Doctor Doom #10 Final issue - "Bedford Falls" SPOILERS

[MichaelC]

He's been firmly in the villain box ever since he skinned Valeria alive.

[Iron Maiden]

He's been firmly in the villain box ever since he skinned Valeria alive.

Unthinkable is hardly ever referenced these days in the comics.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

...firmly in the villain box...

"Unthinkable" was published in May 2003 and ran on till September 2003 with FF#500.

Around the same time Waid wrote Unthinkable, Doctor Doom appeared in JMS' "Doomed Affairs" (Amazing Spider-Man #50, volume 2) which showed him in all his ambiguous morally gray glory. That was April 2003.

Since that was Amazing Spider-Man while Waid wrote the Fantastic Four, far more people read Doom in the Spider-Man comic than have read "Unthinkable".

So "firmly in the villain box" doesn't even apply at the same time that Waid's story went into print.

There's a decade plus worth of stories between September 2003 and about 2019 when Cantwell started his miniseries. Jonathan Hickman's mega-run which started from Dark Reign: Fantastic Four all the way to the end of Secret Wars 2015 made zero references to "Unthinkable".

Doom appeared when Hickman wrote FF, then Avengers, and then the mega-selling SW'2015 series. And then after that you had Brian Michael Bendis' run on Iron Man which had Doom has a heroic figure in "Infamous Iron Man".


In other words, it's only since Slott's run, and Cantwell's series that "Unthinkable" has come back in circulation. A good decade of stories ignored it and by no means did "Unthinkable" completely annul the most interesting version of Doom in comics.

[Snoop Dogg]

it's not like he runs a fascist state or anything

[Revolutionary_Jack]

it's not like he runs a fascist state...

Exactly, he doesn't run a fascist state.

He runs a standard authoritarian monarchy which has no real ideology other than Doom's grandeur and his personality cult.

[Iron Maiden]

Exactly, he doesn't run a fascist state.

He runs a standard authoritarian monarchy which has no real ideology other than Doom's grandeur and his personality cult.

I like to call it feudal socialism. He does have programs to take care of the citizens. And we've never seen him suppress religion.

These panels are from the Loki series took place during Axis when peoples emotions were being manipulated.

[Revolutionary_Jack]

I like to call it feudal socialism. He does have programs to take care of the citizens. And we've never seen him suppress religion.

Well there's more to fascism than "suppressing" religion (fascism was about race more than religion, even Jews who didn't practise any faith or converted to Christianity got gassed).

Anyway, I don't think it's "feudal socialism", it's just personal authoritarian paternalism without ideology. Doctor Doom thinks he's a medieval King, i.e. "the King and the Land are one" and that it's his duty to provide and protect his people, especially if he thinks he has the right to rule over them.

Atlantis, Attilan(*), Wakanda (in the past moreso than now) would be fascist if we merely mean 'anti-democratic government' as defined by US foreign policy (whose friends include Saudi Arabia far more authoritarian and theocratic than even Iran or for that matter Cuba, who are considered enemies of USA).



(*) Attilan of the Inhumans probably deserves the tag fascist far more than Latveria ever did since it's directly predicated on an underclass of serfs who have no rights and are at the bottom of the hierarchy made to serve the royals who are considered pure, noble, high birth and so on with Black Bolt and the Court being the "master race" essentially. I gather recent retcons have changed or modified this.

[Jness]

Perhaps it's because I've been reading about Doom too long, but I have a *massive* difficulty believing that his reaction to seeing his alternate self do well was to kill him and annihilate the entire universe his alternate built.

[Alan2099]

I don't mean to nitpick, but there were a couple of logical gaps in the writing that didn't quite make sense to me. The biggest one is "Good" Doom's approach to Victor. It's like he didn't know himself at all. I don't know if there is an alternate universe version of myself, but if there is, and should I meet him, I know damn well not to leave him unattended near a plate of freshly baked peach cobbler, if I don't want him to eat it. Every version of myself across all realities is chomping down on that cobbler, especially if I'm drained and just want to sit back and relax with a little comfort snack. "Know thyself" applies in any reality.

Yet somehow we have "good" Doom mindlessly pushing all of bad Doom's buttons, including piling on a heavy dose of condescension veiled as constructive criticism. Surely "good" Doom must know that Victor gets enough of that from Reed. Honestly, I was hoping Blue Marvel would have opened a can of antimatter "stfu" on "good" Doom at that point. Any idiot could see that bad Doom was about to lose it.

Actually, I liked that part. It showed that deep down even good Doom was still DOOM. He was right and you're an absolute idiot for not seeing he is right.

And nobody gets away with calling Doom an absolute idiot. Not even Doom.

Likewise that's also why I can so easily accept Doom wiping out that Universe.
Good Doom basically told him to his face that everything he ever did was wrong.
The only way to one up him at that point was taking away everything that Good Doom had ever done, which because of what he had done, couldn't be contained to just erasing an earth.

[xcoijoi]

Maybe Doom will be retconned into being compromised in some way. After the movie flops because they refuse to humanize Victor.

[evolutionaryFan]

Meh... for me this ending just pushes Dr. Doom further into lame territory. I mean other villains seem to have goals... Dr. Doom is just a baby that throws tantrums when his ego is bruised. He has no idea what he wants and destroys universes while trying to figure it out. I wouldn't mind it if they wrote him like Thanos... just plain crazy. Given his actions, that's how his psychology should be framed... instead they try to portray him as some kind of 'gray' character.

[Iron Maiden]

You seem to think that Doom being a character with shades of gray is a new development. This goes all the way back to the days when Stan Lee was still editor at Marvel in stories like Astonishing Tales #8, Marvel Superheroes #20 and Fantastic Four #116 (which he plotted along with Archie Goodwin)

[evolutionaryFan]

You seem to think that Doom being a character with shades of gray is a new development. This goes all the way back to the days when Stan Lee was still editor at Marvel in stories like Astonishing Tales #8, Marvel Superheroes #20 and Fantastic Four #116 (which he plotted along with Archie Goodwin)

Yeah, but the grayness comes from the instability of his ego, and whatever whim he has at the moment. Other villains have some higher goal/purpose they're trying to achieve. They'll do bad things when required to try and achieve it. Doom as far as I can see is has no higher goal/purpose... just trying to boost his ego whether by doing good or bad things.

[Iron Maiden]

Yeah, but the grayness comes from the instability of his ego, and whatever whim he has at the moment. Other villains have some higher goal/purpose they're trying to achieve. They'll do bad things when required to try and achieve it. Doom as far as I can see is has no higher goal/purpose... just trying to boost his ego whether by doing good or bad things.

Doom's long time goal has always been to conquer and then bring stability and order to the world; Emperor Doom is a good example of that but he became bored. IMO part of his makeup is that he thrives on adversity and needs a challenge. The bureaucratic element of governing makes him restless. IMO part of his makeup is that he thrives on adversity and needs a challenge and I think it has its roots in his early years. His family and tribe was always on the move since they were considered undesirables and outcasts in most of Europe (which is true to this day even in the real world) . He spent some time in his young adulthood as a sort of revolutionary element in Latveria, leading a small band of rebels. He probably looks back fondly on that period of his life

[stingray]

I don't mean to nitpick, but there were a couple of logical gaps in the writing that didn't quite make sense to me. The biggest one is "Good" Doom's approach to Victor. It's like he didn't know himself at all. I don't know if there is an alternate universe version of myself, but if there is, and should I meet him, I know damn well not to leave him unattended near a plate of freshly baked peach cobbler, if I don't want him to eat it. Every version of myself across all realities is chomping down on that cobbler, especially if I'm drained and just want to sit back and relax with a little comfort snack. "Know thyself" applies in any reality.

Yet somehow we have "good" Doom mindlessly pushing all of bad Doom's buttons, including piling on a heavy dose of condescension veiled as constructive criticism. Surely "good" Doom must know that Victor gets enough of that from Reed. Honestly, I was hoping Blue Marvel would have opened a can of antimatter "stfu" on "good" Doom at that point. Any idiot could see that bad Doom was about to lose it.

I'm not surprised that Victor killed "good" Doom. I figured that he was going to play a part in his demise. But to destroy the entire universe?

I suspect many of Doom's fans will be thrilled at this development. It will only make their twisted little hearts love him more. But to me this lowers Doom considerably in the pantheon of great villains and noble bastards. At this point, he's little more than a rabid dog that needs to be put down. Nothing will happen to him, because...Marvel. But it should. And since Blue Marvel doesn't need to sleep or eat, and he has nothing but spare time on his hands, Doom should count his blessings that he doesn't wake up one morning to find himself and the entire land mass of Latveria tossed into the sun. (And yes, Blue Marvel could easily do that -- well, as long as Cantwell isn't writing it. )

Yeah, I loved this series up until this point. Really good point about good Doom pushing all of Victor's buttons. He surely should have realized how his counterpart would react. This ending kind of reminded me a bit of 'Thanos Rising', where a complex, multi-layered character was reduced to a two dimensional villain.