Doctor Strange – Damnation: #01

So I really wanted to hate this, especially since it pulls in a slew of other characters from the Marvel Universe, something I don’t particularly care for. But the fact is, it was quite good, and the villain, Mephisto (clearly a graphic rendering of Mephistopheles), is diabolical in a most refined manner.

So the basic premise of this arc is that Doctor Strange “resurrects” Las Vegas, which appears to have been destroyed at some point after I had stopped reading Doctor Strange because the quality plummeted, in my opinion. Anyway, one of the negative ramifications of resurrecting the city is that he inadvertently brought Mephisto out of Hell and he now has dominion over the City of Sin. Having been to Vegas for the first time recently, the idea of the city being ruled by a demon is not too much of a stretch for me. But I digress.

The most intriguing aspect of this issue is Mephisto’s commentaries on the nature of sin, and humanity’s tendency to embrace the darker side of the human experience.

Sin!! It doesn’t take much, you understand. It’s your natural condition, after all — has been since the apple and the garden… if you believe that sort of thing. I’m still on the fence myself. Point is, you just love to do what you’re told not to do, and I’m not blaming you — Heavens no! I understand you, admire you, accept who you really are, what you really want. You want to rip each other apart. You want to see some blood.

Of course, this is a pretty bleak assessment of humanity, but it’s not without justification. There are a lot of people who fall into Mephisto’s view, but there are also many who do not. And that is what Doctor Strange is betting on, that there is at least as much good in the world as there is evil, if not more. I for one share the view. We are bombarded with news and hype focusing on the negative, feeding off our fears, but really, there is so much good happening, we just don’t hear about it as much.