Who Is Soulfire Darkseid? Origin & Powers Explained

DC Comics throughout the years presented us with truly powerful supervillains, and it intensified especially after the introduction of cosmic beings and the aspect of the Multiverse. Lex Luthor, Joker, Ultra-Humanite, Reverse-Flash, and more were Earth’s biggest supervillains, and then in the 1970s, or Bronze Age of the comics, introduced New Gods. One of them is Darkseid, the biggest supervillain of Superman, and one of the most powerful beings in the DC Universe. In this article, we will analyze who is Soulfire Darkseid, and go through his origins and powers.

Soulfire Darkseid appeared in the Death of the New Gods storyline in 2007, which focused on the mysterious serial deaths of the New Gods, which until that point were considered unkillable. In that comic issue, Soulfire Darkseid is a result of him merging with the dead New God’s souls, which made his powers stronger tenfold.

We will also go further into the Death of the New Gods storyline, how was Soulfire Darkseid created, what were his powers, and what were the consequences of that comic book event. If you are interested, definitely stick with us until the end!

Origins of Soulfire Darkseid

As we already mentioned, Soulfire Darkseid first appeared in DC’s comic book storyline called Death of the New Gods, which was created by Jim Starlin in 2007. Jim Starlin is most known for his work on one of the most shocking comic book storylines in recent decades, Batman: Death in the Family, where the second Robin Jason Todd was killed by Joker.

The Death of the New Gods provided us with a new look into New Gods lore and brought up new details in New Gods storylines. Darkseid is a tyrannical Lord of Apokolips whose ultimate goal is to enslave all universe, brainwash them, and free wills in every sentient being. He is a true tyrant and leads his planet with “an iron fist”. His biggest rival is the planet New Genesis, which is considered the positive counterpart to Apokalips. The New Gods in New Genesis are strongly opposed to Darkseid and spend their time keeping him in check and protecting their planet.

The storyline of the Death of the New Gods starts with mysterious deaths of the New Gods, including Forever People of the New Genesis, orchestrated by the unknown assassin. Seeing that this will affect the universe immensely, Superman with the help of Mister Miracle and Orion, the second Darkseid’s son, goes to the Apokalips to see if Darkseid is responsible for those deaths. Meanwhile, Darkseid finds out that the New Gods were killed by soul extraction – someone took their souls. Among the killed New Gods is Big Barda, Mister Miracle’s wife, who is on the fence about using of the Anti-Life Equation on his deceased wife.

The Anti-Life Equation is an important link in this comic book series – in this storyline, Anti-Life Equation Entity is revealed to be one-half of a cosmic being that was split into two by the war of the old gods, while the other part of the cosmic entity is the Source.

Even Darkseid is not sure of its true power, and in the comics, wants to use it to take over all of the universes. Anyway, Darkseid gets a hold on the part of the Anti-Life Equation. Meanwhile, Metron speaks with the Source which reveals it is responsible for New Gods’ deaths and that it is killing New Gods to establish the Fifth World, which would be perfect and erase the Fourth World, an imperfect current world they are in. The Source reveals that is also responsible for the Infinite Crisis and bringing back the Multiverse during the New 52 event, which also freed the dark part of it – the Anti-Life Entity.

Betrayed by the Source and the entity he worshipped, Mister Miracle demands to die, and which Source grants him that wish. Seeing Source’s brutality toward its most loyal followers, Metron requests the same thing, and Source terminates him. Afterward, The Source decides to kill the last New God, Darkseid, who in the meantime, has taken a serum giving him access to the power of the Anti-Life portion of the Source.

Soulfire Darkseid was born.

Soulfire Darkseid Powers

Taking a serum that gives him access to the power of the Anti-Life portion of the Source, Darkseid gained the lost souls of deceased New Gods. What basically happened was that the formula tapped into the Source power that killed the New Gods has multiplied Darkseid’s powers tenfold, and with thousand souls of deceased New Gods, he will be able to control and rule all heavens. If we take into account that the Source, which was responsible for the killings and Darkseid’s already unbelievable powers, Soulfire Darkseid is unstoppable.

Darkseid’s powers like superhuman abilities, genius intelligence, telekinesis, telepathy, matter, and energy manipulation, immortality, invulnerability, Omega effect, and more, in Soulfire form, are tenfold stronger. This is a worst-case scenario for our heroes, and Superman seeing that he will get beaten instantly, steps aside while Soulfire Darkseid and the Source fight.

The Source sends the ghost of Darkseid’s son Orion, to fight with Soulfire Darkseid. After a furious exchange, Darkseid realizes that it is not worth it, that it was not meant to be, and lets his son rip his heart out and flees. Superman uses the last of the Mother Box that was Big Barda’s and comes back to Earth, while the Source connects Apokalips and New Genesis and creates the Fifth World.

This comic book volume showed the incredible power of the New Gods, especially of the Source and Darkseid, who gained an access to the New Gods’ souls and the power of the Source, which made Darkseid, just for a moment, the strongest being in the universe.

The Death of the New Gods comic book was not received well by the fans, and even though to comic book served as a prologue to Infinite Crisis, the fact that there were a lot of plot holes in the New Gods stories was just too much. The Death of the New Gods is practically a forgotten storyline and is regarded as one of the most confusing and below-average comic books in the last two decades, especially after the last issue was released.

Regardless of that, we saw what the Source’s powers and New Gods’ souls can do, especially when it comes to the biggest supervillain in the DC universe. Superman’s realization of how strong the New Gods are and the creation of the Fifth World are also pretty interesting.

Thank you for reading. Hopefully, we explained Soulfire Darkseid’s origins and powers properly, and if you are interested, definitely check out our other articles. Until the next time!

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