After a successful try-out run, Doctor Strange was granted a new solo series written by Steve Englehart with art by Frank Brunner on the first story arc and Gene Colan on the second. These early issues focus on Strange’s deepening relationship with the extradimensional pixie Clea and see them acting as full partners for the first time in mystical odysseys that resemble the psychedelic acid trips they were no doubt based on. Concurrently, Strange had more standard superhero adventures in The Defenders and the quarterly Giant-Size Defenders as well as both of Marvel’s team-up books, with writing chores shared between Len Wein and Steve Gerber. These overstuffed punch-ups drew the new Sorcerer Supreme out of his usual ambit but added little to his characterization. It was in his own book that Doctor Strange dealt with philosophical issues of identity, religion, life, death, and resurrection, leaving a legacy of landmark issues still celebrated decades later.
Note: The following timeline depicts the Original Marvel Universe (anchored to November 1961 as the first appearance of the Fantastic Four and proceeding forward from there. See previous posts for a detailed explanation of my rationale.) Some information presented on the timeline is speculative and some is based on historical accounts. See the Notes section at the end for clarifications.
We now continue... The True History of Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme!
January 1967 – Following their encounter with the 31st-century sorcerer Sise-Neg, Doctor Strange takes the utterly stupefied Baron Mordo back to the Sanctum Sanctorum in New York’s Greenwich Village. There, Strange’s disciple and lover, Clea, his faithful manservant, Wong, and his semi-permanent houseguest and Defenders teammate, the Valkyrie, are glad to see he has returned safely. In one of the mansion’s guest rooms, Strange tries to revive Mordo but is unable to bring him out of his catatonic state. Realizing the experience with Sise-Neg was too much for Mordo to bear, Strange decides to focus on just keeping his old rival alive until his mind can heal itself.
Doctor Strange’s studies are interrupted one night by Spider-Man, who appears to have gone mad. Catching the sorcerer off-guard, Spider-Man manages to knock him unconscious. When he comes to, Strange discovers that the web-slinger has stolen a magical artifact, the Crystal of Kadavus. Tracking the crystal’s mystical emanations to a dilapidated brownstone on the city’s west side, Strange finds Spider-Man there with the wizard Xandu, whom they battled together some three and a half years ago. Using the Wand of Watoomb, Xandu whisks them off to another dimension, where he demonstrates his might by turning his prisoners into living marionettes. However, when Xandu boasts of his spell that prevents the two heroes from using their powers against him while in that dimension, Strange sees an opportunity. He weaves a counter-spell that enables them to use each other’s powers instead. Thus, while Spider-Man, now back in his right mind, staggers Xandu with bolts of eldritch energy, Doctor Strange covers the villain in webbing and punches him in the face. Strange leaves the Wand of Watoomb adrift in that nameless dimension as he teleports everyone back to Earth, materializing in their foe’s shabby lair. Xandu is distraught over losing the Wand of Watoomb since he mainly wanted it to rouse his fiancée, Melinda, from a deathlike sleep he accidentally placed her in while practicing spells many years ago. Sympathetic, Strange offers to help, but his mystical analysis of Melinda reveals her to be truly dead—Xandu’s spell has merely preserved her body. When he learns that he actually killed his lover all those years ago, Xandu suffers a complete emotional breakdown. Having retrieved the Crystal of Kadavus, Doctor Strange and Spider-Man make a discreet exit.
Feeling playful, Clea proposes to report on her progress in the mystic arts one evening but merely conjures a white rabbit from a top hat while saying “abracadabra.” Doctor Strange is amused and suggests the Vishanti are notorious for their card tricks. After they’ve spent some time having sex, Strange decides to get some sleep and, leaving Clea to play with her rabbit, retires to his bedroom, where he levitates in the lotus position within the magical Mists of Morpheus. Suddenly, he is stabbed in the back with an enchanted dagger and collapses to the floor in agony. About an hour later, Wong enters and finds him barely conscious. Wong reports that the assassin kidnapped Clea and stole the Amulet of Agamotto. Distressed, Strange has Wong bring in his large crystal ball, the Orb of Agamotto, whereupon he is able to cast a spell that stops him from immediately bleeding to death, though he has still suffered a mortal wound. He then tries to locate Clea in the crystal ball and learns that she is chained up in a basement with the assassin demanding that she renounce sorcery. Realizing they are being observed, the assassin attacks Strange through the Orb of Agamotto. Tentacles erupt from the crystal and grab Strange, and he instantly recognizes the spell as a work of necromancy. Despite his efforts to resist, Strange is pulled through the crystal into another dimension.
Finding himself in a bizarre landscape, Strange comes upon a giant caterpillar smoking a hookah atop an oversized mushroom. The caterpillar informs Strange, in its own elliptical way, that the assassin, known as Silver Dagger, has trapped him within the Orb for all time. Strange refuses to accept this, declaring that he is the Sorcerer Supreme and nothing will stop him from rescuing Clea. Impressed by the sorcerer’s resolve, the caterpillar suggests he try to find his way to the center of the Orb, where there may be a means to return to Earth. However, the enigmatic being warns, he would then find himself right back where he started—moments away from an agonizing death. Undaunted, Strange soars off, carried by his Cloak of Levitation, only to quickly become hopelessly lost. Along the way, Strange encounters horrific monsters as well as twisted doppelgängers of his friends and associates, such as the Valkyrie, the Hulk, the Sub-Mariner, the Silver Surfer, Spider-Man, and others, and thereby learns that everything he is experiencing within the Orb is shaped by his own subconscious mind. The true foe he must face at the center of the Orb, he realizes, is Death itself. A duplicate of the Valkyrie’s winged horse, Aragorn, then takes him where he needs to go, allowing Strange to focus on overcoming Death’s attempts to demoralize him. When they finally encounter Death’s immense, skull-like visage, the pseudo-Aragorn is destroyed instantly. Strange, however, rejects the very notion that Death holds sway over the Sorcerer Supreme. Death shrugs off Strange’s magical attacks, saying he can’t fight a universal law—everything dies. Strange decides to retreat and soon comes across a void in the distinctive shape of Eternity. He takes refuge within the void, remembering that not every lifeform in the universe is mortal. Though Death tries again to dishearten Strange, the sorcerer declares that they’ve reached a stalemate so long as he remains within Eternity’s void. Soon, though, Strange realizes he’s running out of options—his strength is finite while Death can generate no end of perils. If he cannot attack or escape, he reasons, his only other choice would seem to be to surrender. Recalling everything the Ancient One taught him about death and dying, he works through his fear in the face of the inevitable, slowly filling the void as he does so. When he’s ready for the end, he emerges from the void and opens himself to Death’s touch. At that instant, Doctor Stephen Strange dies.
There is a sudden rushing sensation as the universe seems to fall away, leaving Strange floating in the resultant nothingness. The face of the Ancient One then materializes and congratulates him on passing the first of a series of trials that he must undergo as Sorcerer Supreme. By overcoming the deep-seated fear of death, Strange will be reborn on the physical plane in a form “touched by eternity”—manifested by a mystical ankh that will appear from time to time on his forehead. Though he may never die of natural causes, the Ancient One warns, Strange could still be killed in battle, and so he must remain ever vigilant. The Ancient One then tells Strange that, if he passes his remaining trials and lives well, he will eventually follow him in becoming one with all there is. Barely able to process what has just happened to him, Strange admits to feeling a bit different as it dawns on him that he will never get any older than his current age of 54. As the beatific image of the Ancient One fades away, Strange suddenly finds himself transported back to Earth.
Still attuned to the higher dimensions of the universe, Strange is disoriented as his astral form emerges from the Amulet of Agamotto in the abandoned subway station that Silver Dagger has made into his lair. He searches frantically for his physical body, but his distorted perceptions cause him to briefly animate a headless mannequin dressed in his sorcerer’s garb. The figure collapses into a heap, but Strange senses Clea’s presence and takes refuge within her mind, where he is able to reconstruct a coherent conception of reality. At the same time, he perceives how Silver Dagger invaded the Sanctum Sanctorum a few days ago by causing Clea’s rabbit to grow to gigantic proportions and crash through the window to escape the building. Taking Clea by surprise, Silver Dagger mesmerized her, beat up Wong, and then stabbed Strange in the back. He then kidnapped Clea and, revealing that he was formerly a cardinal at the Vatican, has been trying to “deprogram” her in order to save her soul from eternal damnation. When Silver Dagger enters the room, Clea uses Strange’s knowledge of sorcery to escape and, finding herself in Chelsea, runs the several blocks to the Sanctum Sanctorum in Greenwich Village. Once there, Wong leads her to Strange’s physical body, which emerged from the Orb of Agamotto healed of its mortal wound, and Strange then reunites his corporeal and noncorporeal selves.
Moments later, Silver Dagger again invades the building and tries to defeat Strange using the Amulet of Agamotto. Together, Strange and Clea cast a spell that turns the amulet’s power back upon Silver Dagger, forcing him to face the truth that his understanding of magic is too limited and his murderous crusade is therefore misguided. In despair, Silver Dagger is sucked into the Orb to take Strange’s place as companion to the hookah-smoking caterpillar. Strange assures Clea that Silver Dagger lacks the skill to escape such a predicament. Returning to his meditations, Strange contemplates his realization that the caterpillar was in fact a manifestation of Agamotto, one of the “holy trinity” of the eternal Vishanti.
February–April 1967 – Doctor Strange and Clea focus on building her mastery of the mystic arts, as they discover that her merger with his consciousness has made it easier for her to wield the magical energies of Earth’s dimension.
May 1967 – Nighthawk returns to the Sanctum Sanctorum, sporting a new-and-improved costume, and announces that he is at last ready to take his place among the Defenders. Doctor Strange and Valkyrie give him a tour of their residence, but they are interrupted by the astral form of Charles Xavier, whom Strange met four years ago at the wedding of Mister Fantastic and the Invisible Girl. Strange uses the Amulet of Agamotto to make Xavier’s astral form visible to his teammates so they can join in the conversation. Xavier explains that he is seeking help against the mutant super-villain Magneto, as those who would normally aid him with such matters are off on a secret mission. The Defenders are happy to assist, so Strange sends out a psychic projection to locate the Hulk before transporting the team to Carlsbad Caverns in New Mexico, where Xavier is waiting. Hulk arrives a few minutes later, whereupon they all enter the caverns. Within moments, they are ambushed by a seemingly invincible cyclops, but Xavier reveals the monster to be merely an illusion. However, they are all knocked unconscious by a blast of energy, and when they wake up, they find themselves trapped within a field of magnetic force. Flanked by his Brotherhood of Evil Mutants—the Blob, Mastermind, Unus the Untouchable, and Lorelei—Magneto rants and raves about a humanoid figure forming in a tank of chemicals behind him. He tells the Defenders a preposterous story of being trapped at the center of the earth by the Avengers until, several months later, a passing comet shifted the planet’s magnetic fields enough that he could make his way to Subterranea, where he translated books left behind by ancient aliens and thus learned the secret of genetically engineering a being powerful enough to enable him to conquer the world. When the villains return to their diabolical scheme, Xavier reveals himself to be a powerful telepath and harnesses the Defenders’ combined psychic energy to disrupt the field imprisoning them. They quickly defeat Magneto’s minions but are unable to prevent him from bringing his new creation to life. Gleefully, Magneto dubs the giant, brutish creature “Alpha, the Ultimate Mutant.”
Doctor Strange attempts to incapacitate Alpha with blasts of mystical energy, but Alpha erects a force field to protect himself, a field potent enough to repel the Hulk as well. Magneto then causes part of the cavern to collapse, trapping everyone underground, only to have Alpha teleport the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants away. Hulk and Valkyrie dig an escape tunnel, and the Defenders slowly make their way to the surface. Once there, Xavier does a telepathic scan to locate their foes, and after a few minutes of intense concentration, he finds them in New York City. Strange conjures up a portal through which the five heroes return to Manhattan. They are astonished to see the United Nations Building floating about half a mile above the city, presumably more of Alpha’s handiwork. Flying up to the building, the Defenders and Xavier fight their way past concrete automatons and confront Magneto and his minions in the general assembly chamber, where they are holding the assembled delegates prisoner. The heroes are surprised to see that Alpha has changed, having developed heightened intelligence and a less brutish appearance. He seems to visibly evolve every time he uses his powers and quickly surpasses mainstream humanity to take on a superior form. Noting Alpha’s reluctance to harm the Defenders, Xavier convinces him to judge for himself which of the two groups acts out of evil intent. Alpha does so, reading everyone’s innermost thoughts and motivations, and then condemns Magneto’s group as being little more than selfish children. The heroes are shocked when Alpha unleashes a beam of psychic energy that reduces Magneto, the Blob, Mastermind, Unus, and Lorelei to the equivalent of nine-month-old babies. Alpha then undoes the damage he caused to the United Nations Building and erases all memory of the traumatic event from the minds of the people affected by it. Continuing to evolve, Alpha bids farewell to the Defenders and Xavier before ascending into the sky, having decided to leave Earth to seek his destiny among the stars. Xavier takes charge of the babies, assuring the Defenders that they will be well cared for at the Mutant Research Centre in Scotland.
After the Hulk has gone off on his own, Doctor Strange, Valkyrie, and Nighthawk leave the United Nations Building and return to the Sanctum Sanctorum. A little while later, a hooded apparition appears and conjures up images of the Hulk in one of Strange’s crystal balls, revealing how the green behemoth was tricked by a demon posing as a little girl and led to an unearthly cavern deep beneath the city where he is being tormented with illusions of his alter-ego, Bruce Banner. Unless the Defenders agree to serve its evil master, the specter warns, the Hulk will be driven insane. Unwilling to surrender without a fight, the Defenders split up and search the city for their hapless teammate, without success. Back at the Sanctum Sanctorum, Strange decides to contact Daimon Hellstrom, a demonologist who has made a name for himself recently. With no time to lose, Strange sends his astral form to Hellstrom’s office at Gateway University, where he finds the occult expert working late. Knowing Doctor Strange by reputation, Hellstrom agrees to assist the Defenders and makes an arcane gesture that transforms him from a mild-mannered academic into the weirdly costumed “Son of Satan.” Strange immediately teleports Hellstrom to the Sanctum Sanctorum, where he reunites his astral form with his physical body. Hellstrom then uses his psycho-sensitive trident to track the Hulk to a vacant lot that Nighthawk had searched earlier. However, Strange and Hellstrom sense something is amiss and quickly disrupt a spell concealing a sinister-looking mansion. Entering the building, the heroes split up to follow four staircases down into the shadowy depths.
Descending the seemingly endless flight of stairs, Strange’s apprehension grows. He is suddenly accosted by hundreds of moldering corpses, specters of all the people whom he failed to save during his career as a surgeon. Though initially overwhelmed with guilt, Strange manages to overcome his self-loathing and free himself from this personal hell. He soon liberates the Valkyrie and Nighthawk from similar situations and leads them to a chamber where the Hulk and Hellstrom are battling the ersatz Banners. Seeing his friends, Hulk rallies and finally defeats his illusory foes. Without warning, the floor dissolves, sending everyone tumbling into an enormous throne room. Strange is shocked to recognize the figure on the throne as his former colleague Dr. Charles Benton, also known as Asmodeus of the Sons of Satannish, who died about three years ago. Asmodeus reveals that he struck a bargain with Satannish to be returned to life in exchange for their five souls. However, Hellstrom proves immune to Asmodeus’s eldritch power, protected by his golden trident, and saves the lives of the Defenders. Asmodeus panics as his time runs out, whereupon Satannish destroys him. The Defenders and Hellstrom then find themselves back in the vacant lot, which retains no trace of its former enchantment. Strange thanks Hellstrom on behalf of the entire team before they go their separate ways.
June 1967 – Strange spends a quiet month with Clea, Wong, the Valkyrie, and the Hulk at the Sanctum Sanctorum. Nighthawk drops by several times and annoys everyone talking about the big plans he has for the Defenders.
July 1967 – Doctor Strange, Valkyrie, and Hulk join Nighthawk at the Defenders’ new headquarters, a secluded former riding academy on Long Island that Nighthawk has purchased in his civilian identity as businessman Kyle Richmond. Knowing that Aragorn will be well looked after there, Valkyrie announces that she’s taking a leave of absence to try to find out more about the life of the woman named Barbara whose body she inhabits due to the Enchantress’s sorcery. To aid her, Strange casts a spell of concealment on the Valkyrie’s sword, Dragonfang, so it will be invisible when not in use. The spell also enables her to magically switch from civilian clothes to her Asgardian garb when the sword is drawn from its scabbard. Hulk becomes very upset by the Valkyrie’s departure, throws a temper tantrum, and leaps away in search of solitude. Nighthawk then shows Strange the state-of-the-art conference room he’s had installed, where he receives a phone call from Richmond Enterprises’ Chief Operations Officer J.C. Pennysworth informing him that the company’s newest skyscrapers in Manhattan are being demolished by a gang of costumed super-villains calling themselves the Wrecking Crew. With only one building left, still under construction at W. 29th St. and Broadway, Nighthawk speeds to the city to investigate, accompanied by Doctor Strange.
When they arrive, they find that Pennysworth has engaged the services of the superhero-for-hire known as Power Man, but he mistakes them for the saboteurs and is very aggressive. During the confrontation, Power Man punches Strange in the face and knocks him out. Coming to a few minutes later, Strange conjures the Shield of the Seraphim to break up the fight between Power Man and Nighthawk. Almost immediately, the skeletal structure of the building collapses, prompting Strange to expand his mystic force field to protect all three of them as they plunge 20 stories to the ground. Emerging from the rubble, the trio comes face to face with the Wrecking Crew—the Wrecker, Thunderball, Bulldozer, and Piledriver. Erecting a mystical barrier to prevent the villains from escaping, Strange senses that their super-powers derive from Asgardian magic. Unaccustomed to fighting such purely physical foes, though, Strange gets slammed into the debris during the brawl and is left a bit dazed. To make matters worse, Hulk shows up and starts pounding on the barrier, determined to join the battle. His blows create a kind of psychic feedback that disrupts Strange’s attempt to siphon away the villains’ powers. Both spells fail, giving the Wrecking Crew the chance to get away with their loot—an adamantium capsule roughly the size of a football that they’ve dug out of the wreckage. However, Thunderball is shocked to discover that the capsule is empty, revealing that it should contain a compact gamma bomb that he created when working as a research scientist for Richmond Enterprises. Strange is alarmed that such a destructive weapon has gone missing, but the crooks take the heroes by surprise, beat them into unconsciousness, and escape.
Following faint mystic emanations from the Wrecker’s enchanted crowbar, Doctor Strange, Hulk, Nighthawk, and Power Man make their way uptown to Harlem, where they eventually come across a frightened boy named Joey who reports that the Wrecking Crew has invaded the Harlem Boys Club. Ignoring Strange’s words of caution, Hulk immediately charges in and attacks the villains, followed by Nighthawk and Power Man. Fortunately, the fight moves out into the street before the building is destroyed. Grappling with the Wrecker, Strange is able to force the eldritch energies within the crowbar into the villain’s body with a devastating jolt that knocks him out. Then, finding he is unable to disintegrate the crowbar, Strange casts it into a limbo dimension where it will at least be out of the Wrecker’s reach. The rest of the Wrecking Crew is quickly defeated as well. Strange then asks the kids in the clubhouse about the bomb, and they realize it must be the metal sphere Joey was carrying in his baseball mitt. The Defenders quickly track Joey down, whereupon Strange uses the Eye of Agamotto to change the Hulk back into Bruce Banner so he can defuse the bomb. Banner is successful, and everyone breathes a sigh of relief. The Wrecking Crew is taken into police custody, but Power Man still worries that he won’t be paid for his night’s work since he failed to prevent the destruction of the skyscraper. Nighthawk returns the deactivated gamma bomb to Richmond Enterprises, since it is company property.
After an evening out at the theater, Doctor Strange and Clea have a weird encounter in a subway station on the Lower East Side. As another well-dressed couple looks on, two hooligans harass a girl playing the blues on her harmonica. One of the louts grabs the harmonica and shoves the girl onto the tracks just as the train pulls in. Strange lunges toward her, but she begs him to retrieve the harmonica instead. As he does so, the train slams into the girl, causing her to explode into a shower of multicolored sparks that drift onto all the startled bystanders. The hooligans flee the scene, and the young couple boards the train in a panic. The terrified driver of the train pulls out of the station as quickly as possible, leaving Strange and Clea on the platform. Noting that the harmonica is inscribed with the word “Celestia,” Strange hails a taxi to take him and Clea back to the Sanctum Sanctorum to consult the ancient tomes in his library. There, he uses the Eye of Agamotto to conjure up the face of the girl in a swirling miasma, and she reveals herself to be a manifestation of destiny that assumed human form to play the harmonica. She warns Strange that each person affected by the drifting sparks will find their destiny made manifest that very night in a most dramatic fashion. Concerned, Strange sets out to track them all down, leaving Clea and Wong to guard the harmonica.
Strange’s amulet leads him to the apartment of the young couple, Sheldon and Renee Goldenberg, in the Park Slope section of Brooklyn, where he discretely convinces Sheldon to change his destiny by quitting his anonymous corporate job to pursue his dream of being a novelist. Strange then moves on to a tenement on Yancy Street, back on the Lower East Side, where he finds the two hooligans, Duff Coogan and Nick Cromer. To his surprise, Strange sees the Thing loitering outside the building and learns that they are in fact investigating the same phenomenon. Coogan, it turns out, is the grandson of a woman who was the Thing’s neighbor when he was growing up. Suddenly, a gigantic rat scrambles up the side of the building and drags Coogan out of his bedroom window. The Thing attacks the rat, but his most powerful blows have little effect on the creature. It is only when Strange convinces Coogan to stop thinking of himself as a victim of poverty that the rat is overcome. The Thing is ready to call it a night until Strange mentions there is one more person to be located: a drunken bum barely noticed in the shadows of the subway station. Unwilling to leave the sorcerer in the lurch, the Thing insists on accompanying him back to the Sanctum Sanctorum.
When they arrive, Clea reports that the Valkyrie just left with the harmonica, claiming that Strange had sent her to fetch it. Confused, Strange uses the Orb of Agamotto to locate the Valkyrie and finds her sleeping under a tree in Cobbler’s Roost, Vermont. He is further confounded when the Orb can find no trace of the drunken bum. The Thing agrees to meet up with the Valkyrie to ask her about the harmonica and sets off in his aero-car. A little while later, the Orb suddenly reveals the bum to be in a forest clearing upstate, next to the unconscious Thing. The renegade Asgardians known as the Enchantress and the Executioner are teleporting away, and Strange realizes they must have been shielding the bum from his mystic scans. Presumably, the Enchantress had once again disguised herself as the Valkyrie in order to steal the harmonica, and they then ambushed the Thing on his way to Vermont. When the Thing comes to a few minutes later, Strange sends out his astral form to advise the Thing to return to the city, thinking him no match for Asgardian sorcery. However, the Thing decides to take the bum, Alvin Denton, to Vermont to help him with a family crisis. Strange contacts the Thing again, only to be told to quit spying on them in his crystal ball. Concerned about how Denton’s destiny will manifest, Strange ignores the Thing’s objections and continues to monitor the situation. Strange’s hunch that Denton’s destiny is entwined with the Valkyrie’s is confirmed when they meet outside Cobbler’s Roost and Denton reveals that he is Barbara’s father. However, the Enchantress and the Executioner rematerialize, and the sorceress immediately banishes the Valkyrie from Barbara’s body, leaving her shrieking in insane terror. Denton is horrified, and obviously desperate to cure his daughter of her madness, he snatches the magic harmonica from the Enchantress’s grasp and blows into it. Unfortunately, it destroys the planet instead. Doctor Strange, Clea, and Wong are killed instantly.
A split-second later, the world is restored as if nothing had happened. Strange sees in the Orb that the Thing is now holding the harmonica and the Valkyrie is fighting the Executioner, indicating some time has passed for them. When the Thing punches out the Executioner, Valkyrie runs over to Denton, who has died, and breaks down crying. The Executioner tries to continue the fight, but the Enchantress decides to retreat, teleporting herself and her lackey away. Strange realizes that the end of the world was the manifestation of Denton’s destiny, since he’d lost everyone he’d ever loved. He sends out his astral form again to ask the Thing to remain in Cobbler’s Roost until he and Nighthawk can join them there. The Thing is annoyed but agrees to hang around. When Strange and Nighthawk arrive in Vermont a little while later, they find the Thing sleeping under a tree and wake him up. He reports that the Valkyrie has carried her father’s body into town, but Strange has detected a sinister presence in the area and wants to investigate. His amulet leads them to a grand house on the outskirts of town, where a trap door suddenly sends Nighthawk and the Thing tumbling into an underground chamber. Unable to penetrate the trap’s magic shields, Strange enters the house instead. He is startled to see a large oil painting above the mantle depicting a middle-aged woman who bears a striking resemblance to the Valkyrie. A nameplate on the frame identifies the woman as Celestia Denton—obviously Barbara’s mother. Before Strange can discover the connection between the woman in the painting and the harmonica that bears her name, he is knocked out by a sorcerous attack from behind.
When he regains consciousness, Strange finds himself and the Valkyrie at the site of some obscene ritual in the house’s basement, having just been rescued by the Thing. Nighthawk is brawling with a number of cultists in hooded robes, so Strange casts a spell that puts the cultists into a trance. He then marches them outside. Nighthawk and the Thing report that the cultists were trying to drain the life-force from both Strange and the Valkyrie to open a dimensional portal to their demonic master. There had also been a hideous old high priestess, they reveal, who disintegrated when the Thing crushed the harmonica. That also seemed to collapse the dimensional portal before the devil could cross over to Earth. From their description, Strange realizes the devil must have been the Nameless One, meaning they’re dealing with the same cult of which Barbara had been a member. The cult leader confirms this under hypnosis, explaining that the high priestess was, in fact, Celestia Denton. She had not died in a car crash years ago as was commonly believed, but she had been badly disfigured and served the Nameless One on the promise of having her youth and beauty restored after the Undying Ones conquered the world. These revelations send a chill down Strange’s spine due to his own history with that race of demons. The nature of the magical harmonica remains a mystery, but he hopes that their efforts have at least rebalanced the cosmic scales of destiny.
After the Thing has left for New York, Strange and Nighthawk join the Valkyrie inside the house, which turns out to be the Dentons’ old summer home. Uncharacteristically silent and withdrawn, she is looking through the family’s photo albums, learning what she can about the life of Barbara Denton. She is particularly upset to have discovered that Barbara was married and that her husband, Jack Norriss, is living there in Cobbler’s Roost. Nighthawk, who is clearly very attracted to the Valkyrie, takes the news badly and storms out, returning to New York on his own. Strange accompanies the Valkyrie to the boarding house where Norriss lives, but the landlady assumes that Barbara ran off to have an affair with Strange, whom she mistakes for an artist of some kind, and castigates her as a gold-digging slut. In tears, Valkyrie asks Strange to take her home immediately, so he teleports them both back to the Sanctum Sanctorum. There, Strange and Clea spend the afternoon trying to comfort the distraught Valkyrie, wondering why she’s being so unusually emotional. In the evening, Bruce Banner collapses on the doorstep, suffering from acute exhaustion, so the Valkyrie carries him to a guest room and puts him to bed. Shortly after midnight, though, Banner changes into the Hulk and goes on a rampage, under the same malefic influence that has caused most New Yorkers to run riot in the streets. Strange detects an odd sort of “static” in the air that prevents any of his spells from taking effect. Fortunately, the madness passes quickly, though Strange is frustrated to have no clue who was responsible. Nighthawk arrives and reports having fought with a looter who appeared to have the head of a man and the body of a gorilla, theorizing that the two bizarre events could be connected. Doctor Strange is baffled.
A couple days later, Nighthawk recruits Doctor Strange, the Hulk, the Valkyrie, the Sub-Mariner, and Daredevil to fight for the earth in another elaborate game set up by the Grandmaster, the enigmatic alien who originally gave him his super-powers. The seemingly omnipotent Grandmaster assures them that he has no interest in Earth, so if they win, the world will be left alone. However, if his mysterious opponent should win, the human race shall be enslaved and the planet stripped of its resources. The Grandmaster, whom Nighthawk describes as a “galactic gambling addict,” then splits them into teams of two and teleports them to distant planets to fight to the death against his own hand-picked mercenaries. Doctor Strange and the Hulk find themselves in a dilapidated, vaguely medieval city populated by a humanoid race, where they face off against a little yellow alien calling himself Grott the Man-Slayer and a cyborg from the 31st century named Korvac. While Grott attacks the Hulk with his psychokinetic powers, Korvac uses his technology to instantly analyze and counter Strange’s sorcery. Finding his spells useless, Strange defeats Korvac with an unexpected punch in the face. Hulk weathers Grott’s assault, then knocks him out with a flick of his mighty fingers. Having won the match, the two Defenders are teleported back to the Grandmaster’s space station, where he declares himself the game’s winner. However, he then announces that he’s changed his mind, having realized that Earth would be the ideal breeding ground for gladiators to amuse him for generations to come. Enraged, the Defenders attack him, only to be easily repulsed. However, Daredevil challenges the Grandmaster to decide Earth’s fate on a coin toss. When Daredevil wins the toss, the Grandmaster concedes defeat and teleports them all back to Nighthawk’s penthouse apartment in Manhattan. Strange expresses his gratitude to Daredevil, though he has some reservations about risking the future of the human race on the toss of a coin. Enigmatically, Daredevil insists the outcome was never in doubt. He then exits through a window, and the Sub-Mariner, not happy to be among the Defenders again, departs as well. Strange and the Valkyrie return to the Sanctum Sanctorum.
Doctor Strange takes Clea to the Central Park Zoo, having decided that her sorcerous ability is now up to the task of counteracting Silver Dagger’s spell that turned her pet rabbit into a giant. The enormous rabbit has been held in the zoo since being captured in Greenwich Village back in January. Clea succeeds in returning the rabbit to normal, though Strange is annoyed that she draws undue attention to herself in the process. They are then accosted by a panhandling heroin addict who takes exception to Strange’s condemnation of hard drugs. As the young man storms off, Clea wonders aloud if some magic spell could help him. Strange notes that such problems are beyond even the Sorcerer Supreme. When they arrive at the Sanctum Sanctorum about an hour later, though, they are ambushed by Umar, the sister of Dormammu, who laughingly informs them that the junkie is one of her disciples. Working together, Strange and Clea overcome Umar’s attacks and drive her back into the Dark Dimension. Strange worries that Umar’s reappearance heralds Dormammu’s return to corporeal form, recalling the Watcher’s warning after Dormammu’s disastrous alliance with Loki last year. He tries to spy on Umar using the Orb of Agamotto, but she senses the intrusion and blocks him. Frustrated, Strange decides he must physically enter the Dark Dimension to ascertain the situation there, though that may be just what Umar wants. Clea refuses to accompany him, growing highly agitated. Not wanting to press the point, Strange advises her to remain on guard while he’s away, kisses her goodbye, and ventures forth into her native realm alone.
Almost immediately, Strange is attacked by Umar, leading to a fierce magical battle that is cut short when Strange is struck down from behind by his foe’s minion Orini. When he regains consciousness sometime later, Strange finds himself bathed in the deadly light from the cyclopean eye of the G’uranthic Guardian and instinctively saves himself by unleashing the Eye of Agamotto from his amulet. When his mind clears, he attempts to cross the dimensional boundary back to Earth, only to suddenly realizes he has forgotten how. Orini reappears, accompanied by a horde of demons, and explains that the G’uranthic Guardian has drained all knowledge of sorcery from Strange’s mind, leaving him helpless. Luckily, Clea comes to the rescue at that moment but is unwilling to fight Orini, as he is her father. Instead, she causes the Cloak of Levitation to carry them away from Orini, and they soon take refuge in a place where she used to hide out as a child. There, Clea confirms Strange’s suspicion that Umar lured him into the Dark Dimension so he wouldn’t sense that Dormammu was reforming himself deep within the Earth. Finding an old toy, she finally opens up about her lonely childhood as the daughter of Dormammu’s chief disciple, effectively a princess among slaves. After suddenly receiving a vision of the Elder Goddess Gaea, Clea explains that it was Gaea who first warned her of Dormammu’s scheme. She then heads off to appeal to her father for help, leaving Strange to meditate.
When Clea returns, she reports that Orini refused to aid them against Dormammu, as expected. Thus, they decide to seek assistance from Gaea herself using basic earth magic that Clea has learned. She sets up a ritual that imbues Strange with enough power to penetrate the mystical barrier surrounding the rampaging Mindless Ones. He is then able to use the violent creatures as conduits to send the Gaean energy into the G’uranthic Guardian, inverting the properties of its eye-beams. As a result, when the Guardian tries to siphon off Clea’s sorcerous knowledge, it instead pours all of Strange’s stolen power into her. Strange races to her side, arriving just as Orini and his horde of demons descend upon her. Clea unleashes a devastating barrage of eldritch energy on their foes, surprised by the amount of raw power she is wielding. She nearly goes too far, though, when she realizes how deeply her father hates her. Strange talks his pupil down, then absorbs all his power and knowledge back into himself. Shielded by the Flames of the Faltine, the couple flees through the dimensional boundary back to the safety of the Sanctum Sanctorum.
No sooner have they materialized than Strange and Clea receive a vision of Gaea warning them that Dormammu is on the loose at the Grand Canyon. Wong brings in four mystics from around the world who have come to New York in answer to Clea’s summons—Lord Phyffe, Rama Kaliph, Turhan Barim, and Count Carezzi—but they lack the skill to go up against Dormammu. Thanking them for their show of support, Strange teleports himself and Clea to Arizona, where they find Umar instead, grown to 100 feet tall. She has brought Orini to Earth with her and orders him to attack the couple. Orini does so without hesitation but is unable to penetrate Strange’s defenses. He then crumbles under Strange’s counterattack, but Umar props him up with her own power, making him little more than a puppet. Following a daring strategy Clea has come up with, Strange traps Orini within the Crimson Bands of Cyttorak, then transfers the bulk of his power back to Clea. While Strange distracts Umar, Clea phases into the ground and frees Gaea from imprisonment. Sensing what’s just happened, Umar focuses her attacks on Clea, but Clea forms a mind link with Strange that allows them to share the power equally between them. Umar is thus overcome and collapses to the ground, reverting to her normal size. However, Dormammu, standing several thousand feet tall, materializes in the canyon, having reclaimed the power his treacherous sister had stolen from him. Strange demands that Dormammu return to the Dark Dimension immediately, insisting that he’s indebted to them for saving him from Umar. Dormammu scoffs at Strange’s presumption, but Gaea intercedes and grants the two sorcerers the power to drive the arch-demon back to his own realm. Orini is allowed to take the unconscious Umar home as well, since Strange knows they lack the power to imprison her. Before disappearing, Gaea repairs the environmental damage the battle caused and acknowledges her champions, Doctor Strange and Clea, as her son and adopted daughter.
August–November 1967 – Doctor Strange is happy to have Lord Phyffe and Rama Kaliph stay at the Sanctum Sanctorum for the next several months, as they are eager to study under the new Sorcerer Supreme. Turhan Barim and Count Carezzi are content to enjoy his hospitality for a couple of weeks before returning home. The adepts are all fascinated by the Valkyrie, who also continues to live there, though she spends much of her time with Aragorn at Nighthawk’s facility on Long Island. For his part, Nighthawk is frustrated that none of his teammates are interested in having regular meetings, leaving him to act as a solo crime-fighter. Clea finds that her recent mind-melds with Strange have had a lasting benefit, allowing her to advance her studies at a much more rapid pace. As a couple, they also deepen their emotional bond in the light of their recent experiences. Throughout, Strange continues trying to bring Baron Mordo out of his catatonic state, to no avail.
December 1967 – For about 18 hours, Doctor Strange, Clea, and Valkyrie find themselves trapped within force-field bubbles that they recognize as Asgardian sorcery. Try as they might, they are unable to escape. Finally, the force fields vanish as mysteriously as they appeared. Strange quickly determines that while they were trapped, Loki led an invasion force of Asgardian warriors against Washington, D.C., only to be repelled by Thor and the U.S. Army.
On a snowy evening, Strange and Valkyrie rush to a midtown hospital after Kyle Richmond and his girlfriend, Trish Starr, are badly injured in a car-bomb explosion. In the lobby, Strange runs into an old friend, Dr. James Wynter, whom he hasn’t seen in 20 years. Wynter recruits Strange to serve as a surgical consultant as he operates on Richmond. Strange is reluctant, feeling his time would be better spent tracking down the bomber, but he nevertheless soon finds himself among the doctors and nurses in the operating room. The familiar sensations of the O.R. sweep over Strange, taking him back to his days as one of the city’s top surgeons, though his nostalgia is tinged with the new perspectives on the cosmos he has gained as Sorcerer Supreme. During the hours-long procedure, Strange makes numerous invaluable contributions, though his mind occasionally wanders to his other Defenders teammates. Finally, in the middle of the night, the surgical team completes its efforts and Richmond is taken to the recovery room. Wynter assures Strange that Richmond’s prognosis is excellent, marveling at the patient’s seemingly superhuman constitution. Changing the subject, Strange inquires about Trish Starr, but Wynter has no information on her condition. Their conversation is interrupted by the Hulk, who is causing a commotion in the corridor. Valkyrie is trying to deal with the green behemoth as he demands to see Richmond, and before the situation can get out of hand, Strange convinces the Hulk to accompany them back to the Sanctum Sanctorum. Although Strange wants to start investigating the bombing immediately, he realizes he is utterly exhausted and elects to get a few hours’ sleep first.
The following morning, Strange, Hulk, and Valkyrie return to the hospital for visiting hours, though the Hulk agrees to remain outside with Aragorn. Richmond has been moved to a private room, where he speculates that the car-bomb must have been set by his former associates, the Squadron Sinister, even though they are believed to have been killed during the battle with Nebulon last year. Strange is dubious but agrees to check out the villains’ former hideout at the Crayton Observatory. Collecting the Hulk and Aragorn, Strange and Valkyrie head to the remote upstate observatory, where they discover that Hyperion, Doctor Spectrum, and the Whizzer are indeed still alive. Despite having the element of surprise, the Defenders lose the battle and find themselves imprisoned in the observatory’s basement. Luckily, they are rescued by the former Avenger called Yellowjacket, who is also investigating the car-bombing as a friend of Trish Starr’s. Yellowjacket reveals that the Squadron Sinister had nothing to do with the bombing; it was carried out by his old arch-enemy Egghead, who happens to be Starr’s uncle. She was the target, he explains, not Richmond. Even so, Strange realizes the Squadron Sinister may take advantage of Richmond’s weakened state to get revenge on him. Thus, the Defenders race back to Manhattan, accompanied by Yellowjacket, and stop the Squadron Sinister from kidnapping Richmond from the hospital. When the hard-fought battle is won, Strange casts a spell that strips their foes of all memory of their powers and villainous identities, ensuring they will pose no further threat to Richmond.
Doctor Strange and Valkyrie convince the Hulk to spend some more time with them at the Sanctum Sanctorum. Clea and Wong are delighted to host their brutish friend again, though Lord Phyffe and Rama Kaliph need to be reassured that he won’t kill them. The two adepts become very curious about the Hulk once he accepts them as friends. Richmond makes a rapid recovery due to his super-powers and resumes his activities as Nighthawk, though he is depressed that Starr, whose left arm had to be amputated, has broken up with him. Stephen Strange, feeling a deep sense of harmony and joy, relishes the sense of camaraderie that fills his home throughout the holiday season.
Notes:
January 1967 – Doctor Strange and Spider-Man have their rematch with Xandu in Marvel Team-Up #21. Strange then appears in his new solo series, Doctor Strange: Master of the Mystic Arts #1 and following. For brevity’s sake, the 81-issue series is usually referred to here as Doctor Strange v.2. Baron Mordo remains behind the scenes throughout the year.
May 1967 – The Defenders take on the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants at the behest of Professor X in Defenders #15–16. Xavier seeks outside help because the X-Men are off on their mission to Krakoa, as seen in Giant-Size X-Men #1. Magneto’s odyssey through the bowels of the earth is a delusion; following his defeat at the hands of the Avengers (in Avengers #111), he was held in a telepathically induced coma in the basement of the X-Men’s headquarters. However, his deranged mind rejects this humiliating reality in favor of a nonsensical sci-fi fantasy. See my Magneto chronology for further discussion. The Defenders then team up with Daimon Hellstrom, the so-called “Son of Satan,” in Giant-Size Defenders #2.
July 1967 – The Defenders battle the Wrecking Crew in Defenders #17–19. They then join forces with the Thing to once again foil the sinister plans of the Undying Ones in Marvel Two-in-One #6–7 and Defenders #20–21. The temporary spell of madness and the apelike looter are indeed connected, as both are part of a scheme by the freakish small-time crooks known as the Headmen—Arthur Nagan, Jerry Morgan, and Chondu the Mystic. Daredevil helps the Defenders defeat the Grandmaster and his mystery opponent (Doctor Doom’s Prime Mover robot) in Giant-Size Defenders #3. While talking to the junkie—who, like his drug of choice, is nicknamed Horse—in Doctor Strange v.2 #6, Strange admits to using psychoactive drugs himself while studying under the Ancient One in Tibet—a detail omitted in most recountings of the sorcerer’s origin story. Dormammu’s scheme also involves the Scarlet Witch and Agatha Harkness, as seen in Giant-Size Avengers #4, but Doctor Strange seems unaware of this fact. While Gaea is held prisoner by Dormammu, the world’s weather patterns are severely disrupted. This brings us up to Doctor Strange v.2 #9.
December 1967 – Doctor Strange is among the various superheroes seen trapped within Loki’s magical spheres in Thor #233. The Defenders team up with Yellowjacket against the Squadron Sinister in Giant-Size Defenders #4. The criminal Whizzer of the Squadron Sinister should not be confused with the WWII-era hero of the same name.
Jump Back: Doctor Strange – Year Five
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