Revisiting NEW GODS

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1970

New Gods #1 - Written, Drawn and Edited by Jack Kirby (inked by Vince Colletta)

Cover by Jack Kirby (inks by Vince Colletta)

Part ONE:

ON NEWSSTANDS DECEMBER 1970

New Gods #1 - 'A Visit with Jack Kirby' by Marvin Wolfman

I thoroughly enjoy the Kirby stuff.  His dialogue is full of energy.  Favorite is the Demon.  

A modern review of it in 2010 by Jon B. Cooke

With Jack Kirby’s fine work on Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen and The Forever People, we’ve already got a good look at the conflict developing on Earth, but here, in “Orion Fights For Earth!” we now get view of the cosmic dimension, and it’s an awesomely impressive image of an unfolding complex tapestry of celestial intrigue with a universe-quaking background story. As is appropriate for a Kirby epic, this is BIG stuff, involving BIG characters and BIG concepts.

The comic book opens in cataclysmic fashion, Ragnarok depicted on page one; the violent, fiery creation of two planets on page two; and a gorgeous close-up of our hero with that extraordinary helmet on page three. I mean, counting the magnificent depiction of Supertown on page five, that’s three full-pagers out of the first five… and they are so gorgeous, it makes one yearn for an entire book of Jack Kirby splashes!

It is a beautiful set-up for a first issue in that we get a sense, right off the bat, that our main star is much more than he appears — evidenced by Metron and Highfather’s side-chatter — which immediately engrosses us with strong hints that Orion has a deeper connection to the enemy than he himself imagines. It also seems obvious to me that Jack had thought long and hard about the overarching storyline as there seem remarkably few loose threads. (The only one that immediately comes to mind is the fact the Earth-built “Mass-Director Unit” obviously didn’t work, as Darkseid and his minions would later focus on monitoring devices with decidedly smaller range, particularly Happyland (a.k.a the “camp” and “Kingdom of the Damned”), to find the human who possesses the Anti-Life Equation. You’d think, given how the King of Evil has the habit of roughing up and brutalizing those who fail to carry out his orders — think Brola, Desaad, Mantis, Mokkari and Simyan (well, a strong berating to the last two, anyway!) — we would see the Apokolips ruler mete out his unhappiness to whomever supervised the earthbound Mass-Director Unit. But, as we see in the referring panel, it looks like Darkseid himself is directing its construction, so maybe he gave himself a stern talking-to behind closed doors!)

There’s really not much more I can add. It’s a magnificent debut for the title, arguably the best of the Fourth World quartet of comics, and it confidently — and with supreme competence — sets the stage for the Super War on Earth to come… A bravura performance by THE master of adventure comics.

(Oh, just to tie up the story synopsis, let me round out this issue (though I’ve pretty much described what’s happening, only a bit disjointedly, I fear): After Orion confers with Metron, he frees the Earth folk from the brain-scanning device. Kalibak, now freed courtesy of Metron’s exit, engages Orion, who bears partial brunt of Kalibak’s nerve beam and returns fire with Astro-Power. Suddenly a Boom Tube appears and our heroes jump aboard, Orion holding up the rear astride his Astro-Harness. Kalibak hurls his Beta-Club in frustration at the disappearing Boom Tube to no avail, and our team arrives on Earth, to ominous winds of war coming toward them. Jack, who started this opener with an epilogue, audaciously closes with a prologue, a full-page splash of Darkseid and some spectacular minions in the background (none, I believe, who were seen again in the series!). Closing the comic, we sense we’ve just experienced something new to the form, a multi-layered, sprawling, complex and exhilarating epic of cosmic proportions which engages and screams for your attention: Simply put, an intelligent and still viscerally satisfying super-hero comic series…)

Jim Thompson on Facebook makes an interesting comparison with Lee and Kirby's writing...

Some mock Kirby’s writing abilities by citing the “superiority of his collaborations” with Stan Lee, as compared to Kirby’s Fourth World saga. Usually, when pressed, these people have to admit they haven’t actually revisited Kirby’s words in decades. Therefore I think these are just ingrained notions that need to be challenged with actual textual comparisons rather than forty to fifty + year-old memories.

Here are similar panels from Thor #128 (1966) “written” by Lee and The New Gods #1 (1971) written by Kirby.

Let’s start with Thor: [two prepositional phrases, followed by] “... Asgard itself is finally torn asunder by a monumental explosion, which shakes the very foundations of infinity itself!!” ITSELF is an unnecessary word generally speaking, but to use it twice in a single sentence? That’s writing malpractice. “Foundations of infinity” — infinity has foundations? Why not say the “four corners of infinity.” But then, worst of all, Ragnorak basically is described as a “monumental explosion.”C’mon Stan, it’s Ragnarok!

Now, Kirby: No monumental explosion. Instead, he describes filling the universe with “the blinding death-flash of its destruction.” Notice the alliteration of death and destruction. He does it earlier in the sentence with Final and Fatal. An explosion doesn’t convey finality, but death-flash sure does. That sounds like the true Ragnarok!

Can anyone really say that Thor sentence is superior? Or that the New Gods sentence is poor writing?

Now let’s go to the second part. Lee writes “Finally, nothing remains but ... silence.” He already used Finally, but here it is again. Kirby says “In the end .... adrift in the fading sounds of cosmic thunder, silence closed upon what had happened — a long, deep silence — wrapped in massive darkness...”

Narration is part of writing just as much as dialogue. Whenever I do straight comparisons like this, I often find sloppiness and repetition in Stan’s sentence construction, whereas Kirby shows care in his alliteration, grace in his metaphors, and superior use of descriptive adjectives. It reads like poetry.

great stuff

the action spoke for itself!