Looks like Invincible Iron Man #20 is the last in the series! What now for Tony Stark?
A TOUGH TIME FOR LEAD HEROES
Iron Man has been around comics since the 1960s. He’s had several incarnations, including everything from being a teenage computer whiz of sorts to one of the “big guys” in the Avengers for Marvel.
Is it time for a new Iron Man #1?
Yes, Tony Stark has most often been kind of a brilliant but bored rich guy. He definitely has had his share of troubles from suffering with heart problems to alcoholism to difficulties with the ladies. In the comics, he pretended to be his own bodyguard while in the movies, he outed himself as the “man behind the iron mask,” as one of my friends put it. He is something of an egomaniac, naturally, so that often gets him where he wouldn’t like to be—facing the baddies while dealing with personal issues.
But that’s the life of a hero, isn’t it?
Iron Man has had his own unique villains gallery, which has included the Mandarin (although he’s fallen out of vogue these days), the evil version of the Black Knight, the Crimson Dynamo (a Soviet super soldier opposite number), Diablo (a genius alchemist), the Grey Gargoyle (who turned anything he touched to stone), the HYDRA organization, Kang the Conqueror (the time travelling destroyer), Madame Masque (the daughter of Count Nefaria who hides her scarred face behind a golden mask), the Melter (who had a beam that could melt iron), Obadiah Stone (a business rival of Tony Stark), Stilt-Man (an armored thief who wore a pair of hydraulic stilts), Taskmaster (a mercenary who could duplicate any physical abilities he saw), Titanium Man (another armored Soviet super soldier), Ultron (an android built by Hank Pym), Whirlwind (a spinning baddie), and Whiplash (who actually appeared in one of the live-action movies).
But my favorite of all the foes that challenged Iron Man was Doctor Doom, he of the Fantastic Four fame. He was another genius wearing armor that could do amazing things. When they tangled, that always caught my attention!
He had support from friends Pepper Potts and “Happy” Hogan, among others, so he had interesting people around him on all sides. We’ve even had women wear the iron armor, but they don’t seem to be around much any longer!
Then, too, he’s had more suits of armor than I could even begin to rattle off! I personally liked what I called the “midnight” armor that was almost all black with hints of dark blue in it. It was kind of mysterious and made night missions a lot safer, I thought!
What wasn’t to like?
TONY’S PROBLEMS/su_heading]
As a genius, Tony Stark never really had problems that he couldn’t overcome. I mean, the heart thing got really old, so they wrote that out of his books. After so many fits and starts, his relationship with Pepper seemed to be put on the back burner. His friendship with Peter Parker became standard stuff because, well, when you’re a rich genius, a struggling teenager should just model himself after you (which Peter did, for a while).
Recently, he married Emma Frost of X-Men fame. That never really worked for me because her powers kind of made her able to manipulate Tony. And when the Krakoa mutant era went “ker-splat” recently, that made an attempt to link him to Marvel’s merry mutant society just went nowhere.
Bruce Wayne in DC is going through similar problems. Batman has been having to battle a robotic duplicate of himself, and it has taken him off the crime-fighting path that I prefer to read. Of course, many fans I know would prefer that Tony turn his Iron Man armor into a robot so he could stay around the office instead of putting himself in danger, but that would take away all the drama, right?
Can a new number one issue be far away?
ANYONE GOT A NEW IDEA?
As a genius, Tony Stark never really had problems that he couldn’t overcome. I mean, the heart thing got really old, so they wrote that out of his books. After so many fits and starts, his relationship with Pepper seemed to be put on the back burner. His friendship with Peter Parker became standard stuff because, well, when you’re a rich genius, a struggling teenager should just model himself after you (which Peter did, for a while).
Recently, he married Emma Frost of X-Men fame. That never really worked for me because her powers kind of made her able to manipulate Tony. And when the Krakoa mutant era went “ker-splat” recently, that made an attempt to link him to Marvel’s merry mutant society just went nowhere.
Bruce Wayne in DC is going through similar problems. Batman has been having to battle a robotic duplicate of himself, and it has taken him off the crime-fighting path that I prefer to read. Of course, many fans I know would prefer that Tony turn his Iron Man armor into a robot so he could stay around the office instead of putting himself in danger, but that would take away all the drama, right?
Can a new number one issue be far away?
ANYONE GOT A NEW IDEA?
When I was a kid, I always used to mix up the Spider-Man theme and put Iron Man words with it. “Iron Man, Iron Man, does whatever an iron can…” That used to drive some of my friends absolutely crazy!
However, we have to face it… after literally decades of Iron Man stories, what can the writers come up with that we haven’t read before?
I like to read stories I haven’t read before. When Bruce Wayne was going to marry Selina Kyle, I thought that would take him “where no Batman had gone before,” so I was looking forward to it. However, they just turned away from each other and jumped into the night, so that disappointed me!
On the other hand, Tony being married to Emma hasn’t really been all the engaging to me! Now, I know that most comics companies really don’t like to have their characters get married because it takes away a potential storyline. “Will they? Won’t they? I’ve got to know!” is home some of my friends view romance. To me, it’s a 50/50 shot… they either get together or they don’t. Since the odds are fairly predictable, I don’t find romance stories all that intriguing.
Thus, what’s an Iron Man to do? Yes, you can give him a brand new number one issue, which collectors will undoubtedly pick up, but what do you do after that?
Make Tony a secret agent like Dick Grayson was for a while? We discover that Tony has really been a mutant all this time like Prince Namor was found out to be? Will he spend some time in space like Superman recently did? In the past few years, Tony would have been turned into Antoinette, an “Iron Woman.” However, that seems to be a fading trend nowadays, and they did that already!
THERE WILL BE A NEW NUMBER ONE, FOR SURE!
But the one thing we can count on definitely is that Iron Man will not lay fallow like the Fantastic Four did not that many years ago! (There were behind the scenes things that made that happen, after all!)
I always like to tell the story of when I was in Chicago for a comics convention and many of the Marvel creators were there. There had been a lot of grumbling about Tony’s armor at the time, which had the colors of the Coca Cola cans of the time (see above). When fussing broke out among the panelists during a discussion, one of the editors turned to the audience and asked, “How many of you like the armor Tony is currently wearing?” The response was an unexpected silence, which made us all howl with laughter when we realized NO ONE like it. When that died down, the editor leaned into the microphone and announced, “You will see a change!” And we did!
So, all the folks at the House of Ideas are even now having major meetings about the future of Iron Man, how to revive interest in the hero in the comics. I would venture to say that it won’t be long before a sparkling NEW era will be advertised “because you demanded it!” Just what it will be is something I can’t predict but I venture to say that it will still have Tony in the Iron Man armor. More than that, I can’t guess!
What do you think? What should Marvel do with Tony Stark/Iron Man? What would you like to do with him if you had the opportunity to write the characters? Is there a brand new suit of armor in the hero’s future? Whatever your opinions, be sure to share them in the space below!
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Wayne Hall creates the Wayne's Comics Podcast. He’s interviewed Scott Snyder, Greg Capullo, John Layman, Kyle Higgins, Phil Hester, Jimmy Palmiotti & Justin Gray, David Petersen, Christos Gage, Mike Grell, and Matt Kindt. On this site each week, he writes his "Comics Portal" column (general comics comments and previews) and reviews comics.