Lord Darkseid is considered to be one of the most popular comic book characters ever. The New God of Apokolips is a ruthless ruler focused on achieving complete domination. Using his army of Parademons and his subordinates, Darkseid pillages the known universe, conquering planets and terraforming them to look like his home planet. Still, being as powerful as he is, Darkseid has suffered losses throughout his history in the comic books, and yet he is still considered to be one of the strongest. Why is that? Keep reading to find out.
Every form of Darkseid we’ve seen in the comics is said to be only an avatar. His true form is a truly godlike being that is completely multiversal, unfathomably powerful and transcends our perception of space and time.
Now that we’ve given you a short introduction, let us discuss the topic of this article in more detail.
Who is Darkseid?
Darkseid is a fictional character appearing in stories published by DC Comics. He was created by the legendary Jack Kirby and made his full debut in Forever People #1 (1971), after having had a cameo in Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen #134 (1970).
Darkseid is a supervillain in the DC Universe and is usually depicted as the greatest supervillain in the whole franchise. He is one of the New Gods and the merciless ruler of the planet Apokolips. Darkseid’s chief plan is to erase every being with free will in the universe and then reshape the whole universe in accordance with his principles, which is why he often clashes with DC’s superheroes, including the Justice League.
Darkseid was born as Prince Uxas as the son of King Yuga Khan and Queen Heggra of Apokolips. He was the second in line for the throne of Apokolips, after his brother Drax (a.k.a. Infinity-Man). At one point, when Drax tried to claim the famous, yet powerful Omega Force, Uxas killed him and claimed the force himself as part of his plot to take over the planet. The Omega Force transformed Uxas into a rock-like creature, which is when he took the name Darkseid. Not long after these events, Darkseid had his mother poisoned and became the sole ruler of Apokolips.
His early reign is mostly remembered for the destructive and seemingly endless war with the neighbouring planet of New Genesis, where the good New Gods reside. Led by Darkseid’s brother Highfather, the gods of New Genesis fought Darkseid and wanted to stop his evil plans. The war was actually stopped through intense diplomatic efforts made by Darkseid’s son Scott Free (Mister Miracle) and Highfather’s son Orion; in truth, the two children were switched in early childhood, so Orion is in actuality Darkseid’s son, and Scott Free is Highfather’s son.
Darkseid is usually depicted as the biggest supervillain in DC’s Multiverse, although there are more powerful cosmic entities inhabiting the Multiverse. He turned Apokolips into a hell pit and made a plan to conquer the whole universe and submit every sentient being with free will to his own vision of a Darkseid-ruled universe. He traveled the universe, conquering and destroying planets and then terraforming them so that they resemble the hell pit he created on his home planet.
He played a role in several major DC Comics storylines, the most notable among them being Final Crisis and The Darkseid War. In Final Crisis, Darkseid is seemingly killed by Orion at the beginning of the story, but his life essence survived and traveled to Earth, where he took on a human form (“Boss Dark Side”) until returning to his original body.
Using the Anti-Life Equation, Darkseid threatened the whole universe and was eventually confronted by the Justice League. He was shot and mortally wounded by Batman using a Radion bullet (the same one that killed Orion, since Radion is Darkseid’s Kryptonite) and finally “killed” by the combined effort of the two Flashes, Wonder Woman and Superman; Batman was hit by Darkseid’s Omega Beam and was sent back in time, finally returning after a long time traveling experience.
In The Darkseid War, Darkseid had to fight the Anti-Monitor, another evil cosmic entity from the DC Universe, and was eventually killed by him. This event had serious consequences for the evolution of future stories. In Scott Snyder’s Metal series, he appears as a baby.
Darkseid has appeared in a lot of derivative material, do to him being one of the strongest villains in the DC Universe and one of the most popular. He has appeared in several animated movies (he played a key role in the DCAU movie franchise), several video games (most notably Injustice and the LEGO Batman series) and is set to appear in Zack Snyder’s Justice League, where he will be played and voiced by Ray Porter.
Darkseid’s powers and abilities
Darkseid, or – as we’ve established – his regularly seen avatar, is not just a god-like being, he is a god. One of the New Gods, to be precise. Although being humanoid, New Gods (something like the Eternals in Marvel’s universe, but a tad more powerful) are exceptionally powerful, with Darkseid being the most powerful among the group.
He has superhuman strength and stamina, and his regeneration skills, combined with his nigh invulnerability make him practically immortal; Darkseid has died on several occasions, but it was never permanent. He also gained the power of the Omega Force, which made him a lot stronger than before.
Thanks to the force, he can fire Omega Beams, beams of energy that can destroy matter in a second (although some cosmic entities like Doomsday or Superman are immune to it). He also has cosmic awareness, he can travel through dimensions and space (he can create Boomtubes at will, without the need for a Mother Box), he can alter his size and has psionic abilities (telekinesis, telepathy).
Thanks to the Omega Force, he can also resurrect the dead. If needed, he can also feed on the energy of Apokolips and other planets.
Darkseid’s true form
And that’s it. We’ve analysed the character of Darkseid from all aspects and now you know… nothing! Everything we’ve just said applies only to the Darkseid we all know and love (All Hail Darkseid!) from the Prime-Earth continuity of DC Comics. But, this powerful deity is just a fragment of Darkseid, i.e., his true form.
True form, we say? Yes! There is a running rumour that the Darkseid we all know is just one of an infinite number of avatars of the true Darkseid. So, who is that true Darkseid, you wonder? Let us see.
People usually perceive Darkseid as the New God we’ve seen in the comics. Yes, the guy who conquers planets and lost to Doomsday, Superman, Batman and others. But, and we have to stress out that a lot of this is still shrouded in mystery, that seems to be only one of Darkseid’s forms.
In The Multiversity Guidebook, the Highfather, also a New God and Darkseid’s brother, states that each reality – past, present and future – has its own version (avatar) of Darkseid. This means that Darkseid is actually an omnipresent, non-corporeal being fragmented so that he can be present in every possible reality. As far as we know, only actual multiversal deities (The Presence in DC Comics and The One Above All in Marvel) and Dr. Manhattan have these abilities, which would put Darkseid – his true form, that is – very high on the list of the most powerful beings in the history of comic books.
Sadly, not much is known beside this remark by his brother. Throughout the history of the comic books, Darkseid’s true form did make several cameo-type appearances, but it was never fully revealed, nor did it play a major part in most storylines. Why? Simply because the true Darkseid doesn’t really care about such trivial things. He is so powerful and so above the general concepts of reality that he really doesn’t even bother intervening, opting to just send some of his avatars to do the job.
So, when did this true form actually appear?
In Final Crisis, Darkseid is said to be able to cast a gigantic shadow above the whole Multiverse, thus proving that he transcends all of reality and existence, and not just the ones we’ve most often seen him in.
Likewise, the Flash (Barry Allen) stated that him falling is so dangerous that he would take the whole multiverse down with him. Darkseid falling would cause the destruction of existence. Along with that, he was able to create a singularity so powerful that it was swallowing up the Multiverse itself, as the Green Lanters witnessed.
In the Pre-Crisis area, Darkseid was able to take control of a total of 3,000,000 Daxamites (humanoid aliens with powers similar to Kryptonians) without any help whatsoever.
How powerful is Darkseid’s true form?
Now that we’ve given the character some thought, let us see how powerful the true Darkseid actually is.
First of all, we have to stay that Darkseid’s true form has all the same abilities as any of his avatars. This alone makes him immensely powerful, but that’s actually not his limit. Namely, in his true form, Darkseid more of an abstract entity than a true being. He is a non-corporeal god that exists on a higher level of existence itself. He is usually depicted as being the god most often associated with evil and tyranny, which does suit him perfectly if you think about it.
As for his exact abilities, they are as numerous as they are unknown. He can transcend reality, change his shape and size, he can manipulate creation and death (as he is a god), he can devour a person’s mind and soul, manipulate reality and even create black holes (see above). He is also god-level immortal, as if the other powers weren’t enough.
And this is what we know about Darkseid’s true form. For real this time. The thing is that this is guy is really mysterious and not much is known about him; even his existence, albeit confirmed, is shrouded in mystery. No one knows what he looks like and why he hasn’t caused more trouble than he did is still a mystery, so we can only hope that the writers at DC are going to give us some more information sooner rather than later.
This is the story of Darkseid’s true form. The avatars, powerful as they are, are just weaklings compared to the New God’s true form, which transcends regular existence and is in a lot of ways unfathomable to us mortals. We’ve seen just how powerful that form is and what it can do (roughly, as no one really knows the true extent of Darkseid’s true powers), and all we can say before we wrap this up is – All Hail Darkseid!
