All-New, All-Different Avengers #15 (2016)
by Mark Waid & Adam Kubert
cover by Alex Ross
Right before Doctor Doom stars in a new series where he’s the hero, the last issue of this Avengers series has a continuity insert where he’s the bad guy.
And it has the Jane Foster Thor on the cover despite the fact that she plays basically no role in the story.
Her only role is to talk to Heimdall about Civil War II, which somehow prompts him to narrate a completely unrelated Avengers story.
What makes this interesting (besides the Kubert artwork) is the fact that this continuity insert is set in the Silver Age, with the first Avengers lineup (plus Captain America and minus Hulk).
Iron Man tells the team about Doctor Doom as if this was the first time they heard of him.
This is ignoring the continuity insert Avengers #1.5 which is set earlier than this, considering that one was set at the time the Hulk was still a member AND when Doom hadn’t revealed himself as the leader of Latveria.
I would have expected Mark Waid to remember that story.
This gets DEFINITIVELY more political than what would have been published in the Silver Age proper.
Waid has done this in other Cap series, but I always love it when he updates Captain America’s confusion on the modern world to reflect how much farther apart the 40s get from the present.
Thor suggests getting information from Heimdall, which leads to the Avengers meeting another Asgardian (excluding villains) waaaaaay earlier than in regular continuity.
You don’t see Thor pulling rank all that often.
Heimdall gives the Avengers an ominous prediction: they will win the battle, but they will not win against Doom.
And Thor is like “nah, it will be fine”.
The Avengers join the fight against Doom’s forces.
I feel like Waid is referencing a very specific moment in Iron Man’s life, but without a footnote it’s not that easy to pinpoint.
Your regular reminder that Wasp is full of surprises.
Doctor Doom doesn’t seem to have a high opinion of Captain America.
Also, is it just me or do the pencils on this panel look unfinished?
Although it might be on purpose. The following panel does have a certain roughness to it that I think works fine.
Things seem to go pretty well from the Avengers, despite Doom’s confidence.
Doom is very insistent on terminology.
As if Doom wasn’t the master of insults.
If anything, this should bother Captain America more.
You have to love how Captain America figured out immediately that Doom’s love for the sound of his own voice could be exploited.
I’ve ranted so much against the way the Legion abused The Grid that I have to clarify once more that I don’t hate the concept of the grid: it can work if used properly.
This comic uses a 4×5 grid ONCE, and it sells rather well the heat of the battle.
The Avengers win, having destroyed Doom’s superweapon.
Or is it?
Doom rigged things in order to completely destroy the McGuffium that was the main export of the country he wanted to conquer… thus making it even easier to annex.
Doom teleports away from the battlefield, and to add insult to injury the Avengers have to supervise the surrender of the country he conquered.
The moral of the story is that you should never ask the gods for spoilers.
Then again, the Asgardian gods have always been dicks.
Doom significance: 0/10
To the best of my knowledge, it’s never been acknowledged.
Silver Age-ness: 0/10
Despite the setting, this is clearly told as a modern story.
Does it stand the test of time? 8/10
A neat concept, although honestly setting it in the Silver Age doesn’t really add much.
The story and dialogue are the typical level of quality you’d expect from Mark Waid, but it’s weird to see a continuity junkie like him do nothing with the setting.
Doctor Doom is a magnificent bastard in this. Not only he attacks a sovereign nation, but he then destroys everything valuable they have in order to make them BEG to be conquered… even when the “world’s mightiest heroes” are forced to just watch.
But if he destroyed anything valuable Rotruvia had, why even bother to conquer it?
I see three scenarios, in increased order of likeliness:
1) it’s still a little step forward to conquering the rest of the world
2) he later reverses the “alchemical radiation” process that destroyed the McGuffium, keeping it for himself
3) he just woke up one day and decided to completely annihilate a country’s economy. Probably on a Monday.
The doomy land of Doom
Part of Latveria used to be the sovereign nation of Rotruvia before Doom annexed it. I suppose it never gained independence again.
Crazy tech
Doom can rig a superweapon with “alchemical radiation” that can transmute matter.
The very specific moment in Tony’s life would be getting his heart damaged in his origin story, which happened in a war zone. As Tony is wearing his very first red and gold suit, that origin wasn’t that long ago for him.
In the recent Captain America ongoing series by Chip Zdarsky, there is currently an arc set in the past in which Cap fights Doom “for the first time”, and is set shortly after Avengers #4. I doubt that Zdarsky has actually read this issue of Avengers, in which he clearly shows the “first time” that Cap heard about Doom (and also his first fight).
There’s also option 4) To teach a lesson to anyone who thinks they can mess with Doom.