TALES FROM THE KRYPTONIAN: Friday the 13th : all my new gods are dead

Friday, March 13, 2026

Friday the 13th : all my new gods are dead

As I have often mentioned in the behind the scenes parts of my many musings on four coloured publications posts lead to other posts so it may not be a big surprise to my longtime followers that while I don't have enough material for a proper follow - up post to my spotlight on John Byrne's story about Superman and Big Barda's weird entry for America's Funniest Home Videos ( which has been slapped with an age restriction to no one's surprise but which just may be deemed SAFE FOR WORK by blogger right now ) on Jack Kirby's FOURTH WORLD SAGA I did find just about enough for a post about Jim Starlin's DEATH OF THE NEW GODS.

Speaking of the behind the scenes stuff, with our previous post getting an age restriction I hope I have already used up all my bad luck for this week even if in Spain it is Tuesday the 13th that brings bad luck instead of Friday the 13th. So anyway, I already included the link to my post BIG BARDA : DEATH, LIES AND VIDEOTAPES from 2012 ( which covers anything you need to know about Big Barda, Jack Kirby's FOURTH WORLD and of course DEATH OF THE NEW GODS ) in said post but on the off chance that it might have an age restriction when you are reading this I am including it here too. Now since I want to spoil too much ( which I doubt to be possible anyway because the story is literally called THE DEATH OF THE NEW GODS so surprise - all of them die ) for those who have not read it ( as my hope in writing these posts is that people pick up these classics ) I am not going to talk too much about the story which apparently was DC Comics way of putting all these characters out of their misery since they never really knew what to do with them after Jack Kirby left DC Comics.

So to end the mounting inconsistencies, lead in to their big mega event FINAL CRISIS ( although this story contradicts other FINAL CRISIS tie - ins thus proving that the writers can't help themselves and end up creating more inconsistencies even if they are well intentioned ) and give the New Gods a grandiose send off. While Jim Starlin delivered some great artwork ( although you will notice that some of the backgrounds in the original art are very bleak where he used computers ) as usual the jury is still out on the quality and effectiveness of the story. Nobody kills off universes like Jim Starlin and you can see that he had a lot of fun with this but the reception has been mixed. Of course with DC Comics making comicbooks to earn money they all had to come back sooner or later because Jack Kirby's creations like Mister Miracle and Big Barda are just to beloved by comicbook fans to let them simply languish for too long.

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the best comicbook series you have never heard of

I had the box set I ordered it from amazon when it was offered for 30 bucks and didn't think it was the real deal since that has a price tag of 300 bucks but I ordered it anyway thinking it was either the softcover version or just the box or the box with maybe the first hardcover but lo and behold it was the box with all three hardcovers of course I could not keep it when I came to spain and had to basically give it away for free because the guy who bought most of my stuff had no idea what a holy grail of comicbook collecting he was getting