hunter rider said:
The villiany of Doctor Doom,Stan Lee and John Byrne
Dang! I got knocked out of this forum three times trying to answer this!!!
I actually got this as a birthday present when it came out. Even though I have the back issues, I am starting to collect a lot of trades. (*getting into my geek bag *) I hate having to go through my long boxes and unbag the issues I want to reference again. This is a seminal collection of stories, starting with the Doom origin from FF Annual #2, FF #39-40 guest starring Daredevil and the last Doom storyline that Lee and Kirby did in FF#84-87. Jack became a big fan of Patrick McGoohan's "The Prisoner" and he takes some of his ideas about Latveria from the show. The Byrne stories are from FF#246-247 and recounts how Doom gets the FF to help him regain the throne of Latveria after recovering from his severe mental meltdown in FF#200. This would be a good selection.
hunter rider said:
By Chuck Dixon and Leonardo manco
This is a tough call. This contains two mini-series that were printed about a year or so apart. The first tells what happens to Doom after he is exiled, naked, back to Franklin's Heroes Reborn planet after helping Reed defeat the Dreaming Celestial in FF#25. I like that Dixon focuses on showing us why Doom is such a formidable force in the MU even without the armor. His opponents, the Atlans are interesting as is the slave trader that captures him in the beginning. But I get the feeling that the story is a bit rushed.
The second set of stories is more uneven and has Doom back on the HR planet trying to bring order to the chaotic nature of the planet. The first issue and a half are terrific but goes downhill when Doom tries to cross the Negative Zone as a shortcut back to Earth Prime. He runs afoul of a devilish Franklin Avatar and the weird throwback pilgrims led by Hellscout. A mixed bag all in all but I do love the scene where Doom coerces Franklin into turning over control of the reality engine. He is at once wickedly persuasive and yet strangely more human that he is during Mark Waid's FF.
hunter rider said:
there's another one called Avengers:emperors Doom by David Micheline
and one called Iron man vs Doom from the same guy
plus a crossover with doctor strange called Triumph and torment by roger stern
The Micheline stories from the Iron Man title are a lot of fun and makes me wish that Marvel's most famed armored characters would bump into each other more often. There was a brief meeting between the two during the recent Avengers before Bendis took over but not much since. The Iron Man stories are neat time travel tales. The first takes place in the past, putting both in the court of King Arthur while the second takes place about 100 years in the future. Their original plan was to have yet a third time travel tale but it never came to pass.
By all means, you should find a copy (most like second hand on eBay since it is long out of print) of Roger Stern's Doctor Strange/Doctor Doom: Triumph and Torment. This is probably the best Doom story ever IMO. A surprisingly sympathetic portrayal yet it does not compromise his status as Marvel's most feared supervillain.
A while back on another FF MB, I wrote a little essay a couple of years ago on the story from the first Doom solo series that served as the inspiration for Roger Stern's graphic novel. If you click on the link, be warned that I am just as long-winded there as I can be here! This story, called "Though Some May Call it Magic" is also collected in Marvel Essentials: Super-Villain Team-Up, another fun TPB you may want to get since it features Doom's solo series in Astonishing Tales and SVTU, plus a few bonus stories.
http://www.comicboards.com/fantasticfour/view.php?trd=020324151622