Doctor Doom is known in the Marvel Universe as many things, whether that's the ruler of the nation of Latveria or as the Fantastic Four's greatest foe. However, much like his nemesis Reed Richards/Mr. Fantastic, Doom is a brilliant scientist who has created some truly amazing inventions over the years.
Of course, as Doctor Doom is one of the biggest villains in the Marvel Universe, most of those inventions are doomsday weapons or devices created to give Doom more power, and more often than not, these devices either nearly succeed or backfire and put the world in great danger. So today we are going to explore a few of Doom's best inventions, and a few that were almost catastrophic.
10 BEST: DOOM'S ARMOR
After Doctor Doom was horribly scarred during a failed experiment (more on that soon), he retreated to the mountains of Tibet, where a suit of armor was forged for him by monks. The armor has been redesigned and upgraded many times over the years and contains a number of secret weapons and defenses.
While Doom's armor may not appear as visually sophisticated as Iron Man's armor, it contains highly-advanced technology that keeps it on par with Stark's tech while including other mystical enchantments to give him the magical advantage as well.
9 CATASTROPHIC: COSMIC POWER SIPHON HARNESS
Some of Doom's inventions tend to re-appear frequently to cause new problems in the Marvel Universe, much like the Cosmic Power Siphon Harness after its first appearance in Fantastic Four #57. Doom first used the device after inviting the Silver Surfer to his castle in Latveria.
After distracting the Surfer, Doom was outfitted in the harness which drained the Power Cosmic from the Surfer and gave it to Doom, though Doom would lose the power attempting to break the Surfer's exile to Earth. The harness would be used again with overpowered characters like Galactus and Hyperstorm to drain off some of their energy.
8 BEST: BIO-ENHANCER
The healing device known as the Bio-Enhancer appeared in 1987's Fantastic Four vs. X-Men, following a battle between the two teams that left Storm's arm severely burned by the Human Torch. The X-Men were hoping to seek help from Reed Richards in order to save Kitty Pryde, though it was Doctor Doom who ended up offering his services to the team.
Doom used the Bio-Enhancer to heal Storm of her injuries within a short span, and Redd and Doom together cured Kitty with another method. The Bio-Enhancer is the perfect example of the good Doom could bring to the world with his inventions, though they remain locked away in his castle.
7 CATASTROPHIC: PRIME MOVER
Even some of Doom's casual inventions he created for entertainment had the potential to destroy the world, as we learned in the pages of Giant-Size Defenders #3. Doom had previously created a strategy machine called Prime Mover that essentially played a dangerous game of chess to toy with Nick Fury and S.H.I.E.L.D. before Doom grew bored of their "game."
However, Prime Mover reprogrammed itself after Doom abandoned it and sought out a new game to play. After leaving Earth it encountered the Grandmaster and wagered the Earth in a Contest of Champions. Thankfully Prime Mover's champions (Korvac and aliens from the future) failed to defeat the Defenders (and Daredevil), and Earth was spared.
6 BEST: AFTERLIFE TRANSPORTER
While the invention known as the Afterlife Transporter is often credited to Reed Richards, the idea and the design was actually initially from Victor Von Doom, and Reed only enhanced it to take his team to Heaven in order to save Ben Grimm's soul.
Doom's original intention with his dimensional astral projection machine was to contact his mother, who had lost her soul to the demon Mephisto. The device would famously blow up and disfigure Doom, but Reed managed to fix the machine and enter Heaven, where he met God (Jack Kirby) and brought Thing back to life thanks to the work of Doctor Doom.
5 CATASTROPHIC: PSYCHO-PRISM
Doctor Doom has often attempted to take over the world using brainwashing or mind-control techniques on a global scale, though it was with his creation of the Psycho-Prism that he actually succeeded. The Psycho-Prism amplified the mind-control abilities of Zebediah Killgrave/Purple Man, who Doom had kidnapped and imprisoned inside the device.
Doom managed to take control of the entire world for a whole month, and he was only defeated due to an experiment Tony Stark was conducting with Wonder Man which had him locked away for that month. Wonder Man's physiology was able to fight off the mind-control and assembled a team of heroes, who Doom allowed to destroy the Prism as he was unsatisfied with his victory.
4 BEST: TIME PLATFORM
While we've learned from various comic sources (Barry) that tampering with the timeline can be incredibly hazardous, we still think Doctor Doom's invention goes in the best list, mainly due to its frequent use by the heroes of the Marvel Universe to correct any time-related incident that develops.
Aside from a few mishaps through time after the creation of the Time Platform, Doctor Doom has acted relatively responsible with such awesome power, likely due to his own intelligence level and understanding of the ramifications of time travel.
3 CATASTROPHIC: SYMBIOTE BOMB
As we learned during Mighty Avengers' lead-up to Secret Invasion, not all of Doctor Doom's world-ending inventions were purposefully unleashed on the world. After colliding with space debris, one of Doom's satellites accidentally released something that fell to New York City, releasing something into the air.
The population was quickly taken over by what appeared to be Venom symbiotes, and as the Avengers investigated a number of them were also taken over by the viral symbiote infection. Iron Man was able to create a vaccine and managed to track back the creation of the Symbiote Bomb to Doom, who hadn't yet planned to unleash what would have been a very effective weapon.
2 BEST: BIG BANG CANNONS
One of the more recent inventions of Doom's was seen in Dan Slott and Aaron Kuder's latest volume of Fantastic Four, which introduced the Herald of Doom Victorious as Galactus, Devourer of Worlds, arrived on Earth and headed for Latveria.
This was all according to Doom's plan, as he unleashed hidden Big Bang Cannons that actually managed to drop Galactus. These weapons were singularity disruptors, described by Reed Richards as to have "weaponized the building blocks of the universe," and they attacked Galactus' subatomic structure, weakening him enough to be dropped by Victorious.
1 CATASTROPHIC: VIBRANIUM ARMOR
Doctor Doom's greatest nemesis is Reed Richards of the Fantastic Four, but he has formed rivalries with many other heroes over the years, including Black Panther. During the Doomwar miniseries, Doom manages to usurp control of Wakanda and take over its reserves of Vibranium so he could study the unique mystical and technological aspects of the rare aspects.
Using this information, Doom created an armor that allowed him to connect with every particle of Vibranium that had been spread across the planet, which he then was able to control and manipulate to bring the world to its knees. Black Panther was forced to render Vibranium inert in order to stop Doom's global takeover.