Iron Man, out with the old, in with the new

Iron Man #1

By Kieron Gillen and Greg Land
You may recall my glowing praise for the last issue of Iron Man by Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca.

Dynamic, exciting and full of humor and drama…

Sadly all of that is thrown to the gutter with the ‘Marvel Now!’ version of Iron Man introduced this week. It’s a shame since Gillen’s script is at least serviceable (if not up to par with his X-Men or Journey into Mystery work) but is hampered by the trace-art-work of Greg Land, a man so lacking in talent that one has to wonder why he still gets hired for any comic book, let alone a high-profile issue such as this.

The artwork that involves Stark in the Iron Man armor is fine, but any time a human face is featured it falls apart.

What’s even more bizarre is that the previous Iron Man series ended with Stark heading to the stars to get his head together, no doubt resulting in his inclusion for the new Guardians of the Galaxy series. So imagine my surprise when Stark is seen grinning like a corpse talking about his well-earned reprieve. Maybe it’s a simulacrum and not Stark at all, that may explain his non-stop lunatic grin. The action is definitely trying to break out from the staid and awkwardly stiff line-work of Land’s tracing table.

I also have to wonder why Emma Frost is having a drink with Tony Stark as it appears to be her in the sample below. Nope, it’s just one of three women that Land chooses to draw in every project he works on.

Look at what I can do with my tracing table!

I hate to be so negative about anything but given the importance of this new series and the launch of Marvel Now! along with the normally high quality of Gillen’s writing… I have to voice my disappointment along with my dropping this monthly comic from my pull list for the first time in about six years. Gillen has it in him to take up the mantle from Fraction, but he needs a solid artist to support him and make this series great again.

Iron Man: The End of an Era

There are few creative teams who have had as much impact on a monthly book as Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca have.

As a kid, I was always attracted by the design and look of Iron Man, but the book itself left me cold. I tried to get into the series several times as teams came and left but nothing really stuck.

When Daniel and Charles Knauf took over after Warren Ellis revamped the character for the 21st Century all of that changed. Suddenly, Iron Man was an interesting character and his adventures were complex and intense. With the inclusion of the Extremis virus, Stark became bonded to the technology that he had designed and finally stepped into a new era, one that would catapult him into the next six years in print.

However, it was Fraction and Larroca who took the hard work pioneered by both Ellis and both Knaufs and made it something more. The Fraction/Larroca run repeatedly placed Stark against challenges that pushed him to the limit, threatening to demoralize him, shatter his identity and reduce his lifelong work to ash. Even his alcoholism returned which once destroyed his personal, professional and superheroic life.

Through it all, Stark persevered, showing that Iron Man may be invincible, but Tony Stark indomitable.

Under the watch of Fraction/Larroca, Iron Man became an invigorating and stylish series, finally bringing one of the founding fathers of the Marvel Universe into the forefront. Stark went from being director of S.H.I.E.L.D. to a wanted man, his tech reduced to the most basic version of the Iron Man suit as he eluded capture. In more recent issues he has attempted to reinvent himself as a next-gen businessman, offering up bleeding edge technological resources to everyone. It’s this continual modernization of the character that has kept the series on its toes.

The latest story line saw Stark at the end of his rope, reduced to a prisoner and slave to his most dreaded foe, the Mandarin. Mad with ambition, the Mandarin forced Stark to produce shells for the ten alien spirits that dwell inside his rings. Of course, the Mandarin is koo-koo for cocoa puffs, but that doesn’t stop him from achieving his goal. Once more against insurmountable odds, Stark adapts and uses a combination of his charisma to win over his fellow prisoners (formerly enemies of Iron Man’s) and a swarm of nanite repulsor technology.

Developed by Stan Lee on a dare, Iron Man is a concept that should have failed; a weapons manufacturer as the hero during a time when war was protested by his readers. But to his surprise, the comic was a hit. The startling action, sizzling romance and non-stop drama made Iron Man into a sensation back in the 1960’s. Today, he is even more popular than ever thanks to the Iron Man and Avengers feature films and cartoons. But it is the hard work of the monthly book that makes such success possible as it is in print where the hero is defined and developed and that is reflected in the past three years’ of Invincible Iron Man quite well.

For modern readers, in my opinion this is the best Iron Man we have ever had. Opinions will differ, of course (The Michelin/Layton run is still very popular for instance), but for me this series made Iron Man a favorite series and it quickly rose to the top of my read pile each month. The Iron Man monthly book has been a phenomenal read over the past six years, combining humor, action and brilliant ideas. But the past three years’ worth of Iron Man comics have left a high water mark for the character.

This week the final chapter of that run hits the stands, with Kieron Gillen and Greg Land to follow shortly. It’s a hard act to follow.

Recommended: 

Invincible Iron Man Omnibus, Vol. 1

Invincible Iron Man Omnibus, Vol. 2

Official Iron Man 3 trailer premieres

Starring Robert Downey, Jr. as Tony Stark/Iron Man, Gwyneth Paltrow as ‘Pepper’ Potts, Don Cheadle as Jim Rhodes/War Machine and Sir Ben Kingsley as the Mandarin, Iron Man 3 is directed by Shane Black (who previously worked with Downey Jr. on Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang). The film also stars Guy Pearce as Aldrich Killian, the scientist behind the Extremis formula that forever changes the Iron Man technology.

The premiere date of Iron Man 3 is the TBD April 2013.

Thanks, Terrance!

New Iron Man team takes over in November

In addition to his work on the Mighty Thor and Uncanny X-Men Matt Fraction has been a driving force behind Iron Man for the past several years. Taking over the mantle of this series is no small endeavor which is why the announcement of Kieron Gillen as the new writer comes as a pleasant surprise. Gillen has made major strides in Thor, Uncanny X-Men and of course Journey into Mystery so I am eager to see what he will bring to the Iron Man series.

Iron Man has been a knockout series for a long while now and I am confident that Marvel will continue down that path in the years to come. *

Last week, Marvel released teasers announcing the creative teams on a number of its titles slated to be relaunched in November, giving readers hints at what’s to come for Iron Man, Thor, Hulk, Deadpool, the Fantastic Four/FF, Captain America and a possible X-Men title involving the word “Legacy.”

Today, we have confirmation that Kieron Gillen and Greg Land are taking over “Invincible Iron Man” when the series relaunches. In an interview with Marvel.com, Gillen provides a glimpse into his plans for the armored Avenger which involve exploring Tony Stark’s relationships with women, multiple-new suits of armor and a focus on the Extremis aspect of the hero in the new creative team’s initial five done-in-one issues.

“[H]e’s a morally complex guy,” Gillen told Marvel.com, describing the way Tony Stark has been portrayed over the last decade. “Just the fact that he found himself put in, inarguably, the position of the bad guy for a while, and that he defended it. He crushes it, actually, and there’s a lovely bit in “Avengers Vs. X-Men” where he goes to Cap, ‘You know, you’re actually arguing what I was arguing [in Civil War],’ which I loved.”

As for working once more with his “Uncanny X-Men” partner, artist Greg Land, Gillen assures fans he’s the right man for this gig. “[‘Invincible Iron Man’] really plays to many of Greg’s strengths actually. When people see the issue, they’ll say it makes a lot of sense that Greg is the one drawing this. I really want to play up the glamorous part though as well. Tony may be in the lab often but he’s also at glamorous parties and the Tony Stark-ness of it all.”

Stay tuned to CBR for more on Marvel NOW!

(*The announcement of Greg Land as regular artist has me less enthused, I should add)

Quick Review- Iron Man: Execute Program

Iron Man: Execute Program

By Daniel and Charlie Knauf and Patrick Zircher

It may sound hard to believe now that the character is the star of two major motion pictures and has been featured on everything from action figures to party favors, but Iron Man was not always as popular as he is today. In fact, he was dead wood on the chopping block of Marvel Comics just before cult writer Warren Ellis teamed up with graphic artist Adi Gravnov to completely revolutionize the armored avenger. Ellis introduced a viral technology that bridged the gap between humanity and technology called Extremis, an invention so bleeding edge that it challenged Stark’s ego and morals. The revival of Iron Man wasn’t just one of ideas, either. The book was made much slicker-looking than ever before thanks to Gravnov’s cover designs (which earned him a welcome onto the crew of the Iron Man feature film). Iron Man is tremendously popular today and that renewed celebrity all started with Extremis, a story so important that it has been re-envisioned as a motion comic. However, the actual hard work of using those ideas to carve out a new face for Iron Man started in the following story, Execute Program.

Execute Program was the first story line to follow the game-changing Extremis by Warren Ellis and Adi Gravnov. It has always struck me as unfortunate that bookended by Extremis on one end and the Invincible Iron Man relaunch by Matt Fraction and Salvador LaRocca, this run has gone unnoticed. Written by Daniel and Charlie Knauf, the story picks up the threads left by Ellis’ story in which Stark has become superhuman, more machine than man and hooked up to his technology through a virus coursing through his veins. It’s a clever concept but with a lesser writer, the ideas would have been used to simply tell adventures similar to what fans had read before only with a higher standard of tech-jargon.

The Knaufs, familiar to some as the writers of HBO’s Carnivale, brought with them a kind of drama and tension that had been lacking from the book. The version of Tony Stark is so advanced that he appears to be alien even to his closest allies. He fights Crimson Dynamo while bidding on antique armor and conducting business at the same time via a holographic link-up. What’s more, he kills Dynamo just to show that he can use his repulsors as a kind of defibrillator to bring him right back. This frightens his Avengers team-mates who recognize that the Tony of old is long gone. When murders start popping up and Iron Man is identified as the prime suspect, Stark does everything he can to clear his name only to find that he has been compromised. The most advanced privately-owned technology on the planet is being hacked from Internet Cafe’s and sent on killing sprees.

Execute Program is a smart, fast-moving tale that singles out Iron Man as one of if not the most powerful superheroes in the Marvel Universe and the revelation is rather staggering. It’s a thrilling story that builds to a tremendous climax and has a true cinematic feel to it. It even ties neatly into Civil War when Stark states that he has been used as a weapon, and weapons need to be registered. Daniel and Charlie Knauf’s run on Iron Man is incredible and at the time it was initially released I was shocked to see it fail to gain a strong foothold in the comic book market (at least in my area). The only negative comment that I can make about Execute Program is that the artwork looks very dated, especially when compared to the work preceding this book by Gravnov and what follows by Robert de la Torre.

It’s important to note that the entire Daniel and Charlie Knauf run of Iron Man; Execute Program, Civil War, Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Haunted, and With Iron Hands have yet to be collected in hardcover editions and Execute Program has gone out of print. Possibly there are plans to collect the entire run in an Omnibus-style book, buy I have not heard anything to date. The price of Execute Program online is escalating, so if you are interested, make sure to grab one today.

Buy Daniel and Charlie Knauf's Iron Man run on Amazon.com

Iron Man variants

Marvel Comics has been releasing some very pretty variant covers this year from Wolverine appreciation month to the various zombie covers. In celebration of next week’s release of Iron Man 2, the armored Avenger has taken center stage.

(Click on the images below for full size)

Writer Fred Van Lente forges the Legacy of Iron Man

Who would think that a character like Iron Man, once a hero who couldn’t maintain a following to retain his own monthly series would be so popular? Thanks to the hard work of Warren Ellis, Charles Knauf and Matt Fraction, Iron Man is at the top of his popularity. Of course, a certain hit movie franchise doesn’t hurt the Golden Avenger’s acclaim, but the real success of the hero has been in the steady yet strong material published in the monthly comic.

In 2010, Marvel will launch a second ongoing Iron Man comic led by writer Fred Van Lente (of Spider-Man fame) and artist Steve Kurth (artist of Avengers: Initiative and the criminally under-rated recent Dark Reign: Fantastic Force mini-series).

Rather than simply telling more Iron Man adventures, the Legacy series looks to further develop the character and world of Iron Man by delving into his past. Van Lente met with CBR News recently to discuss the new series and why readers should be excited about it:

It’s exciting to be able to do these sprawling, epic, globe-trotting, five issue long novels. That’s what I’m most excited about, because Tony Stark is an incredibly unique superhero in that he’s someone who would have ridiculous amounts of fame and impact on his world even if hadn’t become a superhero,” Van Lente told CBR News. “He still would have been in the news because of his wealth and accomplishments. He’s someone who leaves a big footprint. So another thing that I want to do in ‘Legacy’ is explore Tony’s impact on the world and how that impact affects him.”

While that level of influence can lead to feelings of accomplishment, more often than not it haunts Tony Stark, especially when he dwells upon his past as a weapons designer. “My interpretation of Tony is consistent with the book I used to write in that Tony is Peter Parker on a grand scale. Pete’s actions lead to the death of his Uncle Ben, this father figure that he was very close to to. That lead him to redeem himself with his Spider-Man persona. Tony’s actions have caused the death of thousands, if not tens or hundreds of thousands of people,” Van Lente explained. “This is something that weighs very heavily on his conscience, and we’ll be seeing a lot of it in ‘Iron Man: Legacy.'”

In the first arc of “Iron Man: Legacy,” Van Lente will look at Tony Stark’s impact on Eastern Europe in the post Cold War era. “The first arc, ‘War of the Iron Men,’ finds Tony interfering in a Kosovo style civil war in Transia, one of the many fictional Balkan Republics in the Marvel Universe. This manages to draw the attention of both Russia and China, who have various investments in that country which are being disrupted by Tony’s activities,” Van Lente stated. “So they unleash all of these Cold War era villains in a new era. It’s almost as if in this post-Cold War they view Tony as this symbol of American Imperialism imposing itself on a sovereign nation.

“So Titanium Man, Radioactive Man, and Crimson Dynamo tangle with Tony while he tries to stop a paramilitary group that is essentially carrying out ethnic cleansing, and they’re doing it in what appears to be Iron Man armor,” Van Lente continued. “To a certain extent, this is Tony’s worst fears coming true because he invented the Iron Man suit to be the technology that ends weapons. Now it’s being used to commit horrible atrocities, so he feels personally obligated to stop this.”

The genocidal paramilitary group and the cold war villains aren’t the only adversaries Iron Man runs afoul of in the first arc of “Legacy.” “I should point out that there’s a mystery villain in ‘War of the Iron Men,'” Van Lente said. “His identity is revealed at the end of the first issue. He’s a classic villain from the Michelinie-Layton era.”

(read the entire interview here)

For those looking for a sneak preview, just make sure to pick up the Origins of Siege freebie at your local comic shop featuring the art of Salvador LaRocca (already well known by Iron Man fans for his work on the Invincible series).

Iron Man: Hypervelocity

I recently read the 2007 Iron Man mini-series Hypervelocity in collected trade edition and was surprised by how great it actually is. I have to admit that I was turned off by the manga-influenced artwork when I flipped through the trade (numerous times) but after reading a few positive reviews I decided to take the risk. Boy was I glad that I did!

Iron Man Hypervelocity art by Brian Denham

Iron Man: Hypervelocity by Adam Warren (Empowered) and Brian Denham is a very unusual story. Tony Stark, ever the futurist inventor, has developed a new suit of Iron Man armor complete with a fail safe AI program to take over should he lose consciousness in battle. As it happens, a terrorist organization breaks into his lab as he is working on the new armor, requiring the backup AI program to take over. Developed on Tony’s own persona, the AI’s massive ego believes that it actually is Tony Stark 2.0, an improvement on the original. With Tony himself out of the game from the attack, no one is available to intelligently take care of the rogue suit of armor, so S.H.I.E.L.D. sends in a tactical squad to handle the problem.

Adam Warren has delivered a sophisticated and smart Iron Man story for the 21st Century in much the manner that Warren Ellis thought he was doing with the over rated Extremis storyline. The artwork by Brian Denham is very dynamic and fluid, fitting the writing to a T. The Hypervelocity armor goes down in the annals of designs along with the Silver Centurian as one of the best. Too bad this is the first and last appearance of the armor, but you have to appreciate what you get. I dearly hope this is not the last time the two will collaborate on a project, company-owned property or otherwise.

Much like the title, the story is very fast and to be fair it does take some strange turns in logic that make it hard to follow but in the end what is created is a modern Iron Man graphic novel. It’s a real shame that this story was released in 6 parts (to tie in with the Iron Man movie mania) as it reads far better in one sitting than spread out over half a year. I really wish that it had been slimmed down and released as a proper graphic novel (does Marvel do this anymore?) as it would have benefited the material greatly.

Recommended:
Iron Man: Hypervelocity
Invincible Iron Man Vol. 2: World’s Most Wanted, Part 1