Doctor Doom Appreciation 2022 - Scientist, Sorcerer, Romani, King

[Iron Maiden]

The scarcity of any new Doom developments has really gotten bad as the end of the year approaches. We did get a tease of Doom 2099 in Savage Avengers and there are a gaggle of Doombots on the cover of next week's Fantastic Four so that looks promising.

I do get alternately entertained and annoyed by the spate of Doctor Doom articles on the ususal click bait sites like ScreenRant....case in point the title of this article...Doctor Doom Changes Forever as Marvel Obliterates his Biggest Success
The gist of their assertions lies in this quote from the article...."Marvel reveals that Dr. Doom’s greatest triumph, his conquest of Latveria, is actually a lie engineered by his worst enemies, the Fortunov family." In the comic we are introduced to a new character by the name of Wulf Fortunov who is one of leaders of a group that is a bit like the Illuminati called the Outer Circle.

Here's a page from his appearance in last month's Captain America and the Winter Soldier Special #1 (written by Jackson Lanzing and Collin Kelly / artist Kev Walker). He certainly has a unique look. He reminds me of the Gary Oldman Dracula in the Bram's Stoker's Dracula movie. I glanced through the story after buying a digital version of this and I am not exactly sure how old this character is supposed to be. I really don't plan on following up on this anyway. I just thought I might add him to the list of possible Doom adversaries.

[DoomScribe]

Interesting.
I'm always suspicious of ret-conns ... this tries to take us back to 1922. It isn't possible that Doom would not know of this, but it is possible that he has never been shown knowing of it.

This is like classic conspiracy theories too (Q-Anon anyone?). When the manipulators are so deeply hidden, how do their manipulations even mean anything? Like someone is pulling strings, but things seem to develop organically anyway.

Also, wasn't Fortunov the surname of both Boris and Fortune, the card reader of 2099? I'll have to look into this some later.

[Iron Maiden]

Interesting.
I'm always suspicious of ret-conns ... this tries to take us back to 1922. It isn't possible that Doom would not know of this, but it is possible that he has never been shown knowing of it.

This is like classic conspiracy theories too (Q-Anon anyone?). When the manipulators are so deeply hidden, how do their manipulations even mean anything? Like someone is pulling strings, but things seem to develop organically anyway.

Also, wasn't Fortunov the surname of both Boris and Fortune, the card reader of 2099? I'll have to look into this some later.

I can't recall if we ever knew what Boris's given surname is. The Marvel fandom Wiki states that Fortune is the great great grand daughter of Boris and her last name was possible Rosikon. She had a brother Kazimierz. The Fortunov's were the royals that were in power when Doom was younger. King Vladimir's death is shown in Books of Doom and he had two sons....Prince Rudolpho and Prinice Zorba. Prince Zorba was killed by Doom in John Byrne's run and Prince Rudolpho died off panel after being severely injured at the hands of the Red Skull in SVTU #12.

Prince Zorba's death in FF #247


Prince Rudolpho's Death in SVTU #10


And recently in Christopher Cantwell's Doctor Doom series, Doom killed a Fortunov grandson named Dimitri in issue #7

[DoomScribe]

Nice summary, IM.

With all of those Fortunov kin being dispatched, it seems hard to imagine any living bloodline still remains.

If this is to be a continuing/revised blood feud between Doom and the Fortunov, they've so far either afraid to try to take out Doom or have spent many years in hiding and gathering resources in secret. Anyway, this Wulf Fortunov obviously has some kind of power, maybe a vampire?

[Iron Maiden]

Nice summary, IM.

With all of those Fortunov kin being dispatched, it seems hard to imagine any living bloodline still remains.

If this is to be a continuing/revised blood feud between Doom and the Fortunov, they've so far either afraid to try to take out Doom or have spent many years in hiding and gathering resources in secret. Anyway, this Wulf Fortunov obviously has some kind of power, maybe a vampire?

I have no idea. I think this may be his first appearance and I haven't been following the Captain America title. Another thing is if Dimitri Fortunov is a grandson of the line, who is his father? Prince Zorba or Prince Rudolph? Or maybe some female member of the family?

[DoomScribe]

I have no idea. I think this may be his first appearance and I haven't been following the Captain America title. Another thing is if Dimitri Fortunov is a grandson of the line, who is his father? Prince Zorba or Prince Rudolph? Or maybe some female member of the family?

It's possible that one of the princes had a son before they were killed, that's what I thought although it may have been explained and I've forgotten it.

Also, "Doom Supreme" makes a rather dramatic entrance in this week's book, "Avengers Assemble Alpha #1", a rather thick book that follows along the storyline of previous iterations, where the Doom Supreme and his assorted evil-doers have been decimated multiverse Earths of their heroes, supposedly at the behest of Mephisto. This story continues in Avengers #63 next week.

Also Spoiler alert ...
This Doom is downright nasty. He pokes the eyes out of the Sorcerer Supreme, and removes the bones of the Red Hulk Starbrand, leaving him a rolling whimpering ball of flesh.
Avengers Assemble Alpha #1 pg30.jpg

Avengers Assemble Alpha #1 pg36.jpg

Avengers 63 preview.jpg

[CaptainUniverse]

It's possible that one of the princes had a son before they were killed, that's what I thought although it may have been explained and I've forgotten it.

Also, "Doom Supreme" makes a rather dramatic entrance in this week's book, "Avengers Assemble Alpha #1", a rather thick book that follows along the storyline of previous iterations, where the Doom Supreme and his assorted evil-doers have been decimated multiverse Earths of their heroes, supposedly at the behest of Mephisto. This story continues in Avengers #63 next week.

Why would any version of Doom ally himself with Mephisto? Such an alliance wouldn't be beneficial to Doom, I wouldn't think, what is he planning?

[DoomScribe]

For those despairing for the lack of Doctor Doom appearances in the coming months, history shows that it's been worse. I went through my database and only had to go back to 2004 to find that there were only 5 Doom appearances that year, 12 if you count the Ultimates Victor Van Damme.

In 2002 there were 8
2006 had 14, and that was when Books of Doom had just started.
1999 had 12
1998 had 4 - this was following the Heroes Reborn books in 1997 in which there were 27 Doom appearances that included the end of 2099
1988 had just 11
1982 had just 4

As for books with a 2022 publishing date, there have been 45 comic books with Dr Doom appearances. Not all quality, but not a bad year. I'd take quality over quantity any day, but every year that he appears there are new readers who discover the awesomeness that is Victor Von Doom!

I think my favorite book of the year has to be Wastelanders: Doom. Other memorable issues were the Savage Avengers arc, and the brief appearances in Fantastic Four #s 43 through 45.

It goes up and down. I can guarantee that if Doctor Doom ever appears in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, there will probably be a ton of comic book appearances to follow. Assuming they don't completely f-up his movie debut.
ds

[Iron Maiden]

Thanks for the stats on that. Now that you mention it, Wastelanders Doom was one of the better outings. I think we have been "spoiled" at times, particularly when we had the Doctor Doom solo by Christopher Cantwell which was preceded by Infamous Iron Man, a 12 issue mini series.

As for Jason Aaron's Doom Supreme, I have to say this is the first version of Doom I really don't like reading. He is almost completely soulless and very close to being pure evil. I pass on this one.

[Doom Answers to No Master]

The epilogue to the new Midnight Suns video game...the last minute of the video....

[DoomScribe]

The epilogue to the new Midnight Suns video game...the last minute of the video....

Sweet. I've been wondering if he would show up in this.

ps: since when is Logan so tall? The hairy runt has gotten a height boost I guess.

[Iron Maiden]

I did like Doom's appearance in Midnight Suns #2 but I gather the comic has nothing to do with the video game.

[Doom'nGloom]

The epilogue to the new Midnight Suns video game...the last minute of the video....

Cool. I'm really on the fence about buying this game. The gameplay and the Abbey stuff looks good but I've heard there are some performance issues, hope they get fixed soon. Well this at least makes it certain I'll buy the sequel whenever that comes out.

[Maestro 216]

Cool. I'm really on the fence about buying this game. The gameplay and the Abbey stuff looks good but I've heard there are some performance issues, hope they get fixed soon. Well this at least makes it certain I'll buy the sequel whenever that comes out.

Or DLC like Ultimate Alliance 3.

[dzub]

Or DLC like Ultimate Alliance 3.

yeah the current roster is underwhelming. I expected more people tbvh.