Recap / DEATH BATTLE! S05E16 - Thanos VS Darkseid

Power. Some spend entire lives in search of it, while for others, it is their birthright. But what truly matters in the end is how it's used.

Like with Thanos, the ultimate villain of the Avengers. And Darkseid, archnemesis to the Justice League.

The two flagship franchises of the comic book world return for the most anticipated entry yet in their eternal feud, as the final episode of season five marks a landmark occasion in the series' history; its most requested matchup finally brought to fruition. Two cosmic warlords, unstoppable gods of destruction, conquerors whose already insurmountable might is heightened only further by relics of awesome power, engage in a duel for the ages. Ancient artifacts will collide and the heavens will shake as the power of the Eternals clashes with the divinity of the New Gods, the sheer scale of infinity against the nothingness of omega, the slayer of untold numbers versus the conqueror of all that is, for Thanos and Darkseid, two of the greatest threats their universes have ever known, otherworldly destroyers and reshapers of reality, now face each other for a greater challenge, supremacy in the ultimate ring of honor, which is revisited this season, one final time: a death battle.

To open the episode is a biography of Thanos, the Mad Titan, and one of the many products of the godlike entities hailed as the Celestials. While mankind evolved in eons past to take the current form of humanity, the Celestials arrived on a primordial Earth and genetically engineered early humans to create a number of genetic offspring. Though they granted these subspecies several evolutions, chief amongst them ever-changing DNA or a dormant mutant gene, none of their creations would have a more profound impact across the cosmos than the Eternals, homo immortalis, blessed with eternal life and latent cosmic power. The Eternals, despite their otherworldly origins, were still based off the genetic modelings of mankind and prone to the folly it entails; the first generation of Eternals waged a civil war, where the warmongering Uranos and his followers were bested and left the planet in exile. These disgraced Eternals chose to settle further out amongst the stars, the most prominent case being Saturn's moon of Titan, which in fact was a creation of these banished entities. Further war ravaged the moon, leaving only a single survivor, the reclusive native Sui-San; millennia would pass before she met another of her kin, A'Lars, though he would be known to history as Mentor. Having left the Eternals' ancestral homeland to prevent strife amongst their kin, just as Uranos before him, A'Lars found Titan and began to rebuild its tattered surface alongside Sui-San, giving birth to a further genetic descendant of the Eternals; Titanian forms who were formidable, yet still inferior to their predecessors. The last of Mentor's progeny would be a pair of sons, Eros and Thanos, and it is here that the tragedy of the Mad Titan casts him at center stage. The day Thanos was born, it was evident that his large stature and leathery purple complexion made him resemble a Deviant, the misshapen abominations formed by the Celestials' earlier experimentations; Sui-San, driven mad by his appearance, attempted to murder her infant son, granting him his first look into the world of bloodshed and death he would later be thrust into beyond return. For a time, it would seem this singular incident would be but a passing mistake, as Thanos would grow up respected and even admired for a sterling intelligence that rivaled that of A'Lars. Throughout his early years, Thanos would find a compatriot in the form of a fellow Eternal, one who would help overcome his fear of killing; though he long sought after her heart, the Eternal rejected his every advance, but still stood by his side as he sought to understand the mysteries behind his genetic deformities. Thanos gradually became enraptured with murder for its own sake than as a means to support his cause, having slaughtered several of his own kin, including Sui-San, and essentially abandoning what was a promising start to his life. Even years after he chose to explore the cosmos to find solace from the carnage found in violence, this lack of murder left a barren void in his life; when Thanos returned to Titan, his childhood friend demanded that he return to every planet he visited and extinguish its populace to prove his devotion to her was steadfast. Like his mother before him, Thanos was lost to madness when he bore witness to truths he was unready to fathom; that which he thought was his closest companion was no Eternal, but the physical embodiment of Death itself, seeking to shape him into a supreme destroyer of worlds if she was to ever return his adoration. Thanos purged his home world of all life beyond A'Lars, the only survivor to witness his son's descent into tyranny, as caught under the grip of Death, Thanos would embark upon numerous campaigns across the universe, wiping untold numbers of lives from existence, collecting ancient relics of infinite destruction, gathering power on an unimaginable scale; all to finally win the hand of his fair Mistress Death.

Much of the strength Thanos bears to his name stems from his Eternal physiology, being capable of lifting the planet-moving Galactus Engine on his own strength alone and able to survive a blast from a weapon specifically designed for use against him, and is only made more imposing by his mystical and bionic augmentations; the mutation that gives the Mad Titan his Deviant personage only heightens these strengths even further. While his agility is lesser-touted, the Mad Titan is still quick enough to keep pace with the Silver Surfer, the Herald of Galactus, who can cover several thousand light years in a matter of seconds at speeds three trillion times the speed of light. His own genius serves him just as well, if less on a strategic front than it does technologically speaking, as Thanos has designed a diverse array of complicated machinery, such as personalized force fields and a custom-built space throne, which comes equipped with space-time travel and laser armaments. Unlike most other Eternals, Thanos is adept not just in utilizing the cosmic energies the Celestials stored within them, but also in the mystic arts; petrification, matter manipulation, magic talents Thanos has shown himself to be on par with other godlike beings in skill. Alone, these powers and talents make Thanos a truly formidable opponent, but in order to earn his side by Death, the Eternal would use several ancient relics in his conquests, none moreso affiliated with the Mad Titan than the infamous Infinity Gauntlet. The Gauntlet is just an ordinary glove on its own, but Thanos had since crafted it to channel the power of the six Infinity Stones, and with them placed inside, the one who commands the Gauntlet becomes a spectacle of universal destruction. The Infinity Stones, remnants of a long-deceased omnipotent being, are each named after and grant total control over a fundamental aspect of existence; the Mind Stone expands its master's psionic and mental capabilities, even accessing the consciousnesses of all other beings; the Space Stone grants the holder immediate travel through space and can move any object in existence much the same way; the Reality Stone rewrites reality to suit its owner's whims, even if it would be normally impossible to fulfill; the Power Stone can supply infinite energy to the others, while its mere presence amplifies the user's physique; the Time Stone and its wielder can see into and change all of time, even controlling its very flow; and the Soul Stone bestows upon its keeper a hold over all living things, every soul theirs to control, change, attack, and steal as they see fit. Each of the Stones can have universal ramifications upon use, but their combined power would mean whoever controls them would ascend to the position of godhood, and upon the hand of a being already deific in nature like Thanos, the sheer strain from merely tapping into the Gauntlet's unlimited might fails to become an issue in the least.

Some cosmic entities and galactic conquerors may be able to match Thanos in brawn, but none are more known or feared than the Mad Titan. In a fight, pure strength alone will see him through most who dare to fight him, best demonstrated with the aforementioned Galactus Engine; even when assuming its composition to be that of mere steel, has to weigh upwards of 50 quintillion tons, a weight which Thanos has lifted from inside the core of Ego the Living Planet. As Ego can devour whole planets and stars, his interior can emit energy outputs capable of nullifying those produced by stellar bodies, or, in more laconic terms, equivalent to the force of a black hole; the fact that Thanos withstood such an intense force while lifting the Galactus Engine serves as an impressive feat of his durability. As tough as this makes Thanos, an even more impressive showing can be found in his dealings with Blackagar Boltagon, or Black Bolt, monarch of the Inhumans. Black Bolt's voice can cause disruptions in electrons; so powerful is his voice that whispering can level cities using a billion tons of force, making it all the more astonishing that the Mad Titan can survive Black Bolt screaming in his face at point-blank range. With the aid of the Infinity Gauntlet, Thanos can become even stronger still, having achieved his most storied conquest; eliminating half the universe's population with a snap of his gloved fingers and fending off countless cosmic entities, most of them powerful enough to annihilate whole universes. Perhaps it is ironic, then, that with such power at his disposal, Mistress Death saw Thanos as being her superior rather than the equal she had envisioned them to be, and rebuffed his advances, setting up for his own eventual defeat and for the heroes of his universe to undo the devastation caused by his actions. In this way, his own weaknesses become more apparent; the many victories of the Mad Titan come across as unearned, as Thanos has a subconscious desire to fail. Many of the endeavors Thanos sets out to fulfill are undermined by his own accord, even losing the object of his desires to the foulmouthed lunatic Deadpool, who, as he points out during his brief interruption with the hosts, fails to accept setbacks with poise. Likewise, Thanos is an imposing threat, but only with artifacts like the Infinity Gauntlet does he pose the greatest challenge, rather than through any natural merit. The very fact that Thanos continues to terrorize the heroes of the Marvel universe time and again, however, proves that he is a capable antagonist, one who leaves a trail of death and destruction wherever he goes.

Thanos: (to Loki, who is flanked by the Black Order) Dread it. Run from it. Destiny arrives, all the same. And now it's here... or should I say, I am.

The hosts shift gears from Thanos and onward to his imminent opponent, Darkseid, one of the many New Gods born from the ashes of a destroyed race. In the distant past countless billions of years ago, the humanoid lifeforms upon the ancient god world Urgrund attained divinity, christening themselves the Old Gods. A golden age followed in their wake, one rich in cultural and scientific magnificence, but this time of wonder would not be everlasting; dissent was stirred amongst the Old Gods that erupted into war. The conflict between gods, good and evil alike, culminated in Ragnarok, a cataclysm of such proportions that Urgrund was torn asunder in its wake and all the Old Gods had perished. It would not be till eons further that the shattered fragments of Urgrund would be given a chance at redemption, as from its remains were born two neighboring worlds, cast off from the rest of existence; here, in the pocket of space known only as the Fourth World, existed the lands of New Genesis and Apokolips. It can be said that the two planets born in the wake of Urgrund's destruction are the very embodiments of good and evil, as befitting their names; whereas New Genesis is a beautiful haven of nature and abundance, Apokolips is a nightmarish hellscape where torment reigns supreme. The eventual inhabitants of these worlds, absorbing the divine energies left behind from the demise of Urgrund, attained godhood, each populating their land as the New Gods. In the case of Apokolips, a number of these New Gods are deemed the ultimate authorities of the planet, chief among them, King Yuga Khan and Queen Heggra; to account for their sons, Princes Uxas and Drax, is to finally herald the god of evil known in the present day as Darkseid. To rule Apokolips, Drax was tasked with venturing deep within the planet, towards the Omega Pit and within, the Omega Effect which gave the Pit its name. Drax began to absorb the Effect within himself, but Uxas interrupted the process, leaving his elder brother for dead while the unlimited power which surged through Apokolips instead flowed towards Uxas and became his to command. The influx of energy gave Uxas an imposing form as he adopted the god-name Darkseid, dreaded as the one sobriquet even in Apokolips that none dared to claim for themselves. Having his mother poisoned and with his father abandoned to distant stars out in the cosmos, Uxas became the de facto monarch of Apokolips, and he sought to bring all of existence under his tyrannical grip after. His conquests have brought him to countless planets in search of his goal, and the means that would enable him to break the wills of all living things are at the center of his constant pursuit of total domination.

More a force of nature than a man, Darkseid is virtually unopposed in his mission to bring all things under his control. The fact that he was born unto the New Gods grants Darkseid all the strengths which it entails; as with any superhuman race, the New Gods are blessed with heightened strength, speed, durability, and reflexes. The New Gods, divine beings in nature, are also functionally immortal as an added boon; Darkseid is nearly a quarter-million years old, as one such example, plenty of time to garner experience and refine his skills. Like his upcoming foe, Darkseid is a technological genius, having the Boom Tubes at his disposal, trans-dimensional travel portals that can even travel across whole universes; as the average New God is the size of a star, the fact the Boom Tubes convert their traveler to a size deemed acceptable by the denizens of the destination universe acts as a smaller convenience. However, Darkseid has an added advantage over his kin in New Genesis and even those in Apokolips, all thanks to his sabotaging of what was meant to be Drax's crowning glory. The Omega Effect, a force of decay and entropy, acts as a sort of power source for the New God, and grants the ruler of Apokolips a massive collection of abilities unique to himself; a scant few examples being teleportation through time and space, telepathic control, size alteration, controlling inanimate objects, and even localized reality warping. The crown jewel of the Omega Effect, however, would be the beams that share its name. These Omega Beams are under Darkseid's control even while fired, and they are able to track a target's atomic signature even while moving at exceedingly high speeds, in addition to being delivered as concussive force or energy that can have any number of effects upon striking a victim, from matter transmutation to even being wiped from existence. That said, the most terrifying possibility posed by the Omega Beams is sending the victim into the Omega Sanction; here, Darkseid casts whatever being could be unfortunate enough to struck by his Omega Beams into an alternate reality where they undergo an endless series of lives, each life increasingly meaningless and each death increasingly sadistic. The Omega Effect has proven to be so powerful, in fact, that Darkseid has since ascended a physical form; that which he is most commonly seen as is merely an extension of his true self, a noncorporeal form which exists in the dimensions of Fourth World. The idea that something out there exists that Darkseid, with all of this fantastic material and such an extensive cavalcade of powers to utilize, still hungers to claim is a disconcerting one, and yet, exist it does. In the DC Universe, all life originates from the Source, a limitless wellspring of energy, but a fraction of the Source's existence had escaped when the Old Gods had struck. This separate form, the Anti-Life, would later be found as part of a theoretical formula which objectively proves the nature of freedom and hope, even life itself, as utterly pointless concepts, dooming those who hear to surrender all free will and becomes slaves to the New God's thrall; this Anti-Life Equation would since prove to be a focal point of Darkseid's machinations time and again, as numerous times he would burden himself with the search to find and even complete the equation, his preferred weapon to conquer all reality.

Such an awe-inspiring array of powers and hyper-sophisticated technology means that Darkseid has a wide-reaching legacy to his name, and for better or for worse, the lord of Apokolips does more than live up to the hype. With extra power behind them, his Omega Beams can destroy whole planets while Darkseid's hands alone can crush a Lantern Ring, the source of power for countless spacefaring paragons and rogues alike, with little effort. His strength has rivaled, even surpassed that of his greatest opponent Superman on multiple occasions, who has endured the power of exploding suns head-on more easily than Darkseid's fists, and likewise has endured even the greatest blows of Krypton's last son even at his foe's mightiest before and after various cosmic reboots of the multiverse that Darkseid himself has been unaffected by. Through his own power he can travel to the wall encircling the Source, located at edge of the known multiverse, in a few seconds; the Helmet of Nabu owned by the archmage of the DC universe, Doctor Fate, could accomplish this same feat, but would instead do so in a year's time, as a point of comparison. The god of tyranny's true self is confined to the Fourth World as, were he to travel beyond it, his very presence would tear apart reality from the sheer power he exerts, wiping out the entire multiverse and the very structures which existence stands upon wholly. For all other things that are and will be, it should be seen as a gift in its own right that a deity with a scale this grand for total annihilation can still be felled, that the very embodiment of tyranny and evil has his own shortcomings that no amount of primeval energies or existential mathematics will only serve as a solution for. The physical constructs of Darkseid's may be daunting enough to defeat numerous heroes from across the cosmos and even within the Fourth World, but each happens to be weaker than the original, if even as a necessary restraint. Just as his universe's stalwart champion Superman has a debilitating mineral in the form of kryptonite, New Gods such as Darkseid are vulnerable to radion. New Gods may be biologically immortal, but it is known that they may still be slain from grievous injuries, and even Darkseid, for all his splendor, has a history of falling in conflict, if only from the most extreme of wounds. His physical forms have lost vital organs and his soul stolen from his universe's own embodiment of Death; and with the proper effort, even his true self, nestled in the Fourth World, could be ultimately triumphed over. The fact that Darkseid could somehow find a way past this and return to plague the multiverse in his pursuit of entire domination, if nothing else, serves as testament to how his legacy is as everlasting as his utter hatred for all that is. His exploits have taken him to Earth and beyond, and though countless heroes continue to stand against him, such defeats are but minor inconveniences to him in his never-ending quest to get all of existence to kneel before his presence.

Darkseid: (having been revived by Lex Luthor and the Secret Society) It seems I have you to thank for my resurrection. Though your world will suffer slowly, I grant you a quick death. (uses his Omega Beams to annihilate the Society's space station)

The two gods have been given nothing short of the utmost attention to detail. Their powers scrutinized, their weapons analyzed; destruction and mayhem awaits, befitting only these two legendary villains. One advertisement for the Blue Apron cooking service later, and now, it's time for a death battle!

One unassuming blank room is where the match to come opens, wherein none other than the notorious Merc with a Mouth, Deadpool, prattles on to an accomplice resting within a lavish floating seat, eagerly ranting about the myriad useful features of the chair in question. The nonsensical ravings of Wade Wilson's lunatic mind are cut short as from the opposite end of the room bursts a massive void blanketed in wisps of smoke. From within this abyss emerges an imposing figure; the Mad Titan, the Deviant Eternal, Thanos. With his left arm sheathed firmly within the Infinity Gauntlet, the amethyst glow of the Space Stone is accompanied by its kin as the son of A'Lars finds his space throne. Deadpool's feeble attempts to shower the Eternal with praise are met with a fanfare of party blowers as the red-clad mercenary explodes into a shower of confetti. Watching on the side without a trace of interest, this stranger listens dispassionately as the Celestials' creation demands his fealty; Thanos, however, carries his callous tone unaware that with it he approaches the villainous New God, the king of Apokolips, Darkseid. Unimpressed by the threats which this other cosmic warlord issues, the dictator uprights himself, awaiting the first move of the impending showdown, with little regard for the inevitable destruction that awaits them and this plane of reality unfortunate enough to host them.

FIGHT!

It takes Thanos no time to lunge towards the New God with his Gauntlet-clad fist outstretched; brazen enough to let this straight punch connect face-first, Darkseid himself is unfazed from the attack. Darkseid instead pushes his own offensive, and becomes the first to claim proper lead in the match as a result, pummeling Thanos across his enlarged chin with a knee strike that leaves a far clearer mark. The Mad Titan stumbles from the blow, but grants himself enough time to regain his senses, looking skyward to gauge the whereabouts of Darkseid, instead witnessing the lord of Apokolips hovering above him. Darkseid descends upon Thanos, aiming to strike with a dropkick, but the courter of Death catches him by the ankles. The Gauntlet's ring finger and the cosmic gemstone within radiates a cochineal shine, the Power Stone amplifying the already tremendous strength of the Deviant Eternal. Thanos swirls around with his foe in hand before, with a labored grunt of effort, a hammer throw launches Darkseid out and into the bustling streets of New York City above. Darkseid, however, keeps his composure even while skidding through the asphalt. Oncoming traffic is plowed to the side and gravel kicked up, yet the New God's expression reaches little more than mild disdain seeing Thanos arrive in front of him with the Space Stone. It is now Darkseid's turn to force Thanos to surrender, but the Mad Titan brushes these comments aside as he uses the Reality Stone to manipulate the local pull of gravity. Not a second after the world is framed in yellow is it then tilted on its axis and the change to reality made clear; among the numerous automobiles plummeting what is now downward, Darkseid joins their numbers as he crashes headlong against the side of a building. Thanos marches forward stoically, closing the gap between the two godlike combatants once more with the Space Stone.

Darkseid, meanwhile, eases himself back up before being caught by surprise courtesy of the Mad Titan; perhaps for its irony, the Eternal throws a Superman punch that blasts the New God back against the building. Thanos leaps onto Darkseid's vulnerable frame, hammering the son of Yuga Khan with alternating hooks that shake the very earth around them with their force. The Celestial creation finally ends his assault by hoisting Darkseid into the air and hurtling him further across the building, yet uses the space to rebound off the shattered concrete and give Thanos a sampling of his own power. The Apokaliptian catches a taxi falling inches from his face and catapults it towards the Mad Titan with his psionic power; Thanos, to his credit, is alert enough to bat the vehicles away as he charges towards Darkseid, only being halted with a taxi ramming into him from within the skyscraper. While Darkseid continues to pelt the Eternal with the yellow cabs, a yellow helicopter proves to catch his eye moreso. Indeed, the New God channels his psionics into the Thanos-copter, dropping it onto its owner with force enough to annihilate the building; its remains are only further reduced to fragments of earth as its attempts at being catapulted towards Thanos are met with a Gauntlet-empowered hook. Darkseid's latest foe has seemingly proven himself worthy of witnessing his own signature attack, firing the Omega Beams as a haphazard display of jagged lines; unfortunately for Darkseid, said display is cut short with another haymaker, one so intense that the New God's soul is launched from his body, with his physical self following seconds after.

Rocketing out into space, Darkseid's forms reconverge with just enough time to prevent Thanos striking him yet again. The Omega Beams home in on the Eternal's atomic signature, but his Celestial energies provide him an shield that merely carries the Mad Titan safely along the lasers' trajectory. By the time the beams of oblivion fade, Thanos finds himself floating before the presence of Jupiter, giving the Eternal a far more imposing projectile than any vehicle. It takes the combined might of all six Infinity Stones to slingshot the gas giant towards Darkseid, and conversely, it takes a herculean effort for the New God to push against the oncoming planet. Worlds are shattered on impact while Darkseid occupies himself with the giant planet, only to find his efforts have been for naught as their path has led them directly into the sun. As Darkseid falls into the celestial body, Thanos leaves him with a final comment of his own divinity as the Mad Titan takes the star and transforms it into a black hole. The fight takes on a turn unforeseen, however, as a gargantuan hand grips the edge of the event horizon; the Apokaliptian overlord, as witnessed within the Fourth World, clambers out of the void, finally showing some modicum of aggression. Thanos takes this, the continued existence of Darkseid, as a personal affront as he charges towards the lord of Apokolips, bringing in tow whatever planets and satellites which have yet been spared from destruction. The Gauntlet's power is his to control as Thanos grows to a size rivaling that of the New God, smashing Darkseid's face and tossing him into the path of the oncoming orbs. With his enormous frame, the planets and moons harmlessly pelt Darkseid, but the son of Yuga Khan has his fill of the Eternal's cosmic slaughter soon enough. The two gods descend into a melee of violence, hammering at each other with colliding fists before a final exchange of knuckles that connect with such power that it envelops the universe.

Nothingness fills the void of existence for a fleeting moment before the universe is reborn. Resting motionlessly on a single asteroid, only one god can stand tall first, and that honor goes to Thanos. The Eternal confronts his still-moving foe, and with a snap of his fingers, banishes Darkseid back into the abyss... or rather, that would be the case, were it not for another physical manifestation of the Apokaliptian taunting the Mad Titan from behind him. Again and again does Thanos attempt to wipe Darkseid from existence, but with every form he dissipates, another emerges from the celestial dust. Darkseid watches as Thanos, blinded by wrath, comes to a loss as to the nature of his foe; the New God extends to the Mad Titan an invitation to another realm, and in his prideful folly, he accepts. The portal leading into the Fourth World vanishes as Thanos steps through it, introducing the Eternal to the abstract monstrosity that is the True Darkseid. Try as he does to tap into it, the Gauntlet has no power in this world for Thanos to channel, a fact which Darkseid makes clear as the skies glow a foreboding crimson red. Thanos refuses to accept this defeat by unleashing his own eye lasers, only for True Darkseid to scoff at this effort, the Omega Beams traveling their course and hitting the unprotected Thanos dead-on. The Mad Titan comes to inside a white void, only to react in horror as he witnesses a remade Deadpool fondling the object of his affections. However, Thanos is helpless to react as the regenerate degenerate draws and fires a round through the Eternal; his chest pierced by the bullet as easily as any human. The Eternal drops to the floor in death, and it becomes all too evident that this demise is only one of infinity in wait for Thanos, trapped for all time in the Omega Sanction, a prisoner of Darkseid's will.

K.O.!

In the endless loops waiting for Thanos, Deadpool continues to coddle Lady Death, while the match itself carries on to the post-match analysis. The Infinity Gauntlet was indeed a powerful weapon and one of the most imposing seen in the series, but for all its merits, one chief drawback served to hinder Thanos; namely, it only wields its tremendous might in its home universe. Reed Richards, one of the most esteemed minds of the Marvel universe, verified that, using a number of his alternate selves and the Infinity Gauntlets of their own realities, each one had no power in another universe, thus meaning and Darkseid, using the Boom Tubes, could transport himself and Thanos to another one, depriving the Mad Titan of his greatest tool. That said, the Gauntlet could only do so much against a multiversal entity such as Darkseid; it may affect his physical extensions as well as any other being in the universe, but since Darkseid's true self must always reside in the Fourth World, the Gauntlet would be unable to permanently defeat Darkseid. Even in the event the fight took place in an entirely neutral universe, the Gauntlet would still have no power, and by introducing True Darkseid outside of the Fourth World, his mere presence alone would annihilate all of reality, making the fight even more lopsided in favor of the New God. The Gauntlet was not the only reason for Thanos' defeat, however; it actually proved to be Thanos' best shot and keeping pace with Darkseid, and without it, was massively outclassed. To compare their best measured feats of speed, Thanos may be able to fight the Silver Surfer, but Darkseid's journey to the Source Wall makes him Thanos' better in speed 28 octillion times over. Likewise, the Eternal could live through the force of a galaxy-destroying black hole, something best demonstrated while inside of Ego's core, but even this is overshadowed by the Omega Effect withstanding the output of its counterpart in the Astro Force, a cosmic energy capable of destroying the whole universe. This establishes that the Infinity Gauntlet and Omega Effect are equals, but Darkseid could use his own signature weapon when and wherever he wanted, with all the strengths and benefits such an advantage entails. Ultimately, the Gauntlet was Thanos' path to godhood, whereas Darkseid was born upon that path, and for that reason, the Mad Titan, for all his strength and hallmark power, fell short against a villain long thought to be his equal, only to prove to be so much more.

Boomstick: Thanos just couldn't—
Deadpool: (pops up behind the hosts) — run the Gauntlet! (drops down behind view)
Boomstick: Oh, you son of a bitch!
Wiz: (groan) The winner is Darkseid!

Next season, Death Battle returns with a splash.

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Thanos vs. Darkseid contains examples of:

• Advantage Ball: The finale makes it clear that Thanos has the advantage in battle... in the universe he assembled the Infinity Gauntlet, if he takes the battle completely seriously. The full power of the Gauntlet can wipe out Darkseid's avatars in an instant, and no matter how many more Darkseid sends his way, they'll just get snapped out. However, Thanos can't kill Darkseid himself, and as soon as the Boom Tubes come into play, the advantage goes to Darkseid.
• Always Someone Better: Simply put, Thanos may be supreme, but Darkseid IS.
  • Darkseid superseded Thanos's speed by countless times over, being able to move 28 octillion times faster than the Titan could react (for the record, Thanos can react to things moving over 3 trillion times the speed of light).
  • Darkseid's nigh-omnipotent Reality Warping powers worked in any universe, while Thanos's were restricted to the home universe of the Infinity Stones in his gauntlet, which Darkseid could easily move the fight away from via Boom Tube.
  • As Wiz points out, Thanos needs to rely on mythic artifacts and superior technology to achieve godhood. Darkseid has no need for such things, he IS a god.
• And I Must Scream: This ending is by far one of the most macabre yet; although most losers die in gory and gruesome ways, at least they get the dignity of only going through it once. Being trapped in the Omega Sanction means Thanos has to live through an unending parade of undignified deaths that only get worse and worse (and as implied by the orbs surrounding Darkseid at the end, they all involve Deadpool swiping Death from him).
• Anticlimax: Played for Laughs. Being sentenced to infinite deaths, each more humiliating than the last, is a suitably dramatic fate for the loser of the most over-the-top Death Battle in history, but the first death and the only one we see is Thanos getting shot in the chest by Deadpool after seeing him steal his girl, which is the most pedestrian demise any combatant has suffered on the show.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking:
  • At the very end of Darkseid's fact sheet, after all the imposing facts, there are mentions of how he tends to sit in other people's chairs and that he always gets coal for Christmas (which, by the way, happens to be true◊).
  • As Deadpool rattles on about all of the impressive features about Thanos' high-tech throne to Darkseid, he ends the list with saying that the throne is "perfect for gaming".
• Badass Boast: We're dealing with two god-like beings of power beyond comprehension. As a result, over 90% of their dialogue is comprised of this.
  • This particular one from Thanos:
    Thanos: I am Thanos. Thanos is supreme! Thanos, is God.
  • Earlier in the fight.
    Darkseid: You dare to strike me!? You will beg for the sweet release of death.
    Thanos: You first.
• Book Ends: The fight ends much as it begins; a white void, Deadpool running his mouth, and someone sitting in Thanos' chair that isn't the Mad Titan.
• Brick Joke: Deadpool cracking jokes about the furrowed chin of Thanos is one of the first things he does when he interrupts the hosts. Guess what's also the first thing he compliments the Titan on when he shows up in the opening of the actual fight.
• Call-Back:
  • Doctor Fate's helm traveling around the universe is once again mentioned and scaled to for Darkseid. In addition, the comments made in this episode's verdict strongly echo that one's: the loser has methods to attain the power of a god, but the winner is a god.
  • Superman's feats, such as shrugging off supernovas and his absurd Pre-Crisis resume from his prior bouts are brought up and used as scaling for Darkseid.
• Car Fu: Thanos throws a taxi at Darkseid, who then throws multiple taxis at him.
• Composite Character:
  • Averted thoroughly with Thanos; his comic backstory of wanting to court Death is treated as the source for the character, rather than culling the universe's numbers to prevent overpopulation. The Infinity Gems even take their coloration from pre-Infinity Countdown, which gave each Stone its MCU color.
  • Darkseid isn't really a case of this either. Since ALL incarnations of Darkseid are just avatars of the True Darkseid, not to mention thanks to him being completely unaffected by DC's reboots, his Pre-Crisis feats are as canon as his Post-Crisis feats and beyond.
• Continuity Nod: Deadpool's surprise appearance in Thanos' rundown is chock-full of these:
  • Wade mentions how he got one over on Deathstroke and brokered peace with the cast of Friendship is Magic. (he's strangely mum about what's happened in Ponyville post-Raven vs. Twilight Sparkle)
    • Boomstick also questions Deadpool about what pony party he's late for, referencing how his fight with Pinkie Pie ended.
  • He also isn't a big fan of the match where they pit a dog in a trenchcoat against a talking bear.
  • In general, the hosts aren't happy that Deadpool is interrupting an episode yet again.
• Curb-Stomp Battle: Darkseid was already an uphill battle, what with his best showings absolutely blowing Thanos' out of the water, but with the Infinity Gauntlet, he could manage. With the inclusion of True Darkseid, you can just take all that and throw it out the window.
• Curb-Stomp Cushion: Though Thanos was ultimately dwarfed by Darkseid, he didn't go down without a fight. As their fight went on Darkseid slowly began to take Thanos seriously and stopped holding back. At the end of their initial fight, with Darkseid's fight avatar, Thanos actually won and turned the avatar to dust. Thanos then proceeded to instantly turn all the other avatars to dust one after the other, and Darkseid was forced to bring Thanos to the real him via Boom Tube to finish him off himself.
• Defiant to the End: Thanos doesn't let petty things like the neutering of his greatest weapon weaken his front. No, he just continues calling out Darkseid and fires off one last shot of Eternal power.
• Evil Sounds Deep: Justice Washington and Edward Bosco give Thanos and Darkseid (respectively) appropriately deep, powerful voices that add an extra layer of gravitas to their showdown.
• Evil Versus Evil: One is a maniac who thrives on mass murder to get the Anthropomorphic Personification of Death to love him. One is the physical embodiment of tyranny who seeks to bring all of reality under his rule and fully intends to torture or kill anything that won't bend the knee. Put 'em together, you get this trope.
• Hurl It into the Sun: Thanos smashes Darkseid with a moon that sends the New God hurtling into the sun. Deciding that isn't enough, he then turns the sun into a black hole just to make sure. Unfortunately, Darkseid simply climbs out of the black hole after growing star-sized and crushes it in his grip, taking the fight to the next level.
• I Can't Believe I'm Saying This: A sentence Boomstick finishes by believing he's finally starting to drink too much, after the Nomad of Nowhere made his beer can come to life.
• Just Toying with Them: In the end, no matter how powerful Thanos was or how immense the Infinity Gauntlet's power, he was ultimately nothing but an insect compared to Darkseid. It becomes clear that the only reason the Mad Titan lasted as long as he did was because of this, as the God of Tyranny could simply transfer the fight to 4th world at any time, nullify all of the Gauntlet's (and a good chunk of Thanos's) power, and just Omega-Beam him. He does this in the end.
• Mood Whiplash:
  • The bio on Thanos is a spectacle, grandiose and full of the cosmic-scale achievements he has, one piled after another... and then it just gets undone in a minute once Deadpool pops in and we're treated to a minute of wacky banter.
  • It only gets even more pronounced when the impending showdown between these two signature villains opens with 'Pool joking about using the space throne as a gaming chair. Then the tossing of planets and reshaping of reality happens, all good stuff, played for gravitas and seriousness; and then he gets to kill Thanos for all time and joke about anime at the very end.
• Mythology Gag:
  • Jack Kirby's original vision for the New Gods was that they were the reincarnations of the Asgardians and their saga after the end of The Mighty Thor comic line. In the episode, it's joked that the birth of the Fourth World stems from Ragnarok; that is, Thor: Ragnarok.
  • The infamous Thanos-copter makes its appearance as one of the many objects hurtled by Darkseid in the fight.
  • Just to Avengers: Infinity War alone:
    • Thanos, with his tall stature and purple skin is compared to the Grimace; Star-Lord is the one to make the comparison in the film.
    • The Gauntlet's power is said to make Darkseid's physical forms "not feel so good." To further make the reference more obvious, the line is played over Spider-Man/Peter Parker's infamous death scene.
    • While the Infinity Stones keep their original coloration in the comics, in the fight itself, they're arranged in the exact same order as Thanos places them.
    • Thanos throws another moon at someone (this time whole). Sure enough, the target loses it.
    • The final battle of the season opens like the film's final battle in Wakanda; with Thanos emerging through a black hole using the Space Stone.
  • During the battle, Darkseid says "You dare strike me!? Beg for the sweet release of death".
• Nigh-Invulnerability: Thanos and Darkseid are straight up unhurt-able compared to everyone thus far. Thanos treats Mjolnir's strongest blows like a minor inconvenience and has intentionally shot himself with a gun specifically designed to kill him just to show that it couldn't. The hosts speculate that it's more than likely that he can survive attacks exceeding the devastation of entire galaxies. Darkseid pretty much blows this out of the water though, as his avatars alone can shrug off Post-Crisis Superman firing on all cylinders, a bomb that could rip apart the fabric of existence, and even technically scale canonically to Supes' ridiculously overpowered Pre-Crisis feats.
• No-Sell: Since Darkseid was using avatars during the fight and his true self exists in 4th World, Thanos couldn't use "the snap" to wipe him from existence. Thanos also blasts Darkseid's true self with the full force of his Eternal powers... he doesn't even flinch.
  Darkseid: Pitiful.
• No True Scotsman: According to Deadpool, every season has to feature a cameo by him. The previous season, which didn't do so, doesn't count, what with that Smokey vs. McGruff nonsense setting a low bar as is.
• Offscreen Moment of Awesome: Per the rules of Death Battle, both combatants start the fight in prime condition. Thanos appears at the start of the animation with a victorious "at last" that implies he'd just finished assembling the Infinity Gauntlet. This means that he'd claimed the last Infinity Gem literally without breaking a sweat.
• Pyrrhic Victory: A unique example with Thanos, since he actually has two during the battle but is still the loser of the battle itself.
  • After a long fought battle against Darkseid's avatar, during which they destroy the entire universe, Thanos manages to just barely defeat Darkseid and turn him to dust with "the snap". This victory is quickly rendered pointless when the real Darkseid immediately creates a new avatar as good as new, and continues to do so when Thanos continues to snap them out of existence.
  • Thanos has actually wanted to die for a long time, so he can be with his true love Mistress Death, and Darkseid fulfills that wish by killing him. Unfortunately, he killed him by trapping him in the Omega Sanction, which grants Thanos infinite lives but kills him in more grusome and painful ways with each life. Ironically, his first death was losing Mistress Death to Deadpool, who taunts Thanos over this before shooting him.
• Serial Escalation: No Death Battle from the past, not Goku vs. Superman, not Sephiroth vs. Vergil, not even the absurd Chuck Norris vs. Segata Sanshiro fight, comes close to just how insane the fight between the Mad Titan and the God of Tyranny becomes. The battle literally starts with the annihilation of New York City as a warm up and just keeps escalating. It gets to the point where both combatants grow to the size of stars and punch each other so hard they literally reset the entire universe (which, it should be said, was how the aforementioned Chuck vs. Segata ended. Here? That's just after the halfway mark). Almost every second of the fight reminds the audience that these two are gods who far exceed anything or anyone seen before them (with the possible exception of Chuck and Segata).
• Shoo Out the Clowns: Thanos' first move in the fight is to immediately kill Deadpool while he's talking to Darkseid.
• Shout-Out:
  • Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 is referenced multiple times in the episode; once as a joking scale of reference to the Ego which Thanos withstood being in, and again when mistaking Drax the prince for Drax the Destroyer.
  • Darkseid's trip to the Source Wall, located at the edges of existence, is comparable to the Planet Express crew's voyage to the end of their universe.
  • Before all the negative caveats of the Omega Sanction are revealed, Boomstick mistakes it as being just like Groundhog Day.
  • Once the battle ends up in space, Darkseid gets thrown into a sun. His posture and the camera angles during this are evocative of (the soul of) Jubileus suffering a similar fate.
• Superpower Lottery: Each of the fighters' go-to power sources, the Infinity Gauntlet and the Omega Effect, supply the user with a ridiculously large selection of powers to pick from, giving them no shortage of options to fight each other with.
• Super-Speed: Despite the bulkiness of the fighters, they're as fast as they are strong. Thanos isn't really a marathon runner like speedsters, but he can think and react to objects and people moving over 3 trillion times lightspeed. Sadly for him, Darkseid can make it to the edge of existence in 5 seconds, making over 87 duodecillion times faster than light and over 28 octillion times faster than Thanos. For the record, Darkseid didn't teleport to the edge or rely on some artifact, that was pure speed on his own.
• Super-Strength: Both of these characters are on a level unto themselves in this category, with Thanos having lifted the 50 quintillion ton Galactus engine and easily overpowering two Thors at once, whereas Darkseid has effortlessly bitch-slapped Superman out cold after a couple strikes and naturally has the absurd strength that comes with being the size of a star. With the Infinity Gauntlet, Thanos proves to be a match for any of Darkseid's avatars; his true self, however, is another story all together.
• Take That!:
  • Boomstick calls DeviantArt that website full of smut and calls it as "deformed and disturbing" as the Deviants.
  • When Deadpool claims they can't have a season of Death Battle without him, Wiz retorts that they did, last season. Deadpool retorts by saying nobody counts that season.
  "I mean, that's the year you put a dog in a trench coat against a goddamn bear. What did you think would happen?"
• This Is Gonna Suck: The second Deadpool appears during Thanos' rundown, Boomstick and Wiz's expressions immediately transition from 'weapons, armour, and skills' to 'seriously, again?'
• Villain Song: "Kings of Infinity" is a Boastful Rap about how each cosmic conqueror sees his respective world as a plaything and how nothing stands before his presence, most of all, each other.
  Battle for the universe, let's get striking
  Feel the power and the force of the mightiest fighting
  Energy blasts hitting fast, eye beams like lightning
  Who can win, a new god or the hands of a titan?
  I'm the king
• You Cannot Grasp the True Form: True Darkseid is so astronomically powerful, his presence in any universe beyond Fourth World would be wiped from existence. This plays a major role in his victory, as the Infinity Gauntlet wouldn't work in any universe present with him.
• Your Magic's No Good Here: The Infinity Gauntlet, while powerful, is only useful in its home universe. So, take the Gauntlet out of its comfort zone, as Darkseid can with the Boom Tubes, and it's little more than a glorified glove.

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