Line #45 ComicBook/DoctorZero


1	[[quoteright:350:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/aa999d02_792d_44b8_8469_905d0a504bac.jpeg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:350:"Can we stop him from saving the world?"]]
3	''Doctor Zero'' is a superhero comic book series published by the Creator/EpicComics imprint of Creator/MarvelComics.
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5	It's part of the ComicBook/{{Shadowline}} shared universe, set in a world where a second, hidden race - the Shadow Dwellers - evolved alongside humanity. Individually, Shadow Dwellers are more powerful than humans, but humans vastly outnumber them and so they've tended to stay hidden. Until now.
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7	The being calling himself Doctor Zero is the most powerful of the Shadow Dwellers, and he's just made his public debut as the world's first superhero. However, his motives are not be as benevolent as they seem - and, when out of the public eye, his methods are cynical and manipulative.
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9	Doctor Zero wants world peace. He wants to keep the UsefulNotes/ColdWar cool and stop humanity destroying itself. And he's prepared to do many things to achieve that goal. Not because he loves humanity, but just because - at least for the moment - he's sharing the planet too.
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11	The first issue was released February 16, 1988. The last issue (#8) was released April 18, 1989.
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13	After the series was cancelled, Doctor Zero's story continued in [[ComicBook/CriticalMassShadowline Critical Mass]], an AnthologyComic combining the previous three Shadowline titles.
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15	----
16	!!''Doctor Zero'' includes the following tropes:
17	* AllInTheManual: The in-house promotions state that Doctor Zero is the most powerful of the Shadow Dwellers, something that's not directly stated in the comic itself.
18	* AssassinOutclassin: Doctor Zero is on the receiving end when he first tries to kill Dr Clerk, a mere human. His energy powers are countered by a chemical spray, he's hit with an electric shock and his [[OnlyMostlyDead lifeless body]]'s dumped in the arctic snow.
19	* BadPeopleAbuseAnimals: A flashback shows Clerk, as a child, launching Snowball the cat inside a small rocket. He's listening to its panicked yowling over the radio right up until the moment the rocket detonates. Clerk later claims this was purely ForScience, not because Snowball scratched him, but doesn't seem entirely plausible.
20	* {{Bookends}}: ''"Things of Fire and Smoke"'' starts with Doctor Zero rescuing two American space program workers from an accident that would have killed them when a rocket's engines fired. It ends with Doctor Zero leaving an injured Marid to die in the flames when another rocket takes off.
21	* ByronicHero: The immortal Doctor Zero himself falls into this category. He's intelligent, manipulative and scornful of others' ethics or authority. At times he's very much a VillainProtagonist or WellIntentionedExtremist, but he also seems to genuinely care for people, even if he keeps most at arm's length. If it wasn't for his narration he would be a very enigmatic figure, though.
22	* CapeSnag: Defied. When the Merchants lure Doctor Zero onto the submarine Leviathan he removes his usual cape as soon as he realises he'll be fighting in a cramped environment.
23	* ChuteSabotage: After [[spoiler:[[http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix7/preecit-major-merchants-shadowline.html Major Preecit]] deserts the Merchants and tries to flee to South Africa, Doctor Zero intercepts the jet fighter she's flying. When she uses the ejector seat, he follows her down and snaps the parachute's suspension lines]].
24	* ComicBookTime: Averted. Specific dates are given for some events, with the first issue's air raid on Libya occurring on 15 April 1986.
25	* ContinuityNod:
26	** When Doctor Zero visits UsefulNotes/{{Guyana}} in the first issue, a newspaper on the plane shows a picture of "Ravenscore & friend" in a drug lord story. The Ravenscores are the Shadow family who act as the BigBad for sister title ''ComicBook/PowerLine''. Later issues make it clear that Doctor Zero knows exactly who they are.
27	** The Merchants are studying Power Line as well as Doctor Zero himself.
28	** General Retler, commander of the Merchants, is getting information from the Father Abbot of the Order of ComicBook/StGeorge.
29	** Shreck is seeking permission to deal with the latest knight of ''ComicBook/StGeorge'', saying that this falls under Doctor Zero's authority.
30	** The rocket Marid is tampering with at the US space program is based on a Henry Clerk design.
31	* CruelMercy: Rather than killing MadScientist Henry Clerk, Doctor Zero protects him from the nuclear explosion he triggered at the Toy Factory and then uses his mental powers to destroy Clerk's genius. He's left as a dull-witted fast food chef at "Stop & Stuff”.
32	* DoomsdayDevice: Dr Henry Clerk has created a modified nuclear bomb which, he believes, will trigger a world-destroying chain reaction via the Nitrogen in the atmosphere. He's going to detonate it just to prove it works. ForScience
33	* EnclosedSpace: The immortal Marid is unable to leave Earth under his own power, as his body can’t escape its energy field. His plan is to escape on a rocket instead.
34	* EvilCounterpart: Marid and Doctor Zero share the same aim - they want to escape the Earth into space, to get away from mortal humans - and are both prepared to kill people to make this happen. But they have different timescales and plans for it, and end up fighting to the death when Marid's reckless scheme might plunge the world into war.
35	* ForScience: Dr Clerk's motivation for creating a world-destroying bomb is seemingly that he likes nuclear explosions, he likes killing people, and he wants to prove that he can correct the 'mistakes' that stopped the original atom bomb triggering an apocalyptic chain reaction.
36	* FunWithAcronyms: Downplayed, but the '''M'''ilitary '''R'''esponse and '''C'''overt '''T'''echniques '''S'''quadron is better known as the Merchants.
37	* HeroicDolphin: After Doctor Zero is left for dead by Clerk and ends up in the sea, dolphins bring him to Sheila.
38	* HistoricalRapSheet: Anubis was responsible for the Black Death sweeping Europe. From his perspective, it was apparently the best time of his life.
39	* HoistByHisOwnPetard: Marid's found a way to integrate with computers, infiltrating systems as a virus. But this connection also means that Shreck can use a programmer's skills to affect him via the computer, shocking him out of his SuperSmoke form and letting Doctor Zero deliver some LaserGuidedKarma.
40	* {{Immortality}}: Shadow Dwellers such as Marid, Anubis and Doctor Zero himself are immortal and unaging, but at least some of them can be killed if you try hard enough.
41	* JackassGenie: Marid is a Shadow Dweller with the powers of a genie, although most of his gifts are just illusion. He uses his abilities malevolently when humans make wishes.
42	* LaserGuidedAmnesia: Doctor Zero is fond of using this to edit people's memories. The branding team who designed the Doctor Zero superhero costume and persona for him immediately forgot their involvement.
43	* LaserGuidedKarma: Marid, a JerkassGenie who kills his victims by fire, ends up incinerated under a rocket's exhaust flames at take-off.
44	* MadScientist:
45	** [[http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix/clerkhsl.htm Dr. Henry Edward Clerk]], who's very fond of nuclear explosions, murder, and murder via explosions. He's also smart enough to analyse Doctor Zero's powers from circumstantial evidence and design countermeasures. Clerk would quite happily destroy himself along with the world, if he could, purely ForScience
46	** [[http://www.marvunapp.com/Appendix9/anubis-88194.html Anubis]], aka Soviet biological weapons researcher Corporal Anubich. His Shadow abilities make him a PlagueMaster who's immune to the diseases he absorbs and spreads, but he's very keen to design new and better plagues to kill the humans.
47	* MasterOfIllusion: Marid is a murderous JackassGenie who grants wishes with illusions.
48	* MayflyDecemberRomance: Doctor Zero and Sheila. She's a normal human, he's [[TimeAbyss older than the human race]].
49	* MindControl: Doctor Zero has some level of this, over and above the ability to induce LaserGuidedAmnesia. It sometimes seems to cause permanent damage to his target's mind, though.
50	* MolotovTruck: Doctor Zero assists William Belluts with his plan to drive a truck bomb into a US government SDI facility, in revenge for the way they closed down the previous factory on the site and left some workers redundant and in poverty.
51	* NobleDemon: Doctor Zero himself seems to fall into this category. He's quite prepared to kill innocents, directly or indirectly, but does have some sort of moral code.
52	* NoNameGiven: The Doctor Zero persona is a new invention and neither humans nor Shadows who know him refer to "Zero" by any other name, although Marid calls him "old one". Not even Sheila calls him by name.
53	* OnlyMostlyDead: Doctor Zero is left in this state after Clerk's initial attempt to kill him, and again after the Merchants trap him on a scuttled submarine. He gets better.
54	* PlagueMaster: Anubis is a Shadow who absorbs and spreads diseases. He's the inspiration for the Egyptian deity and his contagions are one of the reasons the Egyptians started mummifying their dead. He's also at least partly responsible for the Black Death sweeping Europe.
55	* PlayingWithFire: Marid has some fire powers, although they seem limited to killing those who he lures into making wishes via his JackassGenie powers. The third wish always ends in death by fire.
56	* RenegadeRussian: Corporal Anubich plays this role, although he's actually far older than Russia. KGB Colonel Gerasimov works with Doctor Zero to hunt him down.
57	* SapientCetaceans: Doctor Zero talks with dolphins, and seems to consider them a better species than humans. He's offered to take them with him when he finally leaves the planet.
58	* SealedEvilInACan: The Merchants manage to leave Doctor Zero himself in this state, unconscious on the scuttled nuclear submarine Leviathan, which has crumpled and flooded thousands of feet below the surface. His narration before he passes out suggests that he's expecting to be down there for a long time. [[spoiler:Unfortunately, they just can't resist retrieving the wreck to analyse what's left of him]].
59	* ShowWithinAShow: One data page features a TV schedule listing including a ''Doctor Zero'' movie based on the previous issue's battle with Anubis. The jokey tone and inclusion of information that's not public suggests it's not supposed to be taken as canon, though.
60	* SueDonym: The Soviet biological warfare researcher Corporal Anubich is actually the Egyptian god Anubis. Or, rather, the Shadow who inspired those myths.
61	* SuperheroesWearCapes: An invoked trope. Doctor Zero is an identity crafted by branding and marketing consultants. He wears a cape because it helps to reinforce his desired image as a superhero.
62	* SuperSmoke: Marid can shift into an intangible smoke form.
63	* SyntheticPlague: The Taymyr Facility's created an incurable cryptosporidium variant that affects humans. It'll cause victims' intestines to rupture and burst their skin. And then it'll go airborne. Anubis, aka Corporal Anubich, is ''very'' proud of it.
64	* TakeThat: One issue's data page is a jokey ShowWithinAShow TV listing with a ''Doctor Zero'' film (based on the previous issue's plot) prominently listed. It also includes a listing for ''Series/StarTrekTheNextGeneration'' that explains how Picard "looks on uselessly" while Wesley Crusher saves the day.
65	* TelephoneTeleport: A variation. Marid has adapted his JerkassGenie abilities to work through computers, manifesting as a virus, and can travel through them as well.
66	* TimeAbyss: Doctor Zero is far older than humanity, old enough to remember the continents shifting, and possibly as old as life on Earth. Anubis is at least four or five thousand years old, so may also fall into this category.
67	* VampiricDraining: Doctor Zero can steal LifeEnergy from others. He doesn't seem to need it for his immortality, but it does speed healing and fuel his powers.
68	* VillainProtagonist: Doctor Zero is never far away from this, but his ByronicHero nature means he's sometimes in shades of grey instead.
69	* WoundedGazelleGambit: The Merchants lure Doctor Zero onto a nuclear submarine by using a fake distress call, claiming that there’s been a reactor failure.
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Context ComicBook / DoctorZero