10 Justice League Villains MORE Powerful Than Darkseid
All the rogues that could spell the end of the world, even for Apokolips.
Darkseid. Leader of Apokolips, enemy of New Genesis, and perennial big-bad of the DC Universe.
First appearing in 1971 in Jack Kirby’s New Gods series, Darkseid has appeared as a Justice League antagonist in basically every form of media, most recently in the animated movie Justice League Dark: Apokolips War, but also in several TV shows and comics. While narrowly missing out on a live-action movie debut in Zack Snyder's Justice League (although possibly not with the Snyder Cut on the way) Ava DuVernay and Tom King's New Gods script reportedly features him as a character, so here's hoping we'll see him in the rocky flesh soon.
But despite the Lord of Apokolips' greatness, there are plenty of other characters that deserve as much if not more attention. The Justice League has a storied roster of villains to choose from, with many rivalling and even surpassing Darkseid as a threat. While his search for the Anti-Life Equation is compelling, it's time to explore the other enemies of the League, and hope they get their time in the pop-culture sun.
So, who's the over-used and rinsed-out mainstay of the Justice League's rogues gallery?
Darkseid is.
10. Starro
The O.G. - The first villain to face-off against the Justice League of America back in 1960 was a one-eyed giant starfish with mind-control powers, Starro the Conqueror.
In his first appearance, Starro absorbs a nuclear blast, consumes the brain power of scientists, and controls the minds of thousands of people, only to be defeated by some quicklime. What a comedown.
He doesn't have the physical gravitas of Darkseid - as an alien-shaped-like-a-fish-shaped-like-a-star - but he's brought the League to the brink on several occasions, notably during Grant Morrison's nineties JLA series, when they have to enlist the help of Dream himself to overcome the stellar nuisance.
More recently, a small tissue sample of a defeated Starro was cultivated by Batman in a jar, resulting in a smaller, friendlier version assisting the Justice League under the name 'Jarro', who calls Batman 'Dad' and dresses up like Robin. Because sometimes it's nice to be nice.