The Invincible Iron Man #2: "The Autobiography of Tony Stark, Chapter Two"

[superboyprime]

"The gift that I intend to bring to Tony as a forever gift, hopefully, and obviously future creators and future editors will get to decide this, is whether or not this new Iron Man villain that's coming along is going to be a forever gift. I certainly intend it to be." - Gerry Duggan

Comments

[zylly]

I'm not yet finding Feilong to be a particularly interesting villain... he seems pretty petty as far as these things go, and much more X-Adjacent than I'd expect an Iron Man villain to be.

But I am still enjoying the story itself. Duggan seems to have a good grasp on Tony himself.

[morallyambiguousscience]

I mean he kinda feels like a CHINA BAD YELLOW PERIL villain to me

[shakalooloo]

Ah, but see, they made him pink, so they can sidestep that entirely.

....

Right?

[deh_tommy]

So, like some sort of... Mandarin?

Dow we know for certain it’s Fei Long? The red skin is an obvious giveaway but they’re covering his hair with that beanie there.

[windleopard2]

How so?

[deh_tommy]

I think one of the solicitations for either this or X-Men has them get attacked by Sentinels made to resemble Iron Man, Duggan writes both he’s probably setting up a bit of crossover.

[zylly]

Yeah, I’m not wholly surprised, given Duggar’s one of the people at the wheel of the X-Bus right now. It just seems an odd fit to starting a new volume.

[lbd_nytetrayn]

Yeah, the guy hasn't even made the cut for Marvel vs Capcom or Street Fighters V or 6, and he suddenly thinks he can hang?

[zylly]

Yeah, that he shares a name with a Street Fighter character doesn't exactly help either.

[numeronone]

The problem is, Iron Man as an entity doesn't lend himself to particularly interesting or long-lasting villains - they typically fall into a binary of "Larger More Threatening Suit Of Armor" or "Power Level Equivalent To Suit Of Armor Without Being One".

[zylly]

And the rest of his villains largely fall into the very “yellow peril”/anti-Commie umbrella of their original era that’s hard to get out of.

[phantomfo]

Not quite. He's also had battles against Extreme Capitalism (Stane, Hammer, Bain) and Anti-Corporations (Ghost, Firebrand III).

[cainofdreaming]

There's also the former girlfriends (Madame Masque, et all) and their parents.

[thezmage]

I mean Tony Stark's number one arch nemesis always has been Tony Stark

[cainofdreaming]

And his evil sidekick, the Bottle.

[cainofdreaming]

Is it just me or does it look like Riri's helmet has elf-ears on that cover?

[scorntx]

...
Well, I wasn't thinking it before, but now I can't un-see it...

[cainofdreaming]

My job here is done. *fleeing Doctor Zoidberg noises*

[onsokumaru]

Oh, how the mighty have fallen.
Riri is now (barely) a support character in Iron Man, Kamala (barely) a support character in ASM, and Sam and Amadeus are in limbo, Only Miles somehow manages to hold his own series.
If even those legacy darlings that Marvel actively tried to promote can't stick, there is really no hope for novelty in those comics.

[thezmage]

I mean the fact that she's even still appearing is pretty remarkable. She's barely appeared in comics to begin with

[arilou_skiff]

It's what always happens. Remember Gravity? Arana? (the other) Scorpion?

And before that it was Mattie Franklin, and so on and so forth.

Maybe in 20 years someone will be interested and making a defining run that revives them. (or more likely they'll be used as throwaways in some other story) c'est la vie.

[onsokumaru]

Whelp, I spoke too soon. Riri is getting a mini series.

[blues32]

Seriously, Riri? SERIOUSLY?! Someone call Shang Chi to pick up his dad's old rings. I don't trust anyone who just puts them on like that. Especially since, as I recall, they're sentient and hate Tony Stark.

[lordnorj]

The Mandarin is not Shang Chi's dad in the comics.

[arilou_skiff]

Kinda surprised they didn't retcon that back, considering how awkward it got with it first being literal Fu Manchu and then a "Okay, not actually Fu Manchu but pretty similar" due to rights issues.

[blues32]

So why does he refer to the rings as belonging to his father?

[cainofdreaming]

Other set of rings. Though those belonged to the Jade Emperor, not Zheng Zu.

[blues32]

Look, we can't have more than one set of ten rings. Who else has ten magic rings that I don't know about?