MARVEL TEAM-UP #43 (1976)
by Bill Mantlo & Sal Buscema
Third part of one of the weirdest team-ups you’ve seen.
First Super-Villain Team-Up, now Marvel Team-Up… in the 70s they were really trying to team up Doctor Doom with anyone, isn’t it?
Witchslayer switches his allegiance from the Dark Rider to Doctor Doom for no real reason, and Doom treats him with the adequate level of respect.
Despite the first story putting the emphasis on Doom’s time machine, the Dark Rider is actually more interested in Doom’s magical heritage.
Hey, this is only the fourth time Doom’s relationship with magic has been brought up! Aside from his first issue and his origin story, the only mention has been with his fight with the Devil. So that’s kind of neat!
Dark Rider even flashes us with an abridged version of Doom’s origin in a two-page spread.
Meanwhile Spider-Man and Vision are stuck fighting Dark Rider’s magic cat, who can turn into a tiger! If it sounds exciting, it’s really not.
The cat is defeated by Scarlet Witch, by the way. Apparently being shot in the face in the 17th century only made you a bit woozy.
Dark Rider absorbs the magical energy from both Scarlet Witch and Doctor Doom, turning into a giant. With a mohawk.
Doom is doing his best to at least TRY to salvage this story.
So… I’m confused is this about Doctor Doom in a magical beam struggle against a giant demon, or is this about the Salem witch trials!?
Beam struggle it is.
But hey, the title promised a team-up between Spider-Man and Doctor Doom, and this is actually a team-up. Doom even thanks Spider-Man for his assistance!
I suppose it’s also a team-up with Vision, except… Vision kind of sucks in this story.
Not that the others are much better, because the Dark Rider only needs a couple pages to defeat everyone.
And it’s ALREADY the end: once again, not much has happened.
At least the next part is the ending!
Doom significance: 0/10
It’s neat to see Doom’s connection to magic being used, but this isn’t even a footnote in his history.
Silver Age-ness: 9/10
As the rest of the storyline, this is almost top Silver Age on the Marvel scale.
Does it stand the test of time? 0/10
This is a complete waste of a storyline, isn’t it? Spider-Man treats time travel like it was nothing, Scarlet Witch barely has any thoughts on the witch trials (!!!), and Witchslayer is so incredibly lame that he literally gets bitchslapped at the beginning of the story to then completely disappear!
It was a Doombot all along
Considering that Doombots can’t use magic… at least not in this era… this must be the real Doom.
Take over the world & Destroy the FF!
Neither: Doom was just minding his own business before the Dark Rider summoned him!
Crazy tech
Appropriately for a story focusing on magic, Doom barely uses any technology.
Number of superheroes who have fought Dr. Doom: 20
Scarlet Witch has fought Doom before, as has Spider-Man. I’m not adding Vision to the list because technically speaking he doesn’t fight Doom this time.