I'm Convinced 2025 Is the Perfect Time for Marvel's Most Underrated Supervillain to Return

With Doctor Doom taking over the Marvel Universe in 2025 in the massive event One World Under Doom, it’s the perfect time for the return of Lucia von Bardas, Latveria’s other supervillain leader who played a major role in another Marvel event: Secret War by Brian Michael Bendis and Gabriele Dell'Otto.

In the more recent event Blood Hunt by Jed MacKay and Pepe Larraz, Doctor Strange gave his title as Sorcerer Supreme to Doctor Doom, believing Doom would return it. Doom, of course, reneges on his deal. The upcoming line-wide status quo One World Under Doom will see Doom claim the entire world as an extension of Latveria, so I have to ask: why not bring back the only other major character with a claim to the throne?

Lucia von Bardas Needs to Make a Return During One World Under Doom

Especially If Latveria and Doctor Doom Are Becoming Worldwide Problems

Von Bardas first appears in Secret War as the ruler of Latveria during a time when Doctor Doom is temporarily deposed. Nick Fury discovers that Von Bardas is financing supervillain terrorism in the United States, but the U.S. government is supporting her regime and so refuses to let Fury do anything. In response, Fury attempts to kill her in a black ops mission that goes horribly wrong, with Von Bardas surviving as a revenge-bent cyborg. Von Bardas has since appeared a handful of times, mostly as a villain and almost always angling to take back control of Latveria, but she’s criminally underused.

One of the best comparisons to One World Under Doom is Dark Reign, the 2008 status quo where Norman Osborn took over the U.S. in everything but name, an event that I genuinely love. Part of what made this status quo so successful is how it felt grounded and ever-present across the line in a way that a lot of superhero stories don’t. One World Under Doom needs to do the same thing, and that means talking politics. If Doom is invading the world, what are preexisting governments going to do about it? I'd be sorely disappointed if One World were only focused on the superheroics to the detriment of the fictional politics.

What Could Lucia von Bardas Bring to Marvel's New Status Quo?

One World Under Doom Offers Interesting Story Possibilities

Adding Von Bardas back into the mix has the potential to alleviate this issue. Sure, she’s a maniacal cyborg, but seeing someone with concrete ties to Latveria thrown into the mix could make the overall premise feel much more believable. Maybe the U.S. could even support her again. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, even if my friend has financed international terrorism. This twist would also help Marvel avoid telling a story where the U.S. is framed as a moral good on the international stage, a statement that’s hardly ever been true throughout history.

Something else that Von Bardas’ sporadic biography illustrates is that the success of any one character often rests on singular creators. The vast majority of Von Bardas' appearances are written by her co-creator, Bendis. It’s not like Bendis has some sort of monopoly over the character; he’s just the person most likely to use or think of her for a story, and he’s not currently active in the Marvel sandbox. I'm arguing for the return of Von Bardas, but how many creators even remember her?

One World Under Doom Is Set to Be a Thrilling Line-Wide Event

Marvel's Got Superstars on the Job

It's lucky then that One World Under Doom is being helmed in part by Ryan North, who’s writing the miniseries Rise of Emperor Doom, and MacKay, who wrote Blood Hunt. There are few other current writers who I’d trust more to remember obscure characters like Von Bardas. MacKay in particular built his name on writing B-tier Marvel characters, including obscure villains. Then there’s editorial - as much as some fans love to lambast Big Two editors, part of editorial’s role is to remember obscure continuity and suggest characters for writers to use.

Related

Doctor Doom Rules the Marvel Universe Once Again in ONE WORLD UNDER DOOM

Following the conclusion of Blood Hunt, Marvel Universe will submit to the will of the new Sorcerer Supreme, Doctor Doom, in One World Under Doom.

What works best about characters like Von Bardas is how they build out the fictional worlds they live in. 99% of the time, the only Latverian character that Marvel uses is Doctor Doom, and no matter how great Doom is, he’s still in some ways a hodgepodge of Eastern European stereotypes. Von Bardas was a supervillain in her first appearance, but if Secret War didn’t happen, then she might have been a legitimate modern politician for the Marvel Universe. Maybe she still can be. Just because she’s a cyborg doesn’t mean she has to be a supervillain.

How Long Will Doctor Doom's Worldwide Rule Last in Marvel's New Status Quo?

And Will Lucia von Bardas Have a Role to Play?

The question then is whether the status quo will have room for Lucia von Bardas or even last long enough to get to that depth. Dark Reign lasted through all of 2009, but a long-term status quo change is hard to maintain. It requires many different books to engage with the given premise and then to feel "real," but it also runs the risk of disrupting ongoing stories in said books. It’s a delicate balancing act, and one that’s not always gone perfectly. Luckily, if Marvel Comics has a North Star of characters that writers seem to love, it’s Doctor Doom, and an event in his name is always promising.

The Rise of Emperor Doom #1 is available February 12th, 2025 from Marvel Comics.