BOOKS OF DOOM #1 (2005)
by Ed Brubaker & Pablo Raimondi
cover by Paolo Rivera
For the last part of our dive into the additions to Doom’s origin, we’ll have a look at the 6-part miniseries that will give us what is BY FAR the most detail recount of Doom’s beginnings.
The entire miniseries is narrated by Doom himself, who is telling his origin story to someone else (we won’t discover who until the last issue).
The first weird detail is that, according to Doom, he can actually remember his time in his mother’s womb. As far as I know, this is only ever acknowledged in an issue of Blade.
Apparently Victor was three years old when his mother died.
Cold hands will be a recurring theme.
Doom tells us that his mother was “manipulated by a demon” to attack the Baron that has been persecuting his people.
I’ll take that with a grain of salt: it’s not like Doom would easily admit his mother was at fault.
More interestingly, we’re told why the Latverians killed Doom’s mother: because of her deal with the devil, for every soldier she killed… an innocent child died.
Doom is never told what his mother’s final words were.
But WE are… kind of: whoever is interviewing Doom is also taking testimony from other people.
Throughout the series we will sometimes cut to these other witnesses, who will often contradict Doom’s version.
I really like this documentary style.
Doom’s mother is buried in an unmarked grave.
Doom tells us that he spoke at his mother’s funeral and that the people were scared, but he doesn’t tell us why.
That’s because kid Victor was FU##ING TERRIFYING.
I get the feeling that Victor and his father weren’t particularly close; he doesn’t seem to talk much about him.
Teen Victor is definitely less scary, mostly because that’s when we are introduced to Valeria.
Brubaker does an excellent job at showing us a mix between the bombastic Doom vocabulary and the way a normal human being speaks. You can definitely see this guy growing to be either a Victor Von Doom or a Reed Richards.
We have now reached the point where Victor’s father is blamed for the death of the Baron’s wife.
They are chased into the mountains, where teen Victor would want to fight. His father prefers to wait for the soldiers to just give up.
The death of Victor’s father gets a chilling update.
Like I said, cold hands are a recurring theme. It’s just a little more literal in this case.
Interestingly, Doom acknowledges his father’s dying words but doesn’t seem to give them much thought.
Contrast with the first version of this story:
Everything comes together when the father’s body is taken away.
Forget the the lab accident: THIS is the moment Victor became Doctor Doom.
“Cold like mother’s hands, cold like death, cold like the world”.
Gives me chills every time.
As does the fact that Victor decided he was going to fight the Devil AT AGE ELEVEN.
Despite the quick introduction to magic, Doom does acknowledge that science was his strong suit.
He still feels something for Valeria, even goins as far as considering her his equal (which is a BIG thing for Victor), but they’re already growing distant.
Doom is already the leader of the rebellion (AT SIXTEEN), but he’s careless enough to be caught by a soldier.
This was Victor’s first murder.
This affected Victor more than you might expect.
This happened the night before Victor was contacted by a man from the United States.
In the original story, this was the dean of a university…
…while this time he’s working for the US military.
Which honestly makes a little more sense.
Up to this point Victor hasn’t had a single day of school and keeps a low profile, so why would an American university even know about his genius?
If he was the tech-savvy leader of revolutionaries, on the other hand…
Note that, even after so many years, Victor still regrets not trying to force a better bargain.
Things will DEFINITELY get interesting there, Vic.
Doom significance: 10/10
Obviously an origin story is extremely important, and this likely the most detailed version that we’ll ever get.
Silver Age-ness: 0/10
Even the small somewhat goofy parts of the original story, such as Doom selling fake cures for baldness, are written out of the story.
Does it stand the test of time? 10/10
It’s only from 2005 it’s pretty easy to get a high score. But in addition to that, this is a FANTASTIC story! We really get into Victor’s head, exploring how each tragedy shaped him into becoming colder and more cynical without going over-the-top. All the updates to the original telling of the story make perfect sense, plus any contradiction is rather easily taken care by showing the witnesses. Top notch story, dialogue, pencils and characterization. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!!!