Character Inspiration
According to writer Mark Evanier, Jack Kirby modeled Darkseid's face on actor Jack Palance. Kirby modeled Darkseid on Adolf Hitler and the world of Apokolips on Nazi Germany. Like Hitler, Darkseid is a jackboot-wearing megalomaniac and warmongerer who, in fascist style, sees every citizen as an extension of the state and himself. His society is highly militant, with children being indoctrinated from a young age (à la Hitler Youth) to be warlike and utterly loyal to him.
Darkseid's first appearance is a brief cameo in Superman's Pal Jimmy Olsen #134 (Nov 1970).
Read more about this topic: Darkseid
Famous quotes containing the words character and/or inspiration:
“There is no character, howsoever good and fine, but it can be destroyed by ridicule, howsoever poor and witless. Observe the ass, for instance: his character is about perfect, he is the choicest spirit among all the humbler animals, yet see what ridicule has brought him to. Instead of feeling complimented when we are called an ass, we are left in doubt.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)
“What is called eloquence in the forum is commonly found to be rhetoric in the study. The orator yields to the inspiration of a transient occasion, and speaks to the mob before him, to those who can hear him; but the writer, whose more equable life is his occasion, and who would be distracted by the event and the crowd which inspire the orator, speaks to the intellect and heart of mankind, to all in any age who can understand him.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)