What's up with the continuity of Mister Miracle, Orion, New Gods, & Apokolips?

[KurtW95]

Anybody know what's going on with the continuity with regard to Mister Miracle, Orion, the New Gods, and Apokolips? Because the different appearances have been wildly inconsistent lately. For instance, New Gods Special had thing with a very traditional Kirby-esque status quo. Mister Miracle on the other hand seems to be in a darker, alternate future from the traditional setting- though I haven't seen anything confirming it's status as Elseworlds or set in the main continuity. Then there's the appearance of Orion and Highfather in their New 52 costumes and personas in Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps. Personally, I was hoping that New Gods Special was going to be sort of a Rebirth cleaning up of the New Genesis/Apokolips continuity and weeding out the mistakes from the relaunch, but now it's harder and harder to tell what's going on. Anybody got an idea?

[Bored at 3:00AM]

As near as anyone can tell, it's more residual time shenanigans related to Rebirth. Tom King has insisted that his Mr. Miracle series is in continuity, so it's a foregone conclusion that the Fourth World characters are going back to their classic selves at some point.

[Robotman]

I really hope they ditch the New 52 New Gods (NuGods), especially the changes made to Darkseid in the Villains Month issue. I welcome the return of the classic character designs and origins with open arms. Why try to change what Kirby created?!? Highfather shouldn’t be a militaristic jerk, Orion shouldn’t act like a frat guy, and Darkseid was never a farmer.

I’m really happy to see the classic costumes back. I hated the New 52 Orion redesign. He looks less like a cosmic warrior and more like a reject from Fast and the Furious. Plus the Ironman-like helmet that lifts up in the front doesn’t look as good as the classic. I liked what Fabok did with the designs in the Darkseid War. He really toned down all the gaudy crap that Lee added to Darkseid. He didn’t need gold and shoulder pads. Plus Fabok did a super cool version of the Black Racer (which was easily Kirby’s weakest New God design). So I guess if they’re gonna update the look of the characters they need to keep the spirit of Kirby’s original ideas.

[Green Goblin of Sector 2814]

All the young animal books are in continuity or at least that’s what’s been intimated by writers and what I’ve been told. So everything that happens in Mister Miracle and Forager is supposedly canon with the rest of the DCU. Plus, the Pre-FP New Gods designs have popped up in the Superman books. So I don’t know know why they keep the N52 looks in other books.

[gwangung]

So I don’t know know why they keep the N52 looks in other books.

Change of clothes while the primary clothes are at the New Gods laundry?

[Rickswordfish]

I think the whole story is Mr. Miracle having a near death experience

[KurtW95]

Change of clothes while the primary clothes are at the New Gods laundry?

Highfather also looks like his classic self (which is dramatically different from his New 52) appearance in those books excluding HJATGLC, which also referenced New 52 continuity- saying that he and Darkseid's are brothers. I sincerely hope this is cleared up and it goes back to the way it was before. Merging Highfather and Drax (Infinity Man) isn't a good idea IMO.

[My Two Cents]

Only the King could have come up with a name like High Father and make it ever lastingly cool

[Embryonic Superman]

Technically we never got an explanation for how Darkseid and the Apokolips crew came back after Final Crisis. Unless I'm mistaken, the continuity reboots of New Earth shouldn't really have any influence on the New Gods.

[Stanlos]

I really ?Darkseid was never a farmer.

Is that a real thing???

[theoneandonly]

Thanos told him it was good clean simple living which he found profoundly fulfilling so he thought he would give it a try after the latest reboot/ragnarok.

[Deniz Camp]

They are platonic creatures, their divine light refracted through the lens of material existence into a spectrum of manifestations, distinct but related.

They are gods, decomposed into various states of matter -- douchey Orion, evil Orion, angry Orion, clever Orion. Depressed Scott, dope Shiloh. Baby Darkseid, omnipotent essence of evil Darkseid, supervillain-Darkseid.

None of them are any realer, or any less real, than you want them to be. Enjoy.

[Deniz Camp]

Is that a real thing???

It's a joke based on the Superman/Batman arc where he's waiting in the Kent's barn for Kara and Supes to return. There's a shot that makes it look like he's wearing a plaid shirt, IIRC.

[Calvinr]

King has left room in his book for the rebirth history to be folded in at some point, although I have to be honest I'd rather they not, King's Mister Miracle and the fantastic Forager book on young animal have portrayed the new gods much closer to Kirby than they ever was in the new52.

But as others have mentioned so far writers have lead us to believe it's all in continuity, which I personally think is a mistake, the New Gods should be allowed to exist outside continuity imo, that's not to say they can't intermingle with the rest of the DCU, but I definitely think the fourth world should exist outside the main continuity.

[manduck37]

It's a joke based on the Superman/Batman arc where he's waiting in the Kent's barn for Kara and Supes to return. There's a shot that makes it look like he's wearing a plaid shirt, IIRC.

Actually, it's based on Darkseid's Villains Month issue. I think it was one of the Superman villains month issues, with the fancy lenticular covers. They give an origin to Darkseid where he was an alien farmer who took power from the gods by killing them. So yeah, it's a real thing.