Marvel Is Finally Doing Classic Iron Man Again (and It’s Perfect)

Iron Man is one of the most popular superheroes that hasn’t tasted sales success in a very long time. Tony Stark has been around for close to 70 years now, one of the characters that helped Marvel Comics take over the comic industry in the early ’60s. This positioned him as one of the most important characters at the House of Ideas, eventually culminating in a run in the late ’70s/early ’80s that was the last time the character was part of legitimately great comic stories. Since then, he kept his high rank in the superhero community, but rarely tasted success until the Marvel Cinematic Universe, where he became the most popular superhero in the world for years. However, he never reached that kind of success in the comics.

Iron Man has some amazing stories under his belt, but the character has never been able to bring his MCU success to the printed page. Marvel seemingly never really knew what to do with the character, either making him a pragmatic superhero, trying to solve problems at any cost, or just copying the MCU. Nothing worked to make the character popular. The hero has been relaunched again, by writer Joshua Williamson and artist Carmen Carnero, and fans are finally getting the character at his best. They did this in the simplest way possible: by embracing the character’s classic conception.

Iron Man (Vol. 7) Is Digging Into the Character’s Past to Find His Future

Being an Iron Man comic fan hasn’t been easy in decades. His best run came in the Bronze Age of comics, and since then, we’ve only gotten a few examples of great Iron Man: Iron Man (Vol. 3), from Kurt Busiek and Sean Chen, “Man in the Iron Mask”, “Extremis”, and the Matt Fraction run. He was crucial to Civil War, but that story made him into a character everyone hated, giving him his pragmatic almost villainous portrayal that would stay his status quo until 2015, when Marvel tried to make him MCU Tony Stark. That failed, and the character has been in the weeds ever since. He still gets books, but they are quickly canned because few people are buying them.

In the 21st century, characters like Captain America, Thor, Wolverine, Daredevil, Spider-Man, and so many others have had numerous best of all time runs and stories and Iron Man hasn’t. Marvel could never find a way to recapture the character’s Silver and Bronze Age success or replicate his MCU success. The last few years have seen Iron Man get cool new armors, but never a cool new series. Well, Williamson and Carnero are changing that.

This newest volume of Iron Man is reaching further back than any Iron Man run has in a while. It’s reaching past the post-Civil War quasi villain and the MCU version of the character to find the hero that inspired both of these. This Tony Stark is charming and funny, but he’s also anxious and trying to find solutions to the problem of the world. He has the ’70s mustache back, no goatee, and the character feels more like Tony Stark than any version of the character has in a while. You can see the roots of Civil War/MCU Iron Man in him, but what you really see is the hero that everyone fell in love with decades ago.

The first story arc brings back his relationship with the villainous Madame Masque, as she works with AIM to find the next Tony Stark and bend them to evil. This book is all about who Tony is, why he does what he does, and why he’s special. That’s so different than any other Iron Man run in recent years. It’s focusing on him, not on his actions, not on all of armor or the technology, not the quips. This is the man, warts and all, and it’s perfect. This is the Iron Man we’ve deserved for a long time, and it’s only just starting.

Iron Man Is Getting a Run That Will Actually Make Fans Like Him Again

The MCU made Iron Man a superstar, and new fans going into the comic store to read his adventures weren’t met with much. The character was basically a villain and completely different from the movie, and since then, we’ve rarely gotten a comic that made the character a must-read character. His best stories came in team books, as his books became too obsessed with Iron Man armor upgrades rather than good character-based storytelling that dug into what people loved about him. Well, it only took 19 years, but the House of Ideas is finally putting out an Iron Man comic that will make all of his fans happy.

Iron Man (Vol. 7) takes everything that fans have always loved about the character and puts it on the page. Sure, there’s the arrogance, the humor, the cool tech. But there’s also the broken man, the one who wants to fix the world, the one who does dumb things to feel good for short periods. It’s bringing back classic members of his supporting cast like Pepper Potts, and introducing new ones. It’s got Madame Masque in it, which is awesome. If you ever loved Iron Man at all, buy this book. You’ll find the best conception of the character in decades.

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