YMMV / Mister Miracle (2017)

• Awesome Art: Mitch Gerads is doing a hell of a job with the artwork, which is both expressive and stilted, free-flowing and robotic, and colorful and nightmarish, and picked up a well-deserved Eisner Award for it at SDCC '18.
• Broken Base:
  • While the series has earned widespread acclaim for its writing on its own terms, longtime New Gods fans remain significantly split. Much of it comes down to how the series handled the characterization of characters relative to the rest of the canon (something Tom King had become even more controversial in since Mister Miracle). Several fans dislike how drastically it alters so many established characters, namely with making Orion and Highfather way less pleasant, with the esoteric and deliberately unclear narrative not helping it become more palatable. Others are more accepting because it's so uncharacteristic and palpably loose with canon (especially after it's revealed that the world presented is a product of the Anti-Life Equation), enjoying how it reimagines and recontextualizes the New Gods mythos in the more intense and personal story it tells.
  • Among fans of the series, the ending has also caused some division: with the main threat of Darkseid and Jacob's fate being resolved in the previous issue, the final issue is more of a placid denouement that establishes that Scott is still in a false reality, presenting many different suggestions on why without explicitly sticking to one. It's a cerebral final issue that intentionally leaves several questions pressed in earlier issues unresolved, but whether that makes it emotionally resonant or frustrating depends on whoever you talk to.
• Creepy Awesome: Darkseid is, even though he barely actually appears.
• Crosses the Line Twice:
  • It's a weird sort of Fridge Brilliance to reveal that Scott's into bondage sex.
    Scott: I can always escape.
  • Almost everything Granny Goodness does or says falls into this, like forcing a starving enemy general to watch Scott and Barda eat the Jello she made for them.
  • Scott has his Mother Box play some "romantic music" to get him and Barda into the mood while they're stuck in traffic. Said "music" is actually the screams of people being tortured on Apokolips.
  • At least one urinal on Apokolips is a pit. The line crossing comes from the fact that there are prisoners at the bottom of the pit.
• Evil Is Cool: Darkseid is. Whatever problems readers seem to have with the series, it's a general assessment that the big guy's at his most impressive and awesome as a completely incomprehensible Eldritch Abomination here, possibly rivaling the similarly acclaimed take in Final Crisis.
• Fridge Brilliance: The comic starts with Scott attempting suicide by slitting his wrist with a razor blade, resulting in a lot of blood and a near-death experience. But wait, he's a New God, so such a mundane tool can't pierce his skin. In fact, what makes Jacob's birth difficult is the fact that the hospital's tools couldn't cut through his umbilical cord, so Scott needed to use a New God dagger. Would seem like Fridge Logic until you realize this reality is a flawed fabrication, so such an inconsistency could be expected.
• Heartwarming Moments:
  • After she reveals to him that she's pregnant, Barda gets a big hug from Scott, who is wearing the biggest, stupidest grin any new father could possibly have.
  • Considering the inspiration for his character, the scene of Funky Flashman raving to Scott about the comic he made with baby Jake is pretty heartwarming. Especially poignant since this issue was released only a few weeks after his inspiration's passing in November 2018.
    Funky: Genius Jake doesn't have to talk! Funky talks plenty! He provides the imaginations! I do the words!
    • Adding to the above is Funky's insistence that the story in question - a reference to the classic The Coming of Galactus storyline, is not his story, but Jacob's story, and that's what makes it special. The reason why Jack Kirby left Marvel and created the New Gods in the first place was feeling he wasn't being given credit for his creative work.
• Memetic Mutation:
  • The Arc Words "Darkseid Is." has led to at least three:
    • "Darkseid Is... [X]". This version is one Tom King regularly uses himself.
    • As a response to some rhetorical question:
    Superman (to Krypto): Who's a good boy! Who's a good boy!
    Darkseid (watching from the bushes): Darkseid Is.
    • As an Interrupting Meme for basically any other media where Darkseid appears (or even sometimes places where he doesn't appear). Sometimes in places that have nothing to do with DC Comics at all.
  • Darkseid double-dipping a carrot in Scott and Barda's veggie tray has become well-known for the sheer absurdity of this Humanoid Abomination who can break reality with his existence eating baby carrots. Many call this moment Darkseid living up to his title as the worst evil in the Multiverse.
  • “Batman kills babies” from issue 8 where Scott says it as he protests to Funky putting a Batman plushie in the crib (things inside a crib can be potentially dangerous for newborns).
  • The various superhero shirts Scott wears throughout the entire series.
• Nightmare Fuel:
  • Loads of it. The repetition of "Darkseid Is" during particularly unsettling moments and the nine-panel decapitation of Granny Goodness' corpse deserve special mention.
  • Darkseid wants Scott Free and Big Barda's baby Jacob Free. Why is this scary? He's willing to give up THE ANTI-LIFE EQUATION. How important is this kid that he's willing to surrender something he's been hunting after for years?
  • Granny's Christmas bedtime story about a five-year-old Dutch boy named Sven who, in a moment of innocent ignorance, gets his family killed for housing Jews during The Holocaust. Scott mentions how in the story, Sven, now seven, was taken to the gas chamber and was killed by the weight of everybody climbing on top of him to try to escape. What makes it nightmarish is how one could easily see that happening in reality.
• Older Than They Think: The phrase "Darkseid Is." was actually originally coined by Grant Morrison in their JLA (1997) series, almost a two whole decades before this series truly popularized it. What Mister Miracle can be attributed with is ascending the phrase from a rather mundane Badass Boast used by Darkseid himself to the terrifying, reality-intruding Arc Words shown throughout its panels.
• One-Scene Wonder: Darkseid Is only actually in two scenes of the entire comic (in person). By all accounts, it's still the scariest the character has been in years.

---