Iron Man’s Father Holds the Secret to an Artifact That Could Reshape the Marvel Universe

Iron Man’s current feud with an X-Men villain reveals his father was on the verge of a discovery that will have major ramifications for the Marvel Universe. The new volume of Invincible Iron Man has taken an unexpected route of pitting Tony Stark against Feilong, an anti-mutant industrialist who has also taken control of Stark Unlimited. So instead of just finding fault with mutants, Feilong also has it out for Iron Man. But what we discover in the latest issue of Invincible Iron Man is Howard Stark left his son a secret message that may help Feilong lift humanity above mutantkind.

WARNING: The following article contains spoilers for Invincible Iron Man #5. Continue reading at your own risk!

Invincible Iron Man #5 comes from the creative team of Gerry Duggan, Juan Frigeri, Bryan Valenza, and VC’s Joe Caramagna. The beginning of the issue features Tony Stark’s trip to Krakoa to let Emma Frost know what’s going on with Feilong. Tony also gets some added information on how Feilong got powers when Emma downloads Sunfire’s last interaction with the villain in X-Men #6. Feilong used his new ownership of Stark Unlimited to pour through Tony’s files, where he found an interesting inheritance left to him in Texas.

This hangar bay in Texas is where Howard Stark hid old film recordings for Tony to look at. However, since Tony never discovered them and Feilong did, this allows the latter to watch Howard Stark reveal a previously-unknown team-up with Blue Marvel resulted in his finding a new metal he dubs “miracle metal.”

What Is Miracle Metal?

Whatever this “miracle metal” is, it exists in another universe outside the main Earth-616. “It’s a metal outside our periodic table that shouldn’t exist, because it’s outside our universe,” Howard Stark says. He later ends the recording by calling “miracle metal” Tony’s real inheritance, and why he did everything he did to better humanity. Of course, Feilong is all about preserving humanity and making sure it doesn’t fall to the mutants. So there’s no telling what Feilong plans to do with this special metal once he gets his hands on it.

Until that “miracle metal” is ready, Feilong has moved on building his own brand of Stark Sentinels to hunt mutants. Iron Man has to battle one of these giant robots once he arrives at the Texas hangar bay, and barely escapes with his life. “Sentinels with Iron Man advancements… represent a leap forward that is beyond my current technology,” Tony says to himself. 

Feilong having possession of the “miracle metal” spells bad news for Iron Man and the X-Men, and possibly alludes to the upcoming Fall of X.