Random Iron Man Musings (Sorry, Comic Book Ramblings, not Movie)
I've been a fan of Iron Man for a long time. I hopped on board around the time Rodney was Iron Man and Tony was getting the Silver Centurion Armor (one of the coolest armor designs for its time) up and running. And it would seem that when there was a creative change in the title, the writer would strip away what the previous writer had done and the new artist redesigned the armor. I've endured standard armor, modular armor, Extremis Armor, Sentient Armor, S.K.I.N. armor, Stealth Armor, Hulkbuster Armor, Underwater Armor, War Machine. Having Stark lose his company, getting it back, losing it again, just to form a new company. Stark Industries, Stark International, Stark Solutions, Stark Enterprises.
My favorite all time storyarc is the Extremis Armor written by my all time favorite writer, Warren Ellis (Planetary, Authority, Stormwatch, Fell) who incidentally is my all time favorite writer for Doctor Strange. To sum up the storyline, a Stark branch in Austin was working on a biological formula that would 'upgrade' the human body to help heal faster, be smarter, etc. The formula was converted into a biological weapon and tested on a terrorist. Stark tweaks the formula and uses it on himself to be able to connect directly into the Iron Man armor, making him faster and smarter and stronger. And he wins the day. This story was a major revamping of the Stark character. Instead of a smart man in a suit, he became a technological upgrade for a human. It made him more relevant to the advances of today's technology.
Enter: Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca, who guess what....yeah....changed everything....again. I shouldn't have been too surprised after what went down in Secret Invasion and Civil War, but to reverse engineer what the Extremis storyline did, just made me sad. Stark as the head of SHIELD was a mess and then Dark Reign, where he became a fugitive on the run? WTF? So sad.
Making Stark a sympathetic character for the actions of Civil War is completely stupid. Pitting him against Captain America was completely against everything the two characters were built from. If Stark wanted to tell the world he was Iron Man, he would have done it a long time ago. There was reasons WHY he didn't. But I'm rambling....the whole point of this post is to show the 'new' armor when the new creative team takes over. I like the armor, although its getting a bit more anime-ish, meaning you can see the influence.
NEW IRON MAN ARMOR
The only problem I see with the armor, as I always fear, is that how it will look in other books with other artists. Some can pull it off and get all the little details down, others can't, or they introduce a new armor all together and the reader is like...wha?
But anyway.....sorry for the rambling again. =)
My favorite all time storyarc is the Extremis Armor written by my all time favorite writer, Warren Ellis (Planetary, Authority, Stormwatch, Fell) who incidentally is my all time favorite writer for Doctor Strange. To sum up the storyline, a Stark branch in Austin was working on a biological formula that would 'upgrade' the human body to help heal faster, be smarter, etc. The formula was converted into a biological weapon and tested on a terrorist. Stark tweaks the formula and uses it on himself to be able to connect directly into the Iron Man armor, making him faster and smarter and stronger. And he wins the day. This story was a major revamping of the Stark character. Instead of a smart man in a suit, he became a technological upgrade for a human. It made him more relevant to the advances of today's technology.
Enter: Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca, who guess what....yeah....changed everything....again. I shouldn't have been too surprised after what went down in Secret Invasion and Civil War, but to reverse engineer what the Extremis storyline did, just made me sad. Stark as the head of SHIELD was a mess and then Dark Reign, where he became a fugitive on the run? WTF? So sad.
Making Stark a sympathetic character for the actions of Civil War is completely stupid. Pitting him against Captain America was completely against everything the two characters were built from. If Stark wanted to tell the world he was Iron Man, he would have done it a long time ago. There was reasons WHY he didn't. But I'm rambling....the whole point of this post is to show the 'new' armor when the new creative team takes over. I like the armor, although its getting a bit more anime-ish, meaning you can see the influence.
NEW IRON MAN ARMOR
The only problem I see with the armor, as I always fear, is that how it will look in other books with other artists. Some can pull it off and get all the little details down, others can't, or they introduce a new armor all together and the reader is like...wha?
But anyway.....sorry for the rambling again. =)