An
American billionaire
playboy,
industrialist and ingenious
engineer,
Tony Stark suffers a severe chest injury during a kidnapping in which his captors attempt to force him to build a
weapon of mass destruction. He instead creates a
powered suit of armor to save his life and escape captivity. He later uses the suit and successive versions to protect the world as Iron Man. Through his corporation ―
Stark Industries ― Tony has created many military weapons, some of which, along with other technological devices of his making, have been integrated into his suit, helping him fight crime. Initially, Iron Man was a vehicle for Stan Lee to explore
Cold War themes, particularly the role of American technology and business in the fight against
communism. Subsequent re-imaginings of Iron Man have transitioned from Cold War themes to contemporary concerns, such as
corporate crime and
terrorism.
Throughout most of the character's publication history, Iron Man has been a member of the superhero team the
Avengers and has been featured in several incarnations of his own various comic book series. Iron Man has been adapted for several animated TV shows and films. The character is portrayed by
Robert Downey, Jr. in the live action film
Iron Man (2008), which was a critical and box office success. Downey, who received much acclaim for his performance, reprised the role in several
Marvel Cinematic Universe films, including two
Iron Man sequels and
The Avengers (2012). Iron Man was ranked 12th on IGN's Top 100 Comic Book Heroes in 2011.
Premiere[edit]
Iron Man's
Marvel Comics premiere in
Tales of Suspense #39 was a collaboration among editor and story-plotter
Stan Lee, scripter
Larry Lieber, story-artist
Don Heck, and cover-artist and character-designer
Jack Kirby.
[1] In 1963, Lee had been toying with the idea of a businessman superhero.
[2] He wanted to create the "quintessential capitalist", a character that would go against the spirit of the times and Marvel's readership.
[3] Lee said,
I think I gave myself a dare. It was the height of the
Cold War. The readers, the young readers, if there was one thing they hated, it was war, it was the military....So I got a hero who represented that to the hundredth degree. He was a weapons manufacturer, he was providing weapons for the Army, he was rich, he was an industrialist....I thought it would be fun to take the kind of character that nobody would like, none of our readers would like, and shove him down their throats and make them like him....And he became very popular.
[4]
He set out to make the new character a wealthy, glamorous ladies' man, but one with a secret that would plague and torment him as well.
[5] Writer
Gerry Conway said, "Here you have this character, who on the outside is invulnerable, I mean, just can't be touched, but inside is a wounded figure. Stan made it very much an in-your-face wound, you know, his heart was broken, you know, literally broken. But there's a metaphor going on there. And that's, I think, what made that character interesting."
[4] Lee based this playboy's looks and personality on
Howard Hughes,
[6] explaining, "Howard Hughes was one of the most colorful men of our time. He was an inventor, an adventurer, a multi-billionaire, a ladies' man and finally a nutcase."
[7] "Without being crazy, he was Howard Hughes," Lee said.
[4]While Lee intended to write the story himself,
[5] a minor deadline emergency eventually forced him to hand over the premiere issue to Lieber, who fleshed out the story.
[5] The art was split between Kirby and Heck. "He designed the costume," Heck said of Kirby, "because he was doing the cover. The covers were always done first. But I created the look of the characters, like Tony Stark and his secretary
Pepper Potts."
[8] Iron Man first appeared in 13- to 18-page stories in
Tales of Suspense, which featured
anthology science fiction and
supernatural stories. The character's original costume was a bulky gray armored suit, replaced by a golden version in the second story (issue #40, April 1963). It was redesigned as sleeker, red-and-golden armor in issue #48 (Dec. 1963) by that issue's interior artist,
Steve Ditko, although Kirby drew it on the cover. As Heck recalled in 1985, "[T]he second costume, the red and yellow one, was designed by Steve Ditko. I found it easier than drawing that bulky old thing. The earlier design, the robot-looking one, was more Kirbyish.
[9]In his premiere, Iron Man was an
anti-communist hero, defeating various Vietnamese agents. Lee later regretted this early focus.
[2][10] Throughout the character’s
comic book series, technological advancement and
national defense were constant themes for Iron Man, but later issues developed Stark into a more complex and vulnerable character as they depicted his battle with
alcoholism (as in the "
Demon in a Bottle" storyline) and other personal difficulties.
From issue #59 (Nov. 1964) to its final issue #99 (March 1968), the anthological
science-fiction backup stories in
Tales of Suspense were replaced by a feature starring the superhero
Captain America. Lee and Heck introduced several adversaries for the character including the
Mandarin in issue #50 (Feb. 1964),
[11] the
Black Widow in #52 (April 1964)
[12] and
Hawkeye five issues later.
[13]Lee said that "of all the comic books we published at Marvel, we got more fan mail for Iron Man from women, from females, than any other title....We didn't get much fan mail from girls, but whenever we did, the letter was usually addressed to Iron Man."
[4]Lee and Kirby included Iron Man in
The Avengers #1 (Sept. 1963) as a founding member of the superhero team. The character has since appeared in every subsequent volume of the series.
Writers have updated the war and locale in which Stark is injured. In the original 1963 story, it was the
Vietnam War. In the 1990s, it was updated to be the first
Gulf War,
[14] and later updated again to be the war in
Afghanistan. Stark's time with the Asian
Nobel Prize-winning scientist Ho Yinsen is consistent through nearly all incarnations of the Iron Man origin, depicting Stark and Yinsen building the original armor together. One exception is the
direct-to-DVD animated feature film
The Invincible Iron Man, in which the armor Stark uses to escape his captors is not the first Iron Man suit.
The original
Iron Man title explored
Cold War themes, as did other
Stan Lee projects in the early years of
Marvel Comics. Where
The Fantastic Four and
The Incredible Hulk respectively focused on American domestic and government responses to the Communist threat,
Iron Man explored industry's role in the struggle. Tony Stark's real-life model,
Howard Hughes, was a significant defense contractor who developed new weapons technologies. Hughes was an icon both of American individualism and of the burdens of fame.
[15]Historian Robert Genter, in
The Journal of Popular Culture, writes that Tony Stark specifically presents an idealized portrait of the American inventor. Where earlier decades had seen important technological innovations come from famous individuals like
Nikola Tesla,
Thomas Edison,
Alexander Graham Bell and the
Wright brothers, the 1960s saw new technology, including weapons, being developed mainly by
corporate research teams. Little room remained in this environment for the inventor who wanted credit for, and control of, his or her own creations.
Issues of entrepreneurial autonomy, government supervision of research, and ultimate loyalty figured prominently in early
Iron Man stories—and all were issues then affecting American scientists and engineers.
[15] Tony Stark, writes Genter, is an inventor who finds motive in his
emasculation as an autonomous creative individual. This blow is symbolized by his chest wound, inflicted at the moment he is forced to invent things for the purposes of others. Stark's transformation into Iron Man represents his effort to reclaim his autonomy, and thus his manhood. The character's pursuit of women in bed or in battle, writes Genter, represents another aspect of this effort. The pattern finds parallels in other works of 1960s popular fiction by authors such as "
Ian Fleming,
Mickey Spillane, and
Norman Mailer who made unregulated sexuality a form of authenticity."
[15]First series[edit]
Writer
David Michelinie,
[26] co-plotter/inker
Bob Layton, and penciler
John Romita, Jr. became the creative team on the series with
Iron Man #116 (Nov. 1978). Micheline and Layton established Tony Stark's
alcoholism with the story "
Demon in a Bottle", and introduced several supporting characters, including Stark's bodyguard girlfriend
Bethany Cabe;
[27] Stark's personal pilot and confidant James Rhodes, who later became the superhero
War Machine;
[28] and rival industrialist
Justin Hammer,
[29] who was revealed to be the employer of numerous high-tech armed enemies Iron Man fought over the years. The duo also introduced the concept of Stark's specialized armors
[30][31][32] as he acquired a dangerous vendetta with
Doctor Doom.
[33][34] The team worked together through #154 (Jan. 1982), with Michelinie writing three issues without Layton.
[26]
Following Michelinie and Layton's departures,
Dennis O'Neil became the new writer of the series and had Stark relapse into alcoholism. Jim Rhodes replaced Stark as Iron Man in issue #169 (April 1983) and wore the armor for the next two years of stories.
[35] O'Neil returned Tony Stark to the Iron Man role in issue #200 (Nov. 1985).
[36] Michelinie and Layton became the creative team once again in issue #215 (Feb. 1987).
[26] They crafted the "
Armor Wars" storyline beginning in #225 (Dec. 1987)
[37] through #231 (June 1988).
John Byrne and John Romita, Jr. produced a sequel titled "Armor Wars II" in issues #258 (July 1990) to #266 (March 1991). The series had a crossover with the other
Avengers related titles as part of the "
Operation: Galactic Storm" storyline.
[38][39]
