Okay, so Marvel. I’ve now read a lot of Marvel novels and they always seem to divide me. Either the series is really interesting like Iron Fist and Daredevil, or they’re just weird and boring like Doctor Strange and Moon Knight. It has helped me learn a lot more about certain characters, though, which has been good. So when I heard about a series to do with Iron Man and Doctor Doom, I was pretty intrigued.
‘Infamous’ is the first novel in the ‘Infamous Iron Man’ series. It sees Victor Von Doom re-evaluate his life and who he wishes to be. When Maria Hill is abducted by a small-time villain named Diablo, Doom intervenes and saves her life. Believing that this may be his true calling, he decides to take up the mantle of Iron Man, after Tony Stark apparently dies. Naturally, this causes a lot of friction in the world and Doom sees one of his longtime nemeses Ben Grimm, aka The Thing, come after him. Whilst all this is going on, Victor repeatedly visits a Dr Amara who he seems to be interested in. However, naturally, due to his involvement, S.H.I.E.L.D. continue to keep a tab on her and she remains adamant that she doesn’t know why Victor keeps visiting her. During one such meeting, the two of them are ambushed by The Thing and in the ensuing tussle, Victor transports himself and Amara to Switzerland. Separated from Doom temporarily, The Thing travels to Latveria, the fictional land that Doom once ruled and looks for him in Doom’s old lab but discovers something far more shocking than Victor Von Doom; his mother. Doom, unaware of his mother’s presence, attempts to speak to S.H.I.E.L.D. to convince them that he has changed his ways and is now a force for good. When he finds that Grimm has gone missing in Latveria, he investigates and comes up against his mother. Confused and angry, he battles against her sorcery only for her to disappear at the last moment. Can Doom relocate his mother and find out just how this happened? And is there a more sinister force in play?
As I’ve found on many occasions, Marvel will come up with these novels that just blow my mind. What an amazingly interesting concept! One of the greatest Marvel villains decides that he now wants to be a good guy and becomes Iron Man. The character himself was charming and extremely intelligent and the novel displayed a huge amount of character development. The twist in the novel was also mind-blowing! Generally, although I’ve heard good things about Brian Michael Bendis, they’ve been limited to his work at Marvel and this novel was a prime example of that. The only thing that I’d say was a criticism, would be that I found the whole interaction with Dr Amara a little pointless. It was pretty similar to the relationship that Kingpin had with that writer in his solo novel. Also, this novel was a little too short for me!
The artwork of this novel was impressive. It was done by an artist named Alex Maleev, whose other work I’ve seen and he has an excellent ability to draw the nuances of human emotion. The covers were also very good but I really liked this one above. Overall, ‘Infamous’ was a really intriguing novel and I’m so excited for the future of the series!
Favourite Panel:
Sorry, what. This would be such a good way to introduce him into the MCU though!
Favourite Character:
Doctor— Sorry, I mean Victor Doom. What a ridiculously interesting version of the character!
Rating:
Story Arc: ★★★★
Character Development: ★★★★
Artwork: ★★★½
Enjoyability: ★★★½
Re-readability: ★★★
Level: Intermediate