by Alex Landis

Created on: May 08, 2007   Last Updated: May 13, 2007

Since the creation of the superhero, there are a few notable ones that are extremely powerful, because of their awesome superpower, and also their power to make change to better their fictional worlds. These heroes include Professor Xavier from Marvel Comics, Superman from DC comics, and Peter Petrelli from the NBC television series Heroes.

Of all the superheroes invented, Professor Xavier stands out as being the most powerful. Professor Xavier is a mutant in the comic series, 'The Uncanny X-Men' and is the founder of Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, and the mutant team known as the X-Men. Professor Xavier is extremely powerful for two main reasons, his mutant power, and his desire to create a peaceful coexistence between humans and mutants. Professor Xavier is telepathic, meaning that he can read and control the minds of humans/mutants, and possibly animals. His mind is one of the most powerful in the X-Men comic universe, and the irony is that he is paraplegic and spends the majority of his time confined to a wheelchair. Professor Xavier is also very powerful because of the creation of his X-Men team. Because he founded the Xavier's School for Gifted Youngsters, of which many of the X-Men were students, they have since been able to defeat evil mutants numerous times and have kept humanity safe.

Superman, also known as Clark Kent, is a close second in power to Professor Xavier. In a way they are almost opposites, where Professor Xavier has a damaged body confined to a wheel chair and an extremely powerful mind, Superman is extremely powerful physically such as super strength, invulnerability to attack, ability to fly, X-ray vision, etc. He possesses many abilities that people once attributed to gods. Because of his awesome physical powers, he has been able to defeat his enemies and has saved the world many times. Superman does have one main weakness, a material known as Kryptonite, which removes Superman's powers and essentially makes him a normal person. Kryptonite has been described as being an allergen or toxin to Superman, potentially harming him, and also a retardant, preventing Superman from using his powers.

Peter Petrelli comes in third as one of the most powerful superheroes created. Peter Petrelli is from the hit television series Heroes, and plays a young man just discovering his unique ability to absorb and reuse the powers of other people who have special abilities. The potential power of Peter is immense as he becomes increasing powerful with each unique ability he absorbs. He has the potential of becoming the most powerful superhero created, but isn't right now because he is still learning to control his new ability to absorb powers. With each new power he absorbs, he needs to learn how to control it, use it, and recall it on demand and he hasn't mastered that technique yet. The other reason he isn't as powerful as he can be is that he's only absorbed a handful of powers presently, like the ability to fly, become invisible, see the future, mind-reading, and super-healing. In the future, he may have hundreds or even thousands of unique abilities absorbed, and at this point he will be extremely powerful. If he is still a hero when that happens, remains to be seen.

What makes a hero powerful is not only the super power he/she possesses, but if they use their powers in the best way possible, and if he/she is powerful without his powers. If a hero does good to benefit the world regardless of his powers like Professor Xavier founding a school and the X-Men, he is a truly powerful superhero.

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