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by Robert Greenberger

At its core, Jack Kirby’s new Gods saga has always been about fathers and sons but so often, the cosmic conflict has overshadowed the characters themselves. Of all the writers and artists to tackle the characters after the King departed his creations, Walter Simonson is the only one to actually focus on the most essential player, Orion.

Orion by Walter Simonson Omnibus Edition

Simonson took over the franchise after John Byrne carried out a sweeping attempt to utilize all the Kirby concepts and barnacles added by others through the years. He even did all of the covers to Byrne’s run so this felt like a natural transition. For Simonson, who is possibly at his strongest when taking care of a focal point, it was all about Orion, kid of Darkseid. His run lasted 25 issues at the beginning of the decade and DC is finally collecting it as Orion by Walter Simonson Omnibus Edition.

The series picks up where Byrne’s left off and the issue of Orion’s true paternity hangs over the earliest issues. Tigra claims Darkseid is not Orion’s daddy, which genuinely angers the smoldering god. Simonson told our own Roger Ash and Eric Nolen-Weathington in modern Masters volume Eight, “I wanted to get the Darkseid/Orion fight out, because once that’s done, then you’re not sure what is going to happen next. That’s the condition every comic book reader must be in. You must not know what’s going to happen next.”

The mostly wordless battle verified to be challenging for the artist to execute and verified controversial with the fans. In the end, though, the kid defeated the daddy and Orion took control of Apokolips. From there, his noble intentions turned out to have dreadful consequences and he verified slow to recognize the harm his enforced peace was causing across the worlds. Orion blinded himself in an act of self-flagellation, changing the tone of the series, so his (inevitable) downfall is followed by a quest for redemption.

Orion #12

Even though he is a new God, Orion has also had long-term connections with earth and Simonson shifted the focus later in the run. once back on Earth, he got involved with Arnicus Wolfram, the culmination of threads the writer/artist had seeded long before. The vile man is foreclosing on properties in Metropolis’ suicide Slum and Orion is forced to intervene. There is also a charming change of pace story with a homeless girl, Melissa, who winds up narrating that sequence. Simonson even went to a lot more standard grid-layout storytelling to reflect her perspective.

Overall, Simonson shows fidelity to what came before so Takion, a Paul Kupperberg creation elevated to ruling new Genesis remains in place and the designer also nicely uses characters Kirby briefly used across his fourth world series. and sharp-eyed readers will find lots of an Easter Egg scattered throughout the pages. The MacGuffin that has propelled the series considering that its 1971 debut has been the Anti-Life equation and it remains a crucial aspect here, with Simonson revealing, once and for all, where it resides with a nice, surprise twist.

The world of gods is so huge that there were lots of stories to tell so Simonson resurrected the “Tales of the new Gods” back-up notion, writing the shorter pieces for a variety of friends and fellow artists to execute. In this volume, you will also see the work of Dave Gibbons, Art Adams, Jim Lee & Scott Williams, Howard Chaykin, Frank Miller, Klaus Janson, Allen Milgrom, Jon Bogdanove, Eddie Campbell, and John Byrne (returning the favor). Eric Stephenson, Erik Larsen and Al Gordon took an image break to produce the sixth back-up while Jeph Loeb, Rob Liefeld, and norm Rapmund produced issue #8’s story and Kevin McCarthy and John Paul Leon handled #15. Simonson is also inked on several stories by Bob Wiacek (#8-9, 19-25) and Terry Austin (#13-14). Still, this is all about Simonson, his grand vision and sensational artwork, clearly inspired by Kirby’s creations but making them his own.

Orion #25

A big thinker, he had a five year plan (including an exploration of the Old Gods) curtailed a mere two-fifths of the way and he remains disappointed that he could not bring those ideas to life. The final issue tries to wrap things up, with a focus on the “brothers” Orion and Scott complimentary (a.k.a. Mister Miracle). What is here, though, is a lot more than enough for entertaining reading.

Purchase

Orion by Walter Simonson Omnibus Edition