Friday, 7 February 2020

Death Battle Predictions: Black Canary VS Sindel


“A sound like a sound of thunder rolled, and the heart of a nation stirred”
- William Ross Wallace

Sound, it is a fundamental part of our everyday lives, we listen to music, we hear other people speak. Our natural sense of hearing has long throughout human history been quintessential to our survival, but it can and has often been weaponized against us in a variety of ways, like ultrasonic weapons used to control riots, crying babies on airplanes. However, when it comes to those who weaponise sounds - these two femme fatales as known as some of  the very best. Black Canary - The leader of the Birds of Prey and one of the greatest martial artists in the DC Universe. Sindel - The former Queen of Edenia and a mystical sorceress with powers of the Banshee. These two scream queens are two of the most well known examples of characters who manipulate sound and now they’ll be going toe to toe in a deathmatch that’s anything but music to your ears. Will Black Canary out-banshee the queen or will Sindel make this the Canary’s last song? Let’s find out.


Background

Black Canary

Dinah Drake was a costumed vigilante known as the “Black Canary”. Posing as a criminal, taking down gangs, and serving the Justice Society of America, she was always bound for the crimefightning business. Trained at a young age by her police detective father, Richard Drake, Dinah donned her costumed identity after she tried and failed to become a Gotham City cop. After the government had disbanded the Justice Society, Dinah decided to settle down with a husband, Larry Lance, and they had a daughter. This child would become the next Black Canary, known as Dinah Laurel Lance.

It didn’t take long for the second Dinah to learn about her mother’s heroic past and take on the mantle of the new Black Canary. She had inherited a metagene from her parents, who didn’t have such a thing, giving her the ability to produce an incredibly loud and destructive scream known as the Canary Cry. As a founding member of the Justice League, this second Black Canary is ready to carry her mother’s crimefighting legacy.

Sindel

The story of Queen Sindel is nothing short of a tragic one. Dating over 10,000 years back, she ruled over the realm of Edenia with her beloved family. Alongside her husband, King Jerrod, and daughter, Princess Kitana, she was a benevolent queen. Edenia was a prosperous and fertile land, its name actually being based on the Garden of Eden. Even the inhabitants aged slowly in longlasting youth. But nothing was the same when Edenia’s best fighters had lost ten Mortal Kombat tournaments in a row to Outworld. The ruler and brutal conqueror, Shao Kahn, was able to invade Edenia and and take control.

Sindel was forced to watch the Kahn kill Jerrod, and was then forced to marry the emperor. Her daughter was adopted as Kahn’s own, and Edenia fell. Heartbroken by the thought of being subservient to such a horrible man, her dead husband, and the theft of her daughter, Sindel took her own life in an attempt to escape. (Note: In the new timeline, Sindel’s death was retconned to be one to protect Earthrealm from Kahn’s invasion) 

In a cruel twist of fate, this was not the end of her suffering. She would be resurrected by the corrupted Elder God Shinnok, but was brainwashed to be fully subservient to Shao Khan with no memory of her true lover. However, after Shao Kahn’s defeat at the hands of the Earthrealm Defenders, Edenia was freed from Outworld’s grasp and Sindel was broken free of her mind control. So, she returned to Edenia, determined to rule as its Queen once again and protect it from any forces of evil that may try to invade once again

PS: We know Mortal Kombat (2011), X, and 11 retconned her backstory but we are going with her original timeline backstory due to making more logical sense. Plus the entire retcon regarding Sidnel’s backstory in MK11 is the worst charcter assassination in the whole franchise so ignoring it would be to everyone’s benefit. (To add onto this, her appearance in MK11 is non-canon, so it’s questionable whether this retcon will stay after the backlash it’s received).

Equipment

Black Canary

Sonic Cry Amplifiers (Oral Tech, Choker, Earrings)


Dinah has equipment that she can use in order to enhance her Sonic Cry as well as having better control over it. Created by Vibe, these amplifiers not only make her Canary Cry louder, but they can also increase their range, or help her focus the cry into a more precise attack.

High Frequency Sonic Disruptors


When she was stripped of her Canary Cry, she developed these sonic bombs that emit ultrasonic sound waves that are able to emit sonic blasts that are on par with her Canary Cry. While these disruptors are no longer used by her since she can use her Canary Cry once again, it wouldn’t surprise us if she kept a few around just in case.

Gas Pellets


Like Batman, she carries gas pellets with her which can be used to make her difficult to see for anyone whom she is fighting.

Grappling Hook


While she doesn’t really use this often, she has a grapple hook that she can use in order to reach higher areas. 

Cables


Black Canary has cables she can use in order to swing around the city to compensate for her lack of standard flight. (like say Batman and Catwoman).

Body Armor


In the New 52, Black Canary wore body armor, while it’s not known what Black Canary’s body armor was made out of - we can assume she wore it in order to protect herself more from bullets and knives. Currently in DC Rebirth - she no longer wears body armor and has gone back to a design more resembling Pre-New 52.

Various Martial Arts Weapons

Metal Police Baton


She has used police batons whilst in combat in order to defeat an enemy whilst she was crippled and in a wheelchair. 

Staff


While training against Wonder Woman, she used a bo staff whilst in combat, despite her lacking experience with the weapon - she was still able to match one of the greatest fighters in the DC Universe with it and “beat” her (Black Canary claims that Wonder Woman let her win but she denies that). 

Sindel

Kwan-Dao


Also known as a guando or yanyuedao. A pole weapon sporting a large, heavy blade at its head. It’s like a big spear, but instead of stabbing, it’s best used for sweeping cuts. It can also be used for stabbing though, and Sindel is quite good at using it for that.

Abilities

Black Canary

Canary Cry


The thing Dinah is most well known for, Black Canary lets out a powerful scream that can stop moving cars or even take down massive buildings. In addition, it’s capable of stopping the sonic attacks of other users. Also, thanks to practice from playing a harmonica, as well as her choker and earrings, she can make her cry more powerful or even focus it for pinpoint accuracy. She can also use her Canary Cry to nullify and redirect other sonic attacks.  

Martial Arts


Dinah is one of the most well known martial arts fighters in the DC Universe and has been trained by the best. This includes Lady Shiva who has been described as being the greatest martial artist in the world. She has also taken down some pretty top tier martial arts in the DC Universe including her on-and-off again lover Oliver Queen aka the Green Arrow. She has also taken on skilled martial artists such as Talia Al Ghul, Manhunter and Cheshire. She has even shown to be Wonder Woman’s equal in martial arts. Oracle aka Babraba Gordon even thinks she could take Batman down (which is definitely possible but the two have never been shown going all out in a martial arts match). While in combat, Dinah has employed many styles of martial arts:

Aikido


"Aikido" is a fairly modern martial art that was founded by Morihei Ueshiba in the early Showa period. In terms of its main components, it focuses on taijutsu (a method of using the body for self-defense), based on the ancient Japanese jujutsu (classical Japanese martial art of samurai, usually referring to fighting without a weapon), kenjutsu (samurai swordplay), Jojutsu (martial art using a cane staff) and focuses more on throwing techniques and joint-locking techniques then punching. It focuses on rational body use in order to topple any potential opponent and due to its nature of using an enemy’s own body weight and strength against them - it is Black Canary’s most used martial art.

Amazonian Martial Arts & Weaponry


Trained by the best Amazonian in the business (Wonder Woman). Dinah has become pretty skilled at using Amazonian Martial Arts while in combat, though she can’t come close to the best. She was strong enough to use an Amazonian Weapon that she was unfamiliar with to match a Depowered Wonder Woman in a fight in terms of Martial Arts. 

Boxing


Trained by fellow Justice League Member and well renowned boxer, Wildcat, Dinah has become quite skilled at Boxing style motions and combat. In terms of the Boxing Triangle it can be assumed she is more of a Swarmer - pressuring her enemy with quick attacks before finishing them though she has also displayed some Outboxer tactics as well. (she’s not really a Slugger though).

Capoeira


Due to Dinah tending to prefer kicks over punches generally, she tends to employ a lot of Caporia while in combat. For those who don’t know Capoeira is an extremely fast martial art that focuses on using quick kicks and almost dancing like movements to do sweeping attacks and taking an enemy off guard. To most people who haven’t studied Capoeira, the act of seeing it will make you think it’s more like a dance than anything else but for the experts it is an extremely unpredictable and versatile martial art. 

Dragon Style Kung Fu


Kung Fu is a term used for Chinese martial arts. However, it is also referred to any study, learning, or practice that requires patience, energy, and time to complete. Kung Fu is a martial art that originated in China in 1,111-255 B.C. during the Zhou Dynasty. In terms of Dragon Style Kung Fu, it employs the use and movements of a Dragon - focusing on quick and fast movements whilst in combat. Like most Kung Fu styles - Dragon Style Kung Fu involves more circular techniques then straight techniques. 

Hapkido


Hapkido is a Korean Martial Art that specialises in joint locks, grappling, and throwing techniques though Hapkido Masters have been known to employ kicks, punches, and other striking attacks though certain Hapkido Masters also tend to use pressure point strikes in order to disable an enemy.  Those who train in Hapkido Martial Art also specialize in using traditional weapons such as knives, swords, rope, ssang juhl bong (nunchaku), cane, short stick, and middle-length staff,etc. Users of this fighting style seek to not use brute strength to overpower brute strength but instead use footwork and body positioning to gain an advantage. 

Judo


Judo is a modern martial art that was created in Japan in 1882 by Jigoro Kano. When it comes to Judo, it focuses on throws and takedowns in order to pin an enemy to the ground or simply throw them to the ground in order to knock them out. Judo users will also try to pin the enemy on the ground in order to prevent them from moving or knock them out through pressure to the windpipe. While Judo users mostly employ throws and pins - strikes and thrusts by the hands and feet are also employed.  

Jujitsu


Jujitsu is an Japanese martial art and a method of close combat for defeating an armed and armored opponent. Considering Dinah’s line of work where she often has to fight armed foes - this martial art is extremely useful for her. Often while employing this martial art while in combat Dinah uses throws, traps, joint locks, holds, gouging, biting, disengagements, striking, and kicking while in combat. Jujitsu schools also teach the use of weapons. 

Krav Maga


Krav Maga is a military based self-defense martial art that was developed for Israel Defense Forces and Israeli security forces. It is basically a combination of martial arts in that it takes techniques from all over the martial arts spectrum - using techniques from  boxing, wrestling, aikido, judo and karate, along with realistic fight training. Krav Maga users also use
simultaneous defensive and offensive maneuvers so they are able to block and attack at the same time. Krav Maga employs the mentality of finishing fights as quickly as possible.

Muay Thai


Muay Thai is a martial art based in Thailand and is generally referred to as the "Art of Eight Limbs”. The reason why it is called that is because it makes use of punches, kicks, elbows, knee strikes and shins, thus using eight "points of contact,'' as opposed to "two points" (fists) in boxing and "four points" (hands and feet) which are generally used in other more regulated combat sports, such as kickboxing and savate. Muay Thai focuses on power, ending fights quickly with a crushing blow without leaving an exposure for a counterattack.  

Savate


Savate is a French Martial Art that uses both the hands and feet for combat while also combining elements of western style boxing and extremely graceful kick techniques which Black Canary can employ extremely well due to her graceful fighting style. In Savate, only foot kicks are allowed - preventing the use of the knees. 

Tae Kwon Do


Taekwondo is a combination of martial arts, most of which originated in Korea. Among the oldest disciplines, some of which are over 2,000 years old, that influenced the development of Taekwondo are Taek Kyon, Tae Kwonpup, Tae Kwon, T’ang-su, and Kwonpup.Taekwondo draws inspiration from . inspiration from popular martial arts like Kung-Fu (kicking techniques), Judo, and Karate (linear, abrupt movements). Whilst in combat Taekwondo users employ kicks - focuses on head-height kicks, jumping and spinning kicks, and fast kicking techniques which Black Canary often employs to great effect. 

Wing Chun


Wing Chun Kuen is a Chinese Kung Fu Style that is used mostly as a form of self-defense. Wing Chun employs quick arm movements and strong legs in order to defeat foes. Wing Chun generally focuses on speed over strength.

Pressure Point Combat


Like Batman, Black Canary has studied and used pressure points whilst in combat. Using this fighting style, she can impact an enemy’s pressure points in order to temporarily disable them and then finish them off with a swift strike.

Five Heavens Palm


This is perhaps the oddest martial art/power that Black Canary has. This ability is extremely ill-defined, but basically it channels Black Canary’s Canary Cry power into a strike. With it, she is able to summon the spirits of others (in this case it is her ancestors) to warp whomever gets hit by this attack to a place between space and time. 

Sindel

Superhuman Physicality


Sindel, like most humans throughout MK history, are unexplainably superhuman, capable of dishing out attacks and taking them with grace, on levels no real human could actually survive.

 Martial Arts


Like all other characters in Mortal Kombat, Sindel is actually quite trained in particular martial arts, including ones that weren’t formed in Earthrealm until after she died (somehow). Yet, her skill with these martial arts is unprecedented. 

Zha Chuan


One of the 5 long fist styles of kung-fu, Zha Chuan, a branch of Muslim style kung-fu, is a variation that requires the execution of both hands and legs at all times, making it one of the more difficult styles to learn, but allowing for efficient and graceful usage of all limbs during a fight.

Fu Jow Pai


Fu Jow Pai, originally known as Hark Fu Moon, is a variation of Tiger-style Chinese Martial Arts. While its history has been difficult to document, it is known that this fighting-style originated from the Hoy Hong Temple. Modeled after the style and demeanor of an attacking tiger, Fu Jow Pai focuses on quick and powerful strikes, particularly in the form of clawing and ripping techniques.

Regeneration/Extreme Survivability


Most MK characters display this ability to some extent, like Kano quickly getting up and continuing to fight after having his skull shattered by Kotal Kahn, right after having had his eye gouged inward and being just fine after the fact. There’s also Goro’s continuing to fight after having his skull shattered by Kotal wielding Shao Kahn’s Wrath Hammer. On top of this, Shujinko’s fight against Milleena in Deception has her constantly healing during the fight, though whether or not this is a trait of natural biology or Shang Tsung’s magic is unknown. While Sindel has never shown to have this ability, it is possible she does still have it, due to a variety of other weaker, non-powered characters exhibiting it.

Type 1 Immortality


As the queen of Edenia, Sindel has Type 1 Immortality, also known as “Immortality through Longevity”. This type of immortality makes a person unable to age or grow sick through most normal means. However, it’s important to note that this type of immortality does not prevent the user from being physically harmed or even killed.

Sound Magic/Inner Banshee


Sindel’s not just a powerful fighter, she’s also a very skilled magus. In MK11, it’s established that her magic comes from her “inner banshee” a sound magic representation of herself, almost akin to a soul (with some implications it actually is her soul). Through this, she’s able to use her iconic banshee screams, scream projectiles, as well as be able to control the power of sound and screams without actually having to scream. It’s unknown if this is also what makes her able to grow her hair and weaponize it somehow.

Her banshee scream is capable of tearing apart areas she points it at, as well as tear the skin, clothes, or even heads off of people.

Prehensile Hair


The second of Sindel’s iconic abilities, she can somehow use magic to grow her hair and control it to do impossible feats like toss around big men and cyborgs, as well as puncture through a human body like a hand through wet paper.

Levitation


Using banshee sound magic, she can fly into the air. Not much else to say about it really.

Soul Magic


This one is a bit more iffy to consider since she used it after being given the soul of Shang Tsung (though that’s more or less how she is throughout MK9), but basically, she could use soul manipulation in the style of her own sound magic to kill her daughter Kitana. The reason this is being mentioned is because it looks very much so like her normal magic, and some suggestive imagery in MK11 as well as the inclusion of her “inner banshee” suggests her sound manipulation may be some form of soul magic.

Suicide Ward


It’s revealed in Mortal Kombat (2011) that Sindel’s suicide created an incantation barrier that kept Shao Kahn from ever setting foot in Earthrealm. The only way this was weakened was by Quan Chi resurrecting and brainwashing her, though the barrier remained in place, which is what took Shao Kahn so long to set foot in Earthrealm at the end of MK9 so that Raiden and Liu Kang could have a fight, even though he was already more or less one foot out the door of the portal.

Teleportation


Through sending out her inner banshee, Sindel can choose to teleport to wherever it is.

Feats

Black Canary

Accomplishments


Power


Speed


Durability

Sindel

Accomplishments
  • Ruled over Edenia for hundreds of years
  • Helped Quan Chi free Shinnok
  • Led the Lin Kuei forces’ attack against the Earthrealm Defenders
  • As a revenant, battled and nearly defeated Takeda Takahashi and Jacqui Briggs, alongside Kitana, Kung Lao, Liu Kang, and Smoke
  • Fought against Raiden as a revenant twice
  • When enhanced beyond her usual level, defeated and killed several of Earthrealm’s Defenders in very few hits (In particular: Sonya Blade, Johnny Cage, Jax, Kabal, Stryker, Smoke, Cyber Sub-Zero, Jade, and Kitana)
  • Ruled over what was left of Edenia after Shao Kahn was killed in MK3 and Edenia was no longer merged with Outworld
  • In her non canonical MK11 ending, uses Kronika’s crown powered by the Well of Souls as well as Kronika’s hourglass to fuse every timeline and subjugate everything
  • In the original timeline, managed to eventually resist Kahn’s control over her through the love she has for her daughter
  • Trained Shujinko in her fighting styles, weapon, and abilities

Power


Speed

  • Flies over a temple in couple of seconds 
  • Should be comparable to bullet timers like Johnny Cage and Reptile
  • Should be comparable to Sub-Zero, who can outpace missiles and explosions
  • Potentially comparable to Quan Chi, who reacted to Raiden’s lightning, though the consistency of this is debatable

Durability



Weaknesses

Black Canary


Black Canary is a tough fighter, but it’s important to note that despite being a metahuman, she’s still only a human, meaning she can still be hurt the same way as a normal human or affected the same as them. Her armor can protect her, but it can only do so much. Her Canary Cry can also be stopped if she is strangled or unable to talk for any reason. But if there’s one thing that really hurts Black Canary, it’s that everyone to bare the name has met a gruesome demise.

She’s also known to be extremely headstrong and brash, often rushing into situations without considering the possible risks. This is an especially common problem in the Birds of Prey comics, to the point that Oracle has often had to stop her from doing so on multiple occasions.

Sindel


Sindel may be powerful in Mortal Kombat, but she unfortunately suffers from the same issue that a lot of other members of the Mortal Kombat cast suffer from: intense amounts of jobbing. Sindel has lost to far weaker opponents she should normally beat, such as Jax or Cassie Cage. A lot of her most notable victories have involved various one-time power-ups, without which she’s not nearly as strong. On top of that, Sindel’s backstory was screwed over in MK11.

Summary

Black Canary


Advantages:
  • Likely faster
  • Variety of gadgets to keep Sindel occupied
  • More martial arts at her disposal
  • Can counter Sindel’s Banshee Scream with her own
  • Has fought opponents with far better stats than Sindel, including those who use magic
  • Has fought other sound users before
  • Is better trained than Sindel
  • Her Cry is likely more powerful than Sindel’s Scream as an extension of Canary’s will
  • Scaling them as high as possible, Canary dominates the stat trio

Disadvantages: 
  • Cancelling Sindel’s screams may be difficult due to their magical nature, as well as Sindel’s ability to control the method in which it comes out and takes shape
  • Has also lost to opponents far weaker than Sindel
  • Can’t scream if suffocated in any way (though she potentially still has sonic disruptors)

Sindel


Advantages
  • More experienced, especially with both timelines combined
  • Teleporting is extremely helpful against Canary Cry and martial arts 
  • Soul manipulation is an ability Canary has no counter to
  • Prehensile hair can be used to suffocate or gag Canary
  • Inner Banshee can make the fight more of a two on one battle
  • Can control screams without using her mouth thanks to inner banshee magic
  • Has taken on opponents more powerful than Canary

Disadvantages: 
  • Doesn’t stack up in terms of equipment
  • Outclassed in hand to hand both in variety and skill
  • Controlling Canary’s Cry may not work due to the nature of Black Canary’s abilities
  • Has also lost to opponents far weaker than Canary
  • Has never fought another sound user, outside of training Shujinko
  • Banshee Scream can likely be canceled out by Canary Cry
  • Horribly retconned in the new timeline

Verdicts 

Malcolm Belmont


Hello, Malcolm Belmont here - back for another G1DBFB Prediction.As for this matchup, I have seen a fair amount of people are extremely lukewarm when it comes to this matchup, especially considering that we just had Static in a DEATH BATTLE. On the other hand, I personally disagree with this as I have really enjoyed talking about this matchup on the G1DBFB Discord..in terms of how i would sum it up in one image….

Anyway, I also really had a lot of fun researching the martial arts aspect of Black Canary. For this matchup I am going to take a different approach from what I usually do. Previously I would mostly focus on stats but for this matchup I think the stat gap could honestly go either way depending on how you interpret certain feats plus the other Verdicts are likely going to go into more detail regarding the stats portion but if you want a TLDR 

I think Sindel has the edge in speed scaling to Kotal Khan (the Speed Feat for Kotal was posted in the blog) who was beaten by Shao Khan in MK11. Kitana in turn beat Shao Khan in MK11 and Sindel beat Kitana in MK9. Considering it was the past version of Kitana who beat Shao Khan - you could definitely scale Sindel to Shao Khan. If this feat is accepted then Sindel would be Relativistic compared to Black Canary who has fought and reacted to bullet dodgers like Kitana, so using that feat Ki. In terms of Destructive Capability i could see this going either way but Sindel would definitely scale to Restricted Raiden who could easily create storms and mowed down Netherrealm forces by summoning Thunder Clouds. This feat easily put him at City Level and considering Sindel tanked attacks from him - he should scale. As for Black Canary, she should at least scale to the likes of Batman and Kitana who have displayed Building Level feats/Potential Multi-City Block Level Feats. As for the whole argument on if Black Canary should scale to Heralds - the answer at least to me is a big fat “NO”. She had never shown capable of beating any Herald Level opponents and even when she knocked them out - it was due to her Canary Cry’s disorientating screech not her own destructive capability. As such I would be against scaling her to Heralds. Also the 300 Decibels Feat, while we definitely did include in the blog - is a bit questionable considering she has never displayed anything close to that level in combat and Comic Book Science in general can be questionable - mind you, I do think it is possible that DEATH BATTLE will use that and give her Mountain Level Destructive Capability which if used would put her way above Sindel but i am going under the assumption they won’t. Ultimately in terms of stats - I think Sindel has the edge but it could definitely go either way if DEATH BATTLE interprets certain feats. 

So let’s talk about the subject I want to talk about regarding this matchup the most, their abilities and powers.The reason why i think Sindel has this is because her magical abilities are a lot more versatile than Black Canary (Black Canary does have more equipment though) and a lot of her abilities straight up counter Black Canary’s (though Black Canary does have a counter for Sindel’s Screech which i will talk about later). First let’s talk about Black Canary’s main weakness, that being if her throat is injured or damaged then her Canary Cry will become far less effective then it previously had been. So the question remains, does Sindel have anything she can use in order to damage her throat to prevent her Cry? The answer is obviously yes. One of Sindel’s main abilities is her which is able to easily wrap around enemies and throw them around. We know that Sindel is strong enough to easily lift and hold an enemy in place so it would definitely be same to assume Sindel would be able to use her hair in order to quickly and easily crush Black Canary’s throat which would make it very difficult for her to use her Sonic Screech. Sindel on the other hand, does not have the same restriction placed on her and can use the Sonic Screech anytime she wants. In this fight i could definetly see Sindel going straight for the throat - it’s not like she’s dumb - she ruled as Queen and was able to fight on the level of intellgent fighters such as Kitana, she will likely figure out Black Canary’s weakness and then crush her throat making her Sonic Scream significantly weaker.

 So without her Canary Cry - Black Canary can still beat her if she relied on her martial arts, right? Well not really - while Black Canary is an extremely experienced martial art with many martial arts under her belt (as listed in the blog), most if not all of her martial arts she uses while in combat are extremely close range meaning she is going to have to go in at punching distance in order to beat Sindel. Well unfortunately for her Sindel has several options to get around Canary’s martial arts training - first you obviously have her Hair which Sindel can use as a means of keeping Canary at a constant distance since Sindel should be much faster. Secondly there is Sindel’s flight, unlike Canary who outside of scream lifting is stuck to the ground while Sindel is able to fly any time she wants, this will allow her to keep out of Black Canary’s range and blast her screeches until Canary falls down. Finally there is Sindel’s Teleportation, Black Canary is not going to have an easy time hitting her when she can literally teleport in order to dodge most if not all of her attacks. 

With these three factors into consideration, it’s going to be difficult for Black Canary to actually land a hit on her without her Sonic Cry (though to be fair to her, her sonic bombs help her in that regard) while Sindel can stay out of her range and blast her. Even terms of Equipment - while Black Canary has batons, Sindel has a spear which she can easily use to screw her at a distance and it’s not like Canary has a great healing factor where she can easily repair damage. 

Even when taking into account that Canary has a membrane that reduces sound based attacks - it’s not like she is completely immune to sound and Sindel’s screech is strong enough to blow up an entire head while Black Canary at her max can cause significant damage to the brain. Sindel’s screech could easily be enough to damage Black Canary despite the membrane. 

While I could see DEATH BATTLE taking this fight either way, ultimately I think Sindel has the right abilities, stats and has enough counters to anything that Black Canary can throw at her that ultimately in a hard fought battle - Sindel will take the win in the end. Looks like Dinah will Canary Cry for the very last time at the hands of the Queen. 

RadioactiveCaffeine

[crop output image]
(I don’t have a fitting song for this fight, but in honor of it, here’s some of my favorite screamo songs from one of my favorite bands.)

To no one’s surprise, I’m here to give my opinion on this fight and where these two lie in terms of stats. This fight is a bit more complicated than most MK or DC matches, where a lot of this potentially comes down to the scaling you allow either of these two and the justifications behind it.

Both these series are known to have inconsistencies and both Sindel and Canary sit on the throne of it in their respective verses, with Canary being an undecided character in DC as either metahuman or herald tier, and whether or not the feats Sindel has implying she scales to high tier characters in MK, as well as her terrible retcon in MK11, though that in particular has little influence here. 

Being the huge MK fan that I am, I admittedly know more about Sindel’s situation than Dinah’s, and with the knowledge I do have for Sindel, I find it hard not to have an argument for her scaling to high tiers with all that she’s done and the people she’s challenged. She’s taken hits lethal hits from both Shao Kahn and Shang Tsung, with intent to kill, and through scaling to Shang Tsung, she potentially scales to Cetrion who was defeated by a portion of Shang Tsung’s power (the Well of Souls) being used by one of the potentially weakest characters in MK, that being Jacqui Briggs. To further back up the scaling to Shao Kahn, she should also scale to her daughter, who kills him in the reboot timeline. In the original timeline, Sindel lets herself get kidnapped by Kitana because she worries about hurting her should she resist. In the reboot timeline she kills Kitana, albeit after being empowered by all the souls Shang Tsung contained in him, plus his own. On top of this she fights Raiden twice in the reboot timeline and Fujin once in it, with her leaving both harmed by the end of the fights.

Of course the powers of Shao Kahn and Cetrion are nothing to scoff at, since Shao Kahn is capable of merging realms and shoplifting planet Earth into Outworld, while Cetrion can grow to a size larger than the planet and is responsible for the split of the original infinitely sized universe into the many realms after murdering the One Being and storing pieces of him into the Kamidogu.

The usual evidence given against this scaling is characters like Jax beating her, but my rebuttal is typically just going to end up being that I believe a lot of MK’s mid tiers aren’t too far off from the top tiers in terms of power (plus Jax OHKOd Quan Chi), which would explain the multiple feats of scaling mid tiers all have to high/top tiers throughout MK, akin to most of Guilty Gear’s mid tiers being allowed scaling to Jack-O and her Scales of Juno, which funnily enough, gives her multiversal stats due to having the power of someone capable of surviving the merging of two universes. I figure if that can be given to most Guilty Gear mid tiers, then MK can probably get it too, especially since realm merging is a very common feat throughout the series thanks to Shao Kahn, with realm merging being something constantly maintained by his powers. This is displayed when all the realms Shao Kahn merged with Outworld (including Earthrealm and Edenia) broke free from this the moment Shao Kahn died. (And before it comes up, no Earthrealm isn’t just the globe. To add onto this, the reason Ed Boon says Earthrealm doesn’t encompass the whole universe is likely because Earthrealm is just a piece of the original infinitely sized universe that the Elder Gods had split into multiple realms)

Now, in terms of Canary, I don’t really know what to say in particular. She has many feats of scaling to herald tier DC characters while also being known as one of their street levelers and struggling against mere meta-humans such as herself. She’s a comic character with decades of different media and writers, and it shows. So based off of that, I legitimately cannot give an answer as to how powerful she is, without there being some argument against it. It’s entirely dependent on how the writing wants to perceive her at any given time. Going off of her own feats without scaling to heralds? She should be town to city level. Give her scaling to heralds? She’s multiversal. Obviously it wouldn’t be right to have her rely on her own feats without scaling when most of Sindel’s feats come from scaling, but Canary’s scaling, I would argue, is more inconsistent, due to the nature of comics.

In terms of weapons and abilities, I’d say both have about the same amount of control, variety, and range with their scream powers. In regards to Canary cancelling sound pitches with her own screams, I’m not sure it’d work on Sindel due to her sound manipulation being magical in nature, as well as her control over it being so precise as to manifest it as another one of herself, and compress it. After this, I’d argue that Canary should have an edge in weapons in fighting styles, though Sindel’s control over her hair could help keep the range in ways that don’t require her to use her sound manipulation. In terms of actual movement versatility, I’d argue Sindel has a slight edge due to flight that doesn’t constantly need to be maintained by her screaming and teleportation.

As for where this all leaves me in the end? I have no real fucking clue. In the end, like most Vs Matches, this kind of just comes down to power more than anything else, which can vary for the two heavily based on what you allow them. A lot of this in the end is just up to the interpretation of those who are in charge of this fight. In my personal opinion, I find it hard to believe that Canary can scale to heralds, while Sindel should logically have some scaling to MK high tiers, but that would also admittedly be somewhat biased, because there’s evidence to suggest that Canary also scales to DC’s high tiers. In the end, it’s just personal interpretation, but based on my own, I guess Sindel would end up winning. Could go either way, but given how MK’s scaling has been handled in the past on Death Battle, if I were betting money on who would win in the episode it’d be Black Canary. Normally however, these things are made to be more about who we think *should* win more so than who we think *will* win. 

With that said, I believe Sindel will make Dinah “Canary Cry” for mommy.



Swiftwind/Wolf/MLDKF


This one was a bit of a tough one to try and judge. Both Black Canary have ridiculous things they can do, and are both pretty impressive among their peers in their games. Black Canary’s one of the more well known DC Comics B-Listers, especially thanks to her relationship with Green Arrow as well as the Birds of Prey comics, but Sindel has always been at least a decently popular character since her appearance in MK3. In terms of stats, that’s where things get...dicey

Okay, so, since this episode got announced, we’ve been debating on this one for quite some time. Just before scaling, these two are pretty close, with Canary maybe barely edging out Sindel thanks to the precision and power her screams have, which Sindel has never really shown the ability to do in the games without a SERIOUS power boost. But using scaling and other sources, I’m pretty sure it’s safe to say Canary dominates considering she can stand up to some of DC’s Heralds while Sindel’s scaling is very tricky and kind of hard to work with, and even then is nothing compared to what Canary’s got.

In terms of actual abilities these two have, I’d say Sindel does have an advantage. While Canary is a capable fighter, that prehensile hair could easily incapacitate her. Canary’s got weapons and attacks that can counter some of what Sindel has, but just from abilities alone, Sindel does have an advantage (though that Five Heavens Palm is pretty much an instant win move if Canary can hit Sindel with it). Mentally, however, I’d say Canary has the advantage. Sindel, like previous villains in MK before her (at least when she is a villain) has a MASSIVE arrogance problem, and can sometimes toy with her opponents unless she has a reason not to (like all of them rushing her at once). But then again, Dinah is a very hotheaded person and can sometimes get herself in trouble (at least in Birds of Prey)

Like I said, this is a tough one, but I think I’m going to go with Dinah on this one. Just her scaling to people like Superboy, Shazam, and Wonder Woman alone is far greater than anything Sindel’s ever done, and Canary’s sheer drive to keep going, even when in extreme pain is too much for Sindel. Outworld’s queen will feel the noise of Canary’s Cry.

Clockboxxer


Aight so Byleth’s alright to play not my cup of tea but some cool things you can do with em

Anyway, Miles vs Static was pretty cool. Expectations were a bit higher, but what we got is a good season opener. Glad I got my prediction right and such.

Anyway, not gonna say as much with this one, kinda bores me. Episode 3 is reportedly pretty cool, so I’m looking forward to whatever that may be. At least Swan’s writing this one, so the fight has some potential to be cool.

Prediction time.

Basically, both these gals have some nice non-stat advantages on their side. Sindel has soul manipulation, teleportation, her hair, experience and freaky screamo banshee magic. Canary likely wins a straight hand to hand confrontation, I’m inclined to say her screams are stronger, she has some neat gadgets, and has seen characters like Sindel before.

To me, these advantages pretty much cancel each other out. Sindel has soul manipulation and can possibly gag Canary, which is cool, but Dinah’s got sonic disruptors, her own scream can probably cancel out Sindel, and her hand to hand skills are killer in comparison.

Scaling’s a mess for these two. The basic stuff gives Canary an edge in all 3 stats, while going higher up is something else. These franchises are mega inconsistent. Overall, I’d say that if you scale Sindel to gods, you can also scale Canary to heralds (which I’d argue is more consistent). This would still give Canary the overall edge. Getting into the 300 decibels stuff and temple destruction and nanoseconds and storms and yada yada is also the same thing. Canary has the edge.

In the end, Sindel has some cool stuff on her side, but I gotta go with Dinah for her stats being better in multiple scaling scenarios as well as her arsenal and hand to hand skill.

Also, I really don’t see the actual battle ending in Sindel’s victory on the 9th. I guess this bird just put the Queen of Edenia to a screeching halt. See ya next time.

(Episode 3 is what catches my intrigue the most can’t lie to you I hope it’s heat like Ash vs Lucy or sumthin idk)

UPDATE: Sneak Peek and OST is decent so far




Sgrigger03

I was brought on to the blog this time around since I had done this fight as a written death battle about a year ago.  https://www.deviantart.com/sgrigger03/art/Black-Canary-vs-Sindel-Prelude-749107240
Because of this, I am super excited regardless of the verdict having been part of this blog and seeing if I predicted the future.  In my written fight, Canary wins having been better trained in martial arts. Her Cry is far more powerful and versatile than Sindel’s and allows her to do things that even the more powerful Justice League characters used to be required to do.  She has taken on and defeated opponents that surpass Sindel in every category from strength and speed to magic as well. While my fellow bloggers have found stuff for Sindel that I missed, they also did the same for Canary and nothing really has changed the outcome I’ve seen.  I think we really need look no further than Dinah’s two fights with Black Alice to see how this fight with Sindel will truly turn out. Sindel has far more disadvantages compared to Canary’s overwhelming amount of advantage for this fight. While it will look close and should easily be a terrific fight, Canary can take any non-fatality blow Sindel dishes out with a tenacity Sindel has never seen before and Canary can counter a number of Sindel’s fatalities as well.  Canary has what she needs to beat Sindel and I firmly now more than before believe that our Bird of Prey swoop down, end Queen Sindel’s reign of Kombat, and send her off Cry-ing.

Kingsly


Slightly surprised by how much discussion this match-up garnered. There’s a lot of variables that go into it though, so it’s understandable.
Regardless, quick rundown.

Stats for these two series are pretty controversial, but giving them both what’s generally universally accepted, Canary should solidly reach multi-city block level with quadruple-digit mach speeds. This mainly comes from scaling to Batman character who she’s kept up with before, such as Batman himself surviving numerous multi-city block level explosions, Katana slicing bullets at massively hypersonic speeds, or Deathstroke tagging Geo-Force, who flew into orbit at over mach 1000. Sindel gets lower, with building level power from Kintaro surviving a huge explosion and Kotal Kahn obliterating a boat, as well as supersonic speeds as numerous characters have dodged bullets and outran rockets. She potentially scales to Quan Chi blocking a lightning bolt as well, though this is arguably an outlier. Sindel is likely more experienced to an unknowable degree, but Canary is no slouch in that front either and should be a far more skilled fighter, and has more experience fighting other sound users compared to Sindel. Sindel is arguably more versatile with soul manipulation and prehensile hair, but that isn’t enough to close the gap. Just giving them these stats, Canary should take it fairly handily.

The trouble is that both these characters can be argued as much stronger though. The Canary Cry has a history of hurting people on the level of Superman, Canary has a statement of her moving at speeds relative to a nanosecond, and the Canary Cry has been stated to be as strong as a hurricane and supposedly has a 300 decibel volume. She even has feats of dodging blasts of actual light. Personally though, I can’t say I particularly support using any of this. While the Canary Cry has hurt people on the level of heralds quite a few times, in every other instance, Canary is depicted as being only a street-tier character. There have been countless instances of a bloodlusted Canary attacking characters such as Batman and Green Arrow with her cry, and them being able to survive it. She’s had her own cries reflected at her before many times, and has always been able to withstand it, yet she can still be hurt by people such as the aforementioned Bats and Arrow. Those “300 decibels”, nanosecond timing and hurricane comparisons are only statements with no real feats to support the cry or Canary herself being that strong. Hell, the 300 decibels scene shows a regular civilian being able to survive the cry at that volume. These instances far outnumber the showings of the Canary Cry as stronger than street tier, so ultimately I feel like it’s better to stick to what’s consistent and dismiss these showings. The same applies to her potentially relativistic speed feats. 

On the flip-side, the arguments for Sindel being stronger are slightly more complicated. In Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, her scream destroys an entire valley of temples, with the novelisation claiming she did so on an atomic level. A dubious-canon comic released alongside Mortal Kombat 4 depicts her surviving an explosion that was visible and caused shaking up to 500 miles away. I’ve even seen arguments for her scaling to unrestricted Elder Gods, due to Kitana defeating Shao Kahn, the restriction on Elder Gods being vague, and Shang Tsung’s Well of Souls being able to power up characters to the point of fighting Cetrion. Even on a lesser level, Raiden has showings of potentially creating storms, and characters in-gameplay can move in-tandem with Kotal Kahn’s beam of light. Again though, I can’t say I find these to be legit. The explosion feat from the comic has far too many caveats to be usable to me, such as the fodder demons and guards surviving the explosion too, the explosion causing barely any damage to the actual building it was in, and it’s size and power being very inconsistent. The current calcs for Raiden’s storm showings all have rather inflated values, and ignore things such as the horizon being obscured, Raiden being amped in some instances, and it being unclear as to whether Raiden caused some of these storms in the first place. Kotal Kahn’s light-timing is exclusive to gameplay and contradicts a larger number of low-ends from the actual story. Scaling her to Elder Gods also has too many qualifiers for me to accept it. The lore regarding what the restriction for Elder Gods actually does is vague and inconsistent, there are several unknown factors as to how much power different items and characters actually drew from the Well of Souls, and realm merging is most likely simply done through specific abilities so it’s unclear if it should actually scale to the physicality of these characters. Admittedly, the canyon feat from the movie is harder to dismiss, as it’s a fairly direct showing, but the movie takes place in a completely different continuity to the main-series Mortal Kombat games. Even the atomisation statement comes not from the movie itself, but from its novelisation, making it a tertiary feat at best. Given that, I’m not sure how comfortable I’d be with using it for Sindel, especially as it’s quite a bit above her canonical showings and essentially changes the verdict for this match-up completely depending on how you view Canary.

In essence though, even if you were to give both of these characters the full benefit of the doubt, Canary should likely still win. She would at minimum match Sindel’s speed, if not likely be far faster, and her showings of harming Superman-tier characters and surviving her own cry would make her vastly more powerful than Sindel, even with scaling to the Elder Gods. After all, many Superman-tier characters have durability and power feats in the range of solar-system level to even universal and beyond, giving her greater power than Sindel to the point where it alone would be enough for her to win. Overall, you’d have to be lenient with Sindel and her stats while giving her opponent the bare minimum for Canary to not take the victory. Apologies for the shorter verdict, and also for once again not being able to come up with a pun.

Speedycal

Hey.
Wasn’t originally gonna do a verdict for this because the matchup is kinda meh, but given there’s actually been a fair amount of discussion regarding the outcome, I figured I’d chime in. I’ll be keeping things short though.
To be blunt, Black Canary is inconsistent as hell (varies from being a peer to Batman to being a peer to Wonder Woman depending on the story), and nobody can agree on Mortal Kombat stats. Because of this, the stat breakdown for each character is going to vary greatly depending on who you ask.
However, here’s the thing.
If you go with what’s definitely legit: Batman scaling > Basic bitch MK feats that nobody disagrees with.
If you go with what’s iffy but still arguable: 300 decibels, hurricane statement, and nanosecond timing > Raiden storm creation, canyon atomizing, and Kotal Kahn light timing stuff.
If you go balls-to-the-wall with scaling: Scaling to DC heralds > Scaling to unrestricted gods.
As long as you maintain some level of consistency with what you accept, Black Canary pretty much stays above Sindel in stats no matter what, so she should win.
Also, she’s 99.9% going to win the episode lol.


12 comments:

  1. I think we did a pretty good job with this one :D

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  2. Actually surprised some of you picked Sindel.

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  3. I know some editing errors were in this one, but this was still a good prediction. I can not wait to see the winner for tomorrow as I know the fight is going to be a close one.

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  4. Nice. Definitely not the result I was expecting (a 2.4 Gigaton scream wtf!?) still gonna be an epic episode. Any theories on who's gonna be announced next before the fight?

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  5. I am kinda undecided because there are great reasons both of them would win. Which for me is unusual for this show.

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  6. how do i get into the G1DBFB discord if you dont mind me asking

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    1. Usually the best way you can join the G1DBFB is by joining the DEATH BATTLE Cast Discord and if there is a matchup you are intrested in - you can ask us to add you to the discuss for that DB

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  7. > In Mortal Kombat: Annihilation, her scream destroys an entire valley of temples, with the novelisation claiming she did so on an atomic level. A dubious-canon comic released alongside Mortal Kombat 4 depicts her surviving an explosion that was visible and caused shaking up to 500 miles away.

    > The explosion feat from the comic has far too many caveats to be usable to me, such as the fodder demons and guards surviving the explosion too, the explosion causing barely any damage to the actual building it was in, and it’s size and power being very inconsistent.

    Hmm, I wonder where you fellas got that from: https://redd.it/evhwtg

    You'll be hearing from my lawyers. /s

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  8. Are you sure? Cause you use the same imgur links for the MK4 comic scans that I created for that post and that are only in that post.

    I don’t care at all that you guys used it, but at least don’t lie.

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    1. Kingsly, the person you quoted, here. Yeah I can’t speak for everybody else, but I at least saw that post, and thought the arguments against the feat at made sense so I wrote in that description. Apologies for any confusion lol. Though tbf it’s one of those feats that just falls apart off you think about it for more and more time.

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  9. You guys do great work! I'm looking forward to your Goro vs Machamp break down as I keep going back and forth on that one. I know very little about Pokemon, but from what I've seen and researched myself, Machamp may have many advantages over Goro. That being said, Scaling Goro to Raiden and other characters may add some interesting things to the mix that I'm not accounting for.

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