I just picked up a copy of the Watchmen DVD, and I was quite impressed, I was expecting another formulaic “BatSpiderSuperMan” movie clone, boy was I wrong…
…I could have done without the Full Frontal Doc. M views though…
I tended to empathize with Rorshack out of all the characters, we have very similar views on criminals…
I was thinking, Nite Owl II has a similar M.O. to Bats, lots of gadgets to make up for the lack of actual Super abilities, so…
in a battle, who would win, Bats or NO II, both are appropriately prepared
Battle 1; NO II Vs. Bats, direct conflict between the two of them to see who is superior
Battle 2; direct competition to see who can stop the most criminals
I’d give it to Batman; the whole point of the “if he’s prepared” cliché is that he excels at rigging up specialized counterweapons tailored for particular opponents. Nite Owl doesn’t really show any signs of doing that; he’s just about having general-purpose gear on hand. (It’s excellent general-purpose gear; he could plausibly win a no-prep-time fight against Batman, if neither of them is expecting anything when it suddenly goes down and one guy is behind armor plate ready to blanket the area in sonics or whatever. But he’s not really a Batman-style tactician.)
Night Owl is too old to take on Batman one-on-one – he’s in his forties*; while Batman never seems to age to 30. Batman just has to wait until he tires out.
Though it strikes me that Night Owl never gets into a hand-to-hand fight, anyway.
*He’s implied to be so in the comic; the reference is to Ozymandias, but due to the structure of the scene it also refers to Night Owl.
Keep in mind that Bruce keeps himself in top condition and knows seventeen different ways to kill you with his pinky(not that he’d actually use them) Dan’s kinda let himself go a bit and seems to be more of a brawler when the time comes to get his knuckles bloody.
Going by the numbers, the Flying Mouse takes it, but probably not easily.
If we’re talking about NO from the movie, yes he will have his feathers plucked. NO from the novel gets the tar beat out of him until he remembers the laser pen in his pocket.
Comic book Nite-Owl does tend to carry some fairly lethal gear on him. The Owlship is equipped with a flamethrower, and he attacks Ozymandius with some sort of hand-held laser weapon.
But yeah, he’s out-of-shape and out-of-practice. Even in his prime he was much more gadget-based than Batman is. He is a competent hand-to-hand fighter (remember him and Silk Spectre beating up a group of street punks on their own, after being caught unaware), but Batman is one of the most accomplished fighters on his planet.
Another big plus for Batman is that he’s used to dealing with foes who are vastly more powerful than he. In his world, he fights supervillains with actual superpowers (Clayface, Killer Croc, Poison Ivy) and all sorts of menaces alongside the Justice League.
Nite-Owl’s only experience with a superpowered individual is Dr. Manhattan.
Also, note than when Nite-Owl does get in a fight with his physical superior - even though he gets the drop on him and has backup in the form of Rorschach - he is thoroughly trounced within seconds.
NO from the movie has one as well – it’s just that OH MY GOD HE’S FLINGING A CHAIR AT ME, and then it’s gone, same as in the novel. (If anything, though, I’d figure the movie version of NO is shown to be a better martial artist than his comic-book counterpart: dropping multiple opponents in rapid succession, effortlessly breaking people’s bones, all of it.)
Batman, AFAIK, isn’t fast enough to sight and catch a speeding bullet. Ozymandias does it some time after casually batting another bullet away with a handy ashtray.