Mr Fantastik: The mysterious rapper who smoked MF Doom on his own track in 2003
Everything about the life and, indeed, death of hip-hop legend MF Doom was shrouded in mystery.
He died on October 31st 2020, yet no one outside of his tight-knit inner circle told a soul until his widow, Jasmine, told the world via social media on New Year’s Eve, two whole months later. The man, born Daniel Dumile, died the way he lived, as an enigma that very few people truly understood.
There’s a strong reason why he spent his entire career behind a mask. After all, Dumile wanted MF Doom to be a persona rather than purely an extension of himself.
At every stage, Dumile wanted to play with the idea of persona as much as possible, which went beyond a mask in homage to one of the greatest supervillains of all time, Doctor Victor Von Doom. He also made music under the aliases of King Geedorah, Viktor Vaughn, Zev Love X and Metal Fingers, which are separate projects from his collaborations under the name Danger Doom (with Danger Mouse), Madvillain (with Madlib), and Nehruvian Doom (with Bishop Nehu).
This all shows that Doom liked to create a vast, dense, interconnected universe with his music. One not unlike the Marvel Cinematic Universe that his namesake comes from. But, what would a good super villain be without a superheroic nemesis that’s more than his match? Just like Latveria’s eternal king, MF Doom’s nemesis also seems to be a man who goes under the name Mr Fantastic, except in the world of hip-hop, this version is spelt M Fantastik.
For all my talk about mystery, Doom was also keen to throw the spotlight on everyone he worked with. Every collaboration he made with a producer could have quite easily been an MF Doom record produced by Danger Mouse, but it wasn’t. It was the Danger Doom record. One would have assumed this was the case with Mr. Fantastik, who featured on ‘Anti-Matter’ from 2003s’ King Geedorah record Take Me To Your Leader. He then popped up again on ‘Rapp Snitch Knishes’ from Doom’s masterpiece, 2004’s MM.. Food.
Despite his verses being the unabashed high point of both those songs, there’s one thing missing from the story. Who exactly was Mr Fantastik?. Nowhere on the record points to Mr Fantastik being a fellow recording artist, and there are no other records with his name on them. One would presume that an MC with his ability would surely have more work to their name, suggesting Mr Fantastik is a higher profile MC recording in disguise.
Ever since the records were released, fans have been speculating who it could be, such as fellow MC and close friend of Doom’s, Rodan. The two met as members of the first group that Doom rapped in, KMD, where Rodan performed under the name Jade 1. This is supported by the fact that Mr Fantastik’s verses allude to an upbringing in New York, which most likely rules out Mr Fantastik being a pseudonym for Doom himself.
There are other options, all picked out from the NYC hip-hop underground of the early 2000s. Count Bass D, Euphon, and maybe even a childhood friend of Doom’s who never went professional as a rapper. The truth is, though, isn’t the mystery so much better than any fact we can dig up about it? If Doom wanted us to know who Mr Fantastik was, we’d know intimately. All that we know of this mystery rapper is his stage name.
Perhaps that’s enough.