In the early seventies, my mentor Jack Kirby created, wrote and drew for the folks at DC, three interlocking comics which collectively were to form a long, finite epic.  Alas, for reasons that remain controversial, the books were cancelled before Jack could even reach the halfway point in his saga.  Many years later, he did a kind of "noble effort" quickie ending that satisfied no one, himself included.  Insofar as most of us are concerned, the "Fourth World" — as it was called, God knows why — will remain forever an unfinished work.

But, to me, it's a wonderful unfinished work, one that was way ahead of its time and so has aged well.  DC has reprinted much of it in trade paperbacks in, alas, black-and-white.  Oh, yeah...and they have forewords by me, but I really stuck this page here because I love the material and for whatever it may be worth, want to recommend them to the world.  Jack did not create the series to be a solo Kirby work.  He initially intended to launch the books, hand them off to others and move on to other projects.  When he found himself remaining in place, he turned them into one of his most personal creations.

If you'd like to know more about Jack Kirby's Fourth World, you can read a column I wrote, promoting the New Gods volume, by clicking right here.  Better still, if you want to buy the books, they usually have them at Amazon-dot-com and all sorts of on-line merchants. 

(However, if you order them from Amazon through the links below, this site gets a tiny percentage of the cash you spend.  Which is nice.)