“Now faith, hope, and love remain, and the greatest of these is love.”--1 Corinthians 13:13
“You had a dream; I have a plan”--Cyclops
“There's no point in being grown up if you can't be childish sometimes.”--The Doctor
Well, obviously nothing in comics is scared, but that doesn't mean altering something major or important established by another writer is necessary or warranted. Of course most comic writers can't leave well enough alone...
Obviously we haven't seen how this might play out, but with Bendis' spotty record I'd understand being wary.
Seeing the rapid collapse of Latveria is actually one of the most believable aspects of the Marvel universe today. Governments fail all the time, when even the most efficient and disciplined regime can be brought to ruin by a sudden and unexpected change in leadership.
Doom ruled Latveria as an absolute monarch, never seriously entertaining the thought of a successor seeing as how Doom is apparently immortal. Moreover, even in moments when Doom had to travel abroad he usually left a Doombot in charge. So that as far as the Latverian people were concerned Doom's stern leadership was a constant fixture of their lives.
As such, it shouldn't come as any great shock that the moment Doom abdicated power Latveria erupted into chaos. All the constant effort Doom spent maintaining the perfect nation state, free of the usually political infighting, erupted in years of pent-up ambitions and petty self-interest. In this context, Latveria's fall not only makes sense it's a direct and inevitable consequence of Doom's decisions post-Secret War.
It's not that it fell into chaos, it's that Doom didn't have a better plan to transfer power. I agree that if Doom simply left the "keys to the car" in one man's hands, as depicted, this outcome is quite reasonable. My point is that even a reformed Doom has more sense than to do something like that
Last edited by Biclopcicle; 01-28-2017 at 05:59 PM.
I just read issue 4 , not a bad read good art . I am taking both iron man series lightly . I've been a long time collector of the iron man title . And figure they will both end by issue 12 and Tony will be back . But I cold be totally wrong ,
Frankly, Doom's plan for the transition of power in Latveria is pretty reasonable. Appoint the military as the interim government until civilian leaders (chosen by the people?) can be put in place. Heaps of real world governments use this sort of plan from time to time, after periods of upheaval, as this approach often works to stabilise a country. Of course, if the people want to riot anyway then even the best laid plans can quickly fall apart, as is the case in Latveria.
With that said, this discussion about what went wrong in Latveria precludes the possibility of outside influence. Perhaps it's cynical of me but I won't be surprised if a foreign organisation like Shield or Hydra was funding certain dissident groups in order to destabilise Latveria. If only to make sure that Doom would never again have a power base to return to later. But thus far no Marvel comic has hinted at such geopolitical skulduggery, it's just speculation on my part.
That would be an interesting element to introduce, Kintor. Reed tried to do that towards the end of Mark Waid's run and it lasted for a couple of years. Doom was stuck in hell and didn't return until the early part of the first Civil War event. JMS just sort of cut to the chase and had Doom return to power in about 2 seconds after he got back from Hell.
I liked seeing him return to Latveria in this issue but he went because he found out that's where Ben went. I'd like to know more about these new characters brought up, the general and woman he recommended for chancellor. One wonders though if Doom's finances are still entangled with Latveria's . Seems like he always considered the national treasury at his disposal so I wonder what his source of income would be now that he has this palatial residence in Switzerland. It wouldn't surprise me if he had this set up for years, going back to the time when Kristoff kept control of Latveria.
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Seems to me Bendis is showing 2 conflicting things: one one side without Doom Latveria went immediately to ruin which implies Doom didn't correctly implement his exit strategy. On the other hand he shows us Doom who THINKS he's able to find a solution to the problem in 5 seconds by cross referencing databases. The only way for this to make sense is that Doom is ignoring some variables. He's git the right answer according to his theory but that theory doesn't really hold up to reality.
Exactly. Sure that are plenty of real-world instances of such transfers of political power. And they tend to end pretty poorly. Almost exactly as BMB portrayed. Doom is way above leaving his people, whom he has always loved, in such a state of affairs. The only counter argument to this is that perhaps he was so distraught from the events of Secret Wars, his battle/argument with Reed there at the end (you hold too tightly etc etc), and his effective redemption/second chance Reed gave him that he acted somewhat irrationally and relinquished power "cold turkey." But it's a weak argument. Doom still has his one superpower, which is his iron will (read emperor Doom and see how he does vs Purple Man). No doubt he would believe himself capable of providing a stable, progressive transition of power that would avoid destabilization. But it would be significantly more difficult for BMB to craft the story he wanted to tell around that framework.
That's an interesting point you bring up Biclopcicle about what exactly was the lesson Victor learned at the end of Secret Wars and it just may have something to do with him letting go a little too much, too quickly.
Once again, it depends on the writer as to what message they want to convey about Doom's leaderhip. Early issue with Stan and Jack show that he was in the shadows at first (FF annual #2). Byrne was more generous in his assessment of Doom's relationships with other Latverians
We have seen some sort of chain of command in the past. Doom has been prone to these long absences so there has to be some kind of structure in place. Doombots take care of part of that but we've seen that the town of Doomstadt has a burgomeister that he's had a working relationship with as in Byrne's "This Land is Mine" (FF#247). Some can be a less the kindly burgomaster type like with the unknown fellow from JMS's FF #537 or Waid's Chancellor Beltaine in Daredevil
In Waid's Daredevil, there was Chancellor Beltane. Waid's not exactly subtle about what he thinks about Doom as a leader with the "Heil Doom" salute.
And this fellow ran things while Doom was trapped in Hell. Right now, he's probably in an unmarked grave
Last edited by Iron Maiden; 07-23-2019 at 10:52 AM.