The Immortal Hulk has dragged Bruce Banner and every single one of his personalities into a devastating spotlight, leading to the emergence of some of the Hulk’s most terrifying transformations ever. While the Hulk has gone through plenty of incredible transformations before, two of Marvel’s possible future timelines are menaced and protected by their own green behemoths: Marvel 2099’s Hulk 2099 and the world-conquering Maestro.
Now, we’re taking a closer look at both of these green giants to see which one is truly the strongest Hulk of Marvels future.
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WHO IS HULK 2099?
The world of Marvel 2099 is far different from the modern Marvel Universe, and things on the West Coast have never been worse. Western California has been split off from the rest of the country and left to the devices of greedy, corrupt corporate overlords. The worst hope for the people of the now island region laid in a cult called the Knights of Banner, who worshipped the 20th-century hero and used illegal gamma testing to try and recreate him to set things right. When Hollywood lawyer John Eisenhart interfered with their operations in a bid to secure film rights for an unrelenting studio, he found himself in the middle of a shoot-out between the Knights and the police and in the middle of a gamma bomb explosion when things got even worse. Eventually, John emerged as the Hulk of the year 2099, a massive brute with claws and fangs to match his impossible stature.
Unlike his predecessor, John Eisenhart retained his entire personality and intellect while transformed into the Hulk, something he could do at will more often than not. This allowed John to get along much easier with his fellow future heroes like Miguel O’Hara’s Spider-Man 2099. While his cunning was always portrayed as just as important as his strength from his very first appearance in “Hulk 2099” from 1993’s 2099 Unlimited by Gerard Jones and Dwayne Turner, John Eisenhart’s Hulk was quite possibly just as impossibly powerful as Bruce Banner before him. While the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z has confirmed John capable of lifting up to 150 tons, his maximum capacity has never actually be reached, but the true limits of his strength still remain largely untested to this day.
HOW STRONG IS MAESTRO?
John Eisenhart may be a powerful successor to Bruce Banner, but the original Hulk has persisted into the far future in many timelines. Occasionally, he does so in the form of Maestro. First appearing in 1992’s Hulk: Future Imperfect #1 by Peter David and George Perez, Maestro’s story begins about a century after the present-day, when nuclear war had eradicated most of the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes, leaving the world ripe for abuse at the hands of groups such as the Black Scythe.
Bruce Banner survived the chaos all around him only thanks to being kidnapped by A.I.M., who had planned to use him as part of a plot to repopulate the planet. After escaping their clutches, Bruce made his way across what little remained of the country until finally arriving in New York City, now called Dystopia and lorded over by a tyrant called the Maestro. When Maestro turned out to be his old friend Hercules, who had become an unfortunate and uncaring ruler, Banner plotted against him from the remains of Alchemax’s former headquarters. Their next conflict led to a longer, years-long plot that culminated in Banner using Vapor of the U-Foes to murder Hercules, before murdering her in kind.
This only led to conflict with Banner’s old friend Rick Jones, who would eventually try to kill the Hulk with yet another bomb. This too would fail, and the elder Hulk would take his place as Dystopia’s ruler, as well as the mantle of Maestro, which was also a nickname from Banner’s college days. Empowered by the years of radiation that he had absorbed, Maestro’s iron grip rarely wavered, even in the face of other gamma mutates such as Shulk and Abomination, both of whom he defeated at the same time and singlehandedly.
After some time, Maestro’s enemies got ahold of a time machine built by Doctor Doom and used it to transport the original Bruce Banner to their time in the hopes that he could bring their tormentor to his knees. Though the first Hulk was ultimately able to do this, it wasn’t by his own hand, but rather by transporting Maestro to the moment that Banner was originally turned into the Hulk. Specifically, by dropping Maestro right in the middle of the explosion that started it all. This put an end to Maestro for a time, though even after being obliterated, he proved able to rebuild himself from effectively nothing over the years.
MAESTRO VS HULK 2099: Who Wins?
Even if the full extent of Hulk 2099’s strength isn’t really known, there really isn’t any question over who is truly the stronger Hulk. John Eisenhart is impressive as the Hulk in the year 2099, but his inexperience and relative infancy as a hero compared to the long-lived Maestro give him an obvious disadvantage in any fight. While it’s true that Hulk 2099 could have the same unlimited strength as his predecessor, Maestro most assuredly does, as he is merely another version of Bruce Banner himself. While both of these Hulks have all of their mental faculties available at all times, Maestro is likely the more intelligent of the two, and he’s certainly the most ruthless and the most cunning. Truly, Maestro is the strongest there is, and likely ever will be.
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