Have you ever wondered who would win a fight between the two most powerful Avengers, Hulk and Thor? Who would win if Thor couldn’t use his hammer? Who would win if the Hulk didn’t have to worry about “puny Banner” entering into the equation? Who would win between the two forces of nature if the fight took place in the 90s? With news that Mark Ruffalo is in final negotiations to join Thor: Ragnarok as Bruce Banner, we look at the top fights between the Green Goliath and the God of Thunder and hopefully answer a few of these questions. We'll find out if Hulk and Thor battle it out in live action when Thor: Ragnarok opens November 3, 2017.

Journey Into Mystery #112

One of the first times that the two titans tussled was back in 1965 with "Journey Into Mystery #112", which was Thor’s titular book at the time. In this story, the general populace was seemingly arguing amongst each another over who would win in a fight between Thor and the Hulk on the street, one side holding masks of Thor and the other, masks of Hulk. Conveniently, Thor, who was flying over one of these arguments at the time, sat everyone down and gave a firsthand account of what happened when he went toe to toe with Bruce Banner’s angrier side. In the early career of the Avengers, once the Hulk had been booted from the team for being the Hulk, he joined up with Sub-Mariner and the two essentially became super-villains. That’s right, for a little while, the Hulk and Subby did their best to topple the Avengers and “destroy the surface world” for all the “injustices” they had suffered.

As the fight between Thor and Hulk began in this retelling, Thor talked with his dad, Odin, and asked if he could arrange it so that Thor couldn’t use his hammer, Mjolnir, for five minutes so he could create an even playing field for the Hulk during the fight. Thor, obviously, was insane at this point because you would think that he would get his butt handed to him pretty easily against the Hulk without his ability to fly, summon lightning, or one of the many powers he gets from his mystical hammer, but surprisingly, he holds his own. While Thor isn’t exactly on the same level as the Hulk in terms of brute strength, he’s pretty close, and considering he has thousands of years of fighting experience over the Hulk, he’s no pushover. The fight goes back and forth between the two and they are eventually separated, without a winner being clearly chosen.

Incredible Hulk #440

If you ever want to play a fun game, pick one of your favorite comic book characters and see what they looked like in the 90s. "Incredible Hulk #440" has Hulk and Thor looking pretty different from how they look today, with Thor having an extremely different costume and the Hulk being a different shade of green, sporting a full beard. While Thor’s wardrobe change isn’t as well explained, there is a reason as to why the Hulk looks the way he does in this story. If you don’t know, there’s a bit of “Hulk lore” wherein Bruce Banner, in an alternate future, becomes a despot, killing most of the other superheroes on the planet and calling himself, “The Maestro”. Whether this will ever make it into the Marvel movies, who knows? Perhaps this version of the Hulk will be the antagonist of Thor: Ragnarok? Anyway, during this particular time, the Hulk was slowly becoming the Maestro, isolating himself and catching the eyes of the U.S. Army once again.

Thor discovers that the Hulk is hiding out in the Antarctic and decides that his behavior warrants a hammer to the face. The battle is a pretty knock-down, drag-out affair, with neither party holding anything back. The fight ends, much like the previous entry, without a definitive winner since as things were winding down, the military decides to end it themselves by firing a nuke directly at the Hulk. Thor is saved from the blast, as the Hulk has a change of heart and literally punches him out of the way of the nuclear bomb, but the Hulk takes the full brunt of the blast. Of course, the Green Giant isn’t killed by this, and is alive to fight the God of Thunder another day.

Hulk Vs.

While not taking place in the comic books proper, the direct-to-video animated Marvel outing Hulk vs. proved to be one of the best fights between the Hulk and Thor that we’ve seen. Tired of seeing his brother loved by everyone in Asgard, Loki decides to end the brotherly rivalry once and for all by kidnapping Bruce Banner, and using magic to separate him from the Hulk. For those who don’t know, the strongest interpretation of the Hulk has always been the version where Bruce Banner wasn’t involved in the equation. The Hulk’s strength comes from how angry he is, so without Banner to mediate his endless rage, he becomes the strongest character by leaps and bounds. Loki unleashes the Hulk upon Asgard, taking down nearly every god he comes into contact with until Thor enters the fray.

The two combatants get some really good hits on each other, with Loki taking the steering wheel of the Hulk’s mind. The best moment in particular is when Loki, in Hulk’s body, attempts to lift Thor’s hammer, to no avail. Thor takes the hammer back and unleashes an onslaught of lightning, severing the tie between Loki and the Hulk, which of course makes Hulk even stronger. Hulk nearly beats Thor to death before leaving to smash Asgard even further, with the fight eventually continuing into the Asgardian afterlife of Hel. This is far and away the best Hulk/Thor fight we’ve seen in motion, even including the original one from Marvel Studios' The Avengers, so check it out when you get the chance.

Fear Itself

This fight is just bananas. The God of Fear has returned, and in doing so, has decided to recruit some acolytes via individual hammers. One of the folks who find themselves under his control is none other than the Hulk. Picking up one of the hammers, the Hulk becomes “Nul, Breaker of Worlds” and finally has a hammer of his own to fight Thor with. The two eventually trade blows with one another, with even the Thing, who was also possessed, joining the Hulk to knock Thor’s lights out. Even with the odds stacked against him, Thor actually manages to win the fight against these two powerhouses by knocking the Hulk into outer space, with Bruce Banner landing back to Earth.

"Fear Itself" wasn’t exactly the greatest story ever told, with many fans considering "Fear Itself" to be one of the worst Marvel crossovers, but this fight is worth the price of admission as Thor and Hulk went hammer to hammer against each other. This is also another possibility for what Thor: Ragnarok could be as having a possessed Hulk holding a hammer on screen would be something worth seeing.