FLYING FORTRESS
Classification: Terrestrial technology
Creator: Dr. Doom (Victor von Doom)
User/Possessors: Dr. Doom
First Appearance: Fantastic Four I#17 (August, 1963)
Powers/Abilities/Functions: The Flying Fortress was an immense wingless airship, one thousand feet long, and two hundred fifty feet across at its widest (see comments). While it hovered in the sky, it could generate a bank of clouds to camouflage itself. It had dozens of compartments, all controlled from a central room. The exterior of the vessel could generate a grappler ray that could snag people off the street, or pull enemy crafts towards it. It was also armed with disintegrator guns which could be programmed to fire upon specific targets based on their atomic structure (such as the Fantastic Four).
Aboard the ship, its defenses included power spheres which were drawn to body heat and could--after surrounding a target by swarming it--exile that target to another dimension; a room containing a powerful turbine that could spin a person out of control; a teflon-coated room containing high pressure air jets to spin a target off the floor; a room that could fill with quick-hardening cement; a room with a collapsible floor; and a room that could form a maze with extending metal bars. The ship also contained some minor robot servants, escape pods, holographic projectors, force field generators, and devices which could cause electrical systems across the country to run haywire.
History:
(Fantastic Four I#17) - After escaping the Microverse (@
Fantastic Four I#16), Dr. Doom made his base aboard the Flying
Fortress, hovering thousands of feet over New York City; he sent out "Followers"
to record the Fantastic Four's atomic structure so that they would be
unable to breach the ship's disintegrator gun defenses. He set his plan
into motion by kidnapping Alicia Masters with the ship's grappler ray;
he then broadcast a holographic message to the Fantastic Four, warning
them that if they tried to rescue Alicia, he would unleash his most
terrible inventions upon New York. Doom next sent a recording of his
demands to Washington D.C., a list that included being made a member of
the President's cabinet. When the President refused, Doom retaliated by
causing electrical failures across the nation.
With the aid of an electro-scanner, Mr. Fantastic located the Fortress while photographing a strange cloud he noticed hovering above the city; but he also discovered its disintegrator guns. In order to slip past the Fortress' defenses, Mr. Fantastic created a chemical mixture to temporarily turn the Thing back into Ben Grimm, allowing him to get past the disintegrator beams. The Thing then wrecked the guns so that his teammates could follow him in, and they split up to rescue Alicia. The Human Torch wandered into a room where a powerful turbine spun him out of control, but the Torch blasted the room with his flame, destroying the devices. Mr. Fantastic entered a room which quickly filled with wet cement, but he slipped through it and slid under the door. The Thing entered a room where the floor opened up beneath him, but he managed to pull himself up by climbing the side of the trap door.
Doom attempted to destroy the Fantastic Four with his power spheres, but the spheres were fooled by flaming duplicates of the team members created by the Torch. Doom managed to hold off the Thing, Torch and Mr. Fantastic with a force field, but when he went to collect Alicia to use against them, he found that the Invisible Girl had already freed her. Doom activated metal bars which extended from the floor and walls to capture the Invisible Girl, but her teammates entered, and Doom fled the ship through a trap door.
(Avengers I#1.5 (fb) - BTS) - The ship was taken into the custody of the U.S. Military and impounded for further study at Fort Monmouth, New Jersey. While Major Bowman was inspecting the ship, he was ambushed by one of Dr. Doom's robot duplicate Doombots, and the Doombot disguised itself as Bowman.
(Avengers I#1.5) - The disguised Doombot led the newly-formed Avengers to the Fortress, which was seemingly under Doom's control. As their jet-copter neared the ship, the grappler ray was activated, but the Hulk allowed himself to be carried by it and smashed his way into the ship, with the other Avengers in tow. As the five Avengers split up, the disguised Doombot knocked out the Wasp and took her captive. Hulk entered a room where air jets spun him out of control, while Thor was assaulted by the power spheres, Iron Man was trapped by a robot that began to drain the electricity from his armor, and Ant-Man was imprisoned in a room with the real Major Bowman.
Ant-Man switched to his new identity, and smashed out of the room as Giant-Man; with information provided by the Wasp (who was being held in Doom's monitor room), he tracked down the other Avengers. Giant-Man pulled the Hulk out of the air jet room, but Thor dealt with the power spheres himself by obliterating them with his hammer. The Hulk destroyed the robot plaguing Iron Man, and Thor re-energized Iron Man's armor with his lightning. The Avengers caught up to the Doombot, and the Hulk tore off its head, unaware until that moment that he was dealing with a robot. Suddenly, the giant aircraft began to tear itself apart as Doom scuttled the ship, and the Avengers sent Bowman to safety in an escape pod, while they fled the ship under their own powers. The Flying Fortress exploded as they escaped, and the wreckage landed in the ocean off a rocky Long Island shore.
Comments: Created by Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and Dick Ayers.
A caption in Avengers I#1.5 gave the size specification for the Flying Fortress -- it likely used some form of anti-gravity technology to stay aloft and hover. -- Ron Fredricks
New images by Ron Fredricks.
Profile by Prime Eternal
CLARIFICATIONS:
The
Flying Fortress should not be confused with:
images: (without ads)
Avengers I#1.5, p8, pan1 (Flying Fortress (front view))
Fantastic Four I#17, p9, pan7 (hovering Flying Fortress (side view) in clouds, using grappler ray to capture Alicia Masters)
Appearances:
Fantastic Four I#17 (August, 1963) - Stan Lee (writer/editor), Jack Kirby (pencils), Dick Ayers (inks), Art Simek (letter)
Avengers I#1.5 (December, 1999) - Roger Stern (writer), Bruce Timm (artist), Tom Brevoort (editor)
First Posted: 09/11/2005
Last updated: 08/13/2023
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
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