Summary

• Kirby's Fourth World Saga is a timeless masterpiece that has inspired many artists and writers in the comic book industry.
• The New Gods story "The Pact" may have even influenced the twist in The Empire Strikes Back.
• The Fourth World mythology is highly adaptable and has been featured in numerous acclaimed stories over the years.

Content warning: this article contains a reference to attempted suicide.

Darkseid is frequently seen as the ultimate villain of the DC universe. Beyond comics, some believe the New Gods story “The Pact” even inspired the twist of The Empire Strikes Back.

Kirby’s hard-angled, four-color style is notable for inspiring renowned artists including Darwyn Cooke, Mike Mignola, and Tom Scioli, and his high-concept, symbolic content was influential on the works of fan-favorite writers like Grant Morrison, Paul Cornell, and Walt Simonson. The idea of the Fourth World is highly adaptable, with acclaimed stories from across five decades of writers and artists all working in their own specific styles.

10 Jack Kirby’s Original Fourth World Comics

The original work by the king of comics himself, Kirby’s Fourth World Saga was foundational for the medium, from content to style. Told through Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen, The Forever People, Mister Miracle, and New Gods in the 1970s, as well as the graphic novel The Hunger Dogs in 1985, Kirby’s story was a melodrama utilizing pure symbolism, tortured, larger-than-life heroes, and villains that represented key aspects of human nature. An anti-fascist epic with Kirby at the height of his bombastic artistic power, full of exciting layouts and expressive illustration, the Fourth World became the foundation for DC’s cosmic mythology.

9 Legion of Super-Heroes: “The Great Darkness Saga”

The first great Fourth World story not written by Kirby himself, Keith Giffen, Paul Levitz, and Larry Mahlstedt’s 1982 Legion of Super-Heroes arc sees Legionnaires past and present united in an attempt to battle a mysterious being, himself and his servants shrouded in darkness. Caught in the midst of a battle for freedom of the universe, the mysterious evil is revealed to be the ancient god Darkseid. Not only did the tale establish Darkseid as a villain capable of carrying an epic plot outside of Kirby’s own work, but it also turned Legion of Super-Heroes into one of the most popular titles of the '80s.

8 Justice League International Annual #2: “Hit or Miss”

Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis’ run on the Justice League books of the ‘80s brought psychological realism and sitcom antics to of DC’s premier super-team, with Mister Miracle Scott Free, his wife Big Barda, and his manager Oberon becoming mainstays of the regularly rotating line-up. Justice League International Annual #2 “Hit or Miss” features the team taking a day off at Scott and Barda’s home for a barbecue. Where Kirby created Scott’s affection for his new home of Earth and his eternal love for Barda, DeMatteis and Giffen turned the pair into the bickering but loyal couple popular today.

7 JLA: "Rock of Ages"

Next to Kirby, the most definitive contributions and evolution of the New Gods mythos have been handled by Grant Morrison. In their JLA run, Morrison merged the mythos of the Fourth World with the broader DC Universe. “Rock of Ages” sees Green Lantern, the Flash, and Aquaman in a near future in which Darkseid has taken over the Earth in an effort to transform it into a new Apokolips of the Fifth World. Introducing the statement "Darkseid Is," “Rock of Ages” follows the remaining superheroes embarking on a last-ditch effort to free their world from the very embodiment of evil and destruction.

6 DCU Holiday Bash #2: "Present Tense"

Though only two pages, Ty Templeton’s Christmas story “Present Tense” is one of the most concise and hilarious summations of Darkseid’s nature as God of Evil. The story sees Darkseid attempting to fend off an unstoppable force who returns each year, a foe almost as ancient and eternal as the New Gods themselves. This enemy is a constant thorn in Darkseid's side, no matter what defenses Apokolips puts up. Without spoiling the reveal, Templeton’s expressive pencils do well with Kirby's concepts and play the drama and anger of Darkseid against the lightness of the holiday spirit.

5 Orion

Walt Simonson’s Orion is the sequel to Kirby’s Fourth World Saga seen through the eyes of the titular warrior god of New Genesis. It features some of Simonson’s most impressive penciling to date, with one issue that’s a wall-to-wall slugfest between Orion and his father Darkseid for leadership of Apokolips. Simonson takes Kirby’s artistic influences and mythological content and turns the dial to eleven, seeing Orion undergo an epic struggle to defeat his father and an internal struggle over his own purpose and identity. It’s a fight comic encapsulation of Nietzsche's “the abyss stares back” visualized by Simonson’s electric conceptual artwork in the realms of spirit and imagination.

4 Seven Soldiers: Mister Miracle and Final Crisis

Continuing to evolve the ideas explored in their JLA run, Morrison returns to the New Gods in Seven Soldiers: Mister Miracle. Here, the original New Gods of Kirby are seemingly nowhere to be found, and Scott Free’s assistant Shilo Norman has taken over the Mister Miracle mantle. A super escape artist celebrity, Norman is pulled into a conspiracy involving the criminal Boss Dark Side, revealed to be the Apokoliptian ruler reborn into a new human host. Followed up in Final Crisis, the two series see a reborn Darkseid’s attempt to conquer the Earth once and for all and redefine the anti-life equation metaphor.

3 Action Comics Annual #13 "Father Box"

One of the final stories from DC’s post-Crisis era, Paul Cornell tells a story from Lex Luthor’s first days in Metropolis and reveals the origin of his technological empire: stolen Apokoliptan tech. In the early days of Darkseid’s efforts on Earth via Intergang, an undercover Luthor stumbles across a portal to Apokolips, the world that lies behind reality and beneath Metropolis. He’s recruited by a cackling maniacal Darkseid as a weapons engineer, rising quickly, yet still scheming to take control of the planet for himself. The story has beautiful pencils by Marco Rudy, incorporating the hard-edged, complex layouts of Kirby while adding his own fluid and dynamic page-flow.

2 Mister Miracle

Tom King and Mitch Gerads' Eisner-winning series follows the fallout of Mister Miracle’s attempted suicide. ed off as either an attempt to escape life or death, the super escape artist is soon swept up into another war between Apokolips and New Genesis and has to balance his life in the war with the performances and domestic life with Barda on Earth. King takes Kirby’s metaphoric concepts and infuses them with interpersonal conflict, internal struggle, and traumatic consequences. It’s a perfect pairing of high-concept with realism, bombast juxtaposed against a frequently restrained execution. Mister Miracle becomes a treatise on family, love, and depression seen through the structures of the Fourth World’s archetypical, unending war.

1 Justice League: The Darkseid War: Green Lantern #1 “Will You Be My God?”

Another story by King, “Will You Be My God?” sees Green Lantern Hal Jordan defending the Green Lantern Corps’ home planet of Oa from an invasion of parademons who mind control any they defeat. Up against the zombielike bodies of his allies, Jordan is faced with the choice of whether he should take the dangerous power of the fallen Darkseid’s Mother Box to become a New God or fight the aimless parademons as a man. King pairs this with flashbacks to Hal as a child mourning the recent death of his father in a church alongside a mysterious friend of his father, whose identity ties into Hal’s present in an unexpected twist.