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| ©DC and Marvel. The New Gods and the Old Gods |
[Jack Kirby's Fourth World remains a vital part of the DC Extended Universe in film and comics.
Nigel Brown re-examines The Source and Other Things.... ]
by Nigel Brown
(Warning: Contains Kirby’s Fourth World spoilers!)
Apart from our micro-circulation SuperStuff, my first fanzine contribution was an overview of Jack Kirby’s Fourth World saga, titled The Source and Other Things for Marc Baines’s Eon #2 (May-July 1975), a version of which had appeared in SuperStuff #1 (May-June 1974).
But beyond that overview, further delving into that mythos reveals a fundamental difference between Kirby’s ‘New Gods’ of his Fourth World and those ‘old gods’ of his work at Marvel in the 1960s.
When we consider the gods of the Marvel Universe, first thoughts turn to the Norse gods of the Thor comics. They were introduced very early on, in Journey Into Mystery #85 (Oct.1962), the third Thor story.
Hercules, Zeus, Pluto and others in the Greek god pantheon appeared by the mid-1960s.
Both the Norse gods and the Olympians in the Marvel stories did as the gods of the Vikings and the Greeks did: they lived, they loved, they fought each other.
As well as these gods, there are two major Kirby characters in the Marvel universe that are nominally powerful aliens, but display enough ‘godlike’ characteristics to be termed as such: The Watcher and Galactus.
What marks them both out, as characters, is that they are static.
The Watcher is the very definition of the word. He does, or course, interfere to save the Earth, most notably from Galactus himself in Fantastic Four #50 (May, 1966), but his essential characteristic is just to watch others.
Galactus feeds on energy from planets containing life. That’s it. His sole motivation is his personal survival.
Therefore the Watcher and Galactus are both characters with primarily no other discernible purpose except that one watches, the other feeds. (This isn’t a complaint, by the way. Lee and Kirby produced some of the most exciting and memorable stories with the Watcher and Galactus, as they both played the role of seemingly inexorable forces against which others had to contend with in the Marvel universe.)
So all of these Marvel ‘gods’ have a common characteristic: a lack of purpose beyond the physical world in which they live.
Then Kirby moved to DC in 1970. This has been well documented, and one of the triggers for the move was his disillusionment with Marvel when he wanted to break new ground on his long-standing Thor comic. He wished to use the Norse legend of Ragnarok to transform the old Norse gods into new characters. Marvel said ‘no’, so he took the concept to DC as his ‘New Gods’.
As an aside, Kirby couldn’t explicitly tie them with Marvel’s Norse gods. He had to hint at their previous incarnation with a few clues – Thor’s abandoned helmet, for instance, in the back-up feature ‘The Young Gods of Supertown’ in Forever People #5 (Oct/Nov. 1971):
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| ©DC. Thor's abandoned helmet from Forever People #5 Oct-Nov 1971 |
But from the first issue of the New Gods we can see that Kirby meant that things were to be different. We’re introduced to ‘The Source’, a mystery that Highfather says “lived as the old gods died” - New Gods #1 (Mar. 1971).
The interaction between the New Gods and ‘The Source’ is integral to the Fourth World saga’s narrative. They listen to it, they revere it. Orion says: “… It is eternal!” - New Gods #1 (Mar. 1971).
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| ©DC New Gods #1 |
They don’t understand ‘The Source’, but know that it offers them the possibility of growth, of becoming something beyond themselves. In Mister Miracle #9 (Aug. 1972), Himon says to Scott Free and Barda:
“… there is still the riddle of what powers this Motherbox! The Source! It lives! It burns! When we reach out and touch it --- the core of us is magnified! And we tower as tall as Darkseid!”
He doesn’t mean as evil as Darkseid, but contact with ‘The Source’ enables them to stand up to the power of Darkseid by attaining their own potential… and beyond.
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| ©DC . Mr. Miracle #9 |
They also see their afterlife in ‘The Source’. Orion, on the death of the New Genesis warrior, Seagrin, says:
“… Motherbox… can do nothing more but perform her last service for Seagrin! She takes him to --- The Source!” - New Gods #4 (Sept. 1971).
But they do not submit to its orders. On New Genesis, the concept of freewill is respected. This is made clear at the beginning of the saga when Orion says:
“The Source gives us irrevocable counsel!”
and Highfather replies:
“But it does not decide! The right of choice is ours! That is the life equation!” - New Gods #1 (Mar.1971).
Kirby appears to posit ‘The Source’ as a solution to the threat of another Ragnarok consuming the New Gods, as the salvation from a continual state of war, to peace.
We see this in New Gods #7 (Mar. 1972), when Highfather, in desperation at the destruction brought about by the war between New Genesis and Apokolips, a seeming rerun of Ragnarok that destroyed the old gods, cries out:
“If I am Izaya the Inheritor --- what is my inheritance!?”
A flaming hand writes on a wall: ‘The Source’.
‘Soon after, Izaya returns to his command! He dresses in the clothes of peace—and he carries a new staff!!’
A pact is then formed between Highfather and Darkseid,and an era of cold peace begins that halts the wholesale destruction of the hot war.
The personification of the relationship between the New Gods and ‘The Source’ is the character Metron.
In speaking to Darkseid and the assembled leaders of Apokolips, Metron declares:
“I have no link with the old gods – or new! I am something –different! Something that was unforeseen!! On New Genesis – or here!” - New Gods #7 (Mar. 1972).
This could be bluster on his part, but Kirby’s earnest style seems to discount this possibility.
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| ©DC. New Gods #7 |
Metron’s motivation is made clear the first time we meet him, when he says:
“What wouldn’t I give to possess knowledge of the ‘Source’!” - New Gods #1 (Mar. 1971).
In the first few pages of New Gods #5 (Nov. 1971), we see him contemplating giants in the Promethean galaxy, “Intellects that equal my own!”, who tried and failed to engulf the final barrier to the Source by enlarging their atomic structure, now taking ‘a billion Earth years to feel one heartbeat!’ and ‘larger than a star cluster!’, “… and beyond all the knowledge and sweeping concept at our command, the mystery of The Source lies – serene – omnipotent – all-wise! But it does make contact with us – in New Genesis!” Metron then transports himself to ‘the point of contact with The Source!! Highfather’s staff!!’
He’s frustrated that such a mystery appears so far off, yet is also so near at hand, and he cannot fathom it.
But Metron is more than a cold, calculating scientist. He sees the possibility of the numinous in others, even if they are below him on the evolutionary scale. New Gods #4 (Sept. 1971) begins with him talking to the young scholar Esak, as they fly above the landscape of a primitive planet, and observe savages fighting below:
“One day when their bellies are full, they will look up and see us! Then they will think and dream!”
Kirby ends his Fourth World saga not with another Ragnarok, but with an open-ended fate for the New Gods that stresses their appreciation of the mysteries of the unknown. In the DC Graphic Novel #4 ‘The Hunger Dogs’ (Mar. 1985), after the destruction of the planet New Genesis, with Supertown adrift in space, Highfather states:
“… ahead may lie an endless voyage of wonders! If the cosmos is alive with such overwhelming mysteries as ‘The Source’, it is versatile enough to bombard us with sights and questions of monumental value.”
Highfather’s speech is a bit clunky, it must be admitted, but we get the point.
So Kirby endowed his New Gods with a sense of the spiritual, a striving to transcend themselves that his god-like creations at Marvel lacked.
It’s a shame that Kirby was too far ahead of his time for the comics industry. If he had produced his Fourth World today, I’m certain that he would have been given the space and allowed the depth to portray the fullness of his vision. I suppose we must be grateful that he got as far as he did.
And as I ended my article back in 1975: ‘No matter how many short-lived series Kirby brought out, he will always remain one of the ‘Greats’ in the comic book world.’
© Nigel Brown
