The DC Universe is full of great and powerful villains but ask most fans who the most powerful one is and they'd answer the lord of Apokolips, Darkseid. In fact, there are many fans who would argue that Darkseid is not just the greatest villain in the DC Universe, but the greatest villain in all of comics, a powerful force of destruction that takes all the heroes have to defeat.
Powerful and ruthless, there is nothing that Darkseid desires so much as complete control over every being in existence. While he is definitely a great villain, is he a perfect villain? Let's take a look.
10 Perfect Villain: Apokolips
While Darkseid is superlatively powerful on his own, sometimes a villain needs more than to merely be the most powerful being in the room and that's where Darkseid's lordship of Apokolips comes in. It gives him access to many servants, from cannon fodder like Parademons to powerful elites like Kanto and the Female Furies.
It also shows just what Darkseid desires for the universe- a world of casual torture where the brutalized die on his whims praising his name. Apokolips works both as a source of troops and a foul example of Darkseid's plan for creation.
9 Not So Perfect: His Servants Are Kind Of Ridiculous
Jack Kirby created the Fourth World mythos that Darkseid hails from at the height of the Silver Age. Comics were very different back in these days and Kirby's personal style was huge on flash and bombast. So, while he made sure that Darkseid's servants were powerful, there's also something that's kind of ridiculous about them.
Kanto is Darkseid's chief assassin and he dresses like a Renaissance Fair reject. The Female Furies are some of the most dangerous fighters on Apokolips with extremely on the nose names like Stompa and Lashina, led by an elderly psychopath named Granny Goodness. His chief torturer is named Desaad, like a certain Marquis de Sade. Even Darkseid's name is a bit much. And let's not even get started on how dumb some of the victories over them have been.
8 Perfect Villain: The God Of Evil
Kirby positioned Darkseid as an evil for a new age and the creators that came after he refined that approach. Darkseid is the God of Evil, an all-powerful force of hatred, degradation, and pain and he has the power to back it up. It's befitting for a being that is the God of Evil to be so powerful; there are few who can stand against him one on one.
His amazing power makes him a massive threat all on his own. Even if one can get through his legions of powerful servants, Darkseid himself could easily prove to be too much for any of his foes to handle.
7 Not So Perfect: Inconsistent Power Levels
One of the problems with comic universes and the way they work is different creators have different ideas on how powerful characters are. Usually, there are editors and such that enforce such things but sometimes, they're asleep at the switches or okay a story for whatever reason. The most powerful villains always suffer from this sort of thing and Darkseid is no exception.
His power level has been terribly inconsistent over the years. Sometimes he's an unstoppable force of nature and other times he's less powerful than villains who he should easily overshadow. This inconsistency can be extremely frustrating.
6 Perfect Villain: Even In Death, He's Dangerous
Darkseid is one of the most dangerous villains in the DC Universe and Final Crisis proves that. Darkseid is the main villain of the story but before it even begins, he is defeated by his son Orion, his godly body destroyed and thrown down. Next, he and his servants projected their consciousness into Earthly bodies, changing them into something more useful to them, but the real damage has already been done.
Darkseid's body's "death" created a massive black hole in the center of the Multiverse, pulling everything into it. On top of that, he was able to surprise the heroes and conquer the Earth before they even realized what was happening and he did all of this in his death throes. Even in death, Darkseid is more dangerous than most villains are when they're alive.
5 Not So Perfect: He Can Be Kind Of Passive
One of the problems with Darkseid as a villain is that even though he desires Multiversal dominion, he sort of does very little about it. It's a strange state of affairs. He has a planet full of powerful servants, always ready to do his bidding yet most of the time he's more than content enough to just let things be.
This is usually explained as he's looking for the Anti-Life Equation or trying to break down the Source Wall or something but for a being with his desires, he rarely does anything about it. On top of that, he rarely if ever does much even during his schemes, allowing everyone else to do the heavy lifting.
4 Perfect Villain: The Anti-Life Equation
Darkseid is constantly searching for the fabled Anti-Life Equation, an equation that allows him complete control over anyone exposed to it. This is a very different type of force than most villains go for- most of the time, a villain is trying to find an object of power that will make them an unbeatable physical force. Darkseid, though, is already that; he desires something more insidious.
Darkseid believes that every living thing should bow to his will. He desires complete and total control over everything. He doesn't just want to rule- he wants to be worshiped. He wants to eliminate free will completely. Everything else is just icing on the cake.
3 Not So Perfect: His Ultimate Power Doesn't Always Work As Advertised
Darkseid's most fearsome power is the Omega Effect. These powerful eyebeams follow their target anywhere they go and are supposed to kill with one shot. The operative word being supposed. The problem comes that in giving a villain a one-hit kill power that operates like the Omega Effect makes telling stories about them very hard.
Why doesn't Darkseid just sit on his throne, firing out the Omega Effect beams and killing his foes before they even know he's after them? Over the years, creators have had to nerf this power to such an extent that it almost never works unless the narrative calls for it. It feels like there's no point in Darkseid even having the power in the first place.
2 Perfect Villain: The Tiger Force At The Center Of All Things
Kirby's original vision of Darkseid was as the ultimate, perfect evil. Darkseid's enemies aren't the heroes, not really, nor are his more casual atrocities, the things that most villains only wish they could do, the things that make him such a perfect villain. Darkseid's true enemy is free will and his greatest evil deeds are his complete and utter suppression of free will in his subjects.
Darkseid is everything terrible in every person- the desire for control and exercising one's will over others, the belief in one person's superiority, and the way of life they espouse. His threat is the most mundane yet terrible- the justification of all of the hatred and darkness inside of every human being.
1 Not So Perfect: So Few Creators Know How To Use Him Correctly
Darkseid has a lot of fans among comic creators but so many of them get him completely wrong. They look at him as merely a powerful villain, which he is, but miss all of the subtlety that Kirby put into him. This is easy to do with Kirby's stuff sometimes; his work doesn't always lend itself well to subtlety but Darkseid is a sublime creation and most creators miss out on what makes him so perfect.
Darkseid works on a lot of levels but he rarely gets used on the levels he should be used at and this is a grave disservice to the character. He's so much more than a generic all-powerful evil.