Fantastic Four: House of M #3 (2005)
by John Layman & Scot Eaton
Let’s finish our brief tangent on the “House of M” universe and see if Doctor Doom manages to pull off his coup.
He starts off pretty strong, having lured Magneto and Quicksilver into a parallel dimension where their powers are diminished…
…but where Doom’s magic is exponentially more powerful than usual.
Soooo… Magneto’s dead, right?
OH COME ON!!! I usually defend this kind of thing because it typically has in-universe justifications… but why would THIS Doom keep Magneto alive!?
So Doom and family get back home, having essentially taken out the only roadblock to world domination.
You might remember from last issue that some of the scientists working for Doom’s interdimensional portal are actually Magneto spies. Doom takes care of it by frrsshhhckssshhrrck-ign them.
There IS, however, still one thing that needs to be taken care of: Polaris, because the daughter of Magneto didn’t follow him into the other dimension.
Doom is too busy thinking about his victory speech to actually dealing with her.
This is, however, when The It… this reality’s version of the Thing… has had enough with the endless abuse Doom has inflicted on him.
He would normally be stuck in a cage, but Doom is feeling so great after defeating Magneto that he lets him alone.
So Valeria and Kristoff are left in charge of dealing with Polaris, while The It is given the task to destroy the Doomgate.
I don’t see aaaaany way this could backfire.
But for now, Doom has finally achieved his dream.
No wonder this is an alternate dimension: Doom is ALMOST sitting like a normal person!!!
His victory is short-lived, because not only Valeria and Kristoff were unable to locate Polaris…
…but things are much, MUCH worse for Doom now.
As if dealing with Magneto AND his almost-as-powerful daughter AND Quicksilver, Magneto’s mutant army ALSO shows up!
In a truly Doctor Doom moment, he WOULD have the chance to get a victory… if he wasn’t blinded by his obsessions.
Because instead of capitalizing on Magneto being hurt and helping his family first…
…Doom is too fixated on defeating Magneto.
So not only he leaves his family wide open to assault, but he takes his sweet time to kill Magneto. Therefore wasting the last chance he had to win.
Both Valeria and Kristoff die in the battle, and Magneto summarizes the entire point of the story.
But wait, somehow things turn EVEN WORSE for Doom… with Magneto ready to exile his mother into another dimension.
I can’t believe I have to keep saying this, but things turn out EVEN WORSE for Doom… AGAIN.
I’ve praised this miniseries for a lot of things, but there IS one point that still baffles me… why would Doom, out of all the superpowers he could magically grant himself, choose to become living metal WHEN HIS MAIN ENEMY IS MAGNETO!?!?
Also, while I made fun of Doom for not killing Magneto… it honestly makes perfect sense that Magneto doesn’t execute him.
If we were talking about the regular Doctor Doom, yes, it would be an incredibly dumb move.
But THIS Doom lacks the same drive, and he’s been utterly destroyed.
I mean just look at him, he’s even sitting like a normal person!!!
Clearly a fate worse than death for Doctor Doom.
And so we end with the closest thing to a happy ending this reality can get… Ben Grimm escaping his captivity, and even meeting an alternate version of Alicia Masters.
Few characters deserve a happy ending more than this version of Ben Grimm because holy crap, did he get a rotten deal before.
Did any of this show up in continuity?
I can’t think of anything.
Silver Age-ness: 0/10
Not really.
Does it stand the test of time? 9/10
A satisfying ending to an unexpected gem.
While most of “House of M” fell flat on me because nearly all stories were just “look at how different this version of the character is”, this one actually had something to say.
I think the reason why this Doom doesn’t have the same drive and determination of the original is that he didn’t get through any trauma before or during his rise to power.
So he’s not used to fail only to rise again. Plus as we have seen, his mother dying young might have been a positive thing after all.
His skills are there, but without Reed as his rival he doesn’t lean too much into science. I do think that the regular Doom would PROBABLY also fail to recognize Ben Grimm is not as brain damaged as he thinks, or fail to stand by his family because he has a chance to defeat his nemesis.
However I’m fairly certain that he wouldn’t completely forget about Polaris and delegate fighting her to others. But then again, the regular Doctor Doom has shown to be able to fight Magneto without breaking too much of a sweat, and I doubt Polaris would last long against him.
I don’t recommend basically anything else from this event, but this miniseries is worth checking out.