FANTASTIC FOUR #142 (1974)
by Gerry Conway & Rich Buckler
The cover teases the return of the Most Sinister Super-Villain of All, but since this is the Doom retrospective… sorry about the spoiler!
It’s a bad time for the Fantastic Four. How bad? Last issue Reed had to lobotomize his own son to prevent him from destroying the universe, so… yeah. Not his best hour.
Since things are a bit awkward at the Baxter Building, the Thing follows his girlfriend Alicia (who is now a platinum blonde I guess) who went to a small country in the Balkans to be cured from her blindness.
You know, if you’re teasing the return of a major villain and you want to keep it a secret, maybe don’t set a scene in the Balkans? Just a thought!
During this time, Medusa from the Inhumans was filling in for the Invisible Girl; she does manage to calm down Reed just a little.
Since Reed and Susan were pretty much separated at this point, I wonder if they were trying to set up Medusa as a potential love interest.
I’m not a big fan of Buckler’s art, but he does draw a very good dressed up Thing.
But we need to get SOME action, so suddenly DEMON!!!
This is Darkoth. He does have a somewhat memorable design.
His fight isn’t terribly interesting, though.
After checking up on what Susan and Johnny are doing (they are angry at Reed for perfectly understandable reasons), Alicia begins her operation… or she SHOULD begin.
Darkoth ambushes the Thing and leads him to some underground caverns. You know what time it is:
Darkoth flees, and the Thing is genre savvy enough to know he’s not been defeated yet.
Once again the fight is kind of tedious, even if Darkoth does prove to be a real dangerous opponent.
All of this was needed to lure the Thing here for… reasons.
And I still wonder who could be the villain. I mean, a guy with a cape and cowl who hates the Fantastic Four and lives in the Balkans? Who could it possibly be?
Back to Reed, who is going to a reunion with his university buddies. They continue to tease us with some Medusa relationship potential.
Reed and his old friend Sam Thorne (who doesn’t question why Medusa is here instead of Susan) isn’t the only one to participate to the reunion.
And the big villain turns out to be… a bad imitation of Fantastic Four #87.
Uhm, guys, I think Doom’s mask is having a stroke.
To be continued!
This is barely a cameo so I’m not going to go through the usual categories.
Except…
Supervillains created by Doom: 4
New category! Darkoth has only a couple more appearances, but he’s definitely more important than those idiots from Fantastic Four #23. I suppose I should’ve made the category then, but those losers were too unremarkable for that.