Doom Comic

The Doom comic occupies a place in the broader Doom expanded universe as a sixteen-page promotional pamphlet, with its over-the-top dialogue becoming a lasting part of Doom fan culture.

Origins and production

Steve Behling and Michael Stewart wrote the comic in 1996; Tom Grindberg handled art and color design, while Edd Fear provided lettering. Each contributor was credited under a gory nickname suited to the work’s tone. Dana Moreshead produced the piece for Marvel Comics, and it was distributed as a giveaway at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in 1996, according to former id Software business manager Mike Wilson, who said he was 90% sure that E3 was the event.

The story follows a lone space marine carving through Hell’s forces in search of increasingly powerful weapons, with a cyberdemon serving as the climactic antagonist. Several recognizable enemies appear in the comic, including zombies, imps, cacodemons, and spectres. On the weapons side, the chainsaw, shotgun, chaingun, plasma gun, and BFG9000 each get their moment in the spotlight. The narrative is deliberately pulpy and kinetic, leaning hard into the game’s own maximalist energy.

For more on the monsters and weapons featured across the wider series, see our Doom enemies and Doom weapons guides.

Two printings

Two printings of the comic are on record: the original E3 giveaway edition and a subsequent printing produced for the id Anthology collection. The differences between them are subtle but catalogued: the original giveaway was printed on whiter paper, giving it noticeably higher contrast, and its front cover appears slightly paler. On the original, the issue number is italicized whereas the warning text above it is not; the id Anthology reprint inverts this arrangement, with a normal-weight issue number and italicized warning text.

The advertising pages also differ between editions. The original giveaway carried advertisements for Hexen (Sony PlayStation) on the inside front cover, PlayStation Plus on the inside back cover, and Final Doom for PlayStation on the back cover. The id Anthology reprint replaced these with ads for the PC editions of Final Doom and Hexen, and various Windows 95 id Software titles in those same positions.

As for print quantities, former id Software business manager Mike Wilson recalled that approximately 50,000 copies of the original E3 version were produced, with GT Interactive ordering them for distribution at the show, and that 100,000 copies of the id Anthology version followed.

The id Anthology reprint shipped on December 13, 1996 as part of the four-CD collection, which also included items such as the pewter cyberdemon, id Anthology dog tags, and The Book of id.

Initial reception and rediscovery

When it first appeared, the Doom comic attracted little attention and no particular affection. It was quietly shelved and largely forgotten in the years immediately following E3 1996. TeamTNT coordinator Ty Halderman, who received copies as part of the swag package for participants in the Final Doom project, memorably described it as “rather lame.”

The reversal came in 1999, when Richard “Lowtax” Kyanka published a review of the comic on PlanetQuake. That write-up reframed the comic’s breathless, bombastic dialogue not as a failure of craft but as something fascinatingly unhinged — a text so committed to its own excess that it cycled back around to being entertaining. The review introduced a new generation of readers to lines like “Rip and tear rip and… TEAR RIP AND TEAR… RIP AND TEAR YOUR GUTS! YOU ARE HUGE! THAT MEANS YOU HAVE HUGE GUTS! RIP AND TEAR!” and “I’m a 12.0 on the 10.0 scale of badness!” — dialogue that became widely quoted within the Doom community.

A second wave of exposure arrived in December 2003, when Doomworld published scans of the comic as part of its 10 Years of Doom retrospective. With the full text now freely readable online, a broader audience encountered the comic’s tone for the first time. The following April, original artwork from the project appeared at auction on eBay, providing evidence of continued interest in the physical comic and its artwork.

Cultural legacy

The comic’s most quoted line — “rip and tear” — has long since outgrown its source. In a July 24, 2014 tweet, shortly after the QuakeCon 2014 reveal, id Software described the 1996 Doom Comic as “inspiring the next evolution in Doom.” The 2016 game also opens with the phrase “rip and tear” in its introductory narration, directly echoing the comic.

Doom Eternal also references the comic’s language, including the phrase “rip and tear,” which is rendered as kar en tuk in the fictional language of the Night Sentinels.

The Xbox 360 version of Doom II used lines from the comic as achievement names, including “Rip and Tear,” “The Great Communicator,” “A Man and a Half,” “You Have Huge Guts,” “An Important Looking Door,” “A Really Big Gun,” and “Superior Firepower.”

Notable quotes

Several lines from the comic are frequently quoted by Doom fans:

“Who’s a man and a half? I’m a man and a half! A berserker packin’ man and a half!”

“I’m a 12.0 on the 10.0 scale of badness!”

“Here comes the Night Train!”

“Now I’m radioactive! That can’t be good!”

“Sweet Christmas! Big-mouthed floating thingies!”

The comic’s dialogue is largely delivered as first-person narration, with the marine frequently commenting on weapons, enemies, and his own actions in exaggerated terms.

Place in the expanded universe

The Doom comic is one of the officially produced Doom-related media from the 1990s, alongside the Doom novels and other licensed merchandise and promotional material. As a short promotional comic, it presents a standalone story built around familiar Doom enemies, weapons, and imagery rather than serving as a direct continuation of the games’ narrative.

For the broader chronology of the Doom series and its major releases, see our Doom timeline guide.

Where to read the Doom comic

Doomworld hosts scans of the comic, and the Doom Wiki lists an Atop the Fourth Wall video review among its external links. The comic has also received fan tributes, including a dramatic audio rendition released in September 2005 and a video version combining the scans with that audio performance.