10 Times the Hulk was Marvel Comics’ Most Powerful Hero

In Marvel Comics, no hero is physically stronger than the Incredible Hulk. After being bathed in gamma radiation, mild-mannered scientist Bruce Banner was transformed into a giant green goliath of pure rage. Thanks to the gamma radiation coursing through his body, the Hulk has immense strength, a rapid healing factor, and retroactive immortality. Over the years, the Hulk’s feats of raw strength have only grown more impressive as he can now challenge the most powerful villains and gods in the multiverse. This evolution isn’t surprising: the Hulk gets stronger the angrier he becomes, with no defined limit. By drawing on his immense rage from a lifetime of being abused, hunted, and feared, the Hulk is one of the most powerful heroes in comic book history.

The Hulk has always prided himself on being the strongest and will smash apart anyone or anything that gets in his way. On top of having a lot of repressed rage and trauma, a significant reason why the Hulk is so powerful compared to other gamma mutants is because of the One Below All. This omnipotent embodiment of evil is the source of all gamma radiation in the multiverse. The One Below All further empowers the Hulk in its effort to mold him into becoming its avatar. Thankfully, the Hulk has resisted becoming the One Below All’s puppet and instead uses its infinite power to accomplish great acts of heroism.

10) Destroyed an Asteroid Twice the Size of Earth

Even when the Jolly Green Giant is in his significantly weaker Gray Hulk form, he still has the power to destroy the Earth. In Marvel Comics Presents #52, alien kids were playing around and destroying planetary bodies. As part of the fun, they sent an asteroid hurtling towards Earth. This asteroid was twice the Earth’s size, thereby ensuring that it would annihilate the planet if it struck. Working quickly, the Hulk strapped on a jetpack and flew into space to meet the asteroid head-on. And despite being in his weakest form, the Hulk still managed to reduce this massive asteroid into millions of little pieces with a single punch.

9) Destroyed a Planet and Moon

With a being as powerful as the Hulk, collateral damage from his battles can reach planetary levels and beyond. During the events of Incredible Hulks #634, the Hulk and some of his gamma-irradiated allies are transported to the Dark Dimension, where they fight various villains. During the battle, Red She-Hulk is manipulated by the villain Tyrannus to attack her friends. The two Hulks become so angry that they both enter their Worlbreaker states and charge at each other, with the collision causing an explosion that destroys the planet they were standing on and a nearby moon. Luckily, the blast also triggered a magical wishing well that instantly resurrected everyone vaporized by the apocalyptic blast.

8) Lifted the Weight of a Star

During the events of Infinity, the Mad Titan Thanos and his powerful enforcers, the Black Order, invaded Earth when the Avengers were off on an intergalactic mission fighting the Builders. Thankfully, the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes returned just in time to stop Thanos’s conquest. During the battle, the Hulk fought two of the Black Order’s strongest members, Corvus Glaive and Proxima Midnight. The latter villain impaled the Jolly Green Giant with her spear, which can take on the weight of a star. However, despite also being infected with a deadly poison, the Hulk didn’t crumble under the weight. Instead, the Hulk held the spear up while kneeling.

7) Held Open a Black Hole

Although the Hulk is most well-known for being an Avenger, he’s also been an invaluable member of the Defenders and has saved their lives multiple times. In Defenders #3, the Hulk, along with his teammates Doctor Strange, Namor, and Silver Surfer, is on a journey through dimensions when he’s accidentally caught in the gravitational pull of a black hole. Before any of them could be sucked in, the Hulk grabbed onto the edges of the black hole so that his teammates could hold onto him. While the Hulk resisted the black hole, Namor managed to get the Silver Surfer’s board and use it to fly down and pull everyone out. If it weren’t for the Hulk buying Namor time, the Defenders would have all died.

6) Destroyed Sagittarius A

Not only has the Hulk held open a black hole, but he’s destroyed one from the inside out. In the appropriately named Hulk: Smash Everything series, the second issue has the Leader banishing his brutish nemesis into Sagittarius A. This supermassive black hole rests at the center of the Milky Way Galaxy. The black hole’s time-warping gravity tears the Hulk apart atom by atom. However, in the third issue the Hulk manages to pull himself together and begins fighting back against the seemingly endless void. Inside Sagittarius A and fueled by overwhelming rage, the Hulk begins punching the densest matter in the universe repeatedly. Eventually, the Hulk manages to split Sagittarius A in half and causes the biggest black hole in the galaxy to explode.

5) Punched Through Time

One of the Jolly Green Giant’s most outlandish feats occurred in The Incredible Hulk #135, when he managed to break time itself with a punch. In the story, the time-travelling villain Kang the Conqueror tried to travel to the past but found his ship blocked by an incomprehensibly powerful time storm. Recognizing that he needed sufficient force to break through the barrier, Kang manipulated the Hulk into helping him in exchange for getting rid of Bruce permanently. The Hulk agreed, and Kang sent him to confront the time storm. With a single mighty strike, the Hulk obliterated the storm and travelled to the past, which also allowed Kang to continue his time-altering schemes.

4) Shattered a Universe with a Clap

Only someone as powerful as the Hulk could unintentionally obliterate a universe with a round of applause. In The Incredible Hulk #126, Bruce finds himself kidnapped by cultists who send him to another universe so that he can destroy their mortal enemy known as the Night-Crawler (no relation to the X-Man). When Bruce is reluctant to transform, the cult throws a helpless young woman into the middle of the battlefield. To protect her, Bruce transforms into the Hulk and fights Night-Crawler. To end the fight, the Hulk performed his signature thunderclap, which accidentally tore apart Night-Crawler’s universe. Only by Night-Crawler teleporting all three of them to another dimension did they survive the collapsing reality.

3) Escaped a Dimension of Infinite Density

When his Joe Fixit personality was in control in The Incredible Hulk #370, the Hulk sees a strange light emanating from an apartment and goes to investigate. Inside, he finds Doctor Strange’s astral form fighting a pair of demonic hands in a closet. The hands grab Strange’s spirit and drag him into a dark dimension. Wasting no time, the Hulk jumps in after him and immediately feels overwhelming pressure. With great effort, the Hulk manages to rescue Doctor Strange’s spirit and pulls himself out of the dark dimension while also fighting off the demonic hands. Later, Bruce talks to Doctor Strange, and we learn that the dark dimension was a place of infinite density, making his survival and escape all the more astounding.

2) Broke First Firmament Chains

In Incredible Hulk #18, Bruce gave a Lovecraftian villain known as the Eldest permission to take the Hulk’s body for herself in exchange for the life of an innocent woman. With the deal, the Eldest bound the Hulk in chains made from the First Firmament, the remnants of the first universe. These chains are so powerful that they have overwhelmed and subdued the omnipotent and omnipresent personification of the universe known as Eternity. And in the past, just a piece of the First Firmament had enough power to threaten Marvel’s infinite multiverse. With such incomprehensibly powerful chains, the Eldest was confident that the Hulk was trapped. However, the Hulk was so angry that he broke the cosmic chains.

1) Shook the Multiverse

One of the Hulk’s most dangerous enemies is the supervillain team the U-Foes, with the metallic Ironclad as the team’s muscle, thanks to his ability to increase his density drastically. When the Jolly Green Giant is banished to another dimension by Doctor Strange in The Incredible Hulk #304, he runs into the U-Foes. Of course, the Hulk and Ironclad immediately rush at each other and begin trading blows. The force of their strikes is so immense that the shockwaves could be felt across an infinite number of dimensions. To send punches that could be felt across the multiverse is no small feat, and it shows just how strong the Hulk truly is when he gets angry.

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