Iron Man: A Retrospective

I'd like to perform a little retrospective on the publishing history of Marvel Comics' Iron Man. Before I start, I'm going to invoke a spoiler warning for Avengers: Endgame.

SPOILERS!

...I'm looking back on Iron Man in part because with the death of Tony Stark in Avengers: Endgame, it seems an appropriate season for reflection. Not that his counterpart in the comics is even the least bit under the weather - comic book Tony Stark will live forever. However, let's face it... if there is just one person who is the most influential creator in terms of Iron Man's acceptance by the general public, it comes down to Robert Downey, Jr. and his performance in the last 11 years of Marvel Cinematic Universe films, not anything which Marvel Comics has published before or since he came along.

And let's take a moment to appreciate that prior to the film, Iron Man was not a huge property. I remember the days when people on the internet questioned why Marvel was still publishing Iron Man other than sheer inertia. The Iron Man series has a fairly uneven history compared to other Marvel properties. For instance, Daredevil had a similarly difficult time finding its footing (in fact, there was a point in the early 70s where Marvel considered merging Iron Man and Daredevil into one book), but after Frank Miller's first tenure on Daredevil the series found a new way to tell its stories which has kept the property more or less consistent ever since. But while fans of Iron Man have their favourite creators and runs (and definitely their favourite armours) I don't think there is one single creative team who figured out how to write an enduring take on the character; to some extent, every creator has tried to veer away from what their predecessor was doing.

I was not a huge fan of Iron Man (series or character) growing up. In fact, most of the series was unread by me until, thanks to the Iron Man movie, I became head writer/coordinator of an Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe publication called All-New Iron Manual. I am extremely proud of that book (it has art by Carlo Pagulayan & Ron Lim! and an armour diagram by Eliot R. Brown!) and I read everything up to that point in order to guide the project. Later, to coincide with Iron Man 2, I headed up Iron Manual Mark 3, a comic so nice, even Robert Downey, Jr. bought a copy!

I resigned from Marvel Comics in 2012 and since then have not really followed what's been going on with the characters (I do check in on certain creators). So, my tour of Iron Man's publication history is only going up to 2012. I've divided the history by writers and I'm going to observe how the character of Tony Stark changed over the years, how his supporting cast developed and highlight a few memorable stories.

Follow along...

Stan Lee (1963-1968) wrote Tales of Suspense #39-98 with writing assists from Larry Lieber, Robert Bernstein, Al Hartley and Roy Thomas, art by Don Heck, Jack Kirby, Steve Ditko and Gene Colan. So, here's where it all begins - Tony Stark is touring his defense plants in Vietnam when he walks into a booby trap set by the Viet Cong. With shrapnel in his heart, Stark and scientist Ho Yinsen build a suit of armour to keep him alive. There is a lot of important Iron Man history in these issues, naturally, but it is mostly foundational to what comes next. Stan Lee had long been giddy about pitting his comic book heroes against the 'red menace' of communism and no 1960s hero demonstrated that better than Iron Man. Iron Man battled communists in Russia, China, Vietnam and Cuba! Further, as an industrialist who was building weapons for the government, Tony Stark had a stake in the Cold War which other heroes simply didn't have (Lee also established him as the arms dealer to S.H.I.E.L.D. over in his Nick Fury stories as well as the financier of the Avengers).

It took a while for the series to build a supporting cast and it's still very small at this point; the most important were Harold 'Happy' Hogan and Virginia 'Pepper' Potts, who formed a love triangle with Tony, the sort of thing Lee enjoyed writing. However, Lee eventually decided to bring the triangle to a close by having Happy & Pepper hook up and get married. That kind of resulted in them leaving the series, unfortunately, but eventually nostalgia would cause the Tony-Pepper-Happy triangle to return. The only other notable characters were Senator Harrington Byrd (a gruff J. Jonah Jameson-type) and Jasper Sitwell, who immigrated from Nick Fury, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. Meantime, there were plenty of notable villains created: the Crimson Dynamo, Titanium Man, the Melter, the Unicorn, Ultimo, the Black Widow, Hawkeye... the biggest of them all, however, was the Mandarin. The least-appreciated villain must be Tony's cousin Morgan Stark, a fascinating character who surprisingly few writers have taken an interest in over the decades.

A few trends began during this run: we have Tony's first health problems as his armour needs to keep him alive; Tony's 'transistor-powered armour' as the first of many charmingly bad comic book science concepts; Tony repeatedly altering and improving his armour; the first time Tony shares his armour (with Happy); and we have the author leaving in the middle of a story which his successor has to complete (in this case, the Whiplash/Maggia story).

Archie Goodwin (1968-1970) wrote Tales of Suspense #99 and Iron Man #1-28 with art by Gene Colan, Johnny Craig, George Tuska and Don Heck. This, to me, is the first great run on the series. As I was reading through the entire series, I found myself slowing down to enjoy the stories. The storyline in Iron Man #17-19 where Tony's LMD takes control of his life is an amazing read! Goodwin brought in characters like Janice Cord (Tony's new love interest) and villains the Controller, Madame Masque and Midas. In the course of these stories, Tony finally had heart surgery so that his armour no longer needed to keep him alive (however, it left him extremely weak and less-powerful afterward). And if you thought James Rhodes was the first black Iron Man... nope! It was Eddie March, whom Tony tried to make the new Iron Man in issue #21, only for Eddie to have health problems of his own. And in #22, Janice Cord died at the hands of the Titanium Man several years before the Green Goblin would kill Gwen Stacy over in Amazing Spider-Man (one wonders why Titanium Man isn't Tony's #1 enemy, considering how killing Gwen elevated the Goblin to Spider-Man's top arch-foe).

Allyn Brodsky and Gerry Conway (1970-1972) wrote Iron Man #30-44 with art by Don Heck, George Tuska and Herb Trimpe. Here we have the first low point in the series. This run of issues was so bad it nearly got the series cancelled! It includes the infamous 'Mr. Kline' story which had also been dragging Daredevil into the sewer. Kevin O'Brien was introduced as a new supporting cast member and got his own armoured identity as the Guardsman (only to be killed off in one of the fill-ins between creative runs) and Tony's new love interest was Marianne Rogers, a psychic. Yeah, a psychic... However, Brodsky did introduce the villain Spymaster, who would go on to be a major villain throughout the series (with various characters assuming the identity).

Mike Friedrich (1972-1975) wrote Iron Man #48-81 with art by George Tuska, Bill Everett, Jim Starlin, P. Craig Russell, Arvell Jones and Chic Stone. This run of issues includes a number of fill-ins. The series didn't have too many running subplots in the 70s, many issues were 'done-in-one'. Still, Friedrich brought out some memorable stories - obviously, #55 which introduced Thanos & Drax the Destroyer is a pretty significant episode in Marvel Comics history. Friedrich also introduced Firebrand and his sister Roxanne (Tony's new love interest) and brought back Happy & Pepper, complete with the love triangle despite their marriage. Friedrich also featured a number of stories where Tony had to deal with labour unrest and student demonstrations, plus Tony's company expanded significantly as for the first time we saw the company's offices in Detroit, Cincinnati, Seattle and such. Unfortunately, his promising 'war of the super-villains' storyline with the Black Lama came down an immensely goofy finish where the Lama turned out to be an alternate reality Gerald Ford.

Bill Mantlo (1976-1978) wrote Iron Man #86-115 with art by George Tuska, Keith Pollard, Carmine Infantino, Keith Giffen and John Romita Jr. Bill Mantlo's 'run' is full of all kinds of fill-ins and it's hard to tell where his run really 'starts'. Of course, I have to mention Mantlo's fill in during Friedrich's run: in issue #78, Mantlo penned a tale where Tony witnesses the impact of his weapons in Vietnam and, struck by the horror of it, determines to get out of weapons. It was a pretty major development for a fill-in story and it began to set up Tony as someone who no longer blindly championed technology but who would wrestle with the effects of his inventions on the world around him. Mantlo tried to set up his own creation Jack of Hearts as Iron Man's protege but it didn't pan out; he also brought in Kevin O'Brien's brother Michael as a means of bringing back the Guardsman and he created the memorable villain Arsenal.

Bob Layton & David Michelinie (1978-1982) wrote Iron Man #116-157 with art by John Romita Jr., Carmine Infantino, Sal Buscema, Jerry Bingham, Alan Weiss, Joe Brozowski, Luke McDonnell and Alan Kupperberg (also inks by Bob Layton). Here we have the first tenure of Layton/Michelinie on the book and they're probably ranked #1 to the majority of Iron Man fans. In their hands, the supporting cast exploded as, for the first time, Stark's company seemed to have a life beyond Tony's office - new characters like Mrs. Arbogast, Bethany Cabe (Tony's new love interest), Vic Martinelli, Yvettte Avril, Artie Pithins... even Scott Lang (Ant-Man) would chime in from time to time. But the most important addition to the cast was James Rhodes, Tony's personal pilot. Rhodey could handle himself in a fight and after Layton & Michelinie established him as being adjacent to Tony's origin story, it pretty much guaranteed he'd be moving on to big things in the series. Michelinie & Layton brought an increased emphasis on Tony as a businessman, not only by pitting him against S.H.I.E.L.D. in an attempted hostile takeover, but by introducing the new villain Justin Hammer, a corrupt businessman who challenged Tony on a different level. Basically, any writer since Michelinie/Layton who didn't use Justin Hammer instead used a different character with the same purpose (ie, Obadiah Stane, Kearson DeWitt, Sunset Bain). Michelinie & Layton are also beloved by fans for introducing armours for special environments, such as the stealth armour. But their biggest influence on the character was felt in issue #128, the first time Tony struggled with alcoholism, a major addition to his character which gave him a new physical weakness to replace what the heart injury had once done for him.

Dennis O'Neil (1982-1986) wrote #158-208 with art by Carmine Infantino, Steve Ditko, Luke McDonnell, Mike Vosburg, Don Perlin, Rich Buckler, Sal Buscema, Herb Trimpe and Mark Bright. O'Neil's run is best known for promoting James Rhodes to the leading role (from #169-199), but is also remembered for introducing the villain Obadiah Stane and the red & silver armour (in issue #200). O'Neil wrote virtually every one of Michelinie & Layton's supporting characters out of the book and brought in the twins Clytemnestra & Morley Erwin as the new supporting cast (Morley died in #199 and the next creative team turned Clytemnestra into a villain, then killed her). Personally, the highlights of this run are issue #182 where Tony finally seeks help for his alcoholism and #192 where Tony earns back Rhodey's friendship.

Bob Layton & David Michelinie (1987-1990) returned for a second run in Iron Man #215-256 with art by Mark Bright, Bob Layton, Barry Windsor-Smith, Jackson Guice, Denys Cowan, Alan Kupperberg, Paul Smith and John Romita Jr. (also inks by Layton). In some respects, this run is a lot like the earlier Michelinie/Layton run: most of the supporting characters whom O'Neil wrote out were brought back, Tony regained his company, Rhodey stopped wearing the armour, Justin Hammer was back, new special environment armours were introduced and Tony eventually went back to the red & gold colours. However, they didn't simply rehash what they'd done before: they brought Tony through one of his most controversial arcs in what they called 'Stark Wars' but which everyone else calls 'Armor Wars' (#225-231), in which Tony obsessively hunted down both villains and heroes wearing armour, trying to prevent his designs from taking lives. They also critiqued Tony's love life as his latest girlfriend Kathy Dare shot Tony in the spine, crippling him. Although Tony regained his mobility by the end of their run it set in motion major complications for the character. Like many creative runs on Iron Man, this one had some problems going on in the background - Bob Layton was supposed to continue writing the series solo, but instead they brought in a new writer...

John Byrne (1990-1992) wrote Iron Man #258-277 with art by John Romita Jr., Paul Ryan and Mark Bright. John Byrne was in the middle of his 'corporate Namor' material in Namor the Sub-Mariner at the time so this was an interesting choice... it was also something to see John Romita, Jr. return to this series with his own art style now fully developed. Most of Byrne's run was taken up by 'Armor Wars II', which, despite the title, had nothing to do with the earlier storyline. The story concerns Kearson DeWitt going after Stark for revenge (and in a nice twist, Stark has no idea who DeWitt is or what he wants revenge for). The microchip in Tony's spine from the end of Michelinie/Layton's run turns out to contain a weapon designed by DeWitt to seize control of Tony's nervous system. By the end of the story, Tony is a nervous wreck... I mean, he's barely able to walk. Byrne also wrote a major Mandarin storyline which tied his origin into Fin Fang Foom (seriously!) and revealed his ten rings belonged to space dragons who now wanted them back... I have no idea why they left them unguarded for several hundred years, frankly.

Len Kaminski (1992-1995) wrote Iron Man #278-318 with art by Paul Ryan, Kevin Hopgood, Barry Kitson, Tom Morgan, Tom Tenney, Steve Ellis and Dave Chlystek. Kaminski came to the book in the middle of the 'Operation: Galactic Storm' crossover with the Avengers but he very quickly became a fan-favourite writer - for a long time, he was the only serious rival to Michelinie/Layton in the fan community. Much of Kaminski's run simply revisited earlier ideas like new special environment armour (eventually he introduced the modular armour which could refit for special situations), Rhodey becoming Iron Man again and the conclusion to Tony's nervous system woes. I really admire him for seemingly killing off Tony Stark, but never tricking the readers, who knew from the outset that Tony was still alive; most comic book writers would have tried to trick the audience. Anyway, Kaminski did a great job of maintaining and building on the supporting cast from the Michelinie/Layton years, reestablished Rhodey as War Machine, introduced Veronica Benning (Tony's newest love interest) and even brought Happy and Pepper back into the cast. In retrospect, this was a very stable time for the series, with no sense of the tumult which would follow.

Terry Kavanagh (1995-1996) wrote Iron Man #319-332 with writing assists from Dan Abnett and James Felder and art by Tom Morgan, Adriana Melo, Hector Oliveira, Sergio Cariello, Jim Cheung, Mark Bright, Jim Calafiore, Dave Hover, Marc Campos and Joe Bennett (basically, Kavanagh never had a regular penciler). And here's what most fans would call the worst creative run on Iron Man. Kaminski evidently fled the series rather than write this story, in which the Avengers crossover 'The Crossing' unmasks Iron Man as a murderer who had been a sleeper agent for Kang for years and begins killing off members of the Avengers (well, unpopular members, anyway). The crossover ended with Tony making a heroic sacrifice while his college-aged self from another reality became the new Iron Man. Pretty much the only people who enjoy these comics are of the 'I like it ironically' school. The entire experience left a bad taste in fan's mouths and I don't recommend they be read by anyone other than researchers.

Jim Lee, Scott Lobdell & Jeph Loeb (1996-1997) wrote Iron Man #1-12 with art by Whilce Portacio, Ryan Benjamin, Jim Lee, Terry Shoemaker and Ed Benes. The entire family of Avengers titles were brought low by 'The Crossing', causing them to dwindle in number instead of thriving, which is supposed to be the point of a good crossover, y'know? So, along came Jim Lee & Rob Liefeld, who rebooted the Avengers & Fantastic Four characters. These comics didn't do much more than provide a cushion between the despised 'Teen Tony' stories and the next revamp, basically clearing the ground for...

Kurt Busiek (1998-2000) wrote Iron Man #1-25 with writing assists from Richard Howell and Roger Stern and art by Sean Chen, Patrick Zircher, Mark Bagley and Tom Lyle. This is an interesting mix of nostalgia for the Lee & Goodwin years which, at the same time, tried to move the series forward. Tony sets up a new company as an independent contractor, which basically turns him into James Bond with power armour. Sean Chen's armour design was great, but it was disappointing to see the Happy-Pepper-Tony triangle brought back yet again. Highlights included Rumiko Fujikawa (Tony's new love interest), Tony becoming an AA sponsor to Carol Danvers and the obscure Machine Man villain Sunset Bain established as a villainous female counterpart to Stark. Lowlights included Tony discovering his armour was causing him new health problems, only for him to fix the problem within one issue; coupled with that was Tony using a telepathic weapon to erase people's memories of his secret identity, all of which seemed like a misguided effort to de-complicate Tony's problems instead of escalating them - not good drama.

Joe Quesada (2000) wrote from Iron Man #26-30 with art by Sean Chen and Alitha Martinez. Quesada basically wrote just one story (although he hung around to co-plot with Tieri as he assumed full writing duties), but it's a pretty good one: 'The Mask in the Iron Man' had Tony's armour become sentient, turn against Tony and finally sacrifice its life for him. It's something of a retelling of Archie Goodwin's LMD story and it brought back Tony's heart problems. I think it works well, as long as you ignore the follow-up story.

Frank Tieri (2000-2002) wrote Iron Man #31-49 with writing assists from Joe Quesada and art by Alitha Martinez, Paul Ryan, Keron Grant, Udon Studios and Chris Batista. So, this one is a pretty despised creative run. Initially fans were interested but around the time Tony's never-before-seen best friend Tiberius Stone had an affair with Rumiko, the knives came out. Keron Grant designed a new suit of armour whose introduction was supposed to be an exciting revelation, but which was ultimately so unpopular that over in the Avengers, creators would go out of their way to avoid depicting Tony in armour. Tieri also brought back Ho Yinsen as the leader of a floating city full of Iron Men, then revealed it (and the sentient armour) were all a plot by Ultron. Oh, and for part of the series Tony changed his name to 'Hogan Potts' and worked at an office job. Let's move on.

Mike Grell (2002-2003) wrote Iron Man #50-66 with writing assists from Robin Laws and art by Michael Ryan, Ryan Odagawa, Mike Grell, Ivan Reis and Alan Davis. This run has been pretty much forgotten by fandom, although it is here that Tony Stark finally went public as Iron Man, a development which will probably never be rolled back (thanks to the movies). The new armour designed by Michael Ryan was much liked, but almost no one remembers Grell rewrote Tony's origin, shuffling it to eastern Europe instead of Vietnam. This all happened during the Bill Jemas era at Marvel Comics where almost every comic would tell stories in six-issue arcs and super-villains, team-ups and crossovers became somewhat scarce. There's not too much that's flashy about these stories and Grell wound up leaving mid-story.

John Jackson Miller (2003-2004) wrote from Iron Man #73-85 with art by Jorge Lucas and Philip Tan. Miller seemed to be a huge fan of the series and filled his rather short run with all kinds of references from across the series, bringing back not only Michelinie/Layton cast members but also stuff which had been left dangling since the Kaminski era. Miller chose to make Tony Stark the US Secretary of Defense, making the book more overtly political than it had been in the past. It might have been an interesting change for the character but it didn't last very long. Miller only really got to tell one story with Tony as SOD, and while I think he wrote a compelling take on the Iraq War, artist Philip Tan's choice to draw the Kurdish female revolutionary Vitriol in T&A poses really worked against the tone of the story.

Warren Ellis (2005-2006) wrote Iron Man #1-6 with art by Adi Granov. This story, 'Extremis', really should have been a limited series. Incredibly, it took 18 months for all six issues to ship! By the end of it, Tony had his body rebuilt by the Extremis technology, turning him into a post-human able to link into virtually any computer. This made Tony ridiculously powerful. I fondly recall a phone conversation I had with Eliot R. Brown while making The All-New Iron Manual where I explained to him how Ellis defined the Extremis powers. Brown scoffed at Ellis' 'pseudeoscience', told me how it was all wrong, then explained how he'd achieve the same ends using ideas extrapolated from real science. I told him to go for it; I doubt my editors noticed. Anyway, Granov had been painting covers for Iron Man since the Miller run but his visuals in these stories wound up having a huge impact on the Marvel Cinematic Universe. In the comics, Ellis' Extremis would hang around for some time to come and his characters Maya Hansen & Sal Kennedy remained in the supporting cast for the next team.

Daniel and Charles Knauf (2006-2008) wrote Iron Man #7-28 with art by Patrick Zircher, Roberto de la Torre, Jackson Guice and Carlo Pagulayan. This creative run started off fairly modest, but by the end, I found I really enjoyed the Knaufs. The shadow of Marvel's 'Civil War' event hovers on their work, as it was during their run that - due to the machinations of Mark Millar - Tony Stark became director of S.H.I.E.L.D., which is kind of an amped-up version of what John Jackson Miller tried to do during his run. In the midst of that, the Knaufs had Tony deliver a mercy kill to Happy Hogan at Pepper's request, which just makes Tony and Pepper hooking up seem all the more wrong-headed. However, they delivered a fantastic Mandarin epic wherein the Mandarin tries to obtain Extremis for himself; it turned out to be the Knafus' farewell to the series.

Matt Fraction (2008-2012) wrote Invincible Iron Man #1-33 & 500-527 with art by Salvador Larroca. This series launched while the Knaufs' book was still coming out so Marvel could see if the Iron Man movie would increase people's interest in Iron Man comics. As it turns out, nope, but the Fraction/Larroca series wound up becoming the principal ongoing title and they remained together for many years, easily the most consistent creative team in the series' history. There are ups and downs in this run, but I think most fans are down with the 'World's Most Wanted' storyarc (#8-19), where Tony loses control of S.H.I.E.L.D. to Norman Osborn and is hunted around the globe by Osborn's resources while his mind slowly unravels. It included Pepper donning her own armour as Rescue and made Tony & Pepper a couple (plus Tony & Maria Hill, for both of the people who wanted that). Fraction/Larroca introduced a number of new threats for Tony based on relatives of long-dead adversaries, like Obadiah Stane's son Ezekiel and Justin Hammer's daughter Sasha. The crossover 'Fear Itself' (which was written by Fraction) threw the book off its game, but Fraction & Larroca did a fine job overall.

And that's it; since 2012, the writers have been: Kieron Gillen (2013-2014), who, bafflingly, decided to retcon Tony's parentage, making him the son of some S.H.I.E.L.D. agent instead of Howard & Maria Stark, a situation I'm sure someone will fix eventually; Tom Taylor (2014-2015) who wrote the 'Superior' Iron Man; Brian Michael Bendis (2015-2018), who eventually killed off Tony and replaced him with two Iron Men - Riri Williams and Doctor Doom - then brought Tony back before jumping ship from Marvel Comics; and Dan Slott (2018-), the current writer.

As I said before, I didn't care too much for Iron Man initially. Thanks to going through the series, however, I came to really appreciate the character. I enjoy him the most when he's heroic, but flawed; savvy in technology, blind to his shortcomings; pitted against villains who challenge him physically and mentally; and supported by a cast of well-developed characters.

All covers taken from The Grand Comics Database.