Isn’t It Ironic?

The best superhero origins are the ones that are timeless. You can pick them up and the story and concepts are as fresh as they were the day they were created.

“A shy teenager is bitten by a radioactive spider, and learns a tragic lesson about responsibility.”

“Rocketed to Earth from a dying world, a newborn child is raised by Midwestern farmers and grows up to be humanity’s greatest champion.”

“Having witnessed the murder of his parents by a common criminal, a young boy swears an oath to spend his life protecting the innocent, to prevent others from suffering as he did.”

Then there’s Iron Man.

Although the basic origin itself can be tinkered with to fit a more current time frame, the original story is, shall we say, problematic, involving as it does the Vietnam War. As we take a stroll through the history of Marvel Comics’ armored avenger, let’s bear in mind that things probably seemed a lot more black and white in 1963, and things that look a little simpleminded and even a touch racist in retrospect, most likely didn’t seem quite so obvious at the time. And if you look past the extremely dated trappings, there’s a concept at the core of it that still works quite well, and is as relevant today as ever.

Back in ’63, Marvel Editor-in-Chief Stan Lee was once again looking to expand the ranks of his increasingly popular superheroes, and as usual, he was looking for something different. Stan had a notion to do a series about a superhero who was really a successful businessman, a jetsetting Howard Hughes type. But Stan’s rich protagonist would need a reason to go out in a costume and risk his life fighting bad guys. Once more, Lee put it all together, as he recounted in SON OF ORIGINS OF MARVEL COMICS:

What if our hero had an injured heart — a heart that required him to wear some sort of metal device to keep it beating? The metal device could be the basic element in an entire suit of armor which could both power him and conceal his identity. I loved it. It had the right ring to it. I knew it would work.

Dubbing his new creation “Iron Man,” Stan turned over the plot to his brother Larry Lieber, who provided the script. As for the art, Don Heck provided the pencils, as he would for many of the succeeding IRON MAN adventures. Compared to the power of Jack Kirby’s work, or the sleek dynamicism of Steve Ditko’s style, some have called Don Heck’s work boring or staid, a position with which I heartily disagree. Heck provided a sophistication to the series that very much fit the “High Society” feel of the Tony Stark character, and the streamlined look of Iron Man’s armor, as opposed to the overly muscled superheroes in Marvel’s other books, very much played to Heck’s strengths as a draftsman. Lee, Lieber and Heck presented their new creation to the world in TALES OF SUSPENSE #39, in “Iron Man Is Born!”

talesofsuspense39.jpg

As the story opens, we meet Tony Stark, millionaire industrialist who’s demonstrating the power of his newfangled “transistors” to the U.S. Army. While in Vietnam to ground-test his new “transistor-powered” mortar cannons, Stark accidentally triggers an explosive booby-trap, and is mortally wounded and captured by Wong-Chu, “the red guerrilla tyrant” of South Vietnam. No, your eyes aren’t deceiving you — Wong-Chu was actually colored yellow.

yankeeinventor.jpg

So anyway, Wong-Chu’s Commie doctors get a hold of Tony Stark, who conveniently has papers identifying him as “famous Yankee weapons inventor,” and determine that shrapnel from the explosion is traveling ever closer to his heart, and will kill him within a week. Wong-Chu lies to the injured prisoner, telling Stark that if he builds a new weapon for them, Wong-Chu will have his surgeons save his life. Stark sees through Wong-Chu’s ruse, and sets to work creating a chestplate that will keep his damaged heart beating, while also powering a suit of armor that will liberate him from the Red prison.

wong-chu.jpg

Stark is assisted by Professor Yinsen, another of Wong-Chu’s prisoners, who turns out to be, in the words of Stark himself, “once the greatest physicist of them all.” How extremely convenient.

With Yinsen’s assistance, Stark completes the armored suit, and just in time, as the shrapnel is just about to reach his heart. Unfortunately, while the armor is charging and Stark lies helpless, Wong-Chu and his men approach. To prevent them from capturing Stark, Yinsen charges into the hallway, distracting the guards at the cost of his own life.

theironmanswearsit.jpg

Now fully charged and operational, and with the chestplate keeping him alive, Tony Stark must quickly learn to function within his gray iron shell. With the help of the many attachments he and Yinsen built into the armor, Stark eludes his captors in the prison, then faces Wong-Chu in one of his impromptu wrestling matches with the local villagers.

attachments.jpg

Stark lays some capitalist smack down on the Commie warlord, and then chases him around the village. After contending with Wong-Chu’s deadly Filing Cabinet Full of Rocks, Stark puts away Wong for good, blowing up the guerrilla’s ammo dump just as he runs toward it.

barroom.jpg

By Iron Man’s next appearance, Stark has returned to the United States and his playboy lifestyle, but is now a prisoner of the chestplate that keeps him alive (although it’s never quite clear why Stark doesn’t, oh, I don’t know, go see a surgeon who might be able to help with the whole damaged-heart problem…). Also, Iron Man shows off the first of many armor changes in his second go-round, changing the color from gray to gold.

talesofsuspense40.jpg

An interesting wrinkle is added when “Iron Man” is introduced to the public as Tony Stark’s bodyguard and the corporate symbol of Stark’s company, Stark Industries. Also introduced are Tony’s lovestruck secretary, Pepper Potts, and his chauffeur, former boxer “Happy” Hogan, who also carried a torch for Pepper.

Moreso than any of the other Marvel Comics of the era, the IRON MAN series was caught up in the fervor of Cold War America, with Iron Man representing the power of American technology and scientific knowhow that was going to quash those backwards Commies. Let’s take a look at Iron Man’s Silver Age rogues’ gallery to illustrate: The first of many armored doppelgangers to face Iron Man was the Crimson Dynamo, first appearing in TALES OF SUSPENSE #46. The world’s greatest expert on electricity, Soviet scientist Professor Vanko creates the Crimson Dynamo armor to “control electricity in any of its forms.” The Dynamo is sent to America to wreck all of Stark International’s military projects, crippling the U.S. in the arms race, and to kill Iron Man while he’s at it.

crimsondynamo.jpg

Iron Man tricks Vanko into believing his Red masters are about to betray him (which did happen to be true), while his alter ego Tony Stark proves the power of capitalism over Communism by buying off the Russian scientist, giving him a job at Stark International as head of electrical research, no doubt with a fat expense account, a company car and full medical and dental. God bless America. There would be many later versions of the Crimson Dynamo armor to come, and almost as many poor Russian dopes enlisted to wear it.

Next up on Tony Stark’s Iron Curtain dance card was the Mandarin, the true ruler behind Red China, before whom even the Red Chinese Army trembled. The Mandarin first appeared in TALES OF SUSPENSE #50. When Iron Man is sent by the CIA to China to gather information on the mysterious Mandarin (who wears a tunic with a giant letter “M” on it, despite the fact that his native language would logically be Chinese), he’s quickly captured and subject to various traps and weapons, as the Mandarin tests Iron Man’s mettle.

themandarin.jpg

Considering that Iron Man is the one invading the Mandarin’s homeland, he’s awfully belligerent about it, telling him, “I can see now that the world will never be safe as long as a power-mad despot like you remains free!” Uh, Iron Man? You weren’t exactly invited…

The Mandarin soon reveals his true power: 10 rings, one for each finger, each of which possesses a different super-power. Between that and his mastery of the martial arts, the Mandarin has Iron Man on the ropes, until Iron Man uses his on-board calculator to determine the exact angle at which to tilt his body to block the Mandarin’s karate chop, causing the most damage. Yes, Iron Man defeated the Mandarin with algebra. Glad somebody found a use for it…

Later Mandarin appearances would seriously downplay the Communist aspects, and reveal that the rings were actually of alien origin, by the way.

Soviet spy the Black Widow made her debut appearance in TALES OF SUSPENSE #52, sent by the Reds to assassinate Tony Stark, as well as Professor Vanko, the defected former Crimson Dynamo. After the Widow fails in several missions, she’s returned to the Soviet Union and given a new device which allow her to walk along walls and spin webs like her namesake, then sent back to America to act as a more physical threat to Iron Man.

blackwidow.jpg

Eventually, the Widow would renounce her former masters and defect to the United States, becoming a trusted ally to Iron Man, as well as something of a super-hero groupie, becoming romantically involved with Hawkeye the Marksman, Olympian demigod Hercules and Daredevil.

In the best example of Cold War boosterism, Iron Man faces the Kremlin’s latest armored creation, Titanium Man, in internationally televised combat in TALES OF SUSPENSE #69-71. The Titanium Man armor, being made from — you guessed it — titanium, was so heavy and cumbersome (especially since the Soviets lacked Stark’s trademark miniaturized transistors) that no mere man could wear it. Inside the armor was Boris Bullski, commissar of a Siberian work camp, whose prodigious strength allowed him to move and fight while wearing the weighty suit. After a lengthy fight sequence (put together with suspense and panache by Lee and Heck), Iron Man defeats the Ruskie with the help of his new “reverser ray,” although the Titanium Man armor, like the Crimson Dynamo, would return again and again with new updates and new occupants.

titaniumman.jpg

Along the way, Iron Man’s armor had been evolving as well, with the most significant upgrade coming in TALES OF SUSPENSE #48, courtesy of artist Steve Ditko, who put together a sleek and streamlined red and gold ensemble which would prove to be the most influential in the series’ run.

ditkoarmor.jpg

Although there would be many iterations and upgrades to come, the Ditko design would be utilized the most, and most new interpretations to this day fall back on this one as a template. The only significant alteration to the Ditko suit for over twenty years was in the helmet, which would occasionally feature a forked faceplate, visible rivets, and even briefly a nose, thanks to artist George Tuska.

ironman_snose.jpg

The armor’s abilities stayed fairly consistent throughout the run: increased strength and resistance to harm, boot-jets for flight, “repulsor” beams of concussive force from the gloves, and a “unibeam” laser from the chest. Occasionally special attachments or add-ons would be utilized, from jet boosters for increased speed to roller skates for, well, increased funkitude, I guess.

rollerskates.jpg

Also, there would be specialized armor created for specific situations, such as outer space, underwater depths, stealth missions, etc.

As the ’60s gave way to the ’70s, the Cold War angle was downplayed, with more emphasis given to Stark’s business interests, and matters of corporate intrigue and sabotage. The matter of Stark’s heart was finally settled, as he was the subject of an experimental operation which gave him a new synthetic heart. This took away a fair amount of the series’ central concept, however, namely “the millionaire playboy with the fatal flaw.” Writer David Michelinie and artist Bob Layton would solve that problem with their landmark run in IRON MAN #120 — #128, in which Tony Stark faces up to his alcoholism. Michelinie builds a tense thriller in which Stark’s company is ever so slowly wrested from his grasp, while competing industrialist Justin Hammer frames Iron Man for the murder of a foreign ambassador, on live TV no less.

solongsergei.jpg

Under constant pressure, Stark finds himself increasingly turning to alcohol, and having lost his company and with Iron Man’s reputation in ruins, hits rock bottom until he finds the strength to turn away from the bottle.

demoninabottle.jpg

The subject was maturely handled, and Layton’s art is clean and appealing. Highly recommended. The story was collected in trade way back in 1984, and recently re-released in trade, as “Demon in a Bottle.”

powerofironman.jpg

The alcoholism storyline was brought back in IRON MAN #169, in a lengthy storyline by writer Denny O’Neil (some might say too lengthy) in which Stark completely lost control of his company (which he had regained after his last bout with alcoholism), as well as his personal fortune, to competing businessman Obadiah Stane, and suffers a major relapse, even giving up his Iron Man identity entirely, passing the armor on to his longtime pilot James Rhodes.

ironman182.jpg

Rhodes would remain Iron Man for over three and a half years, even after Stark sobered up and moved to California with Rhodes and two colleagues to start a new company. Eventually, (IRON MAN #200, to be exact) Stark would return to the armor (albeit one of the ugliest armored suits Iron Man had ever worn), and return to his corporate glories with a new company, Stark Industries.

ironman200.jpg

Rhodes would eventually be given his own armor, and sporadically operate as War Machine.

One of the more well-remembered Iron Man storylines from the ’80s was courtesy of the returning David Michelinie, who, along with artist Mark Bright, gave us “The Armor Wars,” in which Stark discovers that nearly every other armored or technologically based character in the Marvel Universe is utilizing his stolen technology and designs. Riddled with guilt at the pain and damage caused by his creations, Stark goes on a one-man vigilante crusade, tracking down and neutralizing every unauthorized use of his technology, be they friend or foe. Running from IRON MAN #225 to #231, “The Armor Wars” pitted Iron Man against some of his worst enemies as well as his closest friends, including fellow Avengers Hawkeye and Captain America.

ironman228.jpg

Starting with an original idea (a rare commodity with characters that have been around for decades) and following through with it with plenty of surprises and more than a little drama, “The Armor Wars” is solid stuff. Check it out.

One Response to Isn’t It Ironic?

  1. Jeff Nettleton August 29, 2012 at 8:19 am #

    I think the early stuff demonstrates the problem Stan had when he didn’t work with a strong co-plotter as artist: He would routinely fall back on the “Commies” as villains. It’s hard to get a handle on Lee’s politics, but I think it was Mark Evanier who said he was probably too conservative for Kirby and too liberal for Ditko. It seems to fit when you look at Marvel under his watch. There are pockets of social commentary but a lot of middle of the road sentiments, with Commie bashing on the other side. However, the Commies tended to make for some bland villains, as there were no shades of grey, compared to a Doctor Doom or a Magneto (though he was fairly one dimensional for a long time). Black Widow worked better as she seemed torn between both worlds, compared to some of the others. I do feel that the over reliance on the Cold War is one of the reasons Iron Man struggled to rise above the middle of the pack for years, not to mention it was hard to sympathize with Stark’s problems, given his wealth and technology, until the alcoholism. David Micheline really understood how to get under Stark’s skin and use all of the gimmicky thugs in a more logical manner. For me, most Iron Man stories were rather disposable until Micheline, Layton and Romita Jr stirred things up.

Welcoming the Future, Treasuring the Past.