Welcome to Loneliness & Cheeseburgers Presents: Runaways (Vol. 2), Issue #4 – “True Believers (Chapter 4)”! In the previous installment, the Excelsior Team is proven completely ineffective when it comes to stopping a small group of bumbling teenagers who barely have superpowers. Victor Mancha is still the Runaways’ hostage until they either kill him or ensure that he won’t become a big Bad Boy in the future.

BUT HERE ENTERS THE VARIABLE. Single mother Mrs. Mancha has called Victor’s very-much-still-alive-and-possibly-evil father, who used to be a supervillain and maybe STILL IS? Eek!

We’ve really upped the ante here! Good thing I’m going to write about it all next in this very blog!

Runaways (Vol. 2), Issue #4 [July, 2005]
Written by: Brian K. Vaughan
“True Believers (Chapter 4)”

The Leapfrog leaps around town in the dead of night. And by that I mean things aren’t dead because all the buildings are lit up and there’s traffic out your ass. Victor’s phone rings, but Gert doesn’t want him to answer it even though it’s his poor, dear, sweet mother. Molly calls his ringtone stupid.

After Victor defends the ringtone (it’s a Rick Jones song… you know, that Rick Jones), Gert asks him why he’s so into superheroes when he wants to murder them all when he grows up. Victor is confused by this, wondering what the hell they mean by all that. He’s a model student, he’s never even been in detention, let alone shoplifted, let alone murdered someone. There was that one time he burned down the Pentagon, but that was in self-defense!

Chase tells everyone to buckle up and blindfold Victor so he doesn’t know that they’re headed to their secret hideout in the La Brea Museum! Oh… damnit…

At the top of the L.A. Times building, Phil Ulrich waits for the superheroes-in-therapy to come back empty-handed. “Why don’t you put on your old Green Gobbler armor and and try taking down these little monsters yourself?” gripes Chamber. Phil asks what the hell happened and why they’re all so damn incompetent, and they all turn on one another. “He did this” and “she did that” ad nauseam.

Phil never really gets a good answer to his question. His phone starts ringing and he wonders if it’s their mysterious benefactor telling them they’re off the job. It’s sort of that! But in actuality, Phil is asked if he wants to take this to the next step…

And while that sexy conversation is happening, the Runaways show Victor their incredible underground digs! Well, Karolina does. Chase is antsy to get this kid to the brig where he belongs (even though he’s reminded that the place doesn’t have a brig. Not even a laundry brig).

“But what are we gonna do if Vic tries to electrify us again?” Molly asks concernedly. “We don’t have know how many powers he has.”

Nico has an idea! Gas the kid!

Purple smoke! My one weakness!

Victor lies on the floor covered in purple globs, presumably incapacitated. But mostly he just smells perfumed. Nico orders him to zap her with everything he’s got, and he can’t! He has been rendered useless! Perfect, now we can move onto brass tacks…

There’s not much to say. Victor’s mom is an architect’s assistant, a student, and a waitress. His dad was a U.S. marine who died when he was a baby. No evidence of that at all, though, unless you want him to dig up papa’s old boney bones.

Well, fat chance he’ll find anything. Future Gert told everyone that Victor’s father was still alive and totally evil. Sounds like there’s some research to be done if they’re ever gonna get to the bottom of this. Let’s start with Chapter 1 of Kama Sutra…

Meanwhile, at the Mancha residence, Victor’s mom is desperately trying to get ahold of him. She leaves tearful voicemails full of sweet nothings. She slumps on the floor helplessly as she apologizes in advance for siccing his dad on him. Speaking of whom, he enters the house wondering if Mrs. Mancha is speaking to the authorities.

I think he kills her! I don’t know! It sure looks pretty bad, though.

Electricity! My one weakness!

In the Runaways’ Hideout, Nico plays with a holographic gallery of all The Pride’s biggest competitors (i.e., Big Fat Fisk the Kingpin). Maybe she’ll find some files on Victor’s dad. Victor thinks this is all a stupid waste of time. “In the highly unlikely event that I am the son of Charlie Manson, or whatever, he still didn’t raise me.”

Cork it, son. Suspect #1 is Electro. He shoots lightning bolts. Sound familiar? Anyway, that seems to be their only lead right now. Hey, did anyone want any Pizza Rolls?

After Nico has trouble with the remote control, Victor offers to help her since he’s a tech whiz of the highest order. “Huh. Well, if you’re a gadget geek, maybe you’re the son of this whack-job, a gamma-irradiated egghead imaginatively named ‘The Leader’.”

Nah, that’s stupid. Maybe he’s the son of Norman Osborn! That dude fucks.

Hmm, Victor’s father might not necessarily be from Earth. What about Galactus??

Gert suggests that maybe all these entities aren’t evil enough. What about Hitler?

“My dad was not a Nazi, okay?” Victor yells. “And… and even if he was, what does it matter to you? Lots of children of horrible people grow up to be productive members of society!” Take Magneto for example. That asshole fathered both Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch. Then Victor accuses the group of taking everything out on him because of their shitty parents, leading to Victor holding Gert and aiming the remote control at her head and threatening to blast it off.

After his bluff is called easily, he reaches into Gert’s pants and pulls out his phone to call his mom…

But a man answers the phone…

And he tells him that his mother isn’t available right now…

Because she’s tied up to a chair…

And do you know who tied her up…?

…

I don’t know! I think it’s Doctor Doom! Issue over.

Final Thoughts

MORE LIKE DOCTOR DUMB. I should have known that Victor von Doom had a son named Victor. It all makes so much sense. Kind of like how Batman has a son named Batman.

Yeah, I don’t know what I’m saying either. Feel free to click that “x” on your browser window.