Hehe, Matter Eater Lad was always my favorite Legionaire.
He took over after the Dominion War but then stepped down and let Tyroc take over.
Of course, somewhere in there, the earth blew up.
I haven’t read comics consistently in about a decade, and I never was a big Fantastic Four fan, but I always thought Doctor Doom was cool. A couple of questions:
- Did he ever get his mom back from the afterlife (or wherever the hell she was)?
- Did he fix his scar? Seems unrealistic to think it’s still there given modern plastic surgery techniques.
Or did they retcon things so that he never had the scar (or a missing mom) at all? I swear, the people in 1984 who rewrite history for a living have NOTHING on comic-book writers! 
I got the impression that he figured it was more of a “Sometimes you have to put an untrainable dog down.” type attitude. It wasn’t so much as trying to instill fear as to “teach” the people to be obedient. And with Doom, in a contest between obedience and love, obedience (even with the “warm-n-fuzzy” 
Doom* ) always wins.
Snooooopy–He’s made a number of tries at getting his mom outta Hell, but (IIRC) they never work (plus it sets a bad precident: I don’t think there could be good stories with a Doom who’s so damned powerful that he can overrule God! 
)
Regarding the scar, don’t forget, it was magically induced–the gizmo that blew up was a “Lemme look into the afterlife” gizmo that was both magic and technological. Also regardless of which version of the origin you believe**, there’s more than just a scar. His entire face (and back of his head, which we’ve seen) is ruined. The “right now, all he has is a teeny, tiny little scar under his eye” thing was an error when someone misunderstood with either Lee or Kirby had said.
Fenris
*Who wasn’t all that warm-n-fuzzy, actually, just in comparison…
**Version one: the machine blew up, and ruined Doom’s face completely. Version two: The machine blew up and left a teeny, tiny little scar under one of Doom’s eyes. Doom, being…well…psycho, actually, decided that the teeny, tiny little scar “ruined” his face. In either case, after Doom hung out with those techno-mystic monks, they made his face-mask and in both versions, Doom put the red-hot iron mask on his face, it sizzled, Doom screamed, ran outside and stuck his face in the snow. If it wasn’t ruined before that, his face certainly was ruined after that. (Note that in both versions, Doom’s face is ruined forever by the red-hot iron mask–both sides agree that, regardless of how it looked after the explosion, it’s a hopless mess now.) Apparently Lee preferred one version and Kirby the other. I remember an interview where Byrne preferred the second one.
I’m torn. I like the second version better: much more complex and interesting character, but I don’t know if it works. First, in flashbacks, we’ve seen doctors recoiling as Doom unrolls his bandage after the accident. A tiny scar wouldn’t do that. And second, even if Doom thinks his face really is ruined by the tiny scar, why would he put a red-hot mask on over it? Even a psycho-Doom can tell the difference between “Ruined but fixable” and “Ruined but unfixable”.
Why would Doom want to get his face fixed? Deep down, his iron exterior has moulded the creature within. He knows he wouldn’t be the same Doom without it.
Even as early as the 60’s, the Latverians were sometimes portrayed as content to be ruled by Doom – and sometimes just afraid of him. Consistency was not really the hallmark of Marvel’s Silver Age.
–Cliffy
P.S. Fenris, the Editor-in-Chief is still there. It’s the former President of Marvel who may have gotten canned partly because of his role in attempting to fire Waid. (Although it’s actually because he was committed to revitalizing the publishing program and wasn’t willing to be the movie division’s stooge.)
In the Generations series, both Hal Jordan and Barbara Gorden were elected President.
Marvel:
I am certain that I have read a story (late 80’s or early 90’s) in which Dr. Doom not only succeeds in getting his mother out of Mephisto’s power, but makes a point of doing it in a manner so that he doesn’t owe Dr. Strange any debts.
DC:
Pre-Crisis, didn’t the Golden Age (Earth-2) Robin grow up and become a D.A. or a Senator or something?
He was made Ambassador to South Africa in the Carter Administration, I think.
One more from Marvel Comics:
The original Union Jack was a hereditary peer in the House of Lords.
I’m a little fuzzy on succession laws for peerages.
His only son (John, a.k.a. the second Union Jack) died young and childless.
His only daughter (Jacqueline, a.k.a. Spitfire) had a son (Brian, the weasel who passed up the chance to become the third Union Jack), who was an adult by the time the old man died.
Would the peerage go to Jacqueline, or would it bypass her and go to Brian?
If Jacqueline got it, she probably survived the House of Lords Reform Act of 1999 and kept her seat in Parliament. If Brian got it, he probably got booted back to the private sector.
Correct. That was in the graphic novel Triumph And Torment. IIRC Doom’s mother wasn’t in hell due to being an evil person. Either a ritual had gone wrong or she’d been suckered by Mephisto. Doom was able to free her soul, which presumably found its rightful destination.
Re- Doom’s Face
The Doom of 2099 starts with a healed face. He’s mistaken for a Doombot. When Tiger Wylde, the mercenary currently ruling Latveria, realizes his assailant is human he removes the face plate. ‘Hmm, your costume is incomplete. History says that the real Doom was hideously scarred. Allow me to correct this detail.’ He then uses one of his cybernetic hands to burn Doom. Doom later decides to keep the scars, even though a surgeon offers to repair them while Doom is undergoing other surgery.
His son’s name was Brian, actually. John Falsworth was his brother, who was transformed into a vampire and went under the costumed identity of Baron Blood fighting for the Germans in both World Wars.
Also, Jacqueline’s son was Kenneth, not Brian. Kenneth ended up becoming a vampire as well. Some families…
In the Batman Adventures comic, which I gather is based more on the TV cartoon than on the “canonical” Batman comics, the Penguin is mayor of Gotham City.
Duh. You’re completely correct ( :: bangs head on desk :: ), however I’d heard that in part he was trying to be the movie division’s stooge in that he thought that the (really bad, IMHO) “wacky” FF that loses their income and has to go out and get jobs and Reed ('cause he’s too dumb to, y’know, invent stuff that would make money) gets to be the househusband (currently being published as “4”) would be a good movie premise–and when he went to Waid with the idea, Waid refused and was going to be fired. But in part due to fan pressure (plus the sales guys saying “Um. It’s our number 3 book since this guy took over. And you’re gonna fire him why??”, the pres. was canned. 'least that’s the version I heard
I think (but I’m not sure) that they’ve undone that. After all, her rightful place was in Hell–she was a satanic witch* after all. IIRC, the idea was that neither Doom nor Mephisto nor Dr. Strange can overrule God, who presumably knows what He’s doing when placing souls. (I have no cite for this, just a vague memory. If someone else comes along and says I’m misremembering, trust them! 
)
Fenris
*Not to be confused with a follower of Wicca, a pagan, etc. who presumably do not summon demons, etc.
AAARGH! All these retcons make me burn with the combined fire of every stogie Kirby ever smoked!
I cannot express how much I hate the idea that Mephisto can’t claim innocent souls through scheming and lying. That’s his reason for being. People accidentally get his attention and accept his offer of help. He fulfills his half ('I know he’s dead. I arranged for that motorcycle to crash and kill him. Yesterday I promised you that he wouldn’t die of cancer. Once they put out the fire and untangle the corpse from the wreck it will be obvious to everyone that this man died of severe head injuries.), then claims their souls.
Ummmmm, lemme see. Judge Dredd was Judge-Marshall of the Lunar Colony. I think it was a position of government as well as a policing position.
But that’s traditional in the “Deal with the devil” genre. You gotta be smarter than th’ average demonic minion.
(And a buddy of mine who lurks here but doesn’t post just asked me what the hell I was smoking. He didn’t remember the revision to the story. So I may be remembering an earlier story or misrembering. I dunno.
breif hijack.
I don’t read all the Superman titles, just Superman/Batman (which is a fun diversion and keeps me somewhere in the DCU). In recent issues Luthor… …died in an explosion, but was revealed to have survived and is now on the run. He’s also wearing the ginchy alien armour, which is similar to the armour he wore just before crisis (even though the purple and green togs were more fun). There’s a pretty solid implication he’s no longer President, etc…
My question is, how much of this is reflected in the four(?) main Superman books, and where the hell did that armour come from? I know ‘they’ are steadily re-introducing all the coolest parts of the silver age Super-mythos, and it stands to reason we’d have a Luthor in armour again, but where did he get it? And what’s happened/happening to Luthor?
The stories in Superman/Batman seemed to be pretty solid, affecting stories, and if they’re part of the main DCU storyline they would have major ramifications, but I thought the book was a periphery thing where creatives teams could have a bit of fun without intruding on the main portion of the story.
What gives?