Darkseid is a major antagonist in the DC Animated Movie Universe. He is a New God and the lord of the hellish world of Apokolips. He has set his sights on conquering Earth, only to be opposed by its mightiest heroes, the Justice League.
Darkseid appears in Justice League: War, Reign of the Supermen and Justice League Dark: Apokolips War. He is voiced by Steve Blum in his first appearance, then by Tony Todd afterwards.
History[]
Justice League: War[]
Attempting to invade the Earth, Darkseid sends an advance force of Parademons to secretly plant Mother Boxes in several locations around the Earth, including Metropolis, Central City, Keystone City, and Gotham City. Two of his minions die protecting the Mother Boxes' secret from The Flash, Batman, Green Lantern and Superman. With so many heroes beginning to interfere with his plan, the dark lord decides to step up his timetable and commence the invasion.
Darkseid later arrives in downtown Metropolis along with an army of Parademons. He easily destroys several U.S. Air Force jets before being attacked by Green Lantern, who he easily swats aside. He soon confronts each and every hero, and during the brawl, he manages to incapacitate Superman, who is then taken away by Parademons. Batman disguises himself as a civilian and surrenders to a passing Parademon in order to follow Superman and save him, leaving the other heroes to continue fighting Darkseid.
Darkseid then proceeded to destroy downtown Metropolis until a plan was formed, with Wonder Woman taking out one of his eyes with her sword, and the Flash and Shazam taking out the other. Darkseid was soon engaged by all of the heroes who attempted to push him into a Boom Tube back to Apokolips. Despite being blinded, Darkseid still fought the heroes until Cyborg activated a Mother Box that sent the Parademon army across the world back to Apokolips except for Darkseid who stood his ground. Shazam tried to get Darkseid through the portal, but Darkseid pummeled Shazam and tried to crush him, but was stopped by Wonder Woman and the Flash. Superman and Batman arrived and the heroes worked together to fight Darkseid. Together, the heroes defeated Darkseid and sent him back to Apokolips. Although Darkseid was able to resist for a while, he was finally pushed into the portal with a final punch by Superman. With all of the Mother Boxes deactivated, the heroes were reassured that Darkseid and his minions wouldn't be coming back any time soon.
The Death and Return of Superman[]
Some years after his first attack on Earth, Darkseid executed a new plan to destroy the Justice League. He created a terrifying, invincible monster using Superman's DNA that would become known as Doomsday to the people of Earth. This creature, programmed to kill every living thing in its path, was sealed within an asteroid and sent to Earth via Boom Tube. As anticipated, Doomsday carved a path of death and destruction after arriving on Earth, attracting the attention of the Justice League. Its primary goal, however, was to kill the strongest of Earth's champions: Superman.
Doomsday and Superman clashed in an epic battle that threatened to level Metropolis. The battle finally ended with the apparent deaths of both combatants. While Darkseid had hoped for Doomsday to kill the entire Justice League, he had other plans in motion. When Doomsday's asteroid had travelled to Earth, it collided with a space shuttle, killing all of its crew, save for one Hank Henshaw. Darkseid sensed Henshaw's bitterness towards Superman for not saving him and transported the broken man to Apokolips where he had him rebuilt as a monstrous cyborg. Fashioned to resemble Superman, Henshaw was later sent back to Earth under the guise of a false saviour who was meant to deceive the people and even the Justice League into a false sense of security by making them believe he was their new Superman.
Darkseid manage to help Henshaw by staging an attack on Earth which ended up with the Justice League being teleported to an unknown and hostile distant region of space. When Lex Luthor and Lois Lane intercepted a communication link between Cyborg Superman and Darkseid, they discovered that Darkseid believed he had already won and decided to patiently wait to casually invade since the Justice League were no longer around to stop him.
When Darkseid finally realized that Superman had survived his encounter with Doomsday, he immediately ordered Henshaw to open a Boom Tube so that he could have the pleasure of ending Superman himself. Henshaw refused, stating that killing Superman was his right, and tore out the control implant in his head. This also closed the portal that would have brought the Apokoliptian fleet to Earth, once more robbing Darkseid of a potential conquest and his revenge against Superman.
Justice League Dark: Apokolips War[]
Some time following Superman's revival, the Justice League's Watchtower detected Apokolips re-appearing in this dimension. Suspecting that Darkseid was preparing to invade once more, Superman urged the League into launching a preemptive strike against Apokolips. However, Darkseid had been able to access the Apokoliptian tech inside Cyborg's body and, through him, learned about the League's plan. When the heroes arrived at Apokolips, Darkseid was fully prepared and sent his new army of Paradooms - hybrids of Parademon and Doomsday - to attack. Some of the heroes were killed, but several were captured and converted into cybernetic Furies. Batman was brainwashed into becoming Darkseid's loyal lieutenant while Superman was injected with liquid kryptonite, stripped of his powers and sent back to Earth as a means of demoralizing the population.
Shortly after the League's failed attacked, Darkseid and his forces invaded. The Teen Titans were massacred by Darkseid himself while legions of Parademons and Paradooms lay waste to Earth's military forces. Within two years, the planet had been reduced to a hellish wasteland with all major cities being destroyed. Darkseid had also conquered much of Earth's sector of space and would travel to Oa in order to wipe out what remained of the Green Lantern Corps, leaving Lex Luthor to oversee Earth for him. He knew that Luthor could not be trusted implicitly and ordered Batman to monitor him.
Once he was done with destroying Oa, Darkseid returned to Apokolips. When he arrived, he found that Earth's surviving heroes were in the midst of sabotaging Apokolips' power source and had Batman attack his former allies. As Batman fought against his son Damian, the young Robin managed to get through to his father, who started breaking free of Darkseid's programming. Batman threw Robin's sword at Darkseid's face, striking the New God's eye. Darkseid retaliated by firing his Omega Beams and severely burning Robin, killing him. After watching Robin die, Raven lost control and released her father Trigon from his prison. The demon possessed Superman, burning off the kryptonite in his body and restoring his powers before attacking Darkseid.
As Trigon fought Darkseid in Superman's body, a transmission came through via the armour Superman had been wearing. The transmission was from Lois Lane, and ended abruptly as LexCorp Tower self-destructed, killing Lois and everyone else within. Watching Lois die, Superman was overcome with grief and rage, regaining control of his body and attacking Darkseid with all of his might. Once Trigon had been cast out of Superman, he was given a new physical form by Raven and John Constantine. He then pushed Superman aside and resumed attacking Darkseid himself.
While Trigon and Darkseid fought, Cyborg - who was integrated with Apokolips' technological network - came up with the plan to open a massive portal that would send the entire planet into an empty void dimension, trapping Darkseid and Trigon - and himself - for all eternity. He urged his friends to hurry and escape back to Earth before activating the portal, banishing all of Apokolips into the void and ending Darkseid's menace once and for all.