Three Surprises from Invincible Iron Man 522

[blackruzsa]

In four pages.

1) Pepper's love life
2) Mandarin's story
3) Tony+Ezekiel

And for your reference, it has apparently been 6+ months since Tony was captured by the Mandarin.






She's responding to an attack by Mandarin's own set of villains, and will end up saving new!Iron Man from the Detroit Steel motherf*ckers mechs. 

And that is indeed Carson Wyche, head of Resilient, who we last saw introducing Resilient Tech SWARM and recovering from his injuries.

Next, we have The Mandarin (Typo: Mandrain? What the hell, fingers? The man with the powers of a drain?) explaining the origins of his rings to Tony Stark, and how they were FROM SPAAAACE.




Tony's bloody scrubs are a result of him helping with an operation that was meant to remove Ezekiel's many damaging modifications, from his father and himself, so Mandarin will have less of a problem controlling him.

Funny thing is, it didn't occur to the Mandarin that Tony was gonna pull something.



 

Comments

[valtyr]

I gotta say, I find it profoundly depressing Tony can go missing for six months and no one notices.

[mrstatham]

I think they have noticed, but for the sake of a narrative, they won't get involved. Like the JLA not getting involved in say, No Man's Land or hell, Superman not solving every single detective case that Batman has by just listening for the guilty party or using X-ray vision.

Sometimes you just have to separate a character off from the rest of the universe for a story to work.

[shadowpsykie]

Superman not solving every single detective case that Batman has by just listening for the guilty party or using X-ray vision.

hehe i can totally see superman Dicking around with Batman

Bruce: This hair follicle may lead me to murderer,

Clark: Guy's name is Mike Chikliss, lives down by the water front.... he's eating chinese take out....

Bruce:... i fuckin' hate you... you're sleeping on the couch

[ensiform]

Mike Chikliss? The Thing killed someone?? Now, Vic Mackey from The Shield, that I can believe.

[blackruzsa]

He's done that a bunch of times, hasn't he? :)) Well, in casual conversation, at least twice in my memory.

[blackruzsa]

He cut himself off and went away willingly. I think he made it seem like he left and hid away, and I'm sure they did go looking, but assumed he's hiding out under the radar for a reason, not being held against his will.
Though I think Rhodey's been looking for him.

[valtyr]

Well, that's something at least.

[spacebetween]

So who has been filling in for him with the Avengers? And naturally it is hard to determine whether this is before or after AvX. But honestly, the Avengers would notice that one of the founders and frequent members is gone. After all he only left Resilient, not the Avengers as I best as I know

[blackruzsa]

Avengers calls Resilient, Resilient tells Avengers he's out for a while?
IDK Fraction doesn't have the best track record with keeping up with the rest of the Marvel universe.

[blackruzsa]

Oh and, damn, my memory, but wasn't there a scene somewhere earlier where he had a fight with Captain America?

And that was before he gave up being Iron Man, right? So maybe the Avengers backed off for a little while for Tony's sake, so they didn't know he got kidnapped.

[mrstatham]

I'm not so sure I like the adjustment to the Mandarin's rings. It's an interesting idea, but I don't like the idea it could maybe kinda-sorta give him an excuse for all the shit he's pulled over the years.

Also, again - How did the Mandarin go from that old looking guy in one of the IM: Director of Shield series' final stories to this?

[sherkahn]

Just got this during lunch.

Not happy about this new retcon about the Mandarin rings. You would think that with all the history they have played we would have gotten more than "mere hard drives". what are they, the Worthy again?

Hmm... Pepper has moved on. Yay, girl, you go!

[blackruzsa]

The Resilient people seem to have this skill for moving on after a six month period, but eh, Tim can have his unnamed new love interest and Pepper can get with Wyche and I'm pleased :)

[shadowpsykie]

Tim can have his unnamed new love interest

oh really? who?

[blackruzsa]

.... I DON'T KNOWWW
Hahah but in my last post, they made an allusion to a new guy Tim was newly dating :) Everyone was like, gathering around him to hear how it went. It was all very silly. I'd love it if they showed/pursued that.

[dr_archeville]

Did Mandarin dose himself with Extremis before or after that IM: Director of Shield? If after, then it'd be easy to say the Extremis de-aged him.

But, yeah, the Rings as soul-drives is really weird. Were they still part of (not just kept in) the crashed Makluan ship? If so, were they still, as in their original, er, origin, part of the ship's power core/warp engines? If so, does that mean the Makluans use captured souls to power their spacecraft?

[spacebetween]

Yeah I'm not a fan of the new history of the rings. The concept is okay though

It would have worked better if he lost the original rings, somehow found a new set and then do this story line.

[outlawpoet]

I vote the Mandarin is just fucking with him.

[rainspirit]

Huh, Vancouver. Wonder how it's doing in the MU since Alpha Flight halted its attack by Atlanteans.

[lieut_kettch]

Vancouver? Dare I hope for a Rescue/Vindicator teamup?

[blackruzsa]

*sigh* not in this issue ):

[lieut_kettch]

Too bad. Armored redheads kicking ass and taking names (and trading stories about tech-nerd significant others).

[shadowpsykie]

i have to say, love that Pepper is still heroing

[darth_cloudo]

I'm kind of behind on Iron Man stuff - is that Pepper in the suit? Because that would be super cool.

[icon_uk]

Yes, it is Pepper in the "Rescue" suit.

[darth_cloudo]

That is really awesome. * _*

[blackruzsa]

Yeahp, it's been a while, but Pepper took on the identity of "Rescue" (in that female Iron Man suit), with her own arc reactor and everything, and has since been helping with superheroing.

[darth_cloudo]

That is so cool. * _* I never knew that Pepper did "direct" hands-on superheroing.

[blackruzsa]

Right? And she doesn't have to take care of executive jobs herself anymore--after all, Wyche is team leader, and she can do what she wants/needs to with a reliable team like Resilient.

[muccamukk]

I love that, but I mostly love that she has he helmet on her bedside table so JARVIS can be a sort of combination telephone and alarm clock. I wonder if she's programmed him to wake her up with the gentle sound of Buddhist singing bowls or something.

[blackruzsa]

That is brilliant.

[eeemkaaayy]

And that is why I love Pepper.

[blackruzsa]

Indeedy. And she has gotten damn good at superheroing. Damn good.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

Hmm, so J.A.R.V.I.S. is a thing in 616 now? Does Rescue have the only version, or do the other suits use it, too?

[blackruzsa]

He became a thing back when they restarted IIM, I think... After Dark Reign, I think.

[big_daddy_d]

I thought Pepper and Tony were an item now. What the hell happened? Did I miss something?

[blackruzsa]

They were here and there, on and off, nothing terribly steady ):

[big_daddy_d]

Ahh typical ships.

[q99]

Question- when seeing 'long dead warrior of cosmic legend,' seeing mecha, and hearing hard drive for their souls, did anyone else think Transformer?

[blackruzsa]

I definitely did (especially seeing those mechs aaaaggghhh), but I wasn't sure if this had been brought up before so I didn't wanna seem silly.

[spacebetween]

I did, plus it brought up memories when Optimus Prime was stored on a floppy.