The worst of the worst…but in the best way

Darkseid- Thanos

I reckon that no one would disagree that Jack Kirby’s most enduring creation, after he left Marvel for DC in 1970, is Darkseid. Finally, after an interchangeable series of intergalactic despots menacing Superman and the Justice League in the 1960s and 1970s, this one stuck (although you could say that various Green Lantern antagonists fit the bill). Darkseid might even be known to non-nerds via Superman: the Animated Series and the Justice League Unlimited program.

As for Thanos, anyone can see that his character owed rather a lot to Darkseid. I wonder if the character's creator, Jim Starlin, minded that Thanos and his fellow residents of the moon of Titans were later said to be an offshoot of the Eternals. But as it is, Kirby Eternals series never had a really truly awe-inspiring antagonist anyhow: the Deviants leader Brother Tode didn't fit the bill, in my view.

Commonalities:
Big scary guys with ambitions to dominate or destroy on a universal level: not too much difference between Darkseid’s “anti-life equation” and Thanos’ love for the personification of death.

Differences:
Only that Starlin did not intend Thanos and the residents of Titan to have any connection to Kirby’s Eternals mythos. But, as of the late 70s, they do.

Alternate histories:

DA: Uxas is born the son of Himon and brother to Scott Free on a colony populated by “New Gods” ostensibly native to the hidden realm New Genesis. He possesses genes that mark him as part of the race of “New Gods” native to Apokolips, and is thus alienated from his family; taking the name Darkseid, he becomes obsessed with the “anti-life equation,” a means by which he could control all life in the universe. Darkseid is opposed by Hawkman, the Justice League and virtually every superhuman champion on Earth and beyond.

TH: Thanos is the ruler of the Deviants, an genetically unstable offshoot of humanity based in Lemuria, an underground kingdom that spans the Earth. A war between Deviants and their ancient enemies the Eternals reaches a truce when Thano’s son Ikaris is sent to live with the Eternal’s leader Zuras, who sends his own son Eros to Thanos in exchange. The ceasefire ends when Thanos begins to seek a means to court the personification of Death; his war with the Eternals becomes enmeshed with his desire to destroy all life in the universe, which finds Thanos opposed to nearly every superhuman champion on Earth and beyond.