Synopsis / Summary / Plot
Last issue Gwenpool discovered a new tactic - she could push villains out of the pages of the comic and hence out of the Marvel Universe. She decided to use this to get rid of Doctor Doom which she figures will make her a shoo-in as an Avenger (which is where she thinks the money is in superheroing). And she's recruited her associate Vincent Doonan the Doombot to help.
Vincent is currently flying along a New York subway tunnel with Gwen Poole sitting on his back. He zags into a rough-hewn side tunnel, through the mouth of a huge carved demonic face (he claims it's a relic of when this was a gateway to hell, among the other uses the place has had) and into an underground castle. He says he found the place deserted and intends to use it as a detention centre for those he considers threats to the public (as he considered GP when they met in #7-9).
Being a Doombot Vincent can contact Victor Von Doom. He'll get Doom to come here where Gwenpool can fight him without endangering others. But he does't think it'll come to that because his creator isn't the villain he used to be.
In the middle of this we see another Gwenpool working her way back through the page margins, who jumps into a panel behind the duo and hides.
Inside the castle is decorated with pictures and sculptures of Doom (and a significant sword embedded in a stone). And also some regular Doombots. Vincent takes his place among them, and they all start transmitting a message to Gwen from Doom. And she falls through a trapdoor.
As she falls through the air she's accompanied by a floating head of Doom which tells her that he was automatically alerted when she told Vincent her plan. Doom had then remotely altered Vincent's programming to 'remember' this base as his and bring her here. The place actually belongs to Victor. Gwen just asks why his head's not wearing the right armour.
GP is deposited safely in a cell. Doom leaves her and turns his attention to Vincent. He muses that he witnessed how 'Pool made Paste-Pot Pete (who seems to have given up his Trapster alias) disappear. He assumes it was some form of magic. But he's more interested in Vincent's backstory.
Gwen figures getting out of a comicbook prison cell will be easy. 1st she tries yelling for Doom to let her out so she can kill him - but isn't surprised when that doesn't work. So she tries her standard trick of stepping out of the panel to move to a future 1 where she *isn't* in the cell. But she finds that all future panels just show her in the cell. She guesses that time-travel comic logic dictates that there can't be a future with her out of the cell until she finds a way to *get* out.
But then she looks back to previous panels and has an idea. But just as a check she goes back into the panel and calls out to her future self who she hopes is outside the door. And her future self replies confirming that she went back to an earlier panel (as we saw), and from there found a way to get to her current position outside the cell door. So past Gwen leaves her cell-panel again and dashes back to where we saw the duplicate. She exits too quickly to hear future Gwen warning her to avoid something - but future-G isn't worried because she knows she gets here OK.
Doom releases his control of Vincent, but the Doombot is angry so Victor freezes him in place. He asks Vince why he despises his creator. Vince replies that he doesn't believe Victor has reformed and become Iron Man (as we've seen in the International and then Infamous IM series) (that's why he's not wearing the 'right' armour). But Doom says he's *proud* of Vincent's mission to keep his corner of Brooklyn safe. He offers to repair the side of Vincent's humanoid face which has been damaged, exposing his robotic reality. (And we see Victor's face exposed, reminding us that *his* scars have gone since Secret Wars III).
But Gwenpool has been listening to this. She hadn't realised Doom had switched sides. She says it must have happened after she came to this reality. Doom seems to ignore her claim that he inhabits a comic book universe - and he's 1 of the main bad guys which is why she came after him. But she *can't* kill him now because he's obviously in the middle of 1 of those temporary changes that will affect the Marvel Universe forever until they're changed back.
She's pulled the sword out of the stone and wants him to shout "Richards!" or something and attack her. Doom obliges but GP ducks out of comic reality and reappears behind him. The sword slashes his armour (and body?) open, and comic pages gush out. Followed by an old-style evil Dr Doom.