Mews' "thing" isn't power, but rather near-perfect quality in use of it. The best showing-off of this I'm aware of from official material is putting up a decent act of the Kyogre-Groudon rivalry alone: Substitute to be in two places at once with each Transformed into a high-end Legendary and putting on a good enough impression of their abilities as to be mistaken for the genuine article.

They may not be even in the top five for any one thing in the "big picture", but having a good showing at Literally Everything makes any question of what a Mew "can" do almost inherently nonsensical, because that's based much more on what they feel like trying rather than a hard boundary of potential.

>>57176568
To be honest I definitely think it could be top 5. If you take into account all the existing material so far, Mew has absolutely never taken anything seriously in any of its appearances. All the other Pokémon may be fighting for their lives, but for mew it's just another day of fun.
Arceus, Giratina, Palkia and Dialga would definitely be over it due to their abilities going beyond raw power. They are closer to “concepts”.

>>57176629
The point being made is that between mortal freaks of nature and other Legendaries and Mythicals, there may well be five Pokemon better than any Mew at any single task meaning any measures of power aren't going to go excellently, but by being a meaningful contender in ALL OF THEM the lack of any "truly" standout benchmarks is severely underselling.

It's an angle that doesn't get much credit, having neither novel esoteric absurdities nor spectacular extremes of force, but makes for a complete fucking mess to deal with if applied at any serious depth. As you yourself note, this has never been done on-screen because they go at things by little more than whims.

It's more like a curious child that's a jack of all trades than an adult who is a professional at one thing.

was mew going easy on mewtwo in the fight?
i feel like he could have killed him anytime but felt pity for him and was just toying with him

>>57176431
>Mew
>Mutant

>>57176959
Mewtwo was designed to be the ultimate Pokemon for battle. Now you can take that a few different ways considering the types of Pokemon we have now, but it's not like they've ever went back on that thought and still tout it around in Pokedex Entries and lore essentially, and even without those, Mew was around when that was first a thing anyway. It's safe to say Mewtwo is stronger than Mew. See >>57176946 it's like an adult fighting a child. Mewtwo might as well basically be scientists creating an evolution for Mew rather than a clone.

>>57176629
>Mew has absolutely never taken anything seriously in any of its appearances

It was serious in its battle against Mewtwo in the first movie especially after Mewtwo hit it with a Shadow Ball.

>>57177041
Probably because it's the first time it was ever actually hit with anything.

>>57177022
mewtwo was definitely touted as the strongest in those years but even there mew was just like
>lol stop malding bro
mewtwo was born to be a weapon but mew can transform into literally every pokemon and use absolutely every attack