Reading the Fantastic Four comics from the start. In FF vol. 2 #16, it’s time to put an end to Dr. Doom once and for all, and the man for the job is… Ant-Man?!?

Recap: Everyone from the Future Foundation and their assorted allies took on Dr. Doom’s castle in an all-out brawl, knocking out his defenses one by one until Doom was all alone, facing off against Ant-Man. Remember that this is the Scott Lang Ant-Man, who still blames Doom for the death of his daughter Cassie. It’s all come down to this.

First there’s some table-setting as Scott contacts Dragon Man to teleport the unconscious Medusa, She-Hulk, and Darla out of the place, while Doom does an automatic repair on his armor. Doom wants his siphon device back so he can achieve cosmic power, but Scott kicks it away. Doom says once he becomes a god, he can bring Scott’s daughter back to life, but Scott tells him his daughter was more than a bargaining chip. Scott manages to crush Doom’s metal gauntlets. Doom demands to know how Scott did that.

What happens next is confusing. The Watcher is nearby, injured after the battle last issue. He says he knows where Scott the power from. Turn the page, and the Watcher is back on the moon, where everyone else is watching the Doom/Scott fight. I guess the Watcher teleported back? Anyway, he gives a long-winded lecture about the Pym Particles, and how they’ve been different for various characters who’ve used them, and that Scott is the first one to figure out how they really work.

Back in Latveria, Scott beats the crap out of Dr. Doom, tearing off his armor down to some sort of grey pajamas he wears underneath. Then he does the unthinkable – he removes Dr. Doom’s mask! Doom isn’t scarred at all, having repaired his face the second he got cosmic power last issue. Scott theorizes every time Doom fixes his face, it just gets scarred again. He says, “It’s not the ugly dead scar tissue of your face that isolates you from humanity, Doom. It’s the ugly dead scar tissue of your soul.”

Doom keeps trying to get to the siphon device, but Scott keeps kicking it away. Scott calls Dr. Doom a sociopath, only mimicking human virtue, with his code of honor being all a pretense. Doom says Scott’s the one who invaded Latveria, making him a villain as well. Scott says the difference between them is that Scott doesn’t desire to become a god. With that, he destroys the siphon.

There’s a weird bit of business where Doom tries his classic trick of switching his mind with Scott’s, but it doesn’t work this time. Scott says his ants recorded Dr. Doom’s brain patterns (!) and put the unencrypted pattern all over the internet. Now every intelligence agency and hacker has access to all of Doom’s private information. Scott grabs Doom and grows to giant size, bursting out from underground onto the surface outside the castle.

Somewhere in between realities, we pick up where left with Franklin, Valeria, and Ravonna, before the kids returned in Fantastic Four #16. Ravonna assures Franklin that she’s on his side, and there’s a way to defeat Dr. Doom so that he never again considers becoming Doom the Annihilating Conqueror.

In Latveria, Scott and Doom continue to fight, while Scott muses about how Cassie died. There’s another explosion nearby, and the Watcher returns alongside another cosmic being, the Living Tribunal. The Tribunal says when Doom took on godhood, his actions became held to a higher standard. The Tribunal returns Doom’s mask onto him and renders judgment – from this day forward, every act of malice will create a new scar upon Doom’s face. He says, “Let the content of character be displayed on your features,” and “You and you alone are hereafter responsible for any scars that mar your face.”

The Tribunal teleports away, and Dr. Doom still refuses to yield, standing and wanting to fight some more. Both Scott and the Watcher try talking him down, saying it’s time for him to learn that other people matter, not just him. Scott asks the Watcher to turn off the feed so the Foundation kids can’t see what happens next. He then gives Doom a huge beating. Scott says he’s not as honorable as Reed Richards, and if Doom ever comes after him or his family again, then Scott will finish the job.

Doom says, “Not quite, ant.” He gets hold of one of his metal gauntlets and does another auto-repair like he did at the start of the issue. He fires an energy blast at Scott just as Ravonna returns with the kid. The blast hits Valeria as she appears in front of Scott, seemingly killing her. But then we see Valeria alive and well, standing off to the side with Franklin. A ghostly visage of Ravonna appears, saying she gave Dr. Doom the same metal treatment Scott felt at the death of his daughter. She says the illusion won’t last, but the memories will. Ravonna disappears, with speculation as to who she really was. Valeria tries to talk to Dr. Doom, but Scott says Doom isn’t in there. “Just an empty shadow of what could have been,” he says.  

At this point, stick a bookmark in this page (I suggest using a bit of scrap paper and not a hard cardstock bookmark so your comic doesn’t get bent or folded) because we’re not done yet…

Clobberin’ time: As Doom’s info goes worldwide, one of the hackers is wearing a Thing mask for some reason.

Fantastic fifth wheel: In the last panel, we see Medusa, She-Hulk, and Darla teleporting back to the scene, just we know they’re okay.

Four and a half: Ravonna mentions Franklin getting his powers back. He responds “Bullwinkle” as his G-rated version of a swear word.

Our gal Val: Valeria still calls Dr. Doom “Uncle Doom,” showing affection for him, even after all this.

Foundational: Upon hearing about the many uses of the Pym Particles, Bentley-23 and Onome speculate about the creation of an anti-Pym, and the unstoppable power it might have. The Watcher shuts them up and threatens to wipe their memories.

The opening recap shows Alex Power taking his parents out of Dr. Doom’s dungeons and to safety, wrapping up that subplot.

Trivia time: Who is the Living Tribunal? He’s the living embodiment of law throughout the multiverse. He has three heads. The uncovered one represents unity, the partially covered one represents vengeance, and the fully covered one represents necessity.

Characters shown as spiraling out of Hank Pym’s original Pym particles are Scott Lang, Vision, Ultron, Wonder Man, Baron Zemo, and the Eric Josten version of Power Man. With that, we can presume Grim Reaper, Wiccan, Speed, Victor Mancha, and that weird android family Vision made for himself are also connected to the Pym particles.

The Marvel Wiki insists that the Ravonna seen in these issues of Fantastic Four and FF is not the same Ravonna from the main Marvel continuity. That one had been genetically engineered to be Kang’s perfect mate (gross) and later changed her name to Terminatrix. It’s speculated that the Ravonna from this storyline is another version of Valeria from the future. But this was never confirmed, as this issue is her last appearance.

Fantastic or frightful? Interesting to see how a “final battle” plays out between Dr. Doom and a hero other than the original Fantastic Four. Scott insists he’s not doing what Reed would do, although both Reed and Ben have beaten up Doom plenty in the past. Still, it’s satisfying see ol’ Doomsy get his comeuppance, and to have Scott be the one to wrap things up.

Next: Campfire tales.

* * * *

Want more? My ongoing series THE SUBTERKNIGHTS is back on the Kindle store! A man searches for his missing sister in a futuristic city filled with far-out tech, strange creatures, and secret magic. Only $0.99 or free with KU!