Those Doom/Morgan Le fey pages are a thing of beauty (also, further evidence that Doom really has a type).
He so does. The original Valeria, Morgan, Wanda... there was even a Secret Wars AU where the characters were left on Battleworld and Doom had a child with the Enchantress. Hmm, brunette Gypsy witches with magical powers, wherever might he get that preference from...? ;)
Teen!Victor is so happy and carefree. What happened to him? I would honestly love to read an AU where Werner doesn't die and what that means for who Victor grows up to be.
One of the things I love about Books of Doom is the way that it actually shows Victor beginning to heal from the various emotional blows he takes before things go wrong again; he and his father gradually get over the death of his mother and become a happy family again, and when Valeria finds him after the accident he even seems to have started coming to terms with that... but then something always comes along to make things worse just as he's starting to recover. It really emphasizes that it wasn't just any one thing that made him Doom but a whole chain of tragic events that might have been averted if things had gone differently at any point.
I've always wanted to see a Werner lives AU, definitely. Even more than that, I would love a Fantastic Four story where they travel back to this era in Latveria's past, or where Doom is de-aged to his childhood self, because I really don't think Reed and the others know much at all about this era of his life, and I'd be fascinated to see what they made of young Victor and the loving parents he had before tragedy struck. (And Valeria's namesake! Do they even know where Doom got that name from, or why it has sentimental value to him? I don't think they do.)
To be fair, Victor has good reasons to be angry at Reed at that point.
This part of the origin story has always fascinated me, because it's not a retcon added later to give things more nuance, it's right there in the Lee/Kirby version of the origin in Fantastic Four Annual #2 - Reed very definitely barged into Victor's private rooms and read his project notes without permission, which is not just rude and pushy but I would think gives Victor grounds to try and get him kicked out of college! The readers might know that Reed is harmlessly enthusiastic rather than spying or cheating, but Victor has every reason to be suspicious and outraged - and yet it's nearly always framed as Victor's pride being at fault, with no mention of Reed's terrible people skills. (Which is one of several reasons I love Dwayne McDuffie's Fantastic Four special, where he actually has Reed address that and admit feeling bad about the arrogant way he handled things.)
I think Victor tends to look slightly older or younger in BoD than the age he's supposed to be, but not by much and he always look like the same person, which is very hard to pull off.
Yeah, it's not always quite perfect age-wise (I think he's only supposed to be about 11 in that water-splashing sequence, for instance, and while on the next page he actually looks that age, in the panels I posted I'd say he looks more like early teens). But considering most comic artists can't seem to draw any stage between babies and ten-year-olds (you would never guess from any of the F4 and FF artwork that Franklin's more than twice Valeria's age) or just draw creepy miniature adults, I'm still pretty impressed. Particularly, as you say, since he manages to have Victor age from toddler to college student with the shape of his face changing a lot and yet always makes him look like the same boy.
Ooh, favourite Doom panels... I have folders full of scanned pages I've collected from various Doctor Doom stories. I might go through them and see if I can put together a picspam post.
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Date: 2014-04-21 10:12 pm (UTC)He so does. The original Valeria, Morgan, Wanda... there was even a Secret Wars AU where the characters were left on Battleworld and Doom had a child with the Enchantress. Hmm, brunette Gypsy witches with magical powers, wherever might he get that preference from...? ;)
Teen!Victor is so happy and carefree. What happened to him? I would honestly love to read an AU where Werner doesn't die and what that means for who Victor grows up to be.
One of the things I love about Books of Doom is the way that it actually shows Victor beginning to heal from the various emotional blows he takes before things go wrong again; he and his father gradually get over the death of his mother and become a happy family again, and when Valeria finds him after the accident he even seems to have started coming to terms with that... but then something always comes along to make things worse just as he's starting to recover. It really emphasizes that it wasn't just any one thing that made him Doom but a whole chain of tragic events that might have been averted if things had gone differently at any point.
I've always wanted to see a Werner lives AU, definitely. Even more than that, I would love a Fantastic Four story where they travel back to this era in Latveria's past, or where Doom is de-aged to his childhood self, because I really don't think Reed and the others know much at all about this era of his life, and I'd be fascinated to see what they made of young Victor and the loving parents he had before tragedy struck. (And Valeria's namesake! Do they even know where Doom got that name from, or why it has sentimental value to him? I don't think they do.)
To be fair, Victor has good reasons to be angry at Reed at that point.
This part of the origin story has always fascinated me, because it's not a retcon added later to give things more nuance, it's right there in the Lee/Kirby version of the origin in Fantastic Four Annual #2 - Reed very definitely barged into Victor's private rooms and read his project notes without permission, which is not just rude and pushy but I would think gives Victor grounds to try and get him kicked out of college! The readers might know that Reed is harmlessly enthusiastic rather than spying or cheating, but Victor has every reason to be suspicious and outraged - and yet it's nearly always framed as Victor's pride being at fault, with no mention of Reed's terrible people skills. (Which is one of several reasons I love Dwayne McDuffie's Fantastic Four special, where he actually has Reed address that and admit feeling bad about the arrogant way he handled things.)
I think Victor tends to look slightly older or younger in BoD than the age he's supposed to be, but not by much and he always look like the same person, which is very hard to pull off.
Yeah, it's not always quite perfect age-wise (I think he's only supposed to be about 11 in that water-splashing sequence, for instance, and while on the next page he actually looks that age, in the panels I posted I'd say he looks more like early teens). But considering most comic artists can't seem to draw any stage between babies and ten-year-olds (you would never guess from any of the F4 and FF artwork that Franklin's more than twice Valeria's age) or just draw creepy miniature adults, I'm still pretty impressed. Particularly, as you say, since he manages to have Victor age from toddler to college student with the shape of his face changing a lot and yet always makes him look like the same boy.
Ooh, favourite Doom panels... I have folders full of scanned pages I've collected from various Doctor Doom stories. I might go through them and see if I can put together a picspam post.