Newer Gods 16. A new meaning to the never-ending battle!
Newer Gods is a monthly feature where I take a look back at the history of DC Comics’ New Gods from the era after original creator Jack Kirby. It’s a study of creators as they take a look back at work of the King of Comics and re-create it.
All images copyright DC Comics.
Mister Miracle 22
Behind a Marshall Rogers cover, this issue starts with a dramatic statement by Scott Free: "I must kill Darkseid, Oberon! ...And the sooner, the better!"
"Midnight of the Gods" is brought to us once again by the Englehart / Rogers team, together in this book for the final time. Englehart uses his John Harkness alias here, a name he's turned to a few times when he's unhappy with the direction he's forced to take on a book he's leaving. This doesn't appear to be an editorial issue though as often was the case later when he used the Harkness name. Englehart explains on his website: "Because I didn't think it measured up to my previous issues, I put my pseudonym, John Harkness, on it... Here, it meant only that I didn't think I met my own standard."
He also explains that he dashed this issue out in one day as he prepared to leave the country. The rush nature also might be apparent from the presence of two inkers over Rogers: Rick Bryant and John Fuller.
Moving back to our story, Oberon meets Free's declaration with humor. He jokes that he must mean they need some rest, as they're the only two men on all of Apokolips fighting the good fight. But before their conversation can finish, they're attacked by soldiers dressed somewhere between Imperial Stormtroopers and 80s-era Brainiac cosplayers. He slips free of their grasps though and grabs one of their guns. By the time they realize he escaped, he's blasting them with one of their own weapons!
The book also doesn't hide that Scott just committed wholesale murder. As a message starts to play from one of the bodies, Darkseid's hologram states, "Upon the death of Junior Jumbo, this pre-recorded hologram will be activated." Darkseid proceeds to threaten Earth should Mister Miracle not stop his assault.
Yet Mister Miracle rushes headlong into his battle. Oberon tries to contact New Genesis for assistance, but Highfather admonishes him that no other help is available nor does he think it necessary. (This seems a clear reference to the current Return of the New Gods storyline.) Unfortunately, the broadcast attracts the attention of the Apokoliptan guard. He barely escapes before they destroy the location.
Poor Oberon is the "get shot at constantly" kind of friend. He might need to find a new buddy.
Meanwhile Scott Free returns to the Enclave, where he confronts the partially rendered, under-colored proletariat. He's met with a mix of excitement and hostility, examples of the confusion he's put into the people of the twin world. He fights off the soldiers in front of his growing supporters, but when they threaten to kill the lowlies, he surrenders rather than see them shot.
Kanto meets the captured Mister Miracle as he's led away. He asks if he's been thoroughly searched. Despite the soldier's affirmative, Kanto quickly disarms Miracle of some of the tricks he already knows Scott holds. He's then hauled off towards another dungeon and another cell, because the villains of Apokolips never quite learn he's the greatest escape artist in the universe. This time, he doesn't even get to his cell before he ignites the bomb still secreted on his person and makes his escape into the facility.
Finally, he finds his way to Darkseid's inner sanctum, but before he can find the evil god, Darkseid finds him. He arrives in perhaps the most oddball modern picture of Darkseid I've ever seen.
Scott blasts him with the same rifle he stole earlier in the issue. Bu despite the weapon's devastating power, it doesn't even faze Darkseid.
In answer, Darkseid offers a hard truth: New Genesis and Apokolips are locked in a constant battle for eternity. "Can you build a brave new world without balance?" he opines. "Light and shadows! Day and night! Waking and dreaming! And when the dreams grow most vivid, it is Darkseid that you see!"
Scott darkly realized Darkseid tells the truth. He's pulled deep into a spiral of Darkseid's dark laughter as Englehart and Rogers' final Mister Miracle tale comes to an end.
This is the kind of existential dread Englehart grew to use so much in his later work. I will also guess this is where the second inker finds his way into the story as the shift in blacks when Darkseid appears is dramatic. He's presented as almost a force of nature, craggy and cloaked in darkness. If it wasn't nearly a half decade before his debut, I would have guessed Rogers saw some Bill Sienkiewicz before this issue. Instead, he offered a stylized art that won't be seen much for another ten or fifteen years of comic history.
Unlike Conway on Return of the New Gods, this tale seemed dead set on making everyone know there was no escape from this battle. No one will win in the end. The only thing left is the battle. It's a dark message, especially for a mid-70s DC title — but perhaps not so out of place as the Cold War edged towards the 80s.
No mention of a next issue comes at the end of this and one might have assumed this was the end for Mister Miracle’s second run, but a new creative team would debut on the book quite soon before even another issue of Return of the New Gods could reach publication. But next time, we get a special issue stuck smack dab in the middle of that aforementioned New Gods series! See you then.
