Steppenwolf: the uncle of Darkseid and his armies of Parademons

Steppenwolf, the general of Apokolips on one page

Steppenwolf is a New God of Apokolips, the forge-world governed by Darkseid. He is no lone killer: he commands the armed forces of the planet, and with them the Parademons. Jack Kirby created him in 1972, inside his Fourth World saga.

The name is not an invention of DC’s. “Steppenwolf” is a German word meaning “wolf of the steppes”; it comes from Hermann Hesse’s novel, and then served as the name of a rock band. A search in English turns up mostly those, which blurs the identification of the character.

Two weapons are his signature: an electro-axe presented as all but indestructible, and a cable-snare that fires radion beams in order to pin a target down before the blow lands.

Why Steppenwolf is Darkseid’s uncle, and not his brother

The kinship is precise, and it is often told the wrong way round. Darkseid was called Uxas before he reigned; his mother is Queen Heggra, his father Yuga Khan. Steppenwolf is the younger brother of Heggra: he is therefore the maternal uncle of Darkseid and the brother-in-law of Yuga Khan. Orion and Kalibak are his great-nephews.

That detail changes the way the character reads. He is not a dynastic rival, he is a useful relative: a member of the ruling family with no claim on the throne, and therefore the ideal instrument for a nephew who wants his war without carrying the decision for it. Zod’s lieutenant fills the very same slot at DC.

Three confusions keep coming back. Kalibak, the eldest son of Darkseid, is a front-line brute and not an army commander. DeSaad is the torturer and the liaison officer of the master of Apokolips. Granny Goodness drills the soldiers and leads the Furies.

“The Pact!”: an entrance on stage told in flashback

The first appearance of the character is New Gods vol. 1 #7, “The Pact!”, cover dated February-March 1972: the series was bimonthly and carried a double date. Jack Kirby signs the script and the art, Mike Royer the inking.

That debut is a flashback, as is the bulk of the appearances Kirby gives the character afterwards. The same issue brings Queen Heggra on stage, along with Avia, the wife of Izaya.

The story runs in four movements. Darkseid pushes his uncle into going hunting on New Genesis; Steppenwolf kills Avia there; that murder sets off the war between the two planets; Izaya kills Steppenwolf on the field of battle, and that war is what will make him the Highfather. The technology of Apokolips then resurrects the general. The hand was his own, the decision was his nephew’s.

The Parademons: the troops that Steppenwolf commands

The Parademons were not created by Steppenwolf, and the mistake is a frequent one. They appear in New Gods vol. 1 #1, dated February-March 1971, the issue in which Kirby sets up the New Gods, New Genesis and Apokolips all at once; Vince Colletta takes care of the inking. They are the shock troops of Darkseid.

Their first use is a domestic one: holding order on Apokolips. Abroad, they are let loose as flying swarms. Steppenwolf has his hand on the armed forces of the planet, and not merely on one squad.

That nuance sets him apart from the other cosmic adversaries of Superman’s universe. A warlord such as Mongul reigns over his own world and fights on his own account; Steppenwolf never conquers for himself, he delivers worlds to somebody else.

Steppenwolf’s powers and weapons: what is documented

A New God, Steppenwolf is all but immortal, and his strength as much as his durability goes far beyond the human scale. None of that is given a figure by the sources, and no comparison of power with Superman, Darkseid or Kalibak is documented: the rankings that circulate are estimates made by readers.

His real register is a military one: command and combat skill are listed as abilities in their own right, on the same footing as strength. The electro-axe remains his signature, the cable-snare immobilises a target before the blow. His armour is described as able to reshape itself, and he rides war hounds bred for battle.

What he is not: neither the brain nor the supreme strategist. His part is that of the enforcer — manipulated by Darkseid in 1972, in debt to him in 2021. Up against the Kryptonian skin of Superman, his advantage has always been numbers, not raw power.

Steppenwolf against Superman: from the Daily Planet to a red sun

The link with Superman is not a shortcut: this mythology entered DC through a Superman title. The Fourth World starts in Superman’s Pal, Jimmy Olsen #133, cover dated October 1970, an issue that introduces Morgan Edge and Intergang, the organised crime of Metropolis that the saga would later hook up to the machinery of Apokolips, under the eyes of the photographer of the Daily Planet.

The two of them cross paths directly in Action Comics #814, dated June 2004, written by Chuck Austen and drawn by Ivan Reis. Darkseid lands on Earth with Kalibak, Steppenwolf and a pack of Parademons in order to collect Doomsday; Superman sends them home and keeps the monster.

The most head-on confrontation, however, is an animated one. In Justice League Action, the episode “Under a Red Sun” sends Superman to a planet lit by a red sun: Steppenwolf means to leave him there to die and so earn the favour of Darkseid. Stripped of his powers, Superman gets out of it by cunning.

New 52 and Earth 2: when Steppenwolf moves into the lead role

The New 52 reboot of 2011-2012 puts the character back into circulation. The chronology consulted places his first appearance in that continuity in Justice League vol. 2 #6, dated April 2012, at the end of the origin story of the League signed by Geoff Johns and Jim Lee. The two sources consulted agree on that issue, which remains an end-of-story appearance.

It is elsewhere that he changes status. In Earth 2, by James Robinson and Nicola Scott, the first issue — cover dated July 2012 — tells in flashback of an Apokoliptian invasion pushed back at the cost of the Superman, the Batman and the Wonder Woman of that parallel Earth. Batman destroys the network of Boom Tubes, and Steppenwolf is left stranded on the spot.

Stuck there, he does not go back to being a lieutenant: he builds a territorial power out of the country of Dherain and takes on the World Army. His end comes at the hand of “Brutaal”, a Superman turned to the service of Apokolips. The sources diverge on his exact nature — the corrupted Superman of that Earth, or a clone of Kal-El — and he dies in issue 16, dated December 2013.

Justice League 2017 and Snyder Cut 2021: two different Steppenwolfs

Ciarán Hinds plays the character in both versions of the film, in voice and in motion capture, advised on that exercise by Liam Neeson. He has stated his displeasure with the cut released in cinemas on 17 November 2017, which had cut away the bulk of the character’s past; the cut released on 18 March 2021 gives part of it back.

The heaviest difference is a factual one. In 2017, it is Steppenwolf who led the ancient invasion of Earth. In 2021, that invader is Darkseid in person, named Uxas at the time, and he is defeated there: taking the version of 2017 to speak about the long cut is the easiest mistake to make here.

The driving spring of the character changes along with it. In 2017, he wants to bring the three Mother Boxes together into “the Unity”. In 2021, the same mission becomes a penance: a fallen general, he has betrayed Darkseid and has to deliver worlds to him before he is allowed back home, and the scene with DeSaad puts a figure on his debt of fifty thousand worlds. The film does not explain what that betrayal consisted of.

The Mother Boxes also show him the Anti-Life Equation present on Earth, he reports it to DeSaad, and Darkseid swears to come in person. His exit from the stage differs too: in 2017, he is not killed — his own Parademons throw themselves at him when they sense his fear, and a Boom Tube carries him back alive to Apokolips; in 2021, the League executes him and the Superman of Henry Cavill strikes him back through the portal. In both cases, it is the death of Superman that had woken the boxes.

In animation and in games: what is established and what is not

On television he was long a background silhouette. He appears in the two-part episode “Apokolips… Now!” of the 1990-era animated series, with the voice of Sherman Howard: first part on 7 February 1998, second on 14 February 1998, and the sources consulted list him with certainty only in the second.

He comes back in “Twilight”, the opening of the second season of Justice League, broadcast on 5 July 2003; on that role the sources contradict one another, one crediting Corey Burton and the other René Auberjonois, so no name will be put forward here. Then come “Duel of the Double Crossers!” in Batman: The Brave and the Bold, on 12 June 2009, where he is a gladiator of the Warworld of Mongul with the voice of Kevin Michael Richardson, and then “Under a Red Sun” from Justice League Action, where Peter Jessop dubs him — 11 December 2016 in the United Kingdom, 25 February 2017 in the United States. The overview of the series puts these dates back in place.

Two appearances call for tongs. The game Lego DC Super-Villains offers him as a playable character, but only one source mentions it. And the holographic silhouette of the “Communion” scene, in the extended edition of Batman v Superman, is identified as Steppenwolf by the press on the strength of a visual comparison, with no confirmation from the studio.

Conclusion

Steppenwolf holds a place of his own among the enemies of Superman: he almost never has a plan of his own. Uncle of the master of Apokolips, what he brings is the electro-axe and sheer numbers. Keep hold of the three traps of the subject: the uncle and not the brother, the Parademons commanded and not created, and the ancient invader of the cut of 2021 who is not him.

To go further, the profile of Darkseid throws light on the balance of power on the master’s side, and Apokolips War shows what an invasion that succeeds looks like. Among the great adversaries of the Man of Steel, Brainiac fills the opposite slot: intelligence without an army.