ASTONISHING TALES #6(1971)
by Larry Lieber & George Tuska
Considering that Doctor Doom and Black Panther are a superhero king and a superhero villain, it was only a matter of time before they met.
We begin with Doom torturing a random Wakandan with the Doomrack ™.
I don’t have a problem with Doom using torture (he’s impossibly cool but he’s still the bad guy!), but the reason for it is kind of weird: he wants to know where to find vibranium… and it shouldn’t be a secret that Wakanda has it, at least not at this point.
Doom decides that he has to learn more about Wakanda, and he does so with a scanning device that he turns into a bird (!!!).
Why turn it into a hawk? Who knows. But one thing is certain: you don’t f#ck with nature in Latveria.
The hawk reaches Wakanda in three hours (so that’s pretty fast, since Wakanda is typically described to be in the middle of Africa) and once Doom finds the vibranium he blows up the bird.
Cool page and concept, but that’s a little too complicated. Especially if he built the scanner to look like a hawk because he wanted it to be unnoticed:
1) I highly doubt that hawks are native to Wakanda
2) blowing it up in plain sight makes camouflaging it utterly pointless!
But that’s nothing compared to Doom’s method to reach Wakanda: DIGGING THROUGH HALF THE PLANET!!!
Yep. Doom has a vehicle that can dig between continents within an hour.
Doom’s arrival creates an earthquake AND a volcanic eruption, so Wakanda summons Black Panther (who was a member of the Avengers at the time, so he’s in New York).
Black Panther deduces (pretty much out of nowhere) that the cause for the earthquake is something inside the volcano, and he decides to investigate.
I didn’t know that jungle cats regularly survive volcanoes. You learn something every day.
Doom is beneath the volcano, where his vehicle has stopped due to a malfunction.
And as Doom puts down his weapon to repair the device, Black Panther takes him by surprise.
To be continued, of course.
Doom significance: 0/10
This is just the setup for next issue, so nothing new here.
Silver Age-ness: 1/10
Helped by how little happens in the story.
Does it stand the test of time? 7/10
Its main flaw is just how brief it is, and it’s odd to see the Wakandans so helpless without Black Panther. At 12 pages it’s not shorter than the previous issues, but in addition to 3 splash pages very little happens. Still, Doom is acting like Doom should, including the scene with him punishing the hunter for breaking Latverian law.
It was a Doombot all along
No indication, one way or the other.
Take over the world & Destroy the FF!
A bit tricky. Doom’s official motivation for wanting to get his hands on vibranium is to design new missiles… but since he doesn’t say it’s for world domination, this is yet another story where neither category applies.
Crazy tech
The hawk is very interesting, but a vehicle that can dig through continents is almost too cool for words! By contrast, the Doomrack ™ is a disappointment.
Number of superheroes who have fought Dr. Doom: 18
Black Panther joins the list, which will grow fast in the 70s.
I like that the panther confronts Doom with a gun. If you are going against Doom, you need some extra firepower.
It’s even Doom’s own gun: he drops it to fix his vehicle and Black Panther, who is definitely smart enough to realize that any edge against Doom can be useful, picks it up.
Also: props to Black Panther’s stealth, it’s not that easy to sneak up on Doom!