As I recently covered the MC2’s resident Sorcerer
Supreme, the youthful Dormagus aka Doc Magus, in his cameo
appearance alongside various other Sorcerers Supreme from throughout
time and across the multiverse in Doctor
Strange and the Sorcerers Supreme, I thought now might be a great time to
take a proper look at the character. So, today’s post is all about Doc Magus.
Dormagus makes his debut in the pages of A-Next #3,
when he sends his astral form to former Sorcerer Supreme Doctor Stephen Strange’s
Sanctum Sanctorum home. A lot of interesting pieces of information come
to light in this introduction: for starters Doc Magus’s real name, the
fact that he is the current Sorcerer Supreme and that there is evidently
a lot of unspoken resentment, familiarity and history between Doctor
Strange. More on their dynamic in another post someday soon.
Having foreseen a world-threatening tragedy that will unfold in the near future, Doctor Strange takes matters into his own hands and recruits his former Defenders teammates Namor the Sub-Mariner and the Incredible Hulk in an apparent attempt to save the day using extreme measures. Doc Magus attempts to warn off Strange and when this fails, he takes his mentor Deacon’s advice and approaches the newly formed Avengers team for help. Soon enough the two teams clash in Arizona until Dormagus uses the Eye of Agamotto to uncover Doctor Strange’s true motives were three-fold: to make Namor proactive once more, ensure the Hulk is able to fulfill his destiny and provide the new Avengers team a ‘baptism of fire’.
Doc Magus also briefly appears in J2 #3 which
retells the same events from the titular character’s own perspective, but he
makes a far more substantial appearance in the very next issue. We see Dormagus
unmasked for the first time here when J2 aka Zane Yama recruits
the mystic’s help seeking his father, the original Juggernaut who was lost in a
strange dimension on a mission with the X-Men. Following Zane
into his recurring nightmare in his astral form, Dormagus finds himself
alone in an unknown dimension confronting Darklings until Deacon
manages to send J2 to aid the sorcerer. The two heroes discover the Darklings
master is the dark lord Nemesus who reveals he plans to use Doc
Magus’ point of entry into his dimension as a gateway to their plane of
reality. While J2 battles a Darkling posing as his father, Nemesus
drops hints about the real Juggernaut’s fate and taunts Dormagus’
about his strained relationship with his own father before retreating when
temporarily thwarted. Doc Magus promises Zane they will
eventually find his missing father (J2 #4).
True to his word, Doc Magus later summons Zane
and informs him he has found his father being held in a small, unexplored
pocket dimension for years. Ignoring a warning from Doctor Strange to
wait for reinforcements, Dormagus and Zane make their way to the
pocket dimension to rescue Cain Marko aka Juggernaut. Despite
reuniting Zane with his father, Nemesus appears and reveals Doc
Magus had fallen into his trap and closed the heroes gateway home, trapping
them. Fortunately, Doctor Strange appears alongside his fellow Defenders
the Hulk and the Sub-Mariner and aid in escaping from Nemesus’
dimension before they are all swarmed by legions of Darklings (J2 #12).
We don’t see the Sorcerer Supreme for quite some
time, with only a brief appearance in Spider-Girl #58 before he makes a
full-fledged return in Spider-Girl #71, once again teaming up with his
buddy J2 alongside Spider-Girl for a trip to the nightmare
dimension of Nemesus to close a rift Earth. While the magic of Dormagus
and the helmet of J2 permit them to see through Nemesus’
invisibility spell, Spider-Girl was forced to rely entirely on her
spider-sense as the trio sabotage the villain’s invisibility machine and ruin
his plan with Doc Magus turning Nemesus’ magicks against him and
his Darklings and folding the rift in upon itself. Sadly, the trio’s
efforts go unappreciated.
When the demonically empowered vigilante Darkdevil is
stabbed through the chest by the Venom Symbiote
bonded with Normie
Osborn, Doc Magus is called upon to save him. Struggling to save the
hero, Dormagus admits he is out of his depth and accepts the help of Doctor
Strange just as the demon Zarathos
appears and warns the two mystics to leave Darkdevil’s body as he
claimed it as his own. Unable to perform a conventional exorcism, the two are
forced to journey into Darkdevil’s mindscape and restore the balance
between the three vying avatars within the hero: the spirit of vengeance Zarathos,
the ghostly spirt of the costumed hero Daredevil
and the boy Reilly Tyne (Spider-Girl #83-#84).
Now that he’d been firmly reintroduced, Dormagus
returns for the events of the Last Hero Standing mini-series. With a
string of superheroes going missing, Doc Magus sets out to find them on
his own, once again rejecting the aid of Doctor Strange, only to wind up
defeated in his astral form by a disguised Loki
and fall under the villain’s thrall immediately afterwards when reunited with
his mortal form and abducted (Last Hero Standing #2).
Returned to Earth alongside the other abducted heroes, Doc
Magus is unable to recall who kidnapped him and compelled by Loki’s spell
to become more violent leading to a clash with other heroes.Believing he knows
who kidnapped him, Doc Magus falsely leads the other heroes to Doctor
Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum only to be confronted by a Loki-controlled
and enraged Hulk who makes short work of the assembled heroes
indiscriminately. Upon finding Doctor Strange in a coma, Dormagus
is unable to detect Loki’s handiwork thanks to the dark spell’s effect (Last
Hero Standing #3-#4)
Thanks to the arrival of Thor
and a small team of heroes led by Captain
America, as well as the Grand Vizier of Asgard Eternal, Loki’s
bewitchment is revealed and the day is saved, albeit at the cost of Captain
America’s life. Doc Magus is among those who witness the hero’s
passing and his spirit’s transformation into a new star by Thor (Last
Hero Standing #5).
Doc Magus briefly encounters Spider-Girl while
trying to find the source of enormous discharges of psychic energy which are
tampering with the astral plane. While he senses a connection to Spider-Girl’s
search for a kidnapper, she fails to see how it’s possible. Later, Doc Magus
is among the massive assembly of heroes who show up to aid Spider-Girl
in her endeavour (Amazing Spider-Girl #15).
Finally, we have the cameo in Doctor Strange and the
Sorcerers Supreme #12 mentioned at the start of this post, which brings us
full circle for appearances of the young Dormagus. Doc Magus is a
very fun and often arrogant character who tends to get himself into more
trouble as a result of his hubris. As I mentioned above, I will likely delve
into other aspects related to Dormagus in future posts.
Until I suddenly win the favour of the Vishanti and
become the new Sorcerer Supreme, I remain
frogoat