Boomstick: The Atom, DC's legendary mighty mite.
Wiz: Good things come in small packages.
Boomstick: The bigger they are, the harder they fall!
Wiz: ...We're just trying to get these out of the way.
DEATH BATTLE! returns for its tenth season by commencing with yet another bout in Marvel and DC Comics' eternal rivalry, this time between their respective size-shifting scientists. Though both are some of the greatest minds in their own universes, the power of the Pym Particles will be contested against the might of a white dwarf star, as for Ant-Man and the Atom, only one can prove the supreme scientist in a death battle.
Starting off the episode with the analysis of our first miniature genius; Dr. Henry Pym, known by his friends as Hank, was brilliant even at an early age. By the time he was three years old, he was declared by doctors to already be smarter than both his parents together and by the time he was an adult himself, majored in biochemistry and was one of the most successful scientists in that field. He had ironically had big ideas to shrink the size of cargo to reduce the cost of shipping, but his ideas made him a laughing stock among his peers, causing a long lasting insecurity and need to prove himself. Ultimately though, he succeeded in creating a serum to do it, and used himself as a test subject. The result was that he was shrunken down to the size of an ant, but before things went bad, a friendly ant came in and helped Hank return to full size. This inspired Hank to take up the study of insects, entomology, and use the serum he made to become the super hero, Ant-Man.
With his newfound interest in ants, Hank managed to create a helmet that would allow him to communicate with his insectile allies and even form genuine relationships with some of them. He's also made a stinger pistol that uses his bioenergy to fire stun beams, image inducing tech to disguise himself and his ants so well that it was able to fool the likes of Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four and a suit that runs on the very serum he made, using the newly discovered Pym Particles, named after Hank himself.
Pym Particles allow Hank to shrink by reducing the distance between his individual atoms through displacing his mass through another dimension, replacing that mass with massless neutrinos, making his weight and strength remain consistent with his size. Hank's shrinking ability has virtually no limit, allowing him to shrink so far he can enter the Underspace, a plane of existence below all other realities and has even altered his own biology to make himself immune from any outside attempts to alter his size. Hank's constant usage of Pym Particles has caused him to create an energy field that grant him the ability to alter the size of others, either by direct physical contact or by sending Pym Particles to them.
Eventually Hank would supply his wife, Janet Van Dyne with Pym technology to let her become his partner in hero work, The Wasp, and eventually lead them both to work with Iron Man, Thor and the Hulk to take down Loki, Hank and Janet were even the ones to propose the idea of forming the Avengers in the first place.
Unfortunately, Hank's prior issues started to resurface, leading him to create multiple Pym-powered alter egos to compete with his larger allies, like Yellowjacket and Giant-Man, the latter having the ability to increase his size anywhere from twelve feet to becoming so large he enters the Overspace, polar opposite to the Underspace. Here he would meet the entity, Eternity, who would grant him the title of "Scientist Supreme", a title he frequently reminds others of.
He kept pushing himself further even with the risk of death and ultimately making his greatest mistake; the mechanical mass murderer, Ultron. The fallout of Ultron's creation left Hank in a bad place, his guilt made him feel like he reached his limit as a scientist and become a failure, leading him to become abusive towards Janet. Hank suffered multiple mental breakdowns, endured the physical strain caused by the Pym Paticles and had Bipolar Disorder that was undiagnosed for years, fortunately Hank was able to acknowledge his problems and work to fix them and set things right. Hank was able to rebuild the West Coast Avengers, gave Scott Lang his blessing to succeed him as Ant-Man, and take down Ultron by creating a backdoor Trojan infiltration code that was so advanced that it would later create a new species made entirely of AI. After all his struggles and issues in his life, Hank Pym has truly earned his place as the tiniest of Earth's mightiest heroes.
Wiz: Not just by ways of his scientific contributions or his victories in battle, but by proving that heroes come in all shapes and sizes.
One advertisement of the first sponsor Better Help later, the hosts then look at Dr. Pym's opponent, Dr. Raymond "Ray" Palmer, the second to assume the mantle of the Atom. Initially, Ray led an ordinary life, growing up in the American Northeast and studying at Ivy University. This all would change one night when he took a walk outside to take his mind off a frustrating experiment, and happened to witness a meteor falling from the sky and crashing nearby. Approaching the crash site, Ray found that the meteor contained a piece of a white dwarf star, and took it for himself to experiment with, finding that by focusing UV rays through it, he could shrink inanimate objects. Unfortunately, there was a problematic side-effect to this: any object he shrank in this manner then proceeded to violently explode. Making no progress in his efforts to find a way to mitigate this, he decided to take a break from this and go on a hike with his nature club. It would during this brief retreat that disaster struck, as while they were inside a cave, the ceiling collapsed, trapping Dr. Palmer and his colleagues within. As they searched for an alternate way out, Ray found a crevice, too small for an ordinary-sized human to pass through. With no other option and knowing that he would likely explode as his previous experiments had, Ray used his shrinking device on himself, escaping the cave and freeing his friends, but to his surprise, he was able to return to his normal size with no ill side-effects. Curious, Ray assumed that there must've been something unique about his body that prevented the adverse reaction, and thus set to work on created a suit that harnessed the power of the white dwarf star, becoming the Atom.
Ray's empowered suit allows him to freely shrink himself down while retaining control over his density, a logical ability considering white dwarf stars, such as the one the powers Ray's suit, being among the densest objects in space, with just a teaspoon's worth of its mass weighing in at up to 100 tons. Whenever Ray decreases his size, his extra weight is sent to a dimension known as the Mass Zone, a space that he could potentially cheat death with; his successor, Ryan Choi, willed some of his mass there upon his death at the hands of Deathstroke, existing on at the cost of being unable to leave barring outside intervention. Hand-in-hand with Ray's suit is his invented bio-belt, which is what allows Ray free control of his weight at any size, from immaterial to his full 180 lbs, and can even momentarily become as dense as a white dwarf star itself. At the opposite end of the weight spectrum, the belt lets Ray travel along electrical currents through telephone lines, and fly through the air along beams of light. Over time, Ray expanded the powers of the white dwarf star to other parts of his suit, with his bio-belt also functioning as storage for various shrunken weapons and gadgets, as well as preventing Ray's size or mass from being manipulated by outside forces. Despite him being unable to grow past his natural six feet, Ray can shrink down almost endlessly, and can go beyond subatomic space to a plane known as the Microverse, the foundation of the DC universe's reality where atoms are planet-like in size. While within the Microverse, however, Ray must exercise caution, as he is able to regrow with enough force to shatter diamond; thus, if he expands his size too rapidly inside the Microverse, he runs the risk of tearing apart reality from the inside out. At the same time, however, Ray is also able to manipulate atoms within the Microverse however he pleases, from growing an atom to fire a miniature nuclear blast from his hands, to defusing a bomb by moving at the velocity of light and acting as a barrier between all possible atom combinations. Beyond the powers of his suit, Ray carries more conventional weaponry within his bio-belt, such as a laser blaster and a sword.
With this sword, Ray once fought a crocodile that, relative to his size, was truly massive, during a time where he was believed to have died. In reality, Ray was trapped at six inches tall and stranded within the Amazon rainforest, where he encountered the alien race known as the Katarthans. During this time, Ray would lead a rebellion against their tyrant king, becoming their ruler in his place. His heroism was not limited to this, and The Atom ended up becoming a well-respected hero over time, being asked to become a member of the Justice League of America shortly after its formation, and fighting alongside renowned heroes such as Batman and Hawkman. And while his physical capabilities are nothing to scoff at, the doctor's intellect is a mighty force all of its own, having once created Kryptonite within Superman by gathering enough Kryptonian protons to make them turn radioactive, and, whilst stranded in limbo, figured out that if the Flash increased the rate of a nuclear reaction's stellar evolution to exhaust its core, a fire demon could be transformed into a black hole, then proceeded to use it as a wormhole to return to Earth. One of the DC universe's greatest minds, Ray Palmer never ceases approaching a problem until he finds a solution, and this research scientist turned superhero has managed to become something truly greater than the sum of its parts.
After the second sponsor for Mint Mobile, both scientists have been sufficiently studied, and it's time for a death battle!
Inside the laboratory of Dr. Hank Pym, the blonde scientist works only accompanied by the rhythmic clacking of his Newton's cradle. A sudden quickening as it shakes alerts him to an uninvited guest, and he remarks that they should pick on someone their own size, relatively speaking. Leaping off the desk and growing to his usual size, the Atom asks about a device of his, remarking that it contains a particle he's never seen. Informing him of the Pym Particles' name, Hank rises from his chair and throws off his labcoat, revealing his costume underneath as he introduces himself and informs Dr. Palmer that he should've knocked. Ant-Man's helmet assembles around his head and the Atom throws the device aside and growls before both throw a punch at each other and shrink down...
FIGHT!
Ant-Man kicks the Atom away from him, but Atom rushes forwards with a charged punch that knocks Ant-Man into the Dipping Bird that he manages to avoid before its tip can impale him. Ant-Man then leaps onto the Newton's Cradle, shrinking even smaller as he does. Ray Palmer rushes forward to search for him, but Ant-Man leaps off the sphere he was hiding on in an attempt to punch him, but Atom doesn't even budge from the punch.
As they both begin circling the cradle, Ant-Man notices that the Atom is using pieces of a white dwarf star, to which Atom replies that everything they needed has already existed and that he needs to be smart enough to put the pieces together. He then runs back and leaps towards the cradle, punching it with enough force to knock the spheres off their wires. Ant-Man notices one of the spheres about to collide with him, but from our angle, it looks as if the spheres were knocked off by an invisible force.
The two scientists then return to their human sizes, but Ant-Man punches Atom, causing him to shrink again before stomping on him. However, Atom uses the power of his white dwarf star to trip Ant-Man up, causing him to shrink as well. Landing next to a miniature car, Hank informs Ray that at any given moment, there are about 2.5 million ants under his feet. Perplexed, Ray asks Hank why he mentioned it before a swarm of purple ants emerge from the larger-than-life floor.
The ants begin to swarm their way towards Ray who draws Katarthan's sword so he can fight them off, but they manage to dogpile him, only for Ray to enlarge himself and stomp on them, an action which an enlarged Hank remarks that it took him long enough. The Pym Particles that Ant-Man throws at Atom have no effect on him, prompting Ant-Man to throw them onto the car instead. The car is then enlarged and collides with Ray, who shrinks himself down to the size of a molecule, unaware of Ant-Man running along his bio-belt with an ant named Ant-thony.
Hank tells Ant-thony to lay low and tell him what he finds while he hacks his opponent's belt. Ant-thony obeys and moves ahead, but Ray finds Hank and grab him off his belt before throwing him off his body. Luckily for Hank, he manages to hitch a ride on another ant. Ray tries to shoot him with his laser blaster while Hank fires back with his stinger pistol. Atom shrinks even more and runs up the barrel of the stinger pistol so he can study every electron path in the gun, allowing him to disassemble it.
Ant-Man shrinks even more, causing him to appear in the Microverse, whereupon he is instantly pushed back by a nuclear blast from Atom. Ant-Man grows larger than his opponent and tries to punch him, but Atom isn't fazed and tosses him over his shoulder. They both enlarge themselves and then engage in a fist fight with Ray being knocked backwards with a hook to the chest before feeling a large amount of pain as the whole Microverse begins to crack around them.
Ant-Man grows concerned as all of reality is in danger. He commands his ants to destroy Atom's bio-belt from the inside which prevents the destruction of reality. Hank then grows even larger than Ray and tells him that he has created something that goes beyond the limits of human existence and he operates on a scale that can't even be comprehended by Ray, all while growing even more and reaching his hand towards Ray.
Atom then finds himself in the Overspace with the cosmic entity known as Eternity floating in front of him. Next to him, Ant-Man appears wearing his Giant Man helmet, telling him that he can't be afraid to think big. All of a sudden, a swarm of ants rip Atom's body open from the inside-out. As Atom's death scream echoes throughout the Overspace, Hank shrinks away and leaves some of his ants to crawl along the atomic trails of the Overspace.
KO!
2023's season of slaughter is off with a big bang, as the insect-filled remains of the Atom lay adrift in the Overspace. While Hank Pym and Ray Palmer were both some of the smartest minds and tenacious heroes in their respective worlds, the aptly-named Scientist Supreme proved his brains and brawn superior in this battle between these specialists of shrinking. In many ways, these heroes seemed to initially match up with each other blow-for-blow, but Ant-Man's arsenal of gadgets afforded him more ways to control and end the fight on his terms. His ants could be used to distract the Atom and keep him away long enough to employ various traps and tricks, which also countered the Atom's ability to hit with the full force of his mass as opposed to Ant-Man still retaining his human-sized strength while shrunk. One such strategy Hank could employ was hacking the bio-belt to control Ray's sizeshifting capabilities; while it would not outright prevent the Legend of Tomorrow from still shrinking due to the white dwarf star's powers being contained to his suit, compromising the belt would remove any resistance he had to outside factors manipulating his size like the Pym Particles. Conversely, the Atom couldn't do the same in turn, as Hank had rewritten his own biology to fight off this very threat.
What ultimately sealed the good doctor's fate was their shared commonality in shrinking, which he simply paled to in comparison against his opponent. The Avenger has displayed far superior showings of shrinking and growing beyond concepts to the point where the Atom's abilities seemed far limited in this respect. Taking the fight the Overspace for instance would have afforded Ant-Man the win by itself as its presence would boost his intellect and power massively; while the Overspace could ravage normal human minds and Ray would likely be no exception, Hank's repeated trips to it have given him the resistance and the final pieces needed to put his opponent out of commission permanently,
Wiz: The winner is Ant-Man!
"Ant-Man VS Atom" contains examples of:
- Always Someone Better: Ant-Man's arsenal in comparison to Atom's. As noted in Crippling Overspecialization, Ray could only shrink and relied on gadgets with similar abilities whereas Hank's abilities were more versatile, ranging from increasing to gigantic proportions and controlling ants to even entering a separate realm of reality in the form of the Overspace. The only solid defence Ray had against Hank was that Hank couldn't alter his size with the Pym Particles; an advantage that was undone when Hank had his ants destroy Ray's belt.
- Ascended Meme: During the closing remarks, Wiz asks why Ant Man didn't immediately go up the Atom's butt and expand while inside him, in reference to The #Thanus theory, a meme that spawned around Avengers: Endgame's release that imagined Ant Man killing Thanos this way.
- Crippling Overspecialization: While both could change their size, Ray was only capable of shrinking while Hank could grow to vast sizes, which also trumped Ray's ability to alter his density to increase his strength since he could only alter it so far by comparison. This also applies to their arsenals as Atom relied solely on shrunken down gadgets, while Ant-Man had that and an army of ants to back him up.
- Everyone Has Standards: When bringing up Hank's mental issues that led to him abusing Janet, neither Wiz or Boomstick make any insensitive remarks about it, with Boomstick also adding that poor mental health isn't an excuse for his actions either, just a clear sign he needed help.
- Musical Spoiler: "Not Actual Size", the musical track for the episode, noticeably takes more cues from media Ant Man has appeared in over the Atom, foreshadowing who's winning the fight.
- Mutual Disadvantage: Both Hank and Ray have immunity to having their size forcefully changed by others, rendering each other's capability to change the other's size useless. However, Hank had the advantage of having his innate biology rewritten to provide this immunity, while Ray relied on a belt to do so, allowing Hank to destroy it and render him vulnerable to having his size changed.
- Mythology Gag: Hank faces down the severed balls of his Newton's cradle, before the scene cuts away to a normal-size shot of the balls harmlessly scattering and falling off the desk, much like a similar cutaway gag involving a train set in Ant-Man and Yellowjacket's final fight in Ant-Man.
- Sizeshifter: Both combatants are experts at changing their size, having built suits to help them better use their abilities, carrying numerous shrunken weapons, and being capable of reaching dimensions outside of reality. Hank was superior in this regard to Ray, as he was not only the one capable of also growing himself and objects far beyond their original size, but also the one whose powers didn’t solely rely on external equipment.
- Wrecked Weapon: Ray manages to rearrange the molecules of Hank's Stinger blaster to destroy it, but Hank returns the favor via his ants destroying Ray's bio-belt.
