El Sorprendente Hombre Araña #177 (1973)
written by unknown (possibly Raúl Martínez)
pencils and cover by José Luis Durán
translation by Monica Alarcón
Courtesy of my Patreon supporter Monica, we have what is easily the most obscure comic I’ve reviewed so far: Doctor Doom’s appearance on original stories published in Mexico.
If anyone else knows of a crazy adaptation worth reviewing, please write me at ca@comicsarcheology.com
Okay this already requires a tangent, because the background to this is kind of insane.
Spider-Man was a huge hit in Mexico right from the start, with publisher La Prensa beginning publications of “El Sorprendente Hombre Araña”.
He was SUCH a success, in fact, that the title was weekly instead of
monthly.
This is even more aggressive than the Italian translations, which were published twice a month despite the fact that Italy wouldn’t start translating Spider-Man until 1970.
Just like in Italy, La Prensa filled the void by including other translations (Avengers and Tales to Astonish among others), but those didn’t take off.
What La Prensa eventually did was starting to add original stories starting with #123.
Mostly they were written by Raúl Martinez and drawn by José Luis Durán, but for the issue we’ll look today only the artist is officially credited.
I’ll talk about the original stories published after #145, when most stories are Mexican originals only, at the end of the review… stick around because there’s some insane stuff there.
The weirdest part is that apparently La Prensa had Marvel’s consent to do this, something you’d NEVER see in other periods.
Since I don’t speak Spanish, Monica was even kind enough to provide the English translation.
In the original text, Doctor Doom is translated as Doctor Infierno (“Doctor Hell”) because his real name is Victor Von Infierno… which to be honest makes slightly more sense than “Von Doom”.
He’s had A LOT of names in Spanish countries, since there isn’t a direct translation for “Doom”.
He’s been both “Doctor Destino” and “Doctor Maligno “ in the 60s cartoons, Doctor Ruina in the 80s, Doctor Muerte (which is also his name in Spain) and lately he’s just Doctor Doom.
(thanks again to Monica for the breakdown)
We begin with Spider-Man being warned by the police about a new menace, while Gwen Stacy poses for the public.
Yeah, uhm, apparently Mexico was REALLY into Gwen. To a ridiculous degree, as I’ll discuss later.
Even if you didn’t know this wasn’t the official Spider-Man series, you would definitely pick up that the vibe is more than a little… off.
This is supposedly set during the Conway run, right after Stan Lee left the title; that was one of the periods where Spider-Man’s reputation with the authorities was at its lowest (WHICH IS SAYING SOMETHING), but here he’s as close to them as Batman was in the 50s.
Also, no offense to Durán who seems to be a decent artist (when he’s not swiping directly from previous artwork), but he’s no Gil Kane and definitely no Romita.
So that night Spider-Man goes looking for this new menace.
Wait, what exactly IS the menace? The cop said that the mysterious man showed up, they shot him, and he disappeared… did he actually do anything???
It doesn’t seem to be an urgent threat, considering Spider-Man can swing around all night without finding anything.
Until he gets to the outskirts of town, where he finds a spaceship.
This is obviously Doctor Doom, who Spider-Man knows from Amazing Spider-Man #5 (which I bet was definitely translated).
And apparently Doom holds a grudge (shocking, I know) because he came to New York SPECIFICALLY to fight Spidey.
This results into, what else, a Big Dumb Mexican Fight.
Too bad Doom has new powers, including the ability to make the background disappear.
Here’s a thought, Victor, why don’t you try this new Vibrator Ray™ on the Fantastic Four?
Even if it doesn’t kill them, it might make Reed jealous.
Spider-Man is overwhelmed by Doom’s other new power to detach one arm from his body.
Was it really THAT hard to find Doom?
Of course Doom doesn’t waste an opportunity to monologue about how awesome he is.
Will Spider-Man’s second wind be enough to defeat Doctor Doom?
Apparently not.
Mexican Spider-Man is hardcore, as Monica’s footnote reminds us.
Doctor Doom has Spider-Man completely outmatched.
He has Spider-Man completely at his mercy and then he just… leaves.
Okay Doom DOES have a tendency to miss the chance to kill his opponents (he’s done this like fifty times with the Fantastic Four), but I don’t remember him being THIS blatant about it.
Spider-Man then recovers his personality (???) and gets back home.
Apparently that doesn’t make sense in Spanish either.
Turns out that Mexican newspapers also use GIGANTIC FONTS for their front pages.
Would there even be enough space left for an actual sentence there???
The fact that Doctor Doom beat up Spider-Man is enough to rally the city against him.
You know, something normal for Spider-Man, who is canonically universally beloved by all citizens in the 70s.
This one is particularly funny to me, considering Doctor Doom hasn’t actually done anything against the city up to this point.
Jonah Jameson is so excited about Spider-Man losing that he changes his hair color three times in the same page.
Jonah being too cheap to fix the elevators IS in-character, but I struggle to figure out why this scene is even in the comic.
The 70s were not, generally speaking, a good decade for Doctor Doom: he visibly regressed to be a more generic supervillain.
But even at his lowest, I can’t imagine him robbing banks.
But he’s confident he can beat Spider-Man again, because his new powers are powerfully powerful.
Dammit Spider-Man, I’ve been aching to do a “Mexican stand-off” joke this entire time, but the joke won’t work if you keep losing at the first turn!!!
I dread to think about the poor soul who had this comic as the first exposure to Spider-Man, because I cannot imagine rooting for this guy.
Wait… you mean that wasn’t LITERALLY THE FIRST PLACE where you looked???
Spider-Man has lost quite spectacularly against Doctor Doom the first TWO times, so it’s going to take all of his skills to get the upper hand.
Or he could take Doom down by throwing a single web, I guess.
This is THE ENTIRE LAST FIGHT, by the way.
I mourn the literary gems we lost with the advent of cellphones.
By the way, Spider-Man found Doom’s stolen loot only AFTER he called the police.
At least I think that’s supposed to be loot, looks more like random junk to me.
And so Doctor Doom is taken into custody. Because I guess his entire arsenal was disabled by the web?
Apparently they don’t even confiscate the armor when throwing Doom into jail!
That is also an atrocious way to draw his hand… between this and the spaceship, were they under the impression that Doom is an alien?
At least the pictures that Peter took are good enough to restore JJJ’s hair color.
Why even include the detail that he’s not paying Peter immediately?
Peter will use the money to buy a present for Gwen, who despite being on the first page does not actually appear in the story.
Much to the artist’s frustration, I’m guessing.
And we close with Peter delivering a present to Aunt May before deciding to give Gwen a big surprise.
I’m sure he’s thinking of a completely platonic surprise and is not thinking with his webshooter.
Importancia del Infierno: 0/10 
¿Aparece algo de esto en alguna continuidad regular?
Technically speaking Doctor Doom is arrested a couple of times in mainstream continuity.
¿Debería haber ocurrido algo de esto en la continuidad regular?
Edad de Plata-idad: 4/10
I don’t get to say this often, but this was too dumb to be in the actual Silver Age.
¿Resistirá la prueba del tiempo? 0/10
I would love nothing more than saying that this unknown gem brought a new perspective into either Spider-Man or Doctor Doom… but this sucked SO much.
The story is non-esistent, the artwork is incredibly inconsistent, and of course both characters are blatantly not acting like the original counterparts.
That being said, this is a HILARIOUS comic if you manage to switch off your brain.
Still, the only reasons you might possibly want to track it down are either historical significance or laughing at how shocking incompetent the writing was.
Era un Infierno-bot todo el tiempo
It may explain Doom’s ability to detach his limbs at will, and the incredibly easy defeat, if this was just a very badly built robot. 
Tecnología loca
Evidently based on the Molecular Expander™ from Fantastic Four #40, we have the Aparato Vibradormarca registrada which is able to knock out Spider-Man quite easily.
I’m pretty sure that in Latveria you need a prescription to buy one of those.
This isn’t Doom’s only Mexican-exclusive appearance. He also shows up on the cover of Kaliman #294, but not in the story itself.
So sadly I can’t add Kaliman to the list of heroes Doom has fought.
I don’t say this often, but the Doctor Doom story is probably the least interesting part of the Mexican Spider-Man series.
First of all, it’s not surprising in the least that a Mexican publisher decided to add original stories when translating an American comic.
They did the same when publisher Novaro, rival to La Prensa, translated the Blackhawks.
Out of 309 issues of “Halcon Negro” (which might sound strange to US readers, but it IS the literal Spanish translation of “Blackhawk”), they managed to have 233 original comics according to some sources.
I’m assuming this was done without consent, considering they changed the title to “Halcon De Oro” (“Gold Hawk”)
But back to Spider-Man: since the comic was weekly (or bi-weekly according to some sources), they eventually caught up with the US releases once El Sorprendente Hombre Araña reached #122.
La Prensa reduced the publishing schedule from weekly to monthly, but since the title was a big seller that wasn’t ideal.
According to Tom Brevoort’s blog:
The Editorial Director of La Prensa flew to New York and petitioned Marvel and editor Stan Lee to allow him to commission new Spider-Man stories from local Mexican talent, stories that they would insert in-between reprinted American stories. Despite the fact that there would turn out to be virtually no oversight on this project at all, somehow La Prensa was granted this right. Presumably, there was some additional money in it for Marvel, and it seems like Lee and company didn’t much care about the results, since nobody living outside of Mexico would ever see them. (This wasn’t really true, as La Prensa had distribution all throughout Spanish-speaking Latin America, and even got some of their books limited release into Spanish-speaking American communities at one point)
TOM BREVOORT
This resulted in La Prensa alternating US and Mexican stories at first, and then switching to exclusively Mexican stories (more on those in a bit).
In 1974, La Prensa either lost the license or went out of business, with the publishing rights being taken by publisher OEPISA and continuing the Mexican series up to #184.
As for the Mexican stories, if the covers are anything to go by you can REALLY tell what Durán really wanted to draw.
With one exception, it’s incredibly difficult to find images from these stories.
The only panels I could find online are all focusing on Gwen Stacy, who appears to have had a huge behind following her.
I’m sorry, I meant a huge following behind her.
These issues must be hard to find, but for any Spider-Man fan they must be an invaluable treasure.
A gigantic booty, if you will.
Despite being such a voluminous asset, Gwen’s best days were in the rear end for her.
Because the last US story translated was Amazing Spider-Man #120, three issues before Gwen’s historic death in the original continuity. Mexico then decided to have het marry Peter.
Well… kind of. You can see the aforementioned Brevoort post or this excellent Comic Tropes video for a detailed breakdown of that story.
You should really check out the Comic Tropes video for the details, but long story short: the marriage never actually takes place.
It’s just a dream Spider-Man is having after being knocked out by Green Goblin.
The confusion, plus the fact that the comic has never been translated into English and that it’s quite rare, has led to the comic book legend of “Mexico loves Gwen so much that instead of killing her off they kept her alive to marry Peter”.
It’s definitely not the case: the story ends with the usual “Peter is torn between his superhero career and his love life”.
This issue seems to be the extent of Durán’s fame in the US. From what I could find, this is him posing next to his own cover.
As of 2025, you can buy a 9.8 grade copy of this issue for just 349.99 dollars.
Despite the many shortcomings of these comics, we can all appreciate Durán’s passion for really getting behind the enormity of Gwen Stacy, down to the bottom.
Thanks once more to Monica for providing the translations and the idea for the review.
You really deserve your very own Certificate Of Useless Archeology.
