Doctor Doom
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Doctor Doom is a comic book villain that appears in the comic books published by Marvel Comics]]. The character first appeared in Fantastic Four #5 (July 1962), and was created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.
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[edit] Publication history
[edit] Creation
Like many of Marvel's first characters, Doctor Doom was conceived by writer Stan Lee and artist Jack Kirby. With Fantastic Four performing well, Lee and Kirby were trying to dream up a "soul-stirring…super sensational new villain".[1] Looking for a name, Lee latched onto "Doctor Doom" as "eloquent in its simplicity—magnificent in its implied menace".[1] Due to the rush to publish, Doom was not given a full origin in the first issue he appeared in, or even in subsequent stories in which he menaced the Fantastic Four[1] (after issue #5 he appeared in issues six, ten, sixteen and seventeen in succession.)[2] Doom's origins were finally revealed in the Fantastic Four Annual #2, more than two years after his first appearance.[3] While The Fantastic Four had fought villains such as the Mole Man, Skrulls and the Namor the Sub-Mariner before Doom's appearance, Doom managed to overshadow them all and became the Fantastic Four's archenemy.[4]
Jack Kirby modeled Doom after Death, with the armor standing in for that character's skeleton; "It was the reason for the armor and the hood. Death is connected with armor and the inhuman-like steel. Death is something without mercy, and human flesh contains that mercy."[5] Kirby further described Doom as being "paranoid", wrecked by his twisted face and wanting the whole world to be like him.[5] Kirby went on to say that "Doom is an evil person, but he's not always been evil. He was [respected]…but through a flaw in his own character, he was a perfectionist."[6] At one point in the Seventies, Kirby drew his interpretation of what Doom would look like under the mask, giving Doom only "a tiny scar on his cheek".[7] Due to this slight imperfection, Doom hides his face not from the world, but from himself.[7] To Kirby, this is the motivation for Doom's vengeance against the world; because others are superior due to this slight scar, Doom wants to elevate himself above them.[6] Typical of Lee's writing characterization of Doom is his arrogance; his pride leads to Doom's disfigurement at the hands of his own machine, and to the failures of many of his schemes.[8]
[edit] 1980s-1990s
John Byrne began his six-year run writing and illustrating Fantastic Four in 1981, sparking a "second golden age" for the title[9] but also attempting to "turn the clock back [...] get back and see fresh what it was that made the book great at its inception".[10] Doom made his first appearance under Byrne's tenure with issue #236.[11] Whereas Kirby had intimated that Doom's disfigurement was more a figment of Victor's vain personality, Byrne expressed that Doom's face was truly ravaged; only Doom's own robot slaves are allowed to see the monarch without his helm.[12] Byrne also emphasized other aspects of Doom's personality; despite his ruthless nature, Doom is a man of his word.[13] He also genuinely cares for his people of Latveria, who in turn are devoted to their leader; returning to Latveria after being temporarily deposed, Doom abandons a scheme to wrest mystical secrets from Doctor Strange in order to oversee his land's reconstruction.[12] Though possessing a tempestuous temper, Doom also occasionally shows warmth and empathy to others; he tries to free his mother from Mephisto and treats Kristoff Vernard like his own son.[12]
After Byrne's departure Doctor Doom continued to be a major villain in Fantastic Four, and as the 1980s continued Doom appeared other comics such as X-Factor, Punisher, Spectacular Spider-Man and Excalibur. In Fantastic Four #350, writer Walt Simonson introduced the idea of Doom being on a journey through time and space, only returning to Earth on occasion. Simonson's retcon was done so readers could assume that any of the character's appearances that they found odd were in fact Doombots. An urban legend states that Simonson drew up a list of official stories which featured the real Doom and those which did not.[14]
[edit] Modern depictions
In 2003, Doom was the sole villain in the Fantastic Four story arc "Unthinkable", in which Doom imprisons Franklin Richards in Hell and captures Valeria Richards before succeeding in fighting the Fantastic Four to a standstill. Writer Mark Waid sought to redefine Doom's character in a way that had not been seen before. In Waid's reinterpretation, Doom hates Richards for knowing at his core he was right when Doom was wrong.[15][16] Waid was also convinced that the "truism that Victor Von Doom is, despite his villainy, a noble man" (as suggested in Byrne's run) "is absolute crap. [...] A man [Doom] whose entire motivating force is jealousy is ridiculously petty, not grandly noble. Yes, Doom is regal, and yes, whenever possible, Doom likes to act as if he possesses great moral character, because to him that's what great men have... —but when I hear Doom say it 'does not suit him to' do this-and-such, what I hear is, 'it has nothing to do with my hatred for Reed Richards, so it's not worth my time.'" Waid also stated that Doom "would tear the head off a newborn baby and eat it like an apple while his mother watched if it would somehow prove he were smarter than Reed." [16]
In 2005 and 2006, Doom was featured in his own limited series, Books of Doom, a retelling of the origin story by Ed Brubaker.[17] In an interview, Brubaker said the series was a way to elaborate on the earlier portions of Doom's life which had not been seen often in the comics. The series also set out to determine if Doom's path from troubled child to dictator was fated or Doom's own faults led to his corruption— in essence, a nature versus nurture question.[18] Brubaker's version of Doom was heavily influenced by the original Lee/Kirby version; responding to a question if he would show Doom's face, Brubaker stated "following Kirby's example, I think it's better not to show it."[17]
[edit] Fictional character biography
[edit] Origin
Fantastic Four Annual #2 established that Doom's mother Cynthia, a witch, was killed by a demon, and his father Werner, a healer, died after being pursued by the Baron of Latveria because Werner could not save the Baroness from death. The young Victor swears revenge and is raised by his father's friend Boris. He studies his mother's magical artifacts and science, using his skills to swindle the richer Latverians and avoiding soldiers who want to execute him (even using a robotic doppelgänger to escape a firing squad). The Dean of Empire State University in America offers Doom a scholarship. There Doom meets and grows to loathe Reed Richards.[19]
Using the scientific apparatus at his disposal, Victor creates a device to communicate with his dead mother. While Richards warns him his calculations are off, Doom spitefully ignores him activates the machine: he is horribly disfigured in the resulting explosion.[19] Refusing to acknowledge his own fault in the matter, Doom blames Richards for the accident, finding it easier to believe that Richards had sabotaged his work out of jealousy than to admit to his own imperfection. Expelled after the accident, Doom travels the world, eventually being found by a clan of monks in Tibet. Mastering the monk's disciplines, he becomes their master and forges himself a suit of armor, complete with a mask that can only be removed by him. After this, Doom returns to his homeland, overthrowing the standing government, and crowning himself king of Latveria. Ruling with an iron fist and an equally strong will, Doom begins to redirect the small nation's resources to help him realize his goals. He also brings the country a new age of prosperity.[19]
In 1969, Doom's childhood companion Valeria was introduced. It is revealed she and Doom parted ways after he left Latveria to study in America: symbolizing his abandoning of human love and compassion for knowledge and power.[20] In 1971, it was established Cynthia von Doom had sold her soul to Mephisto.[21] In 1985, John Byrne gave further detail regarding Doom's scarring. The story uses the idea that the accident at Empire State University only left Doom with a small scar; when Doom puts on the armor forged for him when it had yet to cool, however, he truly damages his face.[22] Ed Brubaker's 2007 Books of Doom further revealed Doom was sent to learn in America after being drafted by the military to create weapons: after his accident he destroyed all his inventions. He was also pursued by the KGB before being advised to come to Tibet. The series also confirmed Doom led his people to revolt against the Latverian government.[23]
[edit] In spider-man media
- Perhaps most significantly, Dr. Doom appeared in no less than six episodes of the 1981 Spider-Man series produced by Marvel Productions. Voiced by Ralph James (with heavy modulation akin to Darth Vader), the latter five episodes, written by Larry Parr, comprised a complete story arc, and four of them were at one point edited together into an animated feature.
- Dr. Doom's final 1980s animated appearance was in Spider-Man and His Amazing Friends voiced by Shepard Menkin. He appeared in an episode entitled "The Fantastic Mr. Frump!"
[edit] Video Games
- Doctor Doom has appeared in several video games. He was the final boss in the 1989 computer game Spider-Man and Captain America in Doctor Doom's Revenge and next-to-last boss in Sega's 1991 Spider-Man arcade game. Later, he was featured as a boss character in the Capcom fighting game, Marvel Super Heroes, who only became playable after the game was beaten once and a code was entered. He returned as a selectable character in Marvel vs. Capcom 2. He is particularly notorious for the so-called Strider/Doom trap in the latter game. He also appeared in Marvel Super Heroes: War of the Gems for the Super NES.
[edit] Marvel Ultimate Alliance=
- Doctor Doom is the main antagonist of Marvel: Ultimate Alliance voiced by Clive Revill. In the game, he attempts (and succeeds) in stealing the power of Odin. To do this, he forms a new Masters of Evil and makes a pact with Mephisto to obtain his Twilight Sword. It was mentioned that Doctor Doom corrupted Medusa when she was looking for the Ultimate Nullifier on Muir Island. While the players were obtaining the Muonic Inducer and the M'Kraan Crystal, Doctor Doom defeated every hero that tried to stop him and discovered that Odin's powers allowed him to corrupt the defeated heroes (such as Hulk, Professor X, Magneto, Cyclops, Gambit, Shadowcat, Colossus, Emma Frost, Psylocke, and Beast in the Doom's Day cutscene) into his dark superhero army, and then used it to corrupt Earth. It was also discovered that he can use the powers of Odin to create evil clones of superheroes out of nothingness resulting in the creations of Dark Captain America, Dark Spider-Man, Dark Thor, and the Dark Fantastic Four. At the end of the game, once the heroes selected by the player of the game beat Doom, the powers of Odin are returned to Thor's father and then Odin strikes a bolt of lightning at Doom, where there is nothing left of the villain but his iron mask.
- Doom is a playable character downloadable for owners of the Xbox 360 version of the game. If the player uses Doctor Doom and challenges himself in the last level, the game takes a strange but interesting turn. The Doctor Doom that is fought is, in reality, a Doctor Doom from a future in which Ragnarök has occurred, and all the gods of Asgard are dead. Doctor Doom, in an attempt to remedy this, travels to the present to usurp the power of Odin, and in the process, forms the Masters of Evil. However, the Doom from the present notices the presence of Doombots uncontrolled by himself, suspecting Reed Richards or Tony Stark. It is only until he meets his future self that he realizes that it is necessary to defeat the future Doom to keep the world from being destroyed, even though he is not without reluctance of relinquishing command over the power of Odin. This gives a complex and positive vision about the character and shows his high sense of honor.
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