of man. My favorite Jack Kirby
character is Etrigan. Oh, hit you with a poem. Anyway, yeah that's it. I'm kind of embarrassed
I did that, but you know, whatever. It's cool, I stand by it. I stand by my decision. Etrigan.
Etrigan for president. Yeah? We prefer all of our answers to be in the form of a poem. Yeah,
totally. Take note guys. You know, Etrogen is definitely one of the coolest characters, I
think personally, that Jack Kirby came up with. Definitely one of the darkest. Oh yeah, I mean
the spectrum within which Jack Kirby operated was so broad in terms of genre and different
types of characters. It was awesome. The man could work within any subject matter. Whether
it was like, you know, the super patriotic Captain America. to like the dark demonic magic realm
that Etrigan operated in to like the cosmic sci-fi arena of like the new gods or silver
surfer or something like that. There was like nothing he couldn't do. I like the medieval
like tunic he gave him. You know, it's not often that you think of demons and think of them
wearing like lighthearted medieval outfits, but he made it work and still made them so
bad ass. It was very unique. You wanna talk about how unique he was in the form of a poem?
words and poems for me to share. This is a challenge I do not like, but if you don't like it, then
take a hike.
Ah, Jonathan, the next freestyle artist out there. I am the worst. All right, let's go
ahead and move on to our next honorable mention given by DC Joe, who said. I got two answers
to this question. First answer is Darkseid, because he's just one of the most interesting
and most powerful villain that there ever was. And the other answer is Dr. Doom. In his own
right, he's interesting, but without Dr. Doom, there is no MF Doom. best rapper ever, R.I.P.
I mean, I think Jonathan might be the best new rapper out there now. Sweet. But yeah, great
answer with Darkseid and Dr. Doom, respectively, probably DC and Marvel's greatest villains
ever. It's so crazy that one guy came up with like the baddest villains for both respective
universes, right? Yeah, they're both very different, but also, you know, they have some similarities.
They both like to stand around with their arms behind their back a lot. They both also wear
like tunics. Does Darkseid wear a tunic? Yeah, kinda, sorta. At least in his original design.
I do have to say Darkseid would totally stomp on Doctor Doom. I mean, we all saw what Doctor
Doom did to Thanos in 2015's Secret Wars event, so I don't know about that. I mean, Thanos
is no Darkseid. Let's be real. I mean, that's true, because Thanos is better. Do we need
to go back to the duel episode between Thanos and Darkseid? Nope. Exactly. Great answer,
DC Joe. That does it for our honorable mentions. We want to give big shout outs to Miggy Mathagean,
Patrick and Evan Tomkeaf for taking the time to visit our website and leave their answers
as well. But the winner of this week's No Prize is CJ Kraft who said, CJ Kraft here and my
favorite Jack Kirby creation has to be the ever loving blue eyed thing from Yancy Street. Whenever
it's clobbering time, he gets the job done. His battles with the Hulk are epic. His back
and forth with Johnny Storm is some of the funniest stuff in comics. They just apparently can't
get them right in movies. Come on, Marvel, you gotta fix that. But no other character has
so much of Jack in him, right down to the cigar-chomping and smart mouth. So gotta be the Thing. Oh
yeah, definitely. The Thing is such a great answer when it comes to Jack Kirby's creations.
You're right, there was so much that Jack Kirby had in common with the character of The Thing.
It was almost like he personified himself in comic form. And what a lovable character. so
influential, you know, the Fantastic Four really put Marvel comics on the map in the Silver
Age and the character like the thing had never really been done before, you know, basically
you had this monster who was a hero, usually monsters were saved for, you know, villains
or monster tales and the like. And really all of Jack Kirby's work was really influential,
he created so many popular characters that you know have stood the test of time. It's remarkable
that one man could have that amount of influence. I think he's had more influence. over the comics
medium and the characters within than any other person. At least when it comes to Marvel and
DC for sure. Oh absolutely, yeah. The King. King Kirby. Yeah and it's always nice to revisit
some of these early creators that really formed the Marvel and DC universe we know and love
as a fan base we owe so much to them. But congrats again to CJ Craft. Guys, CJ is a long-time
listener of this show. Every year he puts out a new collection of short horror stories called
Pages of Terror. And a day after this episode drops, October 13th, his third book, Pages
of Terror 3, hits Amazon. And he's also compiled these first three books into a collection called
Pages of Terror Trilogy of Fear. I myself read both of his first books. He's a magnificent
horror writer. So if you're into that at all and you wanna support a fellow listener, go
onto Amazon and check out Pages of Terror Trilogy of Fear or any of his Pages of Terror books.
Yeah, I really gotta say, over these past years, CJ has been like super inspirational and how
he's really pursuing you know his dream of becoming a writer. I think he's mentioned before like
writers write and that's exactly what he's doing. As someone who aspires to be you know an artist,
a writer, myself, I'm really proud of the work that CJ has done and the fact that he's putting
them out there for all of us to read is really admirable. So congrats once again to CJ for
releasing another book and guys definitely support your indie artists. That does it for the No
Prize. If you the listener want a shot at winning your Stay tuned to later on this episode when
we'll be asking another question of the week. And now that that's done, on to the news!
Okay, so DC's second annual virtual comic convention, the DC Fandom, is this upcoming Saturday, October
16th. And last week, they announced the full celebrity guest list that will appear during
the virtual panels. It's a huge list! Yeah, there's gonna be a lot of people there when
they release the trailer for the DC Fandom event. While I did recognize some of the celebrities
that are gonna be part of this thing... there were a lot of faces I didn't recognize. They
were like, join me. And I'm like, I don't even know who you are. So we have the full celebrity
guest list for the event. What I'm gonna do is run down this list of names. Jonathan, you're
gonna tell me quickly what they're gonna be doing there. And so we'll have a good idea
of what this event is going to consist of. Sound good? Yeah, cool, let's do it. All right, let
me start off the list with Adeel El-Arbi. Oh, he's one of the co-directors of the HBO Max
film Batgirl. So we're probably gonna be getting news about that. Okay, who is AJ Hudson? So
he's a voice actor. There's this upcoming preschool series called Bat Wheels that'll be on Cartoon
Network, and he's the voice of Robin. Okay, I didn't know that. Yeah, Ethan Hawke is going
to be the voice of Batman. Ethan Hawke? Yeah. In the children's cartoon? Yeah, preschool
series. Wow, okay, that's quite the cast. All right, what about Aldous Hodge? Well, Aldous
Hodge is playing Hawkman in the upcoming Black Adam movie. What about Angel Manuel Soto? He's
the director of HBO Max's upcoming Blue Beetle film. Oh, so we might get news about that,
that's cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Anne LeMay, who's that? She works for WB Games. She's probably
gonna be tied to some video game. I'm not sure which one, and I'm not sure why they're calling
her a celebrity. Next on the list is Anson Mount. I already know who that is. He was the guy
who played Black Bolt in the Inhumans television show, and he's voicing Batman in the Injustice
animated movie. That's right. Ava DuVernay? Ava DuVernay, she was going to do a New Gods
film but that got scrapped. She's gonna be here because she's probably gonna be promoting the
upcoming CW series, Naomi. Who's Bilal Fallah? He's the other co-director of the Batgirl film
for HBO Max. Bruce Timm, we all know him. Yeah, yeah, he's a major producer of a lot of DC's
animated content. Cam Newton is gonna be there? Is that the same Cam Newton as the quarterback
Cam Newton? Yes, it is. And honestly- I can't figure out why he's gonna be there. I think
he just really likes DC Comics. What a loser. I'm glad the Broncos beat him in that Super
Bowl about a decade ago. Alright, who's Cameras Johnson? He's an actor on the Batwoman CW TV
series. He plays Luke Fox, Lucius Fox's son. And he's supposed to be suiting up as Batwing
in this next season. Oh, that's cool. That's cool. Candice Patton? She plays Iris West on
CW's Flash TV series. Okay, who's Chris Wood? He plays Manel on the Supergirl series. Lotta
CW actors here. Oh, is that Manel part of the Legion of Superheroes? Yes, yes he is. There's
actually a few Legion members that appear on the Supergirl series. Interesting. Next up
is Christian Convery. Oh, I'm excited for this actually. He's the young actor who plays Sweet
Tooth on the Netflix show of the same name. So hopefully we get some kind of news about
season two of that show, because that show was freaking awesome. And who's Christina Hudson?
She was the screenwriter on Birds of Prey. but she's also writing the upcoming Flash movie
as well as Batgirl for HBO Max. David Harewood? He plays Hank Henshaw. Really, he plays Martian
Manator who's pretending to be Hank Henshaw in the Supergirl series. And who's Dennis Cowan?
He's a comic book artist. He's done quite a bit of work for the milestone characters like
Icon and Static Shock. And who's Donald Mustard? I've never heard that name before. He is the
chief creative officer for Epic Games. So... Maybe there might be some big DC Fortnite announcement
during the fandom. That would be really cool. That would be cool. Who the hell is this Dwayne
Johnson guy? Actually, that's the one name on the list that I had no idea what he was doing.
Something about like the hierarchy of power in the DC universe. He's changing it forever
or something. I don't know. Sounds lame. Who is Echo Kellum? Oh, he was the actor who played
Mr. Terrific in the CW Arrow series, which is over. I don't know, maybe he'll make an appearance
on Flash. I haven't really been keeping up with the CW shows. So. Looks like Ed Boon is gonna
be there. Of course, he's the head of NetherRealm Games. Yeah, it's expected that he's going
to announce Injustice 3, though I'm really hoping that he announces the video game that he's
been talking about making on Twitter, which is DC vs. Marvel. That will break the internet
and my mind. Elizabeth Gillies, who that is? She's gonna voice the character of Catwoman
in the upcoming animated film Catwoman hunted. Okay, cool. What about Elizabeth Tullock? She's
the actress who plays Lois Lane in Superman and Lois Ezra Miller. Hmm. What's he all about?
He of course is the actor who plays the Flash in the DCEU Who's Freddy Stroma? He's gonna
be playing vigilante in the upcoming Peacemaker series and Gareth Dunnett Aloe said he's the
writer of the upcoming Blue Beetle film Grant Gustin He's the Flash on the CW flash series
What about Hindon Walsh? She's a voice actress, probably most notably in DC for the voice of
Starfire in the Teen Titans Go series. And Jacob Bertrand? Most people probably know him as
the Hawk in the Cobra Kai series, but he's gonna do one of the voices in the Batwell series
for Cartoon Network as well. James Gunn is gonna be there? Oh, probably promoting Peacemaker,
right? Yeah. Who's Jason Momoa? He's gonna kick your ass. He of course is Aquaman, I really
hope we get like some kind of teaser footage for Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom. Javisha Leslie?
She's the actress who plays Batwoman in the Batwoman series. Okay moving on to Jennifer
Holland? That's actually James Gunn's girlfriend. She's going to be one of Peacemaker's handlers
in the Peacemaker TV series. Oh that's right and she was also in the Suicide Squad movie.
That's right. Okay who's Jesse Rath? He's the actor who plays Brainiac 5 in Supergirl. Another
Legionnaire. Who the hell is this Jim Lee guy? Jim Lee of course is the publisher and CCO
of DC Comics. Also one of the best comic book artists of our time. Yeah, for sure. He's been
like teasing this massive artwork piece that he's been working on for like the past few
months on his Instagram. I can't wait to see that thing fully unveiled. It's gonna be incredible.
Oh, JJ Abrams is gonna be there. That's cool. So he's probably gonna be talking about like
Justice League Dark. Yeah, probably like the upcoming Zatanna movie. And I think also Constantine.
And Superman, right? Possibly. Yeah, the upcoming Superman project that's being written by Ta-Nehisi
Coates. John Cena is gonna be there, of course promoting peacemaker Justin Hartley, I know
that name. Isn't he the guy voicing Superman on the upcoming injustice movie? Yeah, that's
right. Casey Walfall She's the actress that's playing Naomi in the upcoming CW show. Kaylee
Cuoco is gonna be there Of course, she voices Harley Quinn in that animated series and what
about Leslie Grace? She's playing Batgirl in that movie Linda Carter. She of course played
Wonder Woman in the old school TV series, but she most recently played Asterea in the Wonder
Woman 1984 movie. Matt Bomer? Of course he's playing Negative Man in the Doom Patrol series,
he also voiced the Flash in the recent Justice Society World War II movie. That's right. Matt
Reeves, he's the director of the upcoming Batman movie. We're supposed to get a trailer for
the Batman, hopefully we get that, that'll be cool. I think that's the thing I'm most looking
forward to. Melissa Benoist? Is that how you pronounce it? Benoist? Yeah, it is. She's Supergirl,
of course, in the CW series. Noah Centineo. He's gonna be playing Adam Smasher in the upcoming
Black Adam movie. Patrick Redding. He's the creative director for Warner Bros. Games, so
I think he'll be talking about Gotham Knights. Patty Jenkins is gonna be there, interesting.
Yeah, yeah, it is interesting. She, of course, directed Wonder Woman and Wonder Woman 1984.
I'm wondering if she's there to announce Wonder Woman 3. Maybe, maybe not. Pierce Brosnan.
Holy shit. Man needs no introduction. Of course he's gonna be playing Dr. Fate in the upcoming
Black Adam movie. That's huge. I'll be tuning into that panel for sure. Quintessa Swindell.
The name sounds familiar. Who's that? They're the actor that's gonna be playing Cyclone in
Black Adam. Reggie Hudlin. I already know who that guy is. He's a writer and producer and
director. He's done work for Marvel Comics as well, but he also works for DC. Oh yeah, he's
one of the minds behind DC's milestone media relaunch. What about Robert- Pattinson who's
that guy? He's the goddamn Batman! What about Ron Funches? He does the voice of King Shark
on the Harley Quinn animated series. And Scott Minville? He does the voice of Robin in Teen
Titans Go. Scott Snyder. Is that Zack Snyder's brother? Everyone asks that I'm sure he gets
that question all the time. He's a popular writer for DC Comics. What about Sefton Hill who's
that guy? He's the creative director and co-founder of Rocksteady Games. He'll be Suicide Squad
killed the Justice League, most likely. Steve Aggey? He's gonna be in the upcoming Peacemaker
series. He was also in the Suicide Squad and did the mocap work for King Shark. Tara Strong?
She is the voice of Raven in Teen Titans Go. And also has done a lot of Harley Quinn work
as well. Yeah, yep. All right, next is Todd McFarlane. That's pretty cool. Yeah, he's gonna
be there probably to talk about the DC toy line that he's making. They're really cool toy sculpts.
Tyler Hocklin is going to be there. Of course, he's the actor that plays Superman in the Superman
and Lois television show. That's right. Shiloh Mardi Dwenya. He's the actor who's going to
be playing Blue Beetle in the upcoming movie. He's also known for his work on Cobra Kai.
Oh, look at that. Yahya Abdul-Mateen II is also going to be there. Yeah, he's the actor who
played Black Manta in the first Aquaman movie. I imagine he's going to be there for the sequel,
but he was also Dr. Manhattan in the Watchmen television series for HBO Max. so you never
know what else he may be there for. Zachary Levi is gonna be there. Of course, yep, he's
the actor who plays Shazam in those movies. And last but not least, Zoe Kravitz, who of
course is playing Catwoman in the upcoming The Batman movie. Right. So a few awesome names
there. I'm probably only gonna turn into the fandom for a few panels here and there, but
largely, like most Marvel fans, I'll be skipping the fandom. Good, we don't even want you there,
Normie. Ha ha ha. This is for DC fans. This list is missing notably I think like Jeff Johns
or anyone else involved in the Green Lantern Corps series for HBO Max. I'm actually really
surprised not to see anyone's name because that's like one of the big projects that I'm really
looking forward to hearing more about. Yeah, where's like Michael Keaton? Yeah, yeah, there's
no Michael Keaton and there's no Sasha Kaia either, which is kind of disappointing. And
no Andy Muschietti who's directing The Flash. What's up with that? I was wondering the same
thing. Apparently the only one that's going to be repping The Flash is gonna be Ezra Miller
during the fandom. Which is kinda disappointing. Overall, does this list make you more or less
excited for the fandom? I mean, I'm really excited. This list, I wouldn't say it made me more excited.
It's kind of pretty much what I was expecting. But yeah, if we would've seen some Henry Cavill
on there or some Michael Keaton, I would've been much more excited. Well, cool, we'll see
how it all goes down this Saturday, October 16th. How do you visit the DC Fandom event?
All you have to do is go to dcfandom.com. they're going to be streaming the entire virtual convention
for like the whole day. So there's plenty of time to check it out. All in all, though, there's
going to be a ton of DC projects that they're going to be talking about. I'm personally most
looking forward to any project that involves the DCEU. And that brings us to our question
of the week.
What is your favorite DCEU film so far and why? There's been 10 of them now. We wanna know
your favorite. Yeah, The Joker is not one of them. No, no, it's not. Record your answer
at dynamicduel.com by clicking the red microphone button in the bottom right-hand corner, which
will prompt you to leave us a voicemail. Your message can be up to 30 seconds long, and don't
forget to leave your name in case we include you on the podcast. We'll pick our favorite
answer and draw that person a Dynamic Duel No Prize that we'll post to social media. be sure
to answer before October 16th. Which again is the day of the fandom. Don't miss it. Bruce
Wayne may appear to be a wealthy playboy, but beneath his facade his true identity is that
of the Batman, waging an endless war against crime. Join the caped crusader in Batman the
Audio Adventures, the first scripted audio original featuring Batman and his villainous rogues
gallery in a world premiere story of life and death in Gotham City. debuting exclusively
on HBO Max. Starring Jeffrey Wright as Batman and a who's who of Incredible Saturday Night
Live alums, this rollicking adventure, told across 10 episodes, is written and directed
by Emmy winner Dennis McNicholas, includes devilishly delightful original music by Doug Bossie, and
performances by Rosario Dawson, John Leguizamo, Chris Parnell, Melissa Villasenor, Seth Meyers,
Jason Sudeikis, Brooke Shields, Fred Armisen. and many, many more. Go to hbomax.com slash
Batman Audio Adventures for more and stream Batman the Audio Adventures only on HBO Max.
Thanks again to HBO Max for sponsoring this episode. But now let's get into the main event
where we pit the Batman villain, Man-Bat, against the Spider-Man villain, Morbius, the living
vampire.
Alright, Manbat vs Morbius. As we said earlier, Manbat is basically Manbear Pig, but minus
the bear pig and adding a bat. So he's kind of lame, but Morbius on the other hand is a
legit vampire. Just in time for Halloween, right off the back of our Venom Let There Be Carnage
review. Morbius is of course a Spider-Man villain who is also getting his own live action film
this upcoming January starring Jared Lotto as the character. And that film was supposed to
come out already. We've been planning this episode for a while, and we always kind of figured
that we would be pitting Man-Bat against Morbius considering both characters were scientists
who became supervillains by experimenting with bats. Yeah, I don't know too much about Man-Bat.
Is Man-Bat like vampiric at all, or is he just like a giant fucking bat? He's like a giant
motherfucking bat. What? Well, that is something to look out for. If you've never listened to
one of our duel episodes before, the way we'll determine a winner between Manbat and Morbius
is by running 1000 Monte Carlo simulations using their statistics. Now, a Monte Carlo simulation
is a probabilistic model used to determine outcomes through random sampling. In our case, it randomizes
statistics along a normal distribution, which is a bell curve, as a way to simulate the many
variables that can occur during battle. The stat parameters we use are based on the official
Marvel power grid. and we use that criteria to extrapolate the DC's character stats. We've
included some additional stat categories of our own, such as range, damage, potential,
versatility, and perception, in order to create a more complete and robust simulation. Running
these 1000 simulations gives us a percentage of wins for each character, and we declare
the one with the higher percentage to be the ultimate victor, considering that they're more
likely to win any given battle. No character ever wins 100% of the time. Comics have shown
that there's always a way for Batman to defeat Superman. We feel our method falls in line
with the precedents that have been established in the comic book stories. And we used this
method because it was the least subjective, most unbiased way to determine who would win.
Of course, we were both heavily biased toward our respective allegiances, and instead of
debating these matches forever, we just let the math decide for us. So there's no fan votes
here, and no relying on just feats. Before we run the simulations though, we like to break
down each character's histories and abilities before improvising a scenario on how we imagine
one of the 1000 simulations we run would play out beat for beat. And I think it's my turn
to break down the Marvel character's history first, so let me go ahead and tell you guys
all about Morbius, the living vampire. Michael Morbius was born in Greece to a single mother
and grew up with a rare blood disorder similar to hemophilia. Fearful of her son getting injured,
Michael's mom kept him indoors for most of his childhood, often bringing him books to read
from the bookstore where she worked. Michael became an intellectually gifted child, though
he occasionally sneaked out of the house to play with his best friend, Emil Nicos. During
one such outing, he fell and got injured, causing both boys to get into trouble and vow to one
day cure Michael's condition. Michael and Emil grew up... and studied science together at
their university, specializing in human and animal biology. They won a Nobel Prize for
their research on using vampire bat blood to cure several other blood disorders, convincing
Michael that was the key to fixing his own condition. Michael became engaged to a fellow scientist
named Martin Bancroft, though his body was quickly weakening. Debilitated to the point where he
could barely lift a coffee mug, Michael rushed an experiment on himself using the vampire
bat blood. and electroshock therapy. The process transformed his body. His skin turned chalk
white, his canine teeth protruded fangs, his nose flattened like a bat's, and his eyes turned
blood red. Michael's blood disorder had mutated into a disease of pseudo vampirism, and he
immediately developed an intense thirst for human blood. He lashed out and bit his lab
partner and friend, Emil, killing him and drinking his blood. which revitalized Michael to a normal
appearance and healthy physicality that he had never known. Restored to his normal mental
state, Michael was shocked to see that he had murdered his childhood friend. Saddened and
horrified by what he had become, and to protect his fiancee, Martine, he threw himself into
the Mediterranean Sea, though a fishing vessel that was traveling toward New York City soon
picked him up. By the time the boat reached the US, all the crewmen were dead, as Michael
feasted on them during the voyage. He washed up on the South Hampton shore where Spider-Man
and the Lizard were at the time. Thirsty, Michael attacked the pair, but was overpowered and
had to flee back into the night. The Lizard was able to use a sample of Michael's blood
to create a serum that could temporarily transform himself back into his human form and cure Spider-Man,
who had at that point mutated into having six arms. You can learn more about Spider-Man in
our Blue Beetle vs Spider-Man dual episode. Michael began reluctantly feeding off of New
Yorkers, occasionally turning random victims into pseudo-vampires themselves. He tried abstaining
from drinking blood, but the thirst would take over when given enough time. Distraught, he
tried to commit suicide, though his new healing factor would not let him die. With nowhere
to turn, Michael reached out to his former fiancée, Martine, who collaborated with him from overseas
in developing an antidote. They created a serum derived from his blood that would cure his
turned victims of their vampirism, though it unfortunately did not work on himself. He declared
that if he must drink blood in his search for a cure, then it should be the blood of criminals.
In an attempt to become an anti-hero, Michael discovered a woman named Barbara Clark, who
was being pursued by a demon named Nilrack. He went through great lengths to protect the
woman from the monster, though afterward, he killed Barbara and drank her blood to satisfy
his thirst. feeling immense guilt at his lack of control. Eventually, Blade the Vampire Hunter,
whom you can learn more about in our Asriel vs Blade episode, came across Michael and tried
to kill him. Once Blade learned about Morbius' plight, however, and his anti-hero status,
the two teamed up to defeat an otherworldly sorcerer named Daimond. Michael also met and
tried to stop another sympathetic monster known as the Werewolf by Night, real name Jack Russell,
and the two became reluctant rivals. Eventually, they both teamed up with Ghost Rider and Man-Thing
and formed the first incarnation of the Legion of Monsters superhero team, though they soon
disbanded after accidentally killing a benevolent entity called the Starseed. Believing that
perhaps Spider-Man's radioactive blood held the key to his antidote, Michael attacked him
and managed to get his fangs in the hero's neck. At that moment, he was hit by a bolt of lightning,
which somehow resulted in Michael being cured of his pseudo-vampirism. Authorities charged
him for his crimes as a vampire, though She-Hulk defended him in court claiming he was not responsible
for his actions. After living life as a normal human again for a few years, Michael was captured
and reverted back to his pseudo-vampire condition by the Voodoo Queen. He teamed up with Dr.
Strange and Brother Voodoo to stop the Voodoo Queen's attempt to bring back vampires after
Dr. Strange had eradicated Dracula, but the group was unsuccessful. You can learn more
about Doctor Strange in our Doctor Fate vs Doctor Strange episode. Morbius then formed a team
of supernatural heroes with his former allies called the Midnight Sons and together they
stopped Lilith, the mother of demons, and her spawn, the Lilin, from plunging the earth into
eternal darkness. During the fight against Lilith, Michael's ex-fiancee, Martine, was killed and
turned into a vampire herself, bringing him more torment. Morbius put his mind to work
trying to find a cure for a zombie virus that had entered Marvel's dimension through the
nexus of all realities in Manthing Swamp. Together with the Midnight Suns, he helped contain a
zombie outbreak, and he later teamed up with the Lizard to try and permanently cure their
conditions together at Horizon Labs, though Michael inadvertently attacked the other scientists
and was sent to the Rapt Prison before he could finish his work. Recently, Michael was seen
back in Europe, where a group of vampires captured him and and mixed his blood with their own,
creating a new breed of monsters. With Domino's help, Michael defeated the new vampires and
continued his journey across the earth in search for a cure. Powers-wise, Morbius is a pseudo-vampire
in that he has all the abilities of vampires but none of their traditional weaknesses, except
for the thirst and a minor sensitivity to direct sunlight. These abilities include superhuman
strength, being able to lift one ton, superhuman speed, especially in short bursts, night vision
and a sensitivity to the smell of blood, a regenerative healing factor, sharp fangs and claws, the
ability to glide almost endlessly, he can mesmerize people through prolonged eye contact with the
duration of his influence depending on his victim's willpower, he can occasionally create other
pseudo-vampires, and he doesn't age being effectively immortal. Morbius is also an incredibly gifted
biochemist and Nobel Prize winner. Silver, garlic, religious relics, stakes through the heart,
all of that have no effect on him. His only weakness being the fact that he needs human
blood in order to maintain his strength. So he can't turn into like a bunch of bats or
anything like that? No. He can't like teleport through shadows? No, I guess he doesn't have
all of their powers. He just has most of their powers. Okay, he's more like man bat than I
realized. For some reason I thought Morbius was a lot stronger than you know the one ton
lifting strength. But I'm glad he's not. This should be a good match, I think. Let me get
into the history of Manbat. When Dr. Robert Kirkland Langstrom, aka Kirk, was a young boy,
he made national headlines as a missing child as he became trapped within a deep underground
cavern for six weeks. He was eventually rescued and began frightening other children, including
a six-year-old Bruce Wayne, with stories of the half-man... half-bat creatures he believed
he had encountered in the cavern during his time there. Kirk maintained an obsession with
bats as the years went on, and he attended Gotham University to become a zoologist specializing
in chiropterology, or the study of bats. It was during his university years that he met
and dated the chemist Francine Lee, with whom he shared his ideas of how his bat studies
could pioneer medical breakthroughs. After obtaining his doctorate, Kirk became a zoologist and
nocturnal mammals expert employed at the Gotham Natural History Museum and he and Francine
became engaged. After learning that he was slowly becoming deaf, Kirk developed a serum derived
from bat gland extracts within his museum basement lab that could benefit blind or deaf people
with enhanced hearing, granting them echolocation like a bat. Kirk tested his formula on himself.
which had the unintended consequences of mutating him into a monstrous half-man half-bat hybrid,
a man-bat with large leathery wings and razor-sharp claws. Terrified by what he had done and overwhelmed
by his enhanced senses, Kirk soon became aware that criminals had broken into the museum above
him. They were members of the Blackout Gang, a stealthy group that was currently on the
run from Batman. who you can learn more about in our Batman vs. Moon Knight episode. Overcome
by his animal instincts, Kirk attacked the gang alongside Batman, who assumed Kirk was a new
fellow crime fighter. Kirk fled immediately after, but ran into Batman multiple times over
the coming days as Kirk attempted to steal chemicals from around the city, desperate to find a cure
before his animal mind took over.
sleeping harmlessly during the day and only going out at night to wreak havoc throughout
the city. That's hilarious. Yeah, they kind of like were roommates for a while. Batman,
who by this time had deduced that the creature was Dr. Kirk Langstrom, attempted to work on
an antidote and enlisted the help of Kirk's fiance, Francine. Though they were successful,
Manbette rejected the antidote, and in an effort to prove her love, Francine took the Manbette
serum. transforming into She-Bat. These names, man. Man-Bat followed the two bat creatures
to Gotham Cathedral, where he forced them both to take the antidote. Grateful to be human
once again, Kirk and Francine got married soon after, and Batman was Kirk's best man. Batman
in his Batman costume? Yes. Yep. Interesting. Okay. The antidote, however, was revealed to
be impermanent, as days after his wedding, Kirk transformed back into Man-Bat, and with his
animal mind attempting to take control, he created a more potent formula that would transform
him into Man-Bat permanently. Batman stopped him from taking it, however, and administered
the antidote once again. Months later, Francine reverted back to She-Bat, and Kirk helped Batman
track her down and administer the antidote to her. Eventually, Kirk was able to develop a
new formula that would allow him and his wife to keep their human minds whenever they transformed.
Kirk became a crime fighter and ally to Batman, helping him as Man-Bat take down villains such
as the Getaway Genius and Baron Time. The Langströms later moved to Chicago to get away from Gotham
City's criminal element, only to encounter and defeat the likes of the Ten-Eyed Man and Dr.
Thanatogenos before moving to New York City. While there, Kirk teamed up with Robin and
Batgirl in order to stop a villain named the Outsider who was attempting to kill members
of the Bat family. The Langstrums eventually became pregnant, and Kirk became a bounty hunter
of sorts, capturing criminals in order to collect the reward money for his growing family. As
Francine went into labor, Kirk teamed up with Etrigan the Demon, who you can learn more about
in our Etrigan vs. Ghost Rider episode. to stop the sorceress Morgan Le Fay from transforming
all of the hospital's babies into demons. Francine gave birth to a healthy baby girl, whom they
named Rebecca. Now with a child to think of, Kirk retired as madbat and began working in
construction to support his family. News reports of a bat creature terrorizing New York City,
however, led him to question whether or not he really had control over his transformations
while he slept. He later discovered It was his wife seeking freedoms from the new responsibilities
of motherhood. When the Langstroms realized Rebecca suffered from acute hearing, Man-Bat
attempted to steal chemicals once again to develop a cure. Batman stopped him, however, and it
was Superman who later helped Kirk find a cure for his daughter. A short time after the Langstroms
moved back to Gotham City, Kirk accidentally made a miscalculation in the formula he and
his wife used to keep their human minds when they transformed. and his animal mind took
over completely. He secretly returned to the Batcave, leading Batman and Alfred to wonder
if the Batcave was haunted. Batman eventually found Man-Bat and attempted to use the antidote,
but Kirk's mind was too far gone and it didn't work. It wasn't until Man-Bat saw his daughter
Rebecca that Kirk's mind was reawakened and he was able to take control once again. Although
after that, Kirk was forced to take the antidote regularly to limit his now more intense transformations.
After getting his job back at the Gotham Natural History Museum, the long hours caused Kirk
to forget to take his antidote, and he transformed into an uncontrollable man-bat once again,
kidnapping Jason Todd in an attempt to transform him into a bat hybrid before being stopped
by the combined effort of Batman, Francine, and Rebecca. The Langströms later had a son,
Eren. who was born with a deadly illness due to Kirk's and Francine's altered DNA. Francine
was forced to inject Eren with the Man-Bat serum, transforming him into a baby-bat hybrid permanently
in order to save his life. Talia Al Ghul, who you can learn more about in our Daughters of
the Demon vs. Daughters of the Dragon dual episode, later kidnapped the Langstrom family and threatened
to kill them if they didn't give her the Man-Bat formula, which they did, in which Talia used
to create an army of bat-hybrid assassins known as the Manbat Commandos. Later, while Francine
worked as a member of the Outsiders, serving as their scientific advisor, Kirk realized
he was able to control his Manbat transformations at will. During the Blackest Night storyline,
Francine discovered a cure for her and her husband's transformations, while also discovering that
if Kirk transformed one more time, he would no longer be able to turn back into a human.
Just as Kirk was about to take the cure, a battle between Black Lantern Solomon Grundy and Bizarro
injured Francine, and Kirk was forced to transform one final time in order to protect and save
his wife. In post-Flashpoint continuity, the Manbat Serum originated as a lab-created airborne
virus that plagued Gotham City before its accidental creator, Dr. Kirk Langstrom, was able to derive
an anti-virus by transforming himself into a bat hybrid, once again, the Manbat. He took
a villainous turn for a while, allying himself with Scarecrow during the Arkham Wars and serving
as a member of the Crime Syndicate before joining an anti-terrorism task force for the supernatural
organization, Shade, which you can learn more about in our Frankenstein vs. Bloodstone episode.
He was later a member of Woodrow Man's Justice League Dark Team, during which time he became
an expert on the science of magic. Powers-wise, Manbat possesses flight thanks to his wings,
as well as enhanced physicality, including superhuman strength and agility. He has extremely sensitive
hearing that allows for echolocation, and he can emit sonic blasts with his voice, capable
of stunning his victims. He also has razor-sharp claws on his hands and feet. He has a brilliant
scientific mind, Though the longer he's in his Man-Bat form, the harder it is for him to fight
back against Man-Bat's pure, instinctual, and animalistic mind. He can communicate with bats,
and has a sensitivity to bright lights in his Man-Bat form. That's Man-Bat. It's interesting,
like, this Batman villain is not really crazy, like, he's never been to Arkham Asylum or anything,
so he seems quite different from the standard Batman rogues. He's kinda like Morbius, where
he's basically more of a good guy who gets into trouble. Yeah, he's a lot like Morbius except
which one do you think came first? Obviously Morbius. He came out in 1971. Oh Man-bat has
him beat by one year. He came out in 1970. What a rip-off. But once again But Marvel did it
better because Morbius is a much cooler character who's actually getting his own film Actually
Man-bat was going to be the villain of the Batman and Robin sequel But that never happened as
long as Joel Schumacher didn't direct it. I'd be down to see that I think he was gonna direct
it actually. Eww Nah, that would be no good. He would have had like nipples, like bright
pink areolas, I think. So these characters are like so similar then. Although you know what's
interesting is that Morbius, although he was essentially turned into like a bat vampire
creature, he doesn't have echolocation like Manbat does. And that's why he's going to die.
Well, let's find out. Now that we've got their histories and abilities out of the way, let's
speculate on how one of the 1000 simulated matches will go. The winner is determined by simulations,
not the speculation, but it's fun to imagine how this fight could play out. We don't set
any rules for this match other than the characters don't know anything about each other going
in, except that the other character is a threat that needs to be put down. And we say that
they start off about 50 meters apart in an environment that has no bearing on the match itself because
we don't take stats for the environment. Plus certain characters have advantages in some
environments over others, and we want these characters to win on their own merit. So let's
get into it. Morbius and Manbat meet on the battlefield. Who goes first? I'm gonna say
that Manbat does just because he's a little bit more animalistic and wild. So he's gonna
start off by soaring into the air and send out the shriek that stuns Morbius. So Manbat's
shriek is capable of stunning people? Yes. Yeah, it can also like shatter windows and stuff.
It's pretty powerful. Well, Morbius would be particularly susceptible to that because he
does have enhanced hearing. Exactly. Okay, so Morbius, you know, he's like in pain, he's
stunned, and Manbat, he's gonna use this opening to just like dive bomb him, right? And he's
gonna slash Morbius' torso, just leaving these deep bloody gashes before taking off back into
the air. That was a good opening, Salvo. And Morbius is definitely gonna be feeling the
attack, both audio and physical, but you know, he's gonna be able to heal those slash wounds.
and he leaps up into the air at Manbat right at him and digs his own sharp claws into Manbat's
chest and holds on tight and reaches up and just sinks his teeth into the creature's neck.
Wait, he's gonna bite his neck as they're flying through the air? Yeah. Except that Manbat reacted
to Morbius's claw attack with a barrel roll as he's flying through the air, right? So that's
gonna fling Morbius off of him towards the ground before Manbat could get bit in the neck. Do
a barrel roll! Exactly. Except Morbius isn't gonna hit the ground, he can glide. So he's
just gonna glide away from Manbat and just kinda like disappear into the shadows. Shadows? What
shadows? Well wherever there's light, there's shadows. And wherever there's not light, there's,
you know, also shadows. Okay? I mean, but you can't hide from Manbat in the shadows though.
He has echolocation. So right when Morbius thinks he's safe- Manbat's just gonna silently swoop
in and just lift Morbius back into the air by his hair. That long ass hair that's just easy
to grab. But Morbius is smart, okay? So, when he realizes that Manbat is able to detect where
he is through echolocation, which Morbius would know because he'd be able to hear the echolocation
scream, and also he would know where Manbat is at all times now that Manbat's bleeding
because he could smell his blood. So, when Manbat- thinks he's getting the drop on Morbius by
swooping in to grab him by the hair. Morbius counters by dashing to the side and slashing
through one of Manbat's wings and just fricking turning it into shreds. No, that's right. Manbat's
grounded. All right. So Manbat, he's probably like screeching in pain. And honestly, that
attack probably like made Dr. Langstrom lose control over the animal mind within Manbat.
So now it's no more Mr. Nice Manbat. All right. He's gonna scurry across the ground and just
lunge at Morbius, just like grabbing his jugular in his jaws and just biting down really hard
going for the kill. Holy shit. Except as Manbat pounces on Morbius, uh, Morbius is gonna throw
up his arms in- in self-defense, and Manbat is only just gonna bite into his forearm instead
of Morbius' neck. And with Manbat's bangs, you know, like, deep into Morbius' forearm, Morbius
is gonna maneuver Manbat's head where he can expose his neck. and Morbius just sinks his
fangs into Manbat's neck and it's gonna drain him of all of his blood and energy. So Manbat's
like done, like Morbius just like freaking pushes him off to the side and Manbat falls lippily
to the ground cause he doesn't have anything left, Morbius wins. Except Manbat, you know,
he's not frail without his blood. In fact, he's stronger now than he's ever been because since
Morbius bit him, he's now a pseudo vampire Manbat. No, no, except, no, that didn't. Nah. He's
man-pseudo-vampire bat with like all white fur and skin like red eyes and now with his own
healing factor But like still all animal instinct. He's more dangerous now than ever. Did you
say man pseudo vampire bat? Yes, man pseudo vampire bat So he's like a giant albino bat
now, but with vampiric tendencies. Yeah. So Morbis is like, oh shit, I done fucked up Exactly,
but you know Morbius is also gonna be stronger than he's ever been because he just got done
feasting on the man bats blood So, you know, he's like full of energy and before man meant
what is it pseudo man's a pseudo vampire bat Yes Before he could do anything Morbius speed
blitzes him and tackles him to the ground pinning him down as Morbius looks into his eyes and
Mesmerizes the creature into becoming docile dude Morbius can't tame the animal mind within
Manitou vampire bat. All right? Animals can't be hypnotized, so they're not smart enough.
OK, so as Morbius thinks he's hypnotizing Manitou vampire bat, he's just going to stick his head
out and bite right into Morbius's neck, just ripping it out entirely and ending this match.
So basically, Manitou vampire bat took advantage of Morbius just staring at him and it did nothing.
Exactly. Morbius tried and failed. But Morbius wouldn't die from getting his throat ripped
out. What? Um, but I'm thinking now that Man-Bat has vampirism and he also has this mutagenic
chemical in his blood that transformed him into Man-Bat in the first place. I bet you like
in the comics, it probably somehow reacts with Morbius's own blood disorder. So as Morbius
heals his neck, he also sprouts giant bat wings and sheds his outfit and he becomes his own.
Man-pseudo-vampire bat-vampire. Man-pseudo-vampire bat is probably horribly confused by what just
happened. So man-pseudo-vampire bat-vampire then attacks man-pseudo-vampire bat and rips
his pseudo-man heart out of his vampire bat chest. Okay, wait, whose heart got ripped out?
The man, pseudo, vampire, bat, vampire? No, no, the man, pseudo, vampire, man, bat. All
I know is Marvel wins. You don't know shit, like no one does anymore. Basically, there's
these two giant albino, vampire, pseudo, man, bats that are attacking each other. There's
just so much cross contamination of like blood conditions and viruses and shit. Who knows
which one is which one anymore? But let's find out who wins this scenario by running these
character stats in 1000 simulations and coming back with a winner. Let's do it!
That was unexpected. What was it again? Pseudo vampire bat man? No, man pseudo vampire bat
man. Oh, okay. I forgot. But we ran the stats on these characters. Pretty comparable here,
as I figured it would be. It's definitely gonna be a close match because these characters are
nearly identical when it comes to things like speed, evasiveness, strength, damage level,
versatility. But it was determined that Morbius is much more durable given that he has a regenerative
healing factor, whereas Manbat does not. Right, but where Manbat did get the edge was in perception,
thanks to his echolocation. That's something that Morbius didn't have. Manbat also had a
slight advantage when it came to range due to his sonic shriek that he has. Morbius has some
range with his whole mesmerization thing, but it's not very much. The victim has to be kind
of in close proximity to see his gaze. So after crunching these numbers and running the simulations,
who do you think is gonna win this match, Jonathan? Manbet, hopefully. I'm not sure, I know it's
gonna be close. I really hope it's not the same results that we got from our Instagram poll,
in which 72% of our Instagram followers chose Morbius. And I'm like, what? What are you guys
doing? Like, Manbet is way cooler than Morbius. I don't know how that happened. Manbet is just
too simplistic of a character, I think. He's not interesting enough to ever be that popular.
Whereas Morbius, you know, he's a fucking vampire. Vampires are cool. Morbius is like the least
cool vampire in fiction. He's like a living vampire. How lame is that? Like even other
vampires hate him. It's interesting to me that Manbat turned out to be not vampiric at all.
I always thought like he'd bite other people and turn them into Manbats themselves. No,
it all comes down to his serum. Hence the lowered popularity. hence these poll results. But let
me go ahead and tell you who won. The winner in the dual matchup between Manbat and Morbius
is Morbius, the living vampire. It was fairly close. It was 56.4% to 43.6%. So Morbius won
564 matches out of a thousand compared to Manbat's 436 wins. I thought Manbat scored higher in
more stat categories than Morbius. but Morbius scored much higher when it came to durability.
And intellect, since we reasoned that Man-Bat isn't always consistent with how smart he is
in that form. I forgot about intelligence. Shit. At the end of the day, a brilliant human mind
will always beat out a crazy animal mind. That's just the food chain. Man-Bat turns into a nice
snack for Morbius, and us Marvel fans get another win. You guys have needed one of those for
a while. DC is totally stomping you guys, so congrats, I guess. Thanks man. I can't wait
to see Morbius's rotten tomato meter. I'm sure it'll probably also be at 56.4%. That's probably
true, touche. That was pretty good. But that does it for this duel guys. Let us know what
you thought about the results by writing to us at dyna or by visiting us on Facebook, Instagram
or Twitter. You can find links to all of our accounts by checking out our show notes or
visiting our website dynamic duel.com And on our site you can also find a link to our patreon
page where we offer bonus content including bonus episodes and duels, monthly live movie
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Our next episode is going to be a review. We're going to talk all about the animated series
What If on Disney Plus. Which I have yet to start watching. Need to get on that. Y'all
be interested in hearing what you think about it. But that does it for this episode. We want
to give a big thanks to our executive producers, John Spees, Ken Johnson, Jace Crump, John Storosky,
Zachary Hepburn, John Bechinina, Mitchell Phipps, Steven Lovato, Dustin Balcom, Salvador Hernandez
Contreras Jr. and Levi Yee-In for helping make this podcast possible. And we'll talk to you
guys next week. Up up and away, true believers.