118: Marvel Fanfare #44 - Doombug
- Location
- Netherlands
118: Marvel Fanfare #44 (June 1989)
Cover
This time, we're dealing with another oddball entry - there's been a bunch of them recently, huh? Marvel Fanfare was an anthology showcase series featuring characters and settings from throughout the Marvel Universe, containing stories of varying lengths by a vast array of different creators. In this case we're tackling a story by Ken Steacy, whose body of work is actually fairly limited. He only wrote about three issues for Marvel, and illustrated maybe two dozen more, many of which were Marvel Fanfare or Epic Illustrated issues. In this case he's credited as cover artist, writer, penciler, inker, and colorist - the only things he didn't do personally are editing and lettering the issue! Promising a high-tech clash between Iron Man and Doctor Doom, let's see what Mr. Steacy's vision of the characters is like, shall we?
To start with, that cover is priceless! Not only does Iron Man look hilariously nervous and constipated, and his armor looks like it just got a spit-shine, but the enormous looming form of Doctor Doom is oddly squashed and bug-eyed, reminding me of Gowron from Star Trek - or possibly a Ferengi. That said, this image is actually pretty awesome, mostly because I like the coloring. Blue and orange, right? It's cliché, but you can't argue with results...
Story Overview
Doombug
We start with Iron Man facing off with a big green Transformers robot with a Geth's face that is wielding a huge chunk of truck debris as a weapon. The hero asks if the robot will come quietly, but is promptly smacked aside for the stupid question, after which he reflects that the robot has shrugged off everything he's thrown at it. So why were you asking it to surrender like you were just getting started, exactly? The hero rushes in for a headbutt, but is distracted when he notices a stray missile fall into the desert nearby. He's promptly punched by the robot, and in a flurry of vengeance he pulls out all the stops and bowls the thing over, knocks out its flashlight head, then rips out some wiring that makes it tick. The mechanized finally goes down and Iron Man lets out a sigh of relief.
Flying back towards a nearby mobile command post hidden beneath a natural rock formation, Tony Stark meets with his friend James Rhodes, who was actually controlling the green robot through telepresence. Rhodey declares it was awesome - he felt like he was slugging it out with Tony, but he was safe in air-conditioned comfort. Tony notes that with this technology he might as well have been performing micro-surgery on the Moon, or salvaging a ship, or cleaning up nuclear waste - it would work the same! Tony brings up the possibility of remote-controlling a robot warplane to a global hotspot, predicting the rise of drone warfare, but Rhodey responds that some things you have to do first hand… Tony notes that at least the controller is never at risk this way, and Rhodey replies by saying there's some risks - he is getting hungry!
Rhodey suggests getting some food at a local Japanese place, and Tony says they'll have to check it out later - first he wants to look into something on the range that he noticed while fighting. He also comments that the telepresence system they just tested will be a hit at the International Robotics Symposium that's due to start the next day. Flying back towards the battlefield, Tony scans for a cylindrical metal object and soon discovers it, digging up a rather small, purple missile that he can't readily identify - it's not one of his own. Suddenly the thing erupts in his hands, spewing a noxious cloud of green gas in every direction that slips through the open gaps in the Iron Man armour's mask and sends its operator into a coughing fit. What the hell did he just breathe in?!
Although Tony's armor automatically enclosed itself when it registered the gas, it wasn't in time to prevent exposure, and Tony rushes off through the sky towards the base - only for his armor to act up and start sputtering. His right boot fails, while the impeller in his left boot is suddenly blasting at full intensity, sending him careening through the sky when his gyroscopes cease operation. At the last moment before impact Tony uses the full force of his repulsor gauntlets to cushion his fall, and he burrows headfirst into the pulverized earth below.
Narrowly escaping death when his repulsors cut out on him altogether, he tries to clamber upright, but the armor isn't listening and he ends up accidentally flipping head over heels when his robot limbs amplify his movement too quickly. Finally the servos in his limbs stop - but now they're locked down. Like a statue, Iron Man suddenly finds himself frozen in place!
While Rhodey is busy getting some Japanese food and waiting for his friend, Tony is still stuck in his armor, with the sun going down and leaving him in darkness. He's baffled, since he built triple redundancy into all his safeguard systems - surely that gas couldn't have bypassed them all, right? Not only is it getting cold, but his nose is getting itchy - soon enough he sneezes inside the armor, and now the inside is covered in snot. Euch. He then realizes that the emergency lockdown of his mask might have been a bad idea - because he's now running on a limited air supply! He's being smothered by his own armor! He knew it'd kill him one day, but not like this, not alone…!
Suddenly someone calls out 'Hey guys, check it out!' and Tony is relieved that rescue has arrived. Except… it's not. A whole array of Iron Man armors has arrived to heckle him, with the old Mark 1 declaring him a geek, while others declare him a bozo who believes himself a superhero. A silver-masked armor (with a taped-on nose) declares that he can't help, because a dance number is about to start! The armors then start doing a jig to the tune of Super Chicken, from the old 60's George of the Jungle cartoon that I'm guessing this era's Tony is supposed to have grown up with.
Tony soon realizes he's suffocating and hallucinating, and demands to know who these armors are supposed to be. One of them says it's obvious - they're the real Iron Man, not some rich, delusional dope that's been stealing their thunder all these years! One removes his faceplate to reveal an empty armor - there are no strings on him! Tony begs for help, and one of the armors decided to give a hand - in the form of a fist to the face!
Choking and coughing as his helmet comes off, Tony drops the floor in a heap and breathes in relief, saved in the nick of time by Rhodey. He's arrived alongside Scott Lang, the second Ant-Man, and explains that he figured out Tony was in trouble when he failed to show up for dinner, but scouring the desert with a chopper would have taken all night. That's why he called up Scott, who contacted the local ant colonies to keep an eye out for a shiny human.
Then, when they finally found him, Scott used the same strategy he'd used in an earlier meeting when Tony got clobbered by the Hulk, and used his size-changing to slip inside the armor and cut the power. Tony thanks them profusely for their help, then declares they'll have to debug the suit before the next day's show…
At that moment, halfway across the world in Latveria, the voice of Doctor Doom calls out to a well-dressed minion in a suit and asks if all is in readiness. The servant says that the first International Symposium of Robotics shall commence at noon the next day - in Latveria! Most of the European delegates have already arrived, while the Americans are due at 11 AM. Doom says that his minions should ensure nothing goes awry, on pain of death. This should prove to be most amusing! He then sends the man away, and he gives a quick bow before obeying.
It's interesting that recent issues featuring Doctor Doom ignore his lack of any real power entirely, and treat him as if he's back in charge already - last time he was hanging out in the Latverian Embassy he was supposedly banished from, and here he is back in his old castle in Doomstadt with no Kristoff in sight! To a limited degree you can justify this by reordering the timeline a bit, but sooner or later things are going to get weird.
Hours later, a sleek aircraft is making its way across the ocean, with Tony, Rhodey, and Scott on board. Scott says he's really thrilled to be invited along, and Tony notes that he's welcome - and if there's any more trouble with his armor, he'll be there as a failsafe. Scott wonders if Tony thinks the extra shielding he installed around the CPU won't do the trick, and Tony admits that he couldn't find any sign of that mysterious gas in his systems, but that must've been responsible somehow for the errors - for now it's better to be safe than sorry. Rhodey asks for some coffee, and Tony delivers the drink to his pilot, who is quite happy with his ride - it even brews a good cuppa!
Tony asks when they're due to arrive in Doomstadt, and is told it'll be another two hours - the approach has already been programmed into the autopilot, since for such a tiny country, Latveria has very advanced air traffic control. Tony points out it's run by one of the world's leading technocrats, and Rhodey acknowledges that, but opines that Doom is a tin-pot dictator, so it's odd that he'd ever agree to hold this big convention in his own backyard. Doom is footing the bill! Just then the electronics of the plane suddenly turn off, and Rhodey is forced to rely on visual flight reference instead. This isn't supposed to happen - better get the armor ready!
Fortunately for them, the rest of the trip occurs without further mishaps, and they land safely in Doomstadt, where many other robotics experts are showing their stuff. Never before, so the captions declare, has the world seen so many hypertech systems assembled in one place! And they run the gamut from engines of destruction to terraformers that can reshape the environment. Here, creation and destruction are united by being the very cutting edge of technology. Rhodey muses that Iron Man tends to be the main attraction wherever he goes, but here… he's not so sure. 'Thanks a lot!' says Tony. Rhodey takes Scott to set up the telepresence demonstration while Tony goes to look over the war robots - he's still a bit miffed by the then-recent Armor Wars storyline, in which some of his technology got stolen and copied by others.
Flying above the trade show in his flying car, Doom muses that this aspect of his little experiment is a dead loss - in the robotics arena, the developments of other nations pale in comparison to his own! Still, he hopes that the wild card he's thrown into this milieu will provide a diversion.
Back on the ground, Major Colin Richard of the Canadian Armed Forces introduces himself to Iron Man with the codename Avro-X. He also introduces Colonel Okada of the Japanese Self-Defense Force and Major Tupolev of East Germany, who goes by Saberbat. Each of them are in armor - the first in an orange Iron Man-like design, the second in a winged green suit, while the last is in an elaborate white getup that closes into an egg-like shape instead of having distinct chest and head regions.
The robot opens up to reveal the female pilot inside, who asks to be called Valentina. Tony immediately says it's a pleasure to meet her, and asks to talk to her after the demonstration - he's a smooth one, as expected.
Thinking to himself that such a distraction might lead to an international incident, he just shrugs and says: 'Oh well.' He turns his thoughts to other things, deciding that it still galls him that many of the advancements around him were only possible because some of his suits were pirated during the Armor Wars. Suddenly, up above, two armors crash into each other, and Tony is quick to catch Avro-X as he comes tumbling out of the sky, followed by Valentina. As he descends, Okada comes to check up on them and asks what happened, and Avro-X explains that he lost control of his gyros and then the controls locked up, while Valentina notes that she's having her own share of difficulties, with her 'endoskeletal extensors' not responding to her instructions.
Rhodey and Scott run up and explain that there are similar problems all across the show - systems are crashing everywhere! It's like a plague! Tony decided he doesn't need three guesses to know who's behind all this, and immediately takes off for Castle Doom. He isn't stopped or even hindered, and thinks it's a bit too easy - it's like he's expected! When a butler opens the door, Tony demands to see Doom, and the man simply responds that there is no reason to shout to make himself understood; not only does he speak fluent English, but the Master is waiting within. Inside, we get a beauty shot of Doom leaning against a merrily burning fireplace, a glass of wine in hand and an iron poker in the other. Doom declares he knew his and Iron Man's path would intersect at some juncture - and then offers him a drink.
When Tony tells him to cut the bull, since this is not a social visit, Doom smashes the glass to smithereens as he warns Tony to watch his tongue - neither his tone, nor choice of words are welcome in Doom's presence! Tony says that the countries of the world won't be impressed when they learn that this entire symposium was just a set-up for him to spread some monstrous virus everywhere. Doom wonders: 'that I spread?' Such slanderous accusations have no foundation in fact!
Now, it is entirely true that the virus in question originated in Doom's bio-engineering labs - it's a nasty little specimen with a propensity for digital mayhem. Tragically it has a short shelf-life, and in the sterile, clinical environments to which it is drawn, it lasts for only a few minutes - but in that time it cripples the CPU and renders every subsystem inoperational - it's ingenious, really. 'Twisted - but ingenious,' Tony observes. Doom tells Tony to keep his condescending attitude to himself - he knows nothing of ingenuity, or genius! Tony replies that maybe Doom should reconsider, since he just contradicted himself - first he denied spreading the virus, but now he's revelling in its creation?
Doom complains that it would be easier to address a child, and points out that he needed a vector to spread the virus, one who would do Doom's will in blissful ignorance, then bear the brunt of the blame with his last gasp. Tony wonders what Doom is implying, and Doom replies that he's not implying anything - he's stating it outright! Iron Man has been disseminating Doom's little Satan Bug! The missile that Tony found was launched by one of Doom's orbiting spy satellites with full knowledge of who would find it. Tony reminds Doom that he said the virus' lifespan was limited, and Doom acknowledges that - but that only applies to the sterile environments of inorganic machines. But inside the moist, dark environment of human lungs, it can thrive indefinitely, and that's where it lives right now!
When Tony calls Doom a monster, he gets smacked aside with an iron fist. To Tony's dismay, Doom's power is substantially greater than the last time they fought, and he's overpowered - he tries to shoot Doom down with his repulsors, but fails to budge him. Doom, enraged at the attack, moves to counter - and suddenly his gauntlet malfunctions. The other follows, and while Doom rejects the possibility of catching his own bug outright, angrily declaring that he'll rend Tony limb from limb, his rocket pack suddenly activates and flings him headfirst into the floor. Tony stares down at the unconscious monarch in shock, realizing that the man was lucky not to break his neck in that sudden violent episode.
When several minions come to check up on their Master and demand to know what was done to him, Tony explains that Doom was overconfident in his ability to guard against his own bio-weapon - the virus must have mutated, bypassing even Doom's safeguards against it. One of the minions rushes over to Doom with a small device that begins ominously ticking, and declares that the reaction can't be stopped! The virus compromised Doom's energy grid - and without the systems that keep his armor running, the primary power system is entirely uncooled. Unfortunately for everyone it's a nuclear micro-reactor that will melt down without coolant, and take a chunk of Latveria with it when it fails!
Tony proposes getting Doom out of his armor, but the minions say it's impossible - there's safeguards and boobytraps in there, and there's no telling which ones are still active. Tony thinks he knows a way to save Doom, but first demands to know a way to deactivate the virus he is carrying within his lungs. The minion is reluctant to tell, but realizes they're all dead if not for Iron Man's help, and he caves. He gives Tony the sub-harmonic frequently that defangs the virus, who promptly cures himself and calls up Rhodey and Scott to help out with a critical operation. They have to get to the castle on the double!
Not much later, Doom is laid out on a table while Tony and Scott discuss the plan. Tony will reduce to microscopic size and break into Doom's armor somehow, so he can find the controls for the nuclear cooling and reactivate it. Scott figures that sounds easy enough and wonders why he'd not the one doing this, and Tony notes that there's no telling which defenses are still active, and Tony is a lot better equipped to deal with that sort of thing. Soon Tony shrinks and tries to slip through the seals around Doom's shoulder, since the nuclear stockpile is located near the heart. With the power off he's able to sneak inside easily enough and follows wires towards his destination. He spots his target up ahead when he's suddenly waylaid by enemies - giant spiders!
Well, actually, it's just spider-robot that's designed to keep out intruders, a micro-sentry. He picks one of them up and smashes it into the other, hoping that there aren't too many relatives nearby. Rhodey contacts him to say that the reactor is decaying fast - he has to hurry! Tony acknowledges that, but is ambushed by another spider-bot and knocked unconscious.
Scott asks what happened, and Rhodey isn't sure - but whatever the case, they have to solve the reactor issue immediately. Scott moves to go in after Tony, but in a rather spectacular 'take that' Rhodey says that if they took down Iron Man, what the hell is Ant-Man going to do? No, he's got a better idea! He rushes out to the chopper they took to get to the castle and grabs his telepresence gear.
With the VR controls slaved to the Iron Man armor's inputs, Rhodey takes control of the armor with Tony's unconscious body riding along inside it. He's alive - just down for the count. He uses the infrared sensors to see, then moves towards the nuclear materials. Doom's minions are getting ready to flee from the impending explosion, saying there's no time, and Rhodey admits that he's not far off - cracks are beginning to show in the pile. Rhodey pries open a conduit for coolant and sprays the cold liquid onto the fissile materials, hosing it down until he can rewire Doom's armor to rely on an external feed. It's right about then that Tony wakes up, confused, and Rhodey tells him to take it from here - and he'll fill in the missing minutes later. He'd better move it - Doom's waking up, and if he starts scratching… Quickly finishing up the cooling process, Tony books it out of there, and regrows to normal size.
Moments later, Doctor Doom rises from the table and reluctantly observes that the heroes saved his life. Tony agrees - as well as the lives of everyone around him. See what his revolting little foray into genetic engineering almost caused? Doom is about to blow up over the disrespect when he calms himself, declaring that it should never be said Doom is incapable of gratitude - Tony and his entourage may leave with their lives. Thus, the debt is cancelled! When Tony asks what the point of it all really was, Doom's answer is as baffling as it is unhelpful - he paraphrases Orwell by declaring that the object is chaos… is chaos! They couldn't understand. He then commands them all to leave.
Outside the castle, Rhodey muses that Doom seemed to like them - they should have him over sometime! Tony and Scott have a good chuckle about that idea as they leave with what might as well be a sappy freeze frame...
Rating & Comments
This issue was better than I anticipated - it tells a coherent story with a bit of setup at the start that pays off near the end, so as far as story structure goes it's fine. For a one-shot adventure that was mostly created by a single person, who hasn't really had anything to do with any of the characters involved, it manages to use Iron Man continuity (Namely the Armor Wars) competently. It even includes some in-jokes regarding the character's history, like having the Silver Centurion show up with an artificial nose, an unfortunate design choice for a few Iron Man armors. This all doesn't really apply to Doom, unfortunately, who is just sort of shoved in here from a period that at this point is nearly half a decade in the past - back when Doom was the sole ruler in his kingdom without pretenders or rebels or apprentices.
I am a little disappointed that all the secondary characters introduced in this book turn out to be utterly pointless - several armored superheroes are referenced at the convention in Latveria, but not only are they original characters rather than updates on lesser known characters from older books, but they never show up again. Not even in future Iron Man books! With big names like Hammer absent, and no sign of the more villainous armored foes (who probably wouldn't mind hanging out in Doom's country) it seems a bit of a weak showing for a 'global' event that's billed to be of some significance in-story. Hell, the Russian lady had one of the more interesting designs there, and at this time the Soviet Union was still a thing, so you'd think more could have been done with that angle…
The 'virus' that Doom sends out is a little strange - it's an apparently organic virus, which infects people, that also doubles as a computer virus that screws up circuitry (but only for a short time before it perishes.) It's a pretty cool concept and the idea of infecting Tony Stark with a tech-destroying disease is just deviously clever. Unfortunately, what we learn of Doom's motives suggests the whole affair is just him toying around with a defective invention to stir up some trouble - he just wants Iron Man to get blamed for the damage and chuckle in the background while a bunch of other people's stuff fails, and that's about it. No grand plan beyond entertainment. I suppose he deserved getting caught in his own trap, even if that eventuality was rather obvious from a mile away the moment Doom started bragging about his creation.
I thought it was neat that the convention in Latveria is billed as a gathering of the greatest hypertech minds in the world, but Doom just looks at all of it and is disappointed that everyone is so far behind his level. The whole reason the convention happened in Latveria was explicitly so Doom could do a bit of industrial espionage and see if anyone's got new stuff he could steal ideas from. I think it fits his character, even if I'm a little puzzled why people are still so happy to do events in the backyards of a supervillain. I suppose it's because Latveria is, as per this comic, one of the few neutral territories that exists within Soviet Union territory, an enclave akin to West Berlin. Due to real-world developments, that won't be relevant for much longer.
I am not sure what to say about the art in this issue. Some panels are great, with neat lighting and some nice takes on various people's faces - a bit stylized, but pretty good. But there are also terrible panels where the Iron Man armor looks like it flew straight out a Saturday morning cartoon - a lot, actually - and various panels which look silly and exaggerated, and not just the ones actually intended to convey that message. Coloring-wise I think the book is better than a lot of mainstream comics of the time, presumably an artifact of being from a somewhat more expensive premium series, but the penciling and inking is spotty in places. I'm told that the last half has a lot of inking done by a secondary artist because of time pressure, and you can tell some difference in the style past the midway point. Most of the panels I like least are early in the issue, so take from that what you will.
Doom's role in this book is… middling. Leaving aside the inconsistency of continuity that this book represents, Doom mostly just spends his time having a laugh before accidentally conking himself out and spending the rest of the issue near death. That said, I enjoyed Doom throwing his wineglass to smithereens like he's channeling Castlevania's Dracula, and I was amused at his dismissive attitude towards all the other creators of power armor. I could also see him letting Iron Man and his allies go as payment for saving his life, but I don't really get why Doom would come up with a bullshit non-answer as an explanation for his motives. The only reason he did it was to cause chaos? I could buy that if he was Loki, but it doesn't really seem like Doom's thing? I suppose we can chalk this up to the same bored attitude that got him to play human chess with robots and SHIELD back in the day, or whatever the fuck happened with Shang-Chi in that one crossover two-parter.
Between the okay plot, half-decent art (depending on panel) and the self-contained nature of the plot, this one's thoroughly average - but not any more than that on account of the continuity mistakes, irrelevant and forgotten side-characters, and the inconsequential inclusion of Ant-Man, who literally just stands around for 90% of it since he's considered too weak to face off with Doom even by his superhero colleagues. Harsh! At least Rhodey gets to be cool, I guess. I give this three stars. Let's hope we get back to mainline entries soon, I'm getting a bit tired of these random one-shots...
Best Panel(s) of the Issues
I quite love the panel of Doom hanging out at his fireplace with a glass of wine and a fire poker, casual as one can be about being visited by a superhero in power armor. Heh!
Most Gloriously Villainous Doom Quotes
"Watch your tongue, you insolent pup! Neither your tone nor your unfortunate choice of words is appropriate in my presence!"
"Your temerity shall cost you dearly - I'll decimate you!"
"To paraphrase Orwell - the object of chaos is chaos…"
Doom's Bad Hair Day
What the hell is going on with everyone's faces in this? Jesus.
Bonus pic of ridiculous children's tv-series Iron Man hacking and coughing...
Doom-Tech of the Week
Most notably here are the Satan Bug itself, an organic/digital virus that proves to be too potent and adaptable for even Doom's own defenses. There are also the arachnid Micro-Sentries which guard Doom's armor from the inside.
Cover
This time, we're dealing with another oddball entry - there's been a bunch of them recently, huh? Marvel Fanfare was an anthology showcase series featuring characters and settings from throughout the Marvel Universe, containing stories of varying lengths by a vast array of different creators. In this case we're tackling a story by Ken Steacy, whose body of work is actually fairly limited. He only wrote about three issues for Marvel, and illustrated maybe two dozen more, many of which were Marvel Fanfare or Epic Illustrated issues. In this case he's credited as cover artist, writer, penciler, inker, and colorist - the only things he didn't do personally are editing and lettering the issue! Promising a high-tech clash between Iron Man and Doctor Doom, let's see what Mr. Steacy's vision of the characters is like, shall we?
To start with, that cover is priceless! Not only does Iron Man look hilariously nervous and constipated, and his armor looks like it just got a spit-shine, but the enormous looming form of Doctor Doom is oddly squashed and bug-eyed, reminding me of Gowron from Star Trek - or possibly a Ferengi. That said, this image is actually pretty awesome, mostly because I like the coloring. Blue and orange, right? It's cliché, but you can't argue with results...
Story Overview
Doombug
We start with Iron Man facing off with a big green Transformers robot with a Geth's face that is wielding a huge chunk of truck debris as a weapon. The hero asks if the robot will come quietly, but is promptly smacked aside for the stupid question, after which he reflects that the robot has shrugged off everything he's thrown at it. So why were you asking it to surrender like you were just getting started, exactly? The hero rushes in for a headbutt, but is distracted when he notices a stray missile fall into the desert nearby. He's promptly punched by the robot, and in a flurry of vengeance he pulls out all the stops and bowls the thing over, knocks out its flashlight head, then rips out some wiring that makes it tick. The mechanized finally goes down and Iron Man lets out a sigh of relief.
Flying back towards a nearby mobile command post hidden beneath a natural rock formation, Tony Stark meets with his friend James Rhodes, who was actually controlling the green robot through telepresence. Rhodey declares it was awesome - he felt like he was slugging it out with Tony, but he was safe in air-conditioned comfort. Tony notes that with this technology he might as well have been performing micro-surgery on the Moon, or salvaging a ship, or cleaning up nuclear waste - it would work the same! Tony brings up the possibility of remote-controlling a robot warplane to a global hotspot, predicting the rise of drone warfare, but Rhodey responds that some things you have to do first hand… Tony notes that at least the controller is never at risk this way, and Rhodey replies by saying there's some risks - he is getting hungry!
Rhodey suggests getting some food at a local Japanese place, and Tony says they'll have to check it out later - first he wants to look into something on the range that he noticed while fighting. He also comments that the telepresence system they just tested will be a hit at the International Robotics Symposium that's due to start the next day. Flying back towards the battlefield, Tony scans for a cylindrical metal object and soon discovers it, digging up a rather small, purple missile that he can't readily identify - it's not one of his own. Suddenly the thing erupts in his hands, spewing a noxious cloud of green gas in every direction that slips through the open gaps in the Iron Man armour's mask and sends its operator into a coughing fit. What the hell did he just breathe in?!
Although Tony's armor automatically enclosed itself when it registered the gas, it wasn't in time to prevent exposure, and Tony rushes off through the sky towards the base - only for his armor to act up and start sputtering. His right boot fails, while the impeller in his left boot is suddenly blasting at full intensity, sending him careening through the sky when his gyroscopes cease operation. At the last moment before impact Tony uses the full force of his repulsor gauntlets to cushion his fall, and he burrows headfirst into the pulverized earth below.
Narrowly escaping death when his repulsors cut out on him altogether, he tries to clamber upright, but the armor isn't listening and he ends up accidentally flipping head over heels when his robot limbs amplify his movement too quickly. Finally the servos in his limbs stop - but now they're locked down. Like a statue, Iron Man suddenly finds himself frozen in place!
While Rhodey is busy getting some Japanese food and waiting for his friend, Tony is still stuck in his armor, with the sun going down and leaving him in darkness. He's baffled, since he built triple redundancy into all his safeguard systems - surely that gas couldn't have bypassed them all, right? Not only is it getting cold, but his nose is getting itchy - soon enough he sneezes inside the armor, and now the inside is covered in snot. Euch. He then realizes that the emergency lockdown of his mask might have been a bad idea - because he's now running on a limited air supply! He's being smothered by his own armor! He knew it'd kill him one day, but not like this, not alone…!
Suddenly someone calls out 'Hey guys, check it out!' and Tony is relieved that rescue has arrived. Except… it's not. A whole array of Iron Man armors has arrived to heckle him, with the old Mark 1 declaring him a geek, while others declare him a bozo who believes himself a superhero. A silver-masked armor (with a taped-on nose) declares that he can't help, because a dance number is about to start! The armors then start doing a jig to the tune of Super Chicken, from the old 60's George of the Jungle cartoon that I'm guessing this era's Tony is supposed to have grown up with.
Tony soon realizes he's suffocating and hallucinating, and demands to know who these armors are supposed to be. One of them says it's obvious - they're the real Iron Man, not some rich, delusional dope that's been stealing their thunder all these years! One removes his faceplate to reveal an empty armor - there are no strings on him! Tony begs for help, and one of the armors decided to give a hand - in the form of a fist to the face!
Choking and coughing as his helmet comes off, Tony drops the floor in a heap and breathes in relief, saved in the nick of time by Rhodey. He's arrived alongside Scott Lang, the second Ant-Man, and explains that he figured out Tony was in trouble when he failed to show up for dinner, but scouring the desert with a chopper would have taken all night. That's why he called up Scott, who contacted the local ant colonies to keep an eye out for a shiny human.
Then, when they finally found him, Scott used the same strategy he'd used in an earlier meeting when Tony got clobbered by the Hulk, and used his size-changing to slip inside the armor and cut the power. Tony thanks them profusely for their help, then declares they'll have to debug the suit before the next day's show…
At that moment, halfway across the world in Latveria, the voice of Doctor Doom calls out to a well-dressed minion in a suit and asks if all is in readiness. The servant says that the first International Symposium of Robotics shall commence at noon the next day - in Latveria! Most of the European delegates have already arrived, while the Americans are due at 11 AM. Doom says that his minions should ensure nothing goes awry, on pain of death. This should prove to be most amusing! He then sends the man away, and he gives a quick bow before obeying.
It's interesting that recent issues featuring Doctor Doom ignore his lack of any real power entirely, and treat him as if he's back in charge already - last time he was hanging out in the Latverian Embassy he was supposedly banished from, and here he is back in his old castle in Doomstadt with no Kristoff in sight! To a limited degree you can justify this by reordering the timeline a bit, but sooner or later things are going to get weird.
Hours later, a sleek aircraft is making its way across the ocean, with Tony, Rhodey, and Scott on board. Scott says he's really thrilled to be invited along, and Tony notes that he's welcome - and if there's any more trouble with his armor, he'll be there as a failsafe. Scott wonders if Tony thinks the extra shielding he installed around the CPU won't do the trick, and Tony admits that he couldn't find any sign of that mysterious gas in his systems, but that must've been responsible somehow for the errors - for now it's better to be safe than sorry. Rhodey asks for some coffee, and Tony delivers the drink to his pilot, who is quite happy with his ride - it even brews a good cuppa!
Tony asks when they're due to arrive in Doomstadt, and is told it'll be another two hours - the approach has already been programmed into the autopilot, since for such a tiny country, Latveria has very advanced air traffic control. Tony points out it's run by one of the world's leading technocrats, and Rhodey acknowledges that, but opines that Doom is a tin-pot dictator, so it's odd that he'd ever agree to hold this big convention in his own backyard. Doom is footing the bill! Just then the electronics of the plane suddenly turn off, and Rhodey is forced to rely on visual flight reference instead. This isn't supposed to happen - better get the armor ready!
Fortunately for them, the rest of the trip occurs without further mishaps, and they land safely in Doomstadt, where many other robotics experts are showing their stuff. Never before, so the captions declare, has the world seen so many hypertech systems assembled in one place! And they run the gamut from engines of destruction to terraformers that can reshape the environment. Here, creation and destruction are united by being the very cutting edge of technology. Rhodey muses that Iron Man tends to be the main attraction wherever he goes, but here… he's not so sure. 'Thanks a lot!' says Tony. Rhodey takes Scott to set up the telepresence demonstration while Tony goes to look over the war robots - he's still a bit miffed by the then-recent Armor Wars storyline, in which some of his technology got stolen and copied by others.
Flying above the trade show in his flying car, Doom muses that this aspect of his little experiment is a dead loss - in the robotics arena, the developments of other nations pale in comparison to his own! Still, he hopes that the wild card he's thrown into this milieu will provide a diversion.
Back on the ground, Major Colin Richard of the Canadian Armed Forces introduces himself to Iron Man with the codename Avro-X. He also introduces Colonel Okada of the Japanese Self-Defense Force and Major Tupolev of East Germany, who goes by Saberbat. Each of them are in armor - the first in an orange Iron Man-like design, the second in a winged green suit, while the last is in an elaborate white getup that closes into an egg-like shape instead of having distinct chest and head regions.
The robot opens up to reveal the female pilot inside, who asks to be called Valentina. Tony immediately says it's a pleasure to meet her, and asks to talk to her after the demonstration - he's a smooth one, as expected.
Thinking to himself that such a distraction might lead to an international incident, he just shrugs and says: 'Oh well.' He turns his thoughts to other things, deciding that it still galls him that many of the advancements around him were only possible because some of his suits were pirated during the Armor Wars. Suddenly, up above, two armors crash into each other, and Tony is quick to catch Avro-X as he comes tumbling out of the sky, followed by Valentina. As he descends, Okada comes to check up on them and asks what happened, and Avro-X explains that he lost control of his gyros and then the controls locked up, while Valentina notes that she's having her own share of difficulties, with her 'endoskeletal extensors' not responding to her instructions.
Rhodey and Scott run up and explain that there are similar problems all across the show - systems are crashing everywhere! It's like a plague! Tony decided he doesn't need three guesses to know who's behind all this, and immediately takes off for Castle Doom. He isn't stopped or even hindered, and thinks it's a bit too easy - it's like he's expected! When a butler opens the door, Tony demands to see Doom, and the man simply responds that there is no reason to shout to make himself understood; not only does he speak fluent English, but the Master is waiting within. Inside, we get a beauty shot of Doom leaning against a merrily burning fireplace, a glass of wine in hand and an iron poker in the other. Doom declares he knew his and Iron Man's path would intersect at some juncture - and then offers him a drink.
When Tony tells him to cut the bull, since this is not a social visit, Doom smashes the glass to smithereens as he warns Tony to watch his tongue - neither his tone, nor choice of words are welcome in Doom's presence! Tony says that the countries of the world won't be impressed when they learn that this entire symposium was just a set-up for him to spread some monstrous virus everywhere. Doom wonders: 'that I spread?' Such slanderous accusations have no foundation in fact!
Now, it is entirely true that the virus in question originated in Doom's bio-engineering labs - it's a nasty little specimen with a propensity for digital mayhem. Tragically it has a short shelf-life, and in the sterile, clinical environments to which it is drawn, it lasts for only a few minutes - but in that time it cripples the CPU and renders every subsystem inoperational - it's ingenious, really. 'Twisted - but ingenious,' Tony observes. Doom tells Tony to keep his condescending attitude to himself - he knows nothing of ingenuity, or genius! Tony replies that maybe Doom should reconsider, since he just contradicted himself - first he denied spreading the virus, but now he's revelling in its creation?
Doom complains that it would be easier to address a child, and points out that he needed a vector to spread the virus, one who would do Doom's will in blissful ignorance, then bear the brunt of the blame with his last gasp. Tony wonders what Doom is implying, and Doom replies that he's not implying anything - he's stating it outright! Iron Man has been disseminating Doom's little Satan Bug! The missile that Tony found was launched by one of Doom's orbiting spy satellites with full knowledge of who would find it. Tony reminds Doom that he said the virus' lifespan was limited, and Doom acknowledges that - but that only applies to the sterile environments of inorganic machines. But inside the moist, dark environment of human lungs, it can thrive indefinitely, and that's where it lives right now!
When Tony calls Doom a monster, he gets smacked aside with an iron fist. To Tony's dismay, Doom's power is substantially greater than the last time they fought, and he's overpowered - he tries to shoot Doom down with his repulsors, but fails to budge him. Doom, enraged at the attack, moves to counter - and suddenly his gauntlet malfunctions. The other follows, and while Doom rejects the possibility of catching his own bug outright, angrily declaring that he'll rend Tony limb from limb, his rocket pack suddenly activates and flings him headfirst into the floor. Tony stares down at the unconscious monarch in shock, realizing that the man was lucky not to break his neck in that sudden violent episode.
When several minions come to check up on their Master and demand to know what was done to him, Tony explains that Doom was overconfident in his ability to guard against his own bio-weapon - the virus must have mutated, bypassing even Doom's safeguards against it. One of the minions rushes over to Doom with a small device that begins ominously ticking, and declares that the reaction can't be stopped! The virus compromised Doom's energy grid - and without the systems that keep his armor running, the primary power system is entirely uncooled. Unfortunately for everyone it's a nuclear micro-reactor that will melt down without coolant, and take a chunk of Latveria with it when it fails!
Tony proposes getting Doom out of his armor, but the minions say it's impossible - there's safeguards and boobytraps in there, and there's no telling which ones are still active. Tony thinks he knows a way to save Doom, but first demands to know a way to deactivate the virus he is carrying within his lungs. The minion is reluctant to tell, but realizes they're all dead if not for Iron Man's help, and he caves. He gives Tony the sub-harmonic frequently that defangs the virus, who promptly cures himself and calls up Rhodey and Scott to help out with a critical operation. They have to get to the castle on the double!
Not much later, Doom is laid out on a table while Tony and Scott discuss the plan. Tony will reduce to microscopic size and break into Doom's armor somehow, so he can find the controls for the nuclear cooling and reactivate it. Scott figures that sounds easy enough and wonders why he'd not the one doing this, and Tony notes that there's no telling which defenses are still active, and Tony is a lot better equipped to deal with that sort of thing. Soon Tony shrinks and tries to slip through the seals around Doom's shoulder, since the nuclear stockpile is located near the heart. With the power off he's able to sneak inside easily enough and follows wires towards his destination. He spots his target up ahead when he's suddenly waylaid by enemies - giant spiders!
Well, actually, it's just spider-robot that's designed to keep out intruders, a micro-sentry. He picks one of them up and smashes it into the other, hoping that there aren't too many relatives nearby. Rhodey contacts him to say that the reactor is decaying fast - he has to hurry! Tony acknowledges that, but is ambushed by another spider-bot and knocked unconscious.
Scott asks what happened, and Rhodey isn't sure - but whatever the case, they have to solve the reactor issue immediately. Scott moves to go in after Tony, but in a rather spectacular 'take that' Rhodey says that if they took down Iron Man, what the hell is Ant-Man going to do? No, he's got a better idea! He rushes out to the chopper they took to get to the castle and grabs his telepresence gear.
With the VR controls slaved to the Iron Man armor's inputs, Rhodey takes control of the armor with Tony's unconscious body riding along inside it. He's alive - just down for the count. He uses the infrared sensors to see, then moves towards the nuclear materials. Doom's minions are getting ready to flee from the impending explosion, saying there's no time, and Rhodey admits that he's not far off - cracks are beginning to show in the pile. Rhodey pries open a conduit for coolant and sprays the cold liquid onto the fissile materials, hosing it down until he can rewire Doom's armor to rely on an external feed. It's right about then that Tony wakes up, confused, and Rhodey tells him to take it from here - and he'll fill in the missing minutes later. He'd better move it - Doom's waking up, and if he starts scratching… Quickly finishing up the cooling process, Tony books it out of there, and regrows to normal size.
Moments later, Doctor Doom rises from the table and reluctantly observes that the heroes saved his life. Tony agrees - as well as the lives of everyone around him. See what his revolting little foray into genetic engineering almost caused? Doom is about to blow up over the disrespect when he calms himself, declaring that it should never be said Doom is incapable of gratitude - Tony and his entourage may leave with their lives. Thus, the debt is cancelled! When Tony asks what the point of it all really was, Doom's answer is as baffling as it is unhelpful - he paraphrases Orwell by declaring that the object is chaos… is chaos! They couldn't understand. He then commands them all to leave.
Outside the castle, Rhodey muses that Doom seemed to like them - they should have him over sometime! Tony and Scott have a good chuckle about that idea as they leave with what might as well be a sappy freeze frame...
Rating & Comments
This issue was better than I anticipated - it tells a coherent story with a bit of setup at the start that pays off near the end, so as far as story structure goes it's fine. For a one-shot adventure that was mostly created by a single person, who hasn't really had anything to do with any of the characters involved, it manages to use Iron Man continuity (Namely the Armor Wars) competently. It even includes some in-jokes regarding the character's history, like having the Silver Centurion show up with an artificial nose, an unfortunate design choice for a few Iron Man armors. This all doesn't really apply to Doom, unfortunately, who is just sort of shoved in here from a period that at this point is nearly half a decade in the past - back when Doom was the sole ruler in his kingdom without pretenders or rebels or apprentices.
I am a little disappointed that all the secondary characters introduced in this book turn out to be utterly pointless - several armored superheroes are referenced at the convention in Latveria, but not only are they original characters rather than updates on lesser known characters from older books, but they never show up again. Not even in future Iron Man books! With big names like Hammer absent, and no sign of the more villainous armored foes (who probably wouldn't mind hanging out in Doom's country) it seems a bit of a weak showing for a 'global' event that's billed to be of some significance in-story. Hell, the Russian lady had one of the more interesting designs there, and at this time the Soviet Union was still a thing, so you'd think more could have been done with that angle…
The 'virus' that Doom sends out is a little strange - it's an apparently organic virus, which infects people, that also doubles as a computer virus that screws up circuitry (but only for a short time before it perishes.) It's a pretty cool concept and the idea of infecting Tony Stark with a tech-destroying disease is just deviously clever. Unfortunately, what we learn of Doom's motives suggests the whole affair is just him toying around with a defective invention to stir up some trouble - he just wants Iron Man to get blamed for the damage and chuckle in the background while a bunch of other people's stuff fails, and that's about it. No grand plan beyond entertainment. I suppose he deserved getting caught in his own trap, even if that eventuality was rather obvious from a mile away the moment Doom started bragging about his creation.
I thought it was neat that the convention in Latveria is billed as a gathering of the greatest hypertech minds in the world, but Doom just looks at all of it and is disappointed that everyone is so far behind his level. The whole reason the convention happened in Latveria was explicitly so Doom could do a bit of industrial espionage and see if anyone's got new stuff he could steal ideas from. I think it fits his character, even if I'm a little puzzled why people are still so happy to do events in the backyards of a supervillain. I suppose it's because Latveria is, as per this comic, one of the few neutral territories that exists within Soviet Union territory, an enclave akin to West Berlin. Due to real-world developments, that won't be relevant for much longer.
I am not sure what to say about the art in this issue. Some panels are great, with neat lighting and some nice takes on various people's faces - a bit stylized, but pretty good. But there are also terrible panels where the Iron Man armor looks like it flew straight out a Saturday morning cartoon - a lot, actually - and various panels which look silly and exaggerated, and not just the ones actually intended to convey that message. Coloring-wise I think the book is better than a lot of mainstream comics of the time, presumably an artifact of being from a somewhat more expensive premium series, but the penciling and inking is spotty in places. I'm told that the last half has a lot of inking done by a secondary artist because of time pressure, and you can tell some difference in the style past the midway point. Most of the panels I like least are early in the issue, so take from that what you will.
Doom's role in this book is… middling. Leaving aside the inconsistency of continuity that this book represents, Doom mostly just spends his time having a laugh before accidentally conking himself out and spending the rest of the issue near death. That said, I enjoyed Doom throwing his wineglass to smithereens like he's channeling Castlevania's Dracula, and I was amused at his dismissive attitude towards all the other creators of power armor. I could also see him letting Iron Man and his allies go as payment for saving his life, but I don't really get why Doom would come up with a bullshit non-answer as an explanation for his motives. The only reason he did it was to cause chaos? I could buy that if he was Loki, but it doesn't really seem like Doom's thing? I suppose we can chalk this up to the same bored attitude that got him to play human chess with robots and SHIELD back in the day, or whatever the fuck happened with Shang-Chi in that one crossover two-parter.
Between the okay plot, half-decent art (depending on panel) and the self-contained nature of the plot, this one's thoroughly average - but not any more than that on account of the continuity mistakes, irrelevant and forgotten side-characters, and the inconsequential inclusion of Ant-Man, who literally just stands around for 90% of it since he's considered too weak to face off with Doom even by his superhero colleagues. Harsh! At least Rhodey gets to be cool, I guess. I give this three stars. Let's hope we get back to mainline entries soon, I'm getting a bit tired of these random one-shots...
Best Panel(s) of the Issues
I quite love the panel of Doom hanging out at his fireplace with a glass of wine and a fire poker, casual as one can be about being visited by a superhero in power armor. Heh!
Most Gloriously Villainous Doom Quotes
"Watch your tongue, you insolent pup! Neither your tone nor your unfortunate choice of words is appropriate in my presence!"
"Your temerity shall cost you dearly - I'll decimate you!"
"To paraphrase Orwell - the object of chaos is chaos…"
Doom's Bad Hair Day
What the hell is going on with everyone's faces in this? Jesus.
Bonus pic of ridiculous children's tv-series Iron Man hacking and coughing...
Doom-Tech of the Week
Most notably here are the Satan Bug itself, an organic/digital virus that proves to be too potent and adaptable for even Doom's own defenses. There are also the arachnid Micro-Sentries which guard Doom's armor from the inside.
