Posted at 12:23 a.m. - Thursday, July 3

The brilliant and oh-so-devious staff of the Red Eye have put this superhero tournament together, and if you ask me, while they've made some fine choices in the participants, there are going to be some interesting comments made my fanboys/fangirls about the seeding.  I'm going to get us rolling by going over a couple of the match-ups in each region and trying to predict how they'll pan out:

In the Stan Lee Region:

• Superman (No. 1 seed) vs Mr. Fantastic (No. 8 seed) - Wow, so Supes gets the top seed, which makes sense, but Reed Richards, the patriarch of Marvel's First Family pulls an 8th?
  
  Oh well, character-wise, the Last Son of Krypton pulls Reed Richards apart like taffy.  Comic book sales-wise, Supes also wins out because he carries at least four titles (Superman, Action Comics, Superman/Batman & Trinity) while the Fantastic Four are featured in only 2 (FF and Ultimate FF), unless you count the young readers line, but that's negligible.
  
  My prediction: Superman in a rout.

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• Captain America (No. 4 seed) vs Captain Marvel (No. 5 seed) - Now here's where the Red Eye staff missed a golden opportunity: they could have pitted the DC Comics version of Captain Marvel against the Marvel Comics version.  (Yeah, there are two versions.) The DC version is a young boy who turns into 'the world's mightiest mortal' when he utters that word Gomer Pyle used to say all the time. (Not too bad, but please get a new cape.) The Marvel version is an alien expatriate who defends the earth from the very people who sent him to take us over. Now how cool is that?
  
  Still, we have a battle of 'captains' from two different comic book companies.  Funny thing is that while the DC Captain Marvel is alive and well, Captain America is currently sitting on a slab in his own title after being the victim of a highly-publicized assassination engineered by his arch-enemy, the Red Skull.  So in this match-up you have the less cool Captain Marvel going up against a dead guy.
  
  My prediction: Captain America (dead - but not for much longer) in a landslide.
  

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• The Thing (No. 3 seed) vs The Shadow (No. 6 seed) - So Ben Grimm, the muscle of the Fantastic Four, pulls a higher seed than Reed Richards, the brains?  Really?  The guy who creates the Ultimate Nullifier and saves the world from Galactus gets bumped down by a guy who looks like a walking avalanche and gets tormented by a bunch of juvenile delinquents on Yancy Street?  (Sorry.  I geeked out there.) And then he's pitted against one of the classic pulp heroes, The Shadow, who's more badass than Batman because he'll shoot you as soon as talk to you.  The voters may disagree, but I say go with the badass. 
  
  My prediction: The Shadow by a whisker.
  

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• Wonder Woman (No. 2 seed) vs Spawn (No. 7) - The Amazon from Paradise Island (although aren't Amazons from, uh, The Amazon?) up against the Spawn of Hell (or do you call it Detroit?).  DC's top female hero against comics' top independent comic creation.  The key to this match-up isn't how much grrrl power Diana Prince has, or how many protoplasm blasts Al Simmons can project, but just how loyal each character's fan base is.  I say America's not ready for a female Top Superhero (insert Hilary comment here).
  
  My prediction: Spawn by a nose.

Next Up: The Kevin Smith Region

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Glad to see you included The Shadow, but where's the greatest pulp hero of all - Doc Savage, the Man of Bronze? Doc not only had incredible adventures, but he and his crew are the inspiration for a number of popular characters, including Indiana Jones, James Bond, Buckaroo Banzai, the Fantastic Four (Stan Lee says so!), and most especially Superman. Hope there's a round 2...

Point to you 'duck'. FYI, the list that the RedEye Staff came up with was fairly exhaustive and there were a whole bunch of heroes that didn't make the tourney. Though IMO - and maybe I'm wrong - I don't see the good ol' Doc faring any better than The Spirit is right now.

Amazons are pointedly not from the amazon. They are female warriors from greco-roman mythology. No-one from the west had made it quite as far as South America back then!

While we're geeking out, note that Reed Richards did *not* invent the Ultimate Nullifier (at least not in any recognized Marvel continuity I'm aware of). But he did spot it as a weapon on Galactus' ship and threaten to use it against the Big G, which counts for something.

To 'sjw152000': You are correct, but I was kind of joking, y'know, making a pun. But it was a bad one, so I'll take 20 lashes with a wet noodle by the RedEye Redhead.

To Dave: You, my good man get the G2M 'D'oh Prize' for correctly pointing out that Reed Richards did not invent the UN. YOU DA GEEK!

Reed didn't spot it either. Uatu the Watcher sent the Human Torch to Galactus' ship to retrieve it. It was then handed to Reed.

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