Marvel’s cosmology is truly amazing. Jack Kirby’s ideas led to Marvel having one of the best cosmologies in modern comic book storytelling. Now, while Kirby’s worlds are always ways and varied, we have – in today’s article – decided to focus on just two small and connected segments of this cosmology – the Eternals and the Celestials – probably the two most famous cosmic races in Marvel’s universe. Which one is stronger? Keep reading to find out!
As the parents of the Eternals, the Celestials are certainly more powerful than their offspring. Aside from this fact, the Celestials are also quite larger than the Eternals and are way more powerful in comparative terms. This is why we think that the Celestials would win win with relative ease.
Our comparison is going to be divided into two sections. The first is going to bring an overview of the two groups, after which we are going to bring you a detailed analysis of the two groups to determine which one would win in a direct clash. This is a bit different than our individual character comparisons, as it would take up too much time to compare each member, even if we only choose the most famous iterations, which is why we are going to do a collective analysis here.
The Eternals and their powers
As stated above, the Eternals are a fictional race from the Marvel Universe. They are an essential part of Marvel’s cosmic stories and are part of the large cosmic narrative developed by Jack Kirby. Their debut was in the comic book The Eternals #1 (1976).
The Eternals are the “children” of the Celestials, who visited Earth one million years ago and conducted experiments on proto-humanity. Using these experiments, the Celestials would later create the humanoid Eternals and their monstrous counterparts, the Deviants. Although humanoid, the Eternals are not human and have much more powers than them.
They are also long-living – although not essentially immortal – and have a variety of different superpowers that make them non-human. Despite their superiority, the Eternals are generally good guys and have protected humanity on several occasions, especially against the destructive Deviants.
The Eternals also fought among themselves, with the two major conflicts being the internal war led by Kronos and the conflict against Thanos. The first civil was actually fought over whether the Eternals should conquer other races, with Kronos’ pacifistic fraction prevailing over Uranus’ side, which was in favor of war.
Uranus and his fraction then left and founded a separate colony. Later on, an experiment of Kronos’ backfired and destroyed the Eternals’ home, Titanos, but also created a new generation of Eternals by activating some of their latent genes. Later on, Thanos of Titan, an Eternal with the Deviant gene, almost destroyed the Eternals’ colony, but they managed to rebuild it and assisted other heroes in their fights against Thanos on several occasions.
The Eternals haven’t been featured in derivative material as a group, although some individual members have. The group is set to appear in The Eternals movie, thereby being integrated into the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
As far as the members of the Eternals are concerned, they are usually divided into several generations, as follows:
- First Generation Eternal (those born before the fall of Titanos): Arlok, Astron, Daina, Kronos/Chronos/Chronus, Master Elo, Oceanus, Shastra, Thyrio, Uranos.
- Second Generation Eternal (those alive at the time of Chronus’s experiment): Mentor (A’lars), Amaa, Cybele, Forgotten One/Gilgamesh, Helios, Perse, Rakar, Tulayn, Valkin, Virako, Zuras.
- Third Generation Eternal (those born after Chronos’s experiment but before the Second Host): Aginar, Ajak, Arex, Atlo, Domo, Ikaris, Interloper, Mara, Phastos, Sigmar, Thanos, Thena, Veron, Zarin.
- Fourth Generation Eternal (those born after the coming of the Second Host, 20,000 years ago): Argos, Ceyote, Chi Demon, the Delphan brothers, Druig, Khoryphos, Makkari, Psykos, Sersi, Kingo Sunen, El Vampiro.
- Fifth Generation Eternal (those born after the coming of the Third Host, 3,000 years ago): Aurelle, Sprite, Titanis.
The Celestials and their powers
The Celestials are a race of superpowered, unusually large humanoid cosmic entities that appear in the Marvel Universe. They were created by Jack Kirby and debuted in Eternals #2 in 1976 and have been an integral part of the Marvel mythos since then. They are among the most powerful beings in the Marvel universe.
The orings of the Celestials are largely unknown, and most Marvel characters only know legends on how these superpowered alien race was created. The problem is, none of these stories are actually substantiated. It is known that the Celestials played a large part in a lot of major events around the universe, especially related ti the history of Earth. They are silent, about 2,000 feet tall and weigh around 260 tons on average.
The Celestials are also responsible for the creation of both the Eternals, Thanos’s species, and their rivals, the chaotic Deviants. They are also responsible for the emergence of mutants on Earth, as they’re responsible for the X-Gene, along with other beneficial mutations, such as Bruce Banner’s mutation into the Hulk.
They haven’t appeared much in derivative media.
Known members of the Celestials include:
- Arishem the Judge
- Ashema the Listener
- The Blue Celestial
- Callus the Void
- Celestial Destructor
- The Celestial Gardener
- The Celestial Madonna
- Devron the Experimenter
- The Dreaming Celestial
- Ea the Wise
- Ego
- Eson the Searcher
- Exitar the Exterminator
- The Fallen a.k.a. Zgreb the Aspirant
- Gamiel the Manipulator
- Gammenon the Gatherer
- Godhead
- Geun the Executioner
- Groffon the Regurger
- Hargen the Measurer
- Jemiah the Analyzer
- Kahltro the Tinkerer
- Marazov the Penitent
- Nezarr the Calculator
- Neena the Luck Dragon
- The One Above All
- Obliteron
- Oneg the Prober
- The Progenitor
- The Red Celestial
- The Red/Blue Judge
- Scathan the Approver
- Star Child
- Xodus the Forgotton
- Tefral the Surveyor
- Valknar the Exhumer
- Ziran the Tester
Can the Eternals defeat the Celestials?
In order to properly answer this question, we have decided first to bring you a short overview of the two groups’ powers, so that you know, roughly at least, what to expect from these guys and what they have to offer.
As we know by now, analyzing the powers of the Eternals is no easy thing. Namely, there are so many of them and each of them has its own special powers that it is quite difficult to give a general outline of their powers. Eternals are humanoid characters, yet the only trait they share with humans is their visual appearance. As far as their strength goes, they are superpowered cosmic entities whose strength is much higher than that of normal humans.
Each Eternal is “blessed” with superstrength, although the degrees vary between each individual Eternal. Compared to some other cosmic Entities, the Eternals are – despite their powers – less powerful than the Celestials, for example, and even Thanos, who himself is an Eternal with the Deviants gene. They are equally as strong as the Deviants, their chaotic counterparts.
Eternals also have psionic abilities, which – again – vary between each individual Eternal. Some are more, and some are less skilled but they all have these abilities, no matter the degree. These psionic abilities are, in part, the reason why they can create and join the Uni-Mind, a special gestalt entity that grants them more power. Each Eternal can join the Uni-Mind, even the Titan cousins of the real Eternals.
Another important trait of the Eternals is that they can project cosmic energy from their hands and their eyes, which makes them extremely powerful in direct combat. Some of them can also harness energy to make them additionally stronger. The thing with the Eternals is that they usually specialize in specific fields, meaning that they focus their powers and manifest them in one specific form, which is why each individual Eternal is so specific.
Finally, we can state that the Eternals aren’t immortal, but they are so long-living and usually have regenerative abilities that they practically are. They can die and be killed, but live so long that it seems like they are completely immortal.
The thing with the Celestials, though, is that they are stronger on so many levels that the Eternals’ powers seem like tidbits. Namely, their physical appearance gives them way more physical power than any one member of the Eternals has, but probably even more than the Eternals combined.
Along with that, they’re just ridiculously overpowered – they can move whole planets at will and even create small galaxies on their own, and those are just some of their powers. When compared to them, the Eternals seem like total weaklings. This makes even more sense once you consider the fact that the Celestials are actually the ones who created the Eternals, which automatically gives them more powers in the very start.
Examining all of these facts leads us to only one inevitable conclusion – the Celestials are stronger in every possible way. Namely, these guys are so huge that the Eternals seem like ants. This is the first difference between them. They could easily stomp or crush the Eternals using only physical force, since they are so much bigger and, thus, more powerful in physical terms. But, that is, of course, not all. The powers that the Celestials possess are on a planetary, possibly even universal scale, making them not only more powerful than the Eternals, but also one of the most powerful races and groups in the whole universe. This all leads to the inevitable conclusion that the Celestials can defeat the Eternals without even using their full powers.
And that’s it for today. We hope you had fun reading this and that we have given you all the information you were looking for. See you next time and don’t forget to follow us!
If you want to see other ‘Who Would Win‘ scenarios follow our link
