Batman vs The Seven: could he win with no prep time?

Could Batman defeat The Seven? With prep time, I think it's easy. Without it, it becomes a lot closer, and a lot more likely The Seven win. They're one of the worst superhero teams out there, although you definitely can't call them heroes, and it would be up to Batman to stop them and put them down.

The Seven are the superhero team from The Boys (2019), the series starring Karl Urban, Jack Quaid and Antony Starr. They're clearly a parody of the Justice League, so many of the same archetypes show up. To see how Batman matches up, it helps to look first at what he brings, then at each member of the team.

Batman's strength, durability and speed put him above peak human

I want to give Batman his flowers. He trained himself until he reached peak human physical levels, then shattered all records and went beyond peak human. He's strong enough to bench press over 1,000 pounds, rip through metal, or knock around things that easily weigh multiple tons. He uses that strength in his punches and kicks, regularly knocking down walls, kicking through metal, knocking out metahumans and sending people flying dozens of feet with one strike.

He might not look it, and he's supposed to be a normal human, but you can say that whatever Captain America can do, Batman can pull off something similar. Steve might ultimately be a bit stronger, but Bruce is well within that super soldier range. His durability is greater than you'd think, especially with his armor. Out of the armor, he has taken some nasty beatings, even an attack or two from Wonder Woman.

He regularly takes hits from strong opponents: Venom amped Banes, Deathstrokes, and heavier hitters like Professor Zoom, Aquaman and even Superman. Those last two were either mind controlled or furious, so they weren't holding back much, yet Batman survived, even if he came out bloodied. He's also incredibly fast and agile, far beyond Olympic level athletes, to the point where normal people move in slow motion to him. He has routinely dodged bullets, even automatic machine gun fire and shots at point blank range. He might call himself a normal human, but I think he's moved past that by now.

Batman is arguably the world's best fighter, with gadgets to match

Batman is arguably the world's best fighter, and if you don't want to put him at the very top, you can count on one hand the people better than him. He has become a master in every form of combat, including many alien fighting styles. He can react without thinking and predict an opponent's next move before even they know it, switching styles on the fly to counter and take them down.

He has fought some of the best martial artists in the world, the likes of Lady Shiva, Bronze Tiger, Owlman and Karate Kid, and he often wins. Ra's al Ghul and Shiva are constantly testing him with the best of the best, usually at the most inopportune times, like when he's off his game or recovering from grievous injuries. Batman still tends to come out on top. There's a reason he's known as the best of the best.

He also carries almost every weapon and gadget you could imagine, outside of guns. His signature Batarangs come first, and he's probably one of the world's best shots when throwing them. He has explosives that can stagger and knock back Kryptonians, electrical weapons that send out tens of thousands of volts, sonic grenades, and knockout gas or darts that can put down superhumans.

The Deep, Starlight, Black Noir and A-Train

The Deep is The Seven's Aquaman. The problem is he can't do much to anyone here, because he's only useful in the water, so he's a joke, and on top of that a huge creep. He's slightly stronger than most people but has no real fighting experience. You could take him down with one good gill punch.

Starlight is surprisingly strong. She overpowers normal people, sends them flying and can even fight Stormfront. She's surprisingly tough, but her main power is manipulating light and electricity. Her light blasts can take down steel doors, hurt Stormfront and send people flying, and she can create light bright enough to blind you.

Black Noir is the Batman of the group, the dark, mysterious master martial artist. He's very strong, once ripping a man's face open and pounding on Starlight. He's incredibly durable, taking point blank explosions, bombs, bullets and blasts from Starlight. He's definitely the best fighter on the team, having taken down Kimiko, Starlight and the Boys. A-Train is the fastest man in the world and The Seven's Flash, although nowhere near as fast as the Flash. He can outrun bullets, dodge Starlight's blasts, fight at super speed and, if he's going fast enough, run straight through people. He's also strong enough to pull a train.

Queen Maeve, Stormfront and Homelander are the heavy hitters

Queen Maeve is essentially Wonder Woman. She's strong enough to stop a speeding truck dead in its tracks, which means she's very durable too, and she can take point blank bullets with no problem. She can restrain Black Noir and fight Stormfront and even Homelander, but she clearly has her limits. She's still very powerful.

Stormfront is Homelander's Nazi lover and definitely one of the most powerful supes in the world. She's strong enough to overpower both Kimiko and Starlight and even throw Homelander around, and she's at least somewhat superhumanly tough. Her main powers are electricity and lightning. Her blasts can down almost anyone in her way, and when she goes all out she can destroy entire buildings.

Then there's the most powerful of them all, Homelander, an evil, twisted, psychopathic, narcissistic Superman. He's so much stronger than everyone around him that even Queen Maeve and Starlight can't do anything to him. He's completely bulletproof, and it's even been said that there isn't a weapon on Earth they haven't thrown at him, and all of them failed. He's incredibly fast, even faster than a train, but mostly uses that speed to fly from one point to another. In a fight, his main tactic is heat vision. He'll laser everybody around him and doesn't care at all.

The rules: no prep, standard gear and no breaking his code

Comic book Batman can obviously beat The Seven when it comes to prep or unleashing one of his seriously powerful armors. This is a guy who has regularly planned to beat the actual Justice League, so I want to make it at least a little competitive.

Here, Batman can take on The Seven one on one if he chooses, but he can't prep for the fight. He has to use his standard gear, and he obviously can't break his moral code.

Black Noir and The Deep are easy wins for Batman

Black Noir is a no brainer. Batman beats guys like this in his sleep and is going to clown on Noir. Considering Batman can beat Deathstroke, who is like Black Noir times ten, there's no question. This is any other night in Gotham.

The Deep is superhumanly strong and definitely tough, but he's also an idiot, so this is another easy win. He has never shown anything more impressive than Bane or Killer Croc in the strength department. Bane easily throws around multi ton objects, and Batman regularly fights and beats him, so super strength isn't the answer. The Deep is definitely not a fighter, doesn't show any skill, and has an easily exploited weakness that leaves him helpless. This one is too easy.

Starlight's light blasts wouldn't save her against Batman up close

Honestly, Batman could probably just convince Starlight to join his side, and I don't think that would be too hard. If they have to fight, he's going to wreck her hand to hand. Her strength and durability are about the same as a Venom user, and Batman regularly fights those. She also has no real fighting skill, and pressure points and nerve strikes work the same even on supes like her.

The only real problem is her light blasts, and it's hard to say how powerful they even are. At her best, she knocks back a metal door or knocks over Soldier Boy, and that won't do much to Batman. He has taken blasts from Green Lanterns, from Blue Beetle and heat vision from Kryptonians. That durability plus his armor makes him effectively superhuman. He doesn't only dodge bullets; he has routinely dodged laser blasts and even light beams. Starlight isn't bringing anything new, and once Batman gets in close, he'll easily put her down.

A-Train's speed is slow by DC Universe standards

Batman is no stranger to super speedsters, but it depends on how fast A-Train is. His top speed is probably around transonic, which is very fast in the world of The Boys but very slow for the DC Universe. There, Batman has regularly tagged speedsters like it's nothing, even members of the Flash family, so A-Train's speed won't be new to him.

A-Train also isn't the smartest guy. Batman can throw a freeze grenade on the floor so A-Train loses all his momentum, then hit him with electrified bolas, maybe throw out the hardening foam that held back Frankenstein. If you want to say A-Train gets some hits in first, Batman has already taken beatings from Reverse Flash and stayed standing, and Reverse Flash throws a far harder punch.

Queen Maeve is a serious step up in difficulty

Queen Maeve is a knockoff Wonder Woman, and she's a serious increase in difficulty for Batman. She can no sell an armored truck, she's strong enough to seriously injure both Stormfront and Homelander, and she took a building level explosion point blank as she threw herself out of a skyscraper. She also has real fighting skill and experience.

But Batman has already taken attacks from the real Wonder Woman, even out of his armor. In the armor, he has taken attacks from Superman, Solomon Grundy, Amazo and many other heavy hitters. He doesn't have to fight Maeve with his fists either. He can throw around building level explosives at will, and explosives that have routinely knocked around Kryptonian level beings.

Homelander and Stormfront are where Batman could lose

Stormfront and Homelander are basically one and the same here. Homelander is stronger, but they're both the most powerful members of the team, and both shoot energy blasts, one heat vision and one electricity. Batman has taken attacks from villains on this level. He has taken hits from the actual Superman, who is far stronger than both, and heat vision from multiple Kryptonians, and he has taken more serious electrical attacks than Stormfront's.

The trouble is putting them down. One of his only real solutions would be sonic attacks, and those would be very effective. He has hypersonics that can injure Superman, and supes are clearly vulnerable to sonic attacks. It's also possible he could use knockout gas, the way it was used on Soldier Boy. Those are the only two ways I see him reliably injuring someone like Homelander. Explosives would knock him around, but it looks like Homelander is tough enough to take them.

So could Batman defeat all of The Seven if he were simply out on patrol? Maybe. Some would be easy, but around Queen Maeve it gets iffy, and Homelander and Stormfront at the very least are sure to give him trouble on a random rooftop. He could throw everything he has at them, launching weapons from the Batwing or crashing the Batmobile into them, and it might be enough. But more often than not in the comics, when Batman is forced into a fight like this, he either calls in the Justice League or escapes to come up with a plan and live to fight another day.

Give Batman an afternoon and The Seven don't stand a chance

Give Batman even an afternoon and he could take down The Seven with no problem, even all of them attacking at once. He only has to jump into one suit of armor and the game is over. It could be a suit with all the power of the Justice League, the Justice Buster, which was designed to take down the Justice League, or the Hellbat, which was designed to take down Darkseid.

Without a suit, he could come up with super hypersonics or a specialized knockout gas. A whole plot point of The Boys was building a virus to kill every supe, and Batman could come up with a non lethal version that was just as debilitating, probably in a couple of hours.

So can Batman defeat The Seven? With prep, easily. The guy can take down the Justice League, so of course he can take down The Seven. Without any prep, there's definitely a chance, but it becomes a whole lot closer and a whole lot more likely The Seven win. Even for as good as Batman is, he might not be that good.