DC K.O. (2025-) #2

by Scott Snyder, Javi Fernandez (Artist), Xermanico (Artist)

The tournament is in full swing. Heroes have fallen. Darkseid is near. The 32 champions have been chosen, and now they must compete to earn the Heart of Apokolips. The first challenge? Battling across a deadly arena to acquire new weapons of war. The greatest powers of the DC Universe are up for grabs, and whoever holds them will advance to the next level. Superman has his doubts that the Justice League is doing the right thing, but there are others who have no problem killing to get what they want…

Genres: Comics, Dc Comics, Graphic Novels

Kindle Edition

Published November 26, 2025

About the author

Scott Snyder is the Eisner and Harvey Award winning writer on DC Comics Batman, Swamp Thing, and his original series for Vertigo, American Vampire. He is also the author of the short story collection, Voodoo Heart, published by the Dial Press in 2006. The paperback version was published in the summer of 2007.

Reviews

[MrGlassWontBreak · Rating 4 out of 5]

As the heroes and villains enter the next round of the tournament. They enter a game where 32 of them must look for 16 powerful items—a Mother Box, The Blue Beetle Scarab, the Atom's Belt, Thor's Hammer, Lantern Power Rings, Bane's Venom infuser, and a Mystery Item pertaining to Darkside, to name a few— hidden across a graveyard of elder gods slain by Darkside. Those without items by the time all items are found will be eliminated.

The Joker finds the Atom's Belt, enlarges himself, and indiscriminately kills a bunch of heroes and villains. Lobo gets Bane's Venom, and Diana gets Thor's Hammer. After weakening Superman with Kryptonite, Lex Luthor gets the Black Lantern Power Ring and reanimates the corpses of the Elder Gods, using them to take out various heroes. After realizing what the mystery item is, Superman stabs his heart with Kryptonite, sacrificing himself like Darkside did to attain his power, The Omega Sanction.

Imbued with omega beams and the full power of Darkside, Superman easily disposes of the elder gods, but they are transported to the next round before Superman can deal with Luthor, while those without items were eliminated, as the final item was found by Guy Gardner, Green Lantern. On the outside, Time Trapper, Booster Gold, and World Forger continue to hold the time barrier against Darkside until Booster Gold, who is currently possessed by Darkside, reveals himself and declares his intention to enter the tournament as well.

[James DeSantis · Rating 4 out of 5]

Superman Is....

[dusty · Rating 4 out of 5]

Scott Snyder is truly in his bag with this one. The first issue of this massive DC event felt larger than life, and I was honestly a little worried things might lose steam as it went on… but DC K.O. #2 proves that is not the case.

This issue is just as exciting, if not more, than the first. I love that halfway through the challenge, I genuinely had no clue where the story was heading. It’s brutal action mixed with strong, universe-shaping story moments; it’s packed with characters we all know and love, all competing for the biggest prize imaginable.

One of my favorite touches is how the story jumps between the past and present, with Clark, Bruce, Diana, and Lois playing a board game. The connection they’re building through those scenes feels meaningful, and it never pulls you out of the massive, high-stakes events unfolding around them.

What truly caught me off guard was the fight between Superman and Lex, and everything that came out of it. And the twist with the mystery item? Loved it.

I cannot WAIT for the next issue, and I’m so glad I picked this series up.

Give me more twists and turns, more mind games, more brutal fights; I seriously can’t get enough of this.

[Colin Post · Rating 4 out of 5]

This second core issue of the event delivers an action-packed round of the tourney with some tantalizing bits of the bigger story parceled out. I appreciate how Snyder and Fernández lean into the game aspect of this, with the fight over mystery items being the focus of the action. I do wonder how that will shape the one on one fights next month. Already, some brutal fun was had, a la Joker burrowing into Big Barda’s brain and also chomping on Connor! Too bad Starro didn’t make it out of this round, but the creators had some fun with them too along the way!

[Tiernan Dunagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Clark, why wouldn't your first move be to TAKE JOKER OUT. Like Lex would have a misguided but reasonable plan for the world, but like... A WORLD DICTATED BY JOKER ARE U FUCKING SERIOUS??

This is why they sniped Bruce. He would've THOUGHT AB THIS! Pisses me OFF.

[Joshua Tompkins · Rating 5 out of 5]

This definitely didn't go the way I expected! I love the design of the comic, the way it starts out and goes back to their time playing a game and I enjoyed how one spread was layed out almost in a a boardgame style manner, because this is all just a game. The action felt fast paced and exciting. All over the place and the art was very well detailed. Great issue!

[Antonio Escobar · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow breathless. KO 2 exceeded my expectations

Dc is absolutely cooking with this

[Craig Schorling · Rating 5 out of 5]

Man, this was so much fun. Joker was great, Lex was great, Booster Gold.... This was non-stop fun from beginning to end.

[Isabel Davison · Rating 3 out of 5]

Slightly disappointed that they didn’t brawl with each other, because it seemed to be more tournament style from the art work. A star deducted for the inconsistent art style, and a star added for Wonder Woman holding Thor’s hammer. Rad.

[Francisco Cesar · Rating 3 out of 5]

Concept is loads of fun and everything but man, this really isn't turning out to be what was promised. The hero's should be KILLING EACH OTHER lol

[Cybernex007 · Rating 4 out of 5]

That was some chaotic fun, but I have to admit also a little disappointing with how quickly they through away characters. The first sections was the big elimination round, I figured we would actually have some more one on ones I was basing the bracket on when it was released. Instead the characters are just getting out left and right to whoever is in their proximity vs who they were actually matched up against. One thing I won’t talk about as much but I do enjoy is the game board analogy they are presenting in relation to the entire event, a drastically different fun hang out session between the Trinity, and Lois, as they ask questions that influence the thinking during the tournament. And the question discussed today, what would you be if you didn’t have your powers? If things were completely different how could you figure it out using a new equation? As we jump into this issue the 32 challengers that survived the first round find themselves in a barren world filled with the corpses of the old gods darkseid killed to take their energy and become king omega. Here they are doing the same but with their fellow champions. Scattered throughout this realm are 16 of the most powerful items from the universe. We have things like blue beetle’s scarab, atom’s belt, psycho pirates Medusa mask, Thor’s hammer, bane’s venom, the genie pen, power rings, speed force ring, the claw of Horus, lasso of truth, soul takes sword, cosmic rod, god filler sword, worlogog (whatever that is), and one final mystery item. As I noted there are only 16 and 32 challengers, in order to continue they have to get their hands on one of the items, everyone else will die….have at it. The challengers immediately scatter, some people like hawkman or cyborg are drawn to items like the claw of Horus or the motherbox, other challengers like Lex scan the entire environment, make a mapping of the items, then immediately head for what they want…and for Lex he is going for the power rings. And at the moment the only thing Clark wants to do is make sure the villains don’t win, specifically Lex.

As Clark is throwing it down with Lex and sending off lasers to delay other villains, Wonder Woman is currently locked in combat with etrigan over atom’s belt. Hilariously Etrigan drops this bar: “to you that belt shall not pass, this demon spawn kick your ass!” But while they are distracted joker happened to slip through and take the belt and grow to a size that even towered over Giganta. This is where the mindless killing against the match ups really comes in, as joker immediately smashes Giganta then eats Connor Hawke and Cheetah…which is massively disappointing. Elsewhere metamorpho and plastic man are getting tied up in each other trying to get the god killer blade…only for metamorpho to melt plastic man with the substance he is made of, and for Jay to swoop in with his speed and take it before metamorpho, or starro who is nearby, could. Guy Gardner is attempting to go for a new ring, specially of the speed force kind, only to be knocked unconscious by Harley who takes the ring for herself and gets super speed.

The fight between Superman and Lex quickly takes a turn as Superman makes the unfortunate decision to give Lex room to monologue. He begins to go in about how he had an epiphany in the phantom zone when Superman sent him there, and in order to keep talking Lex opens his suit to reveal all the Kryptonite he has inside. Lex has come to the conclusion that he tonight he hated Superman because he stopped humanity from maturing, but he was wrong and the real reason he hates Superman is because he does so little. As a thank you for this realization, Lex brought back a bit of the phantom zone in the form of a blade he immediately uses to slice Superman’s hand off! Lex is sure Superman got a vision of the world reshaped in his own image when he arrived here, just like everyone else did, but Lex sees Superman’s current mindset to reject it and restore everything to normal as weak. There is so much more they could do and now Lex wants to make sure Nat actually happens. He attempts to put Superman down by firing a few shards of Kryptonite into his body, and flies off to find the rings. Leaving Superman there to die while Lex believes he will become the hero superman is too much of a coward to become.

Elsewhere guy is now going for the claw of Horus…only for hawkman to swoop in before him. Cyborg is also getting off easy as he found the mother box and immediately made a connection. While swamp thing, Barda’s, and Etrigan are fighting over the soul sword…Lobo discovers the bane venom injector and immediately put it on. Starro attempts to jump on him and take it, starfish are 98 percent muscle after all, and lobo rips him apart for even trying to touch the main man. But the thing with starfish…they regenerate. And suddenly a whole horde of starro clones flood the field and take over everyone they can. Power girl, Jay, Wonder Woman, and Firestorm are all take over and are immediately put against the others. Power girl goes after supergirl who has the Medusa mask, firestorm goes after Aquaman and the cosmic rod (which Aquaman uses his new powers to drain the water right out of his body), Jay goes after black lightning, and Wonder Woman is sent after Zatanna before she can get Thor’s hammer. Zatanna’s magic doesn’t work on the cosmic starfish but Diana is strong and with Zee’s instruction she is able to get Diana to grab Thor’s hammer by her side and send a bolt of lightning across the battlefield to take out all versions of starro. At this moment Guy is also trying once more to get an object in the form of the blue beetle scarab…which Jason Todd grabs first! I have to admit thats a pretty cool matchup, and he immediately turns it on trying to kill the joker. Harley is also attempting to use her speed abilities to hunt him down…but suddenly joker vanishes before them. Turns out he shrunk down…and then climbed his way into big Barda’s head to take her down. Once again…what the hell! While vixen and king shark were distracted fighting for the geni pen, Etrigan ended up swooping it up himself. Which is a really cool pairing. And as apparently no one got it before, Zatanna for her hands on the god killer sword. We cut back to Luthor hunting down the rings, but right as he is about to reach them…star sapphire drops a mock up of the fortress of solitude on him and gets the rings herself. Except Lex still gets his hands on one ring…the black one. Star sapphire doesn’t see the use with nothing dead to control…but it seems she overlooked that they are in a graveyard…surrounded by dead gods!!

Lex now has full control of all the gods darkseid killed before to gain his power. And Sherman can only look around on his knees in weakness from the Kryptonite shards fired into him. Supergirl rushes over to try and give him the Medusa mask so he can continue, only for captain atom to bust in and take it himself. Suddenly heroes are being taken out left and right by the gods. Black lighting, firestorm, and power girl are all down all while Lex never takes his eyes off Superman. And the. Superman has an epiphany of his own. His missing hand is throbbing and suddenly he remembers something the heart of Apokolips said at the start of this round. “Follow the example of darkseid and you shall be rewarded.” Clark remembers back to darkseid, he sacrificed not just his hand…but his life to be something more. The mystery item has not been claimed and Clark realizes what it must be. Before the dead gods can crash down on him, he takes a shark of Kryptonite from his shoulder…and pounds it into his chest! Lex looks on vicarious…until Superman walks forward once more. His hand has been restored with pure omega energy, he found the mystery item to be the omega sanction and the very power of darkseid himself…Superman is. Superman sends out a flurry of omega beams and destroys all the elder gods, just like darkseid did eons ago…and it feels good. He plans on stopping all of them, but then Guy gets his hands on the worlogog and all of the items have now been claimed. The fighting for this round is done and anyone who risked to get an item is sent away. To be honest I’m not exactly sure what some of these final challengers got. We saw most of them but I am assuming Swamp thing got the soul sword. The only one I didn’t see was the lasso of truth, maybe Jay got that after loosing the good killer sword?

But as the issue comes to an end we cut back to the watchtower and the people helping the tournament along from outside of it. And we see tragedy strike, as darkseid, who has taken the form of booster gold, has decided to disrupt the flow of time and enter the arena himself! OH NO! Also it only just now occurs to be how accurate the cover of the comic is. Sure Lobo getting bane venom was RIGHT there and makes sense, but I didn't pick up on Harley's speed, Diana holding thor's hammer, or the least obvious being Superman's hand hidden. Cool details.

[Scratch · Rating 2 out of 5]

Because there are too many characters and they're trying to push the plot along with too few pages, it was difficult to keep track of every death and every event. But, there were fundamental problems just with the basic text.

Lex Luthor recites the many forms of Kryptonite as he is gloating over Superman. And then he gets them... wrong. He talks about using black to drain Superman, when that's not a thing; gold drains his powers, and black split Supergirl into separate good and evil Supergirls. I don't know how/why he got the types of Kryptonite wrong. I don't think it's a plot thing. I think the writer is just... dumb.

Harley Quinn picks up a Flash ring. Normally, Barry Allen would use this to store his costume in. It has no powers other than storing a costume. But, Harley Quinn crackles with lightning, suggesting that the ring is giving her actual Flash powers. Now, could I be mistaken? Could there have been some new development since I stopped reading comics before Flashpoint, and a couple years ago, when I started reading DC again? Maybe.

The unseen gods/entities controlling this tournament listed these items as some of the most powerful items in the DC universe. And, some of them really are, like the worlogolog, and maybe the power rings. (Though, confusing how the power rings were counted as "one" item, even though there were at least eight present; why didn't the heroes try splitting up the power rings across multiple heroes to improve their odds of survival?) Some of these items weren't that powerful at all. Flash's ring doesn't normally have power at all. Atom's bio-belt (not labeled as such here) isn't particularly powerful when all it does is convey size-changing powers. "Venom" isn't an item so much as a drug, and it's just a slightly worse version of Hour-man's miraclo formula, which ISN'T an item available here.

It was all illogical.

Some characters died. Some of the deaths were given such a tiny panel, you were barely aware that they were happening.

[AviChaim Snyder · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought this issue topped the first in every way. Each character feels true to themselves, even when thrown into such a wild, high-stakes scenario. The action is nonstop, and every panel delivers something impressive; I was hooked from page one.
The dynamic between Lex and Superman is especially strong here. Lex feels genuinely threatening, using his intelligence to keep the entire universe on edge, and it finally feels like he’s getting the spotlight he deserves.
Overall, this issue was an absolute blast. My praise couldn’t be any higher, and I honestly just want to talk about it with everyone I know. I couldn’t recommend it more.
Grade: A

[Philmore Olazo · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m still unsure of this story so far. But at least the stakes are somewhat interesting.

Continuing with our DC Mortal Kombat tournament we see that the pre-combat phase was to get a hold of powerful DC items; Lantern Rings, the Scarab, Atom's belt, etc. to somewhat level the playing field.

To me, it’s clear that Superman is the protagonist of this story, given how it’s presented: he’s the one who should win and play by the rules outside of what he normally does. The rest of the cast may have side stories or tie-in comics that will not be very interesting to go through.

Let’s see how this goes.

[Junior · Rating 4 out of 5]

Stupid fun

Not gonna lie. The story doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to me. Not sure why this has to be resolved in the form of a Mortal Kombat tournament, but it’s still entertaining if you’re not looking for something that’s going to leave you deeply introspective or pondering life’s mysteries all weekend. Also I’m disappointed that the heroes aren’t fighting each other as much as I originally thought. Including their respective nemeses makes it seem like the same old, instead of heroes brutally killing each other for the greater good.

[Mocassin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Si on a réussi à accepter les prémices posés dans le numéro #1, on se plaira à suivre ce nouveau round en mode battle royale. Bon, c'est un peu redondant avec le premier affrontement, mais c'est fait suffisamment efficacement pour ne pas s'ennuyer et même s'amuser, les retournements de situation s'enchaînant. Superman et Lex Luthor se partagent particulièrement les projecteurs et c'est très réussi, même si le plot twist concernant l'homme d'acier peut paraître un peu out-of-character, ou tout du moins pas assez bien amené.

[Jason Holtzman · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m truly surprised to be giving this rating and perhaps will give it a reread but… this premise might be getting too out there for me.

Whatever emotional undercurrent is meant to be here simply doesn’t feel strong enough, leaving a book that’s full of action and wonderful art but no real substance. I’ll keep reading in that I look forward to seeing how exactly this impacts the Absolute line, but so far that’s where my interest ends.

[Jerry Aguirre · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just wow. I loved that almost everyone got a scene or something to do. Some really cool characters got awesome upgrades, the question is will it transfer over to the next round. And oh yea, FIGHT! It was an epic showdown, but the star here was LEX LUTHOR. WOW what a monologue and what a BEAST. HE DEF will go far in the tournament. He stole the show.

4.5 stars because I didn’t like that Batwoman and Robin and a few others weren’t even shown at all!

[Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still very confused that Superman Unlimited (and the abundance of Kryptonite) is considered to be part of the same universe / time period as it is at least the second time there is a reference to it in another title but yet we never see Superman use his "gold" transformation outside of the actual Superman Unlimited series...

[DonHeimscheißer · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really fun issue, the 2nd round was so interesting and action packed. It was nice seeing all the hero’s and villains going at it in order to qualify for the next round. A fun read overall and the art is pretty cool.

[Ron · Rating 3 out of 5]

a wild ride with a surprise ending

While it was entertaining sometimes it was hard to figure out Who the heroes were. I was not as impressed with the artwork in this issue as the previous.

entertaining but the artwork is a bit confusing in my personal opinion

[Raymond Paquette · Rating 5 out of 5]

It’s a good fight but none of the dead heroes are actually dead. And other than the Joker and Luthor the heroes are on the same side, kind of. I don’t want Superman to win. He’s too obvious.

[Myles Gerber · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️✨

[Paloma Montecino · Rating 4 out of 5]

La mierda está va a terminar conmigo si seguimos a este paso…basta loco basta

[Chris Loan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book kicked ass!

[Powerman61 · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great issue of DC K.O.
Action packed from start to finish.
Incredible artwork and storyline.
Battles within a battle.
Superman trying to stop
Lex Luthor from molding the universe
in his image.

[Cristhian · Rating 2 out of 5]

?????

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.75
I wish Marvel books were this good. I'm a Marvelite, but DC just has better talent these days. Story and art.

Make mine DC, I guess.

[Lizzy DeMarco · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not bad for the second entry, but I also felt it was fairly predictable.

[Roland Baldwin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is crazy and very chaotic. I wonder is Scott Snyder running out of steam. The narration is a little bit on the corny side.