Category: Iron Man

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Marvel Platinum: the Definitive Iron Man Reloaded


By Stan Lee, Archie Goodwin, Mike Friedrich, Tony Isabella, Len Kaminski, Matt Fraction, Don Heck, George Tuska, Greg LaRocque, Kev Hopgood, Salvador Larroca, Carmine di Giandomenico, Nathan Fox, Haim Kano & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-529-1

With Summer Movie Blockbuster season hard upon us Marvel has again sagaciously released a wealth of film-inspired tie-in books and trade paperback collections to maximise exposure and cater to those movie fans wanting to follow up the cinematic exposure with a comicbook experience.

Produced under the always intriguing Marvel Platinum/Definitive Editions umbrella, this treasury of tales gathers a few of the more impressive but happily less obvious landmarks from the Steel Sentinel’s extensive canon; this time cannily focusing on sinister mastermind, ultimate arch-enemy and movie menace the Mandarin.

Contained herein are high-tech hi-jinks from Tales of Suspense #50, Iron Man volume 1, #21-22, 68-71, 291 & 500, Marvel Team-Up #146 and Iron Man volume 5 #19, (listed on Marvel’s Database as Invincible Iron Man volume 1 #19), spanning 1964 to 2011, which offers a fair representation of what is quite frankly an over-abundance of riches to pick from…

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has changed his profile many times since his debut in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963) when, as a VIP visitor in Vietnam observing the efficacy of the munitions he had designed, he was critically wounded and captured by sinister, cruel Communists.

Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first Iron Man suit to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors. From there it was a simple jump to full time superheroics as a modern Knight in Shining Armour…

Since then the inventor and armaments manufacturer has been a liberal capitalist, eco-warrior, space pioneer, Federal politician, affirmed Futurist, Statesman and even Director of the world’s most scientifically advanced spy agency, the Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate, and, of course, one of the world’s most prominent superheroes with the Mighty Avengers…

For a popular character/concept lumbered with a fifty-year pedigree, radical reboots are a painful but vital periodic necessity. To keep contemporary, Stark’s origin and Iron Man’s continuity have been drastically revised every so often with the crucible trigger event perpetually leapfrogging to America’s most recent conflicts. As always, change is everything but, remember Man, these aren’t just alterations, these are upgrades…

After the now-mandatory introduction from Stan Lee, the star-studded action begins with ‘The Hands of the Mandarin!’ from Tales of Suspense #50 wherein the wonderful Don Heck returned as regular penciller and occasional inker after a brief absence, and Lee introduced The Golden Avenger’s first major menace: a modern-day Fu Manchu who terrified the Red Chinese so much they tricked him into attacking America in the hope that one threat would destroy the other.

In response Iron Man invaded the mastermind’s oriental citadel where, after a ferocious but futilely inconclusive fight, he simply went back home to the Land of the Free.

The furious Mandarin held a grudge however and would make himself arguably Iron Man’s greatest foe.

Of course whilst Stark was the acceptable face of 1960s Capitalism – a glamorous millionaire industrialist, scientist and a benevolent all-conquering hero when clad in the super-scientific armour of his alter-ego – the turbulent tone of the 1970s soon relegated his suave, “can-do” image to the dustbin of history. With ecological disaster and social catastrophe from the myriad abuses of big business manifestly the new zeitgeists of the young, the Golden Avenger and Stark International were soon confronting a few tricky questions from their increasingly politically savvy readership.

With glamour, money and fancy gadgetry not quite so cool anymore, the questing voices of a new generation of writers began posing uncomfortable questions in the pages of a series that was once the bastion of militarised America…

Iron Man #21-22 (January & February 1970, by Archie Goodwin, George Tuska & Joe Gaudioso) found the multi-millionaire trying to get out of the arms business and – following a heart transplant – looking to retire from the superhero biz.

African-American boxer Eddie March, became ‘The Replacement!’ as Stark, free from the heart-stimulating chest-plate which had preserved him for years, was briefly tempted by a life without strife. Unfortunately, unknown to all, Eddie had a major health problem of his own…

As Stark pursued a romantic future with business rival Janice Cord, her chief researcher and would-be lover Alex Niven was revealed as a Russian fugitive using her resources to rebuild the deadly armour of the Crimson Dynamo. The renegade easily overcame the ailing substitute Avenger and, when Soviet heavy metal super-enforcer Titanium Man resurfaced with orders to arrest Niven, a three-way clash ensued. Stark was forced to take up his metal burden again – but not before Eddie was grievously injured and Janice killed in #22’s classic ‘From this Conflict… Death!’

Stark’s romantic liaisons always ended badly. Four years later he was ardently pursuing Roxie Gilbert, a radical pacifist and sister of his old enemy Firebrand. She, of course, had no time for a man with so much blood on his hands…

Iron Man #68-71 (June to November 1974) was the opening sortie in a multi-part epic which saw mystic menace The Black Lama foment a war amongst the World’s greatest villains with ultimate power and inner peace as the promised prize. Written by Mike Friedrich and illustrated by Tuska & Mike Esposito, it began in Vietnam on the ‘Night of the Rising Sun!’ as the Mandarin struggled to free his mind, which was currently trapped in the dying body of Russian villain the Unicorn.

Roxie had dragged Stark to the recently “liberated” People’s Republic in search of Eddie March’s lost brother, a POW missing since the last days of the war. Then the Americans were separated when Japanese ultra-nationalist, ambulatory atomic inferno and sometime X-Man Sunfire was tricked into attacking the Yankee Imperialists. The attack was abruptly ended when Mandarin shanghaied the Solar Samurai and used his mutant energies to power the mind-transfer back into his own body.

Reinstated in his original form, the Chinese Conqueror began his campaign in earnest, eager to regain his castle from rival oriental overlord Yellow Claw. Firstly though, he had to crush Iron Man who had tracked him down and freed Sunfire in ‘Confrontation!’ That bombastic battle ended when the Golden Avenger was rendered unconscious and thrown into space…

‘Who Shall Stop… Ultimo?’ found the reactivated giant robot-monster attacking the Mandarin’s castle as the sinister Celestial duelled the Claw to the death, with both Iron Man and Sunfire arriving too late and forced to mop up the sole survivor of the contest in ‘Battle: Tooth and Yellow Claw!’…

‘Hometown Boy’ (September 1984, by Tony Isabella, Greg LaRocque & Esposito) comes from the period when Stark succumbed to alcoholism and lost everything and his friend and bodyguard Jim Rhodes took over the role of Golden Avenger.

As Stark tried to make good with a new start-up company, this engaging yarn from Marvel Team-Up #146 sees the substitute hero still finding his ferrous feet whilst battling oft-failed assassin Blacklash at a trade fair in Cleveland, as much hindered as helped by visiting hero Spider-Man…

Despite successfully rebuilding his company, Stark’s woes actually increased. Iron Man # 291 (April 1993) found the technocrat trapped in total paralysis and using a neural interface to pilot the armour like a telemetric telepresence drone. He had also utterly alienated Rhodey who had been acting as his proxy in a tailored battle suit dubbed War Machine…

Concluding an epic saga, ‘Judgment Day’ by Len Kaminski & Kev Hopgood explosively revealed how the two feuding friends achieved a tentative rapprochement whilst battling a proverbial army of killer robots and death dealing devices programmed to hunt down Rhodes at all costs…

Invincible Iron Man #19 comes from December 2009 by Matt Fraction &Salvador Larroca. During this time the Federal initiative known as Superhuman Registration Act led to Civil War between costumed heroes and Stark was appointed the American government’s Security Czar – the “top cop” in sole charge of a beleaguered nation’s defence and freedom. As Director of high-tech enforcement agency S.H.I.E.L.D. he was the last word in all matters involving metahumans and the USA’s vast costumed community…

However his mismanagement of various crises led to the arrest and assassination of Captain America and an unimaginable escalation of global tension and destruction, culminating in an almost-successful Secret Invasion by shape-shifting alien Skrulls.

Discredited and ostracised, Stark was replaced by rehabilitated villain and recovering split-personality Norman Osborn (the original Green Goblin), who assumed full control of the USA’s covert agencies and military resources, disbanded S.H.I.E.L.D. and placed the nation under the aegis of his new umbrella organisation H.A.M.M.E.R.

Osborn was still a monster at heart however and wanted total power. Intending to appropriate all Stark’s technological assets, the “reformed” villain began hunting the fugitive ex-Avenger. Terrified that not only his weaponry but also the secret identities of most of Earth’s heroes would fall into a ruthless maniac’s hands, Stark began to systematically erase all his memories, effectively lobotomising himself to save everything…

‘Into the White (Einstein on the Beach)’ reveals the conclusion of that quest as Stark, little more than an animated vegetable wearing his very first suit of armour, faced his merciless adversary in pointless futile battle, whilst in America faithful aide Pepper Potts, the Black Widow and S.H.I.E.L.D.’s last deputy director Maria Hill raided Osborn’s base to retrieve a disc with Tony’s last hope on it and simultaneously engineer the maniac’s ultimate defeat…

The comics portion of this winning compilation concludes with the lead tale from Iron Man volume 1 #500 (March 2011) wherein the generally recovered Stark is plagued by gaps in his mostly restored memory.

‘The New Iron Age’ by Matt Fraction, Carmine di Giandomenico, Nathan Fox, Haim Kano & Salvador Larroca, is a clever, twice-told tale which begins when Stark approaches sometime ally and employee Peter Parker in an effort to regain more of his lost past.

Stark is plagued by dreams of a super-weapon he may or may not have designed, and together they track down the stolen plans for the ultimate Stark-tech atrocity which has fallen into the hands of murderous anti-progress fanatics resulting in spectacular showdown of men versus machines…

Contiguously and interlaced throughout the tale are dark scenes of the near future where the Mandarin has conquered the world, enslaved Tony Stark and his son Howard and, with the ruthless deployment of Iron Man troopers and that long-ago designed super weapon, all but eradicated humanity.

With Earth dying, rebel leader Ginny Stark leads the suicidal Black Widows in one last charge against the dictator, armed with primitive weapons, aided by two traitors within the Mandarin’s household and guided by a message and mantra from the far forgotten past…

The book is rounded out with pertinent covers from Jack Kirby, Tuska, Esposito, Jim Starlin, Dave Cockrum, Ron Wilson, John Romita Sr., LaRoque, Bob Layton, Hopgood & Larroca, plus a dense and hefty 21 pages of text features, including ‘The Origin of the Mandarin’ by Mike Conroy and history, background and technical secrets of Crimson Dynamo, Justin Hammer, Happy Hogan, Mandarin, Pepper Potts, Stark Industries, Titanium Man and War Machine.

This thoroughly entertaining accompaniment to the cinema spectacle is also a well-tailored device to turn curious movie-goers into fans of the comic incarnation and another solid sampling to entice the newcomers and charm the veteran Ferro-phile.
© 2013 Marvel. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Iron Man: Believe


By Kieron Gillen, Greg Land & Jay Leisten (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-530-7

The upcoming third Iron Man movie has naturally inspired a few new releases and this one, despite being another upgrade and notional reboot of the Golden Avenger, is also a thrill-packed finale to an earlier, but no less revolutionary tale – specifically Iron Man: Extremis.

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has changed his profile many times since his debut in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963) when, as a VIP visitor in an East Asian war-zone observing the efficacy of the munitions he had designed, he was critically wounded and captured by sinister, cruel Communists.

Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first Iron Man suit to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors.

Since then the inventor and armaments manufacturer has become a liberal capitalist, eco-warrior, space pioneer, Federal politician, affirmed Futurist, Statesman and even Director of the world’s most scientifically advanced spy agency, the Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate, and, of course, one of the world’s most prominent superheroes with the Mighty Avengers…

For a popular character/concept lumbered with a fifty-year pedigree, radical reboots are a painful but vital periodic necessity. To keep contemporary, Stark’s origin and Iron Man’s continuity have been drastically revised every so often with the crucible trigger event perpetually leapfrogging to feature America’s most-recent conflicts. As always, change is everything…

Thus, with the aforementioned movie hurtling like a missile towards us, this tale opens a brand new era by closing out an outmoded and obsolete model: specifically Warren Ellis & Adi Granov’s cyberpunk epic which directly influenced the filmic franchise and led to illustrator Granov working as a designer and producer on the cinema interpretation.

Collecting Iron Man volume 5, issues #1-5 from November 2012 – March 2013, Believe is part of MarvelNOW! (the latest company-wide refit and relaunch) which recasts the entire continuity in the wake of the all-consuming Avengers versus X-Men war: another inspired attempt to lure readers back to the ever-dwindling periodical publishing market.

Stark has been through hell, but has reinvented himself and his company. Even after cutting himself loose from official Governmental affiliations and all military contracts, abandoning guns and bombs to return to the life of a maverick entrepreneur, happily risking profits for the betterment of humanity, his past continues to haunt him.

In ‘Demons and Genies’, as he and trusted partner Pepper Potts build up their new company Stark Resilient, the inveterate playboy gets a frantic message from an old flame: a pre-recorded failsafe message from Maya Hansen which states that she is dead and Extremis is loose…

When she first devised the nano-tube bio-package it was designed to overwrite human biology and cure any disease or injury. Tragically the military were the only institution interested in funding her research as the process also made super-soldiers possible, with injections capable of making a body faster, stronger, tougher and able to grow new organs with unsuspected capabilities.

In the wrong hands, Extremis caused untold death and destruction and almost wiped humanity from the face of the Earth…

A diluted, specifically-tailored dose of her incredible restorative solution even allowed Stark to rewire his own brain and make Iron Man part of his skeletal structure – until it went bad and he had to remove it all at risk of his life, sanity and soul.

Now Stark discovers Maya had been captive of ruthless tech-merchants Advanced Idea Mechanics for more than a year and forced to recreate the deadly process. At least she left him a method of tracking any “Enhancile” altered by the seductive transformative menace…

Now with his Iron Man armours repurposed into an arsenal of specifically designed iterations – like a shiny, walk-in utility belt with the right tool/suit to wear for every occasion – Stark sets out to track down and eradicate each and every Extremis altered human, determined to shove this genie back into the bottle or die trying…

After brutally dealing with the AIM connection, Stark is contacted by the mysterious “Arthur” who has purchased the nano-solution to turn a number of individuals into a futuristic iteration of The Round Table. The honour-obsessed paladin proposes ‘A Gentleman’s Wager’ wherein his Circle of Tech-Knights will joust with the Golden Avenger for possession of both Hansen and Stark technology, but makes one big mistake. Extremis is too dangerous to leave loose and Stark is no gentleman…

The next mission takes Iron Man – in a stealth suit which sacrifices power for speed and concealment – into the citadel of a Colombian drug-lord with the best reason in the world to buy the nano-solution. Although ‘It Makes Us Stronger’ eventually saw the Hansen’s serum used for its original medical purpose, that was only after a cataclysmic clash with old Iron Man enemies Firebrand, Vibro and Living Laser practically decimated the region…

In ‘Fear of the Void’ the trail led to the catacombs beneath Paris where insanely devoted men had used Extremis to transform 13 women into creatures strong enough to host beings from the Great Black Infinite. Far from his normal comfort zones, battling demons to the death, Stark was never happier to be wearing the heavy-duty armour designed to stop the Hulk.

Even so, only a dozen of the demonic damsels died in that savage final confrontation and the thirteenth presaged even greater horror in the months to come…

The first new adventure concluded with ‘Men of the World’ as the Extremis trail led to space and a clash with an old friend.

Stark’s old mentor Eli also had altruistic intentions when he and his disciples took the nano-solution. All they wanted was to be able to thrive beyond Earth’s sustaining air and gravity. And, after the inevitable clash, Iron Man let them… but only on his terms…

Straightforward, smart, and surprisingly engaging, this compelling return to the basics of Fights ‘n’ Tights action offers big fights, big thrills and big ideas pace that will satisfy any reader, new or old, who likes the movie franchise as much as the comicbook canon. This sleek, slim tome also includes a stunning cover-gallery and variants by Land, Carlos Pagulayan, Adi Granov, Skott Young, Joe Quesada, Mike Deodato Jr. and Jim Cheung and also includes a now traditional 21st century perk for all those tech-savvy consumers with added value in mind.

Many pages contained herein are offer an AR icon (Marvel Augmented Reality App) which gives access to all sorts of extras once you download the little dickens – for free – from marvel.com/ARapp onto your iPhone or Android-enabled device.

Gritty, clever and hard-hitting, this is another explosively entertaining yarn to delight established fans with the added distinction of being self-contained and readily accessible to new, returning or casual readers.

™ & © 2013 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Iron Man: Extremis – Enhanced Edition


By Warren Ellis & Adi Granov (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-527-7

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has played many roles in the Marvel Universe since his debut in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963) when, as visitor to an East Asian war-zone, he was critically wounded and captured by sinister, cruel Communists. Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first Iron Man suit to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors.

Since then the inventor and armaments manufacturer became a liberal capitalist, eco-pioneer, space pioneer, Federal politician, Statesman and even Director of the world’s most scientifically advanced spy agency, the Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate.

…And, of course, one of the world’s most prominent superheroes with the Mighty Avengers…

First conceived in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis at a time when the economy was booming and “Commie-bashing” was an American obsession, the emergence of a glamorous new Thomas Edison using Yankee ingenuity, wealth and determination to safeguard the Land of the Free and better the World was an inevitable development. Combining the then-sacrosanct faith that technology and Capitalism in unison could solve any problem with the universally evocative imagery of noble knights battling evil, the Invincible Iron Man seemed an infallibly successful proposition.

Of course whilst Tony Stark was the acceptable face of 1960s Capitalism – a sexy millionaire industrialist and secretly a benevolent all-conquering hero when clad in the super-scientific armour he built with his own two hands – the turbulent tone of the 1970s soon relegated his suave, “can-do” image to the dustbin of history.

With ecological disaster and social catastrophe from myriad abuses of big business abounding, the zeitgeists of the young shifted leaving the Golden Avenger and Stark International facing some tricky questions from the increasingly politically savvy readership.

With money, fancy gadgetry and unthinking patriotism not quite so cool anymore, the questing voices of a new generation of writers began posing uncomfortable questions in the pages of a series that was once the bastion of militarised America …

For a popular character/concept lumbered with a fifty-year pedigree, radical reboots are a painful but vital periodic necessity. To keep contemporary, Stark’s origin and Iron Man’s continuity have been drastically revised every so often with the crucible trigger event perpetually leapfrogging to feature America’s most-recent conflicts.

Thus, whereas the debut tale saw the inventor captured by Viet Cong guerrilla Wong Chu, who ordered his dying hostage to build weapons or perish from shrapnel embedded in his chest, later revamps had that life-preserving chest-plate and weaponised armour evolve as defiant responses to oriental mastermind the Mandarin and Chinese bandits before this latest logical upgrade brought the hero fully into the 21st century…

With the third Iron Man movie hurtling like a missile towards us, The House of Ideas has re-released an augmented collection of Warren Ellis’ updating of the legend: one wherein the always-futuristic noble knight got a stunning cyberpunk upgrade in a tale which directly influenced the filmic franchise and led to illustrator Adi Granov working as a designer and producer on the cinema interpretation.

Collecting Iron Man volume 4, issues #1-6 – January 2005-April 2006 – the fable follows the continuity-shattering “Disassembled” publishing event (involving and affecting The Avengers, Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, Thor, Captain America and Iron Man himself), which rebooted a number of core concepts and repositioned the inventor-hero as a driven futurist attempting to expiate the blood on his hands at any and all costs…

Although Stark has cut himself loose from official Governmental affiliations and all military contracts, abandoning guns and bombs to return to the life of a maverick entrepreneur, happily risking profits for the betterment of humanity, once upon a time he was an inspired deviser of death-dealing inventions…

Everything kicks off somewhere in Texas when dangerous men utilise stolen science to create a volunteer monster even as, in New York, shell-shocked, weary Stark struggles to get his life on course. Things aren’t made any easier by a conscience-shaking interview with journalist John Pillinger: a forthright, honest individual determined to pick at old scabs by reviewing Stark’s deadly contributions to America’s inhuman arsenal of destruction.

In an uncompromising exchange, Stark is reminded again that his cluster-bombs and landmines have killed so many more than enemy combatants in Iraq and Afghanistan…

With his own Board of Directors daily undermining the head of Stark International, trying to sideline him so that they can go back to building weapons, Stark’s only refuge is the good works performed by his secret identity.

So, when a respected researcher kills himself at biological innovation firm Futurepharm, and the company’s latest project goes missing, Tony jumps at the chance to help its founder – and old girlfriend – Maya Hansen…

Once upon a time they were brilliant young idealists who believed their innovations would reshape humanity, both inspired and influenced by scientific philosopher and truly radical thinker Sal Kennedy and both unhappy at the dirty compromises their work demanded, if they were to build a better world. Now, years later, they both seem closer to achieving their naïve dreams…

The stolen bio-package is codenamed “Extremis”: a nano-tube solution designed to overwrite human biology and cure any disease or injury. This also makes it a super-soldier serum capable of making a body, faster, stronger, tougher and able to build new organs with unsuspected capabilities.

In a hidden place, a man named Mallen comes out of the mutative coma caused by taking Hansen’s Extremis solution. He is no longer remotely human…

As Maya and Tony catch up with their old mentor Sal and are forced to ponder some unpalatable ethical dilemmas, Mallen is invading a Texas FBI office, slaughtering fifty agents and innocent bystanders with uncanny powers.

Long ago his radical, white supremacist family were killed in a domestic siege by Federal Agents, and now the vengeful anti-government libertarian militiaman is just starting his campaign to reclaim his America for his people…

He’s quickly tracked and intercepted by Iron Man and a terrifying battle between technology and biology, Government tool and freedom fighter, super-machine and enhanced man ensues. The Armoured Avenger doesn’t have a chance…

Crushed and broken by Mallen, Stark is perilously wounded and trapped inside his broken billion-dollar toy. The Extremis-enhanced terrorist is simply too strong and far too fast. Slowly dying, Iron Man convinces Maya to take him to Futurepharm, where he reveals his true identity to the astounded scientist and convinces her to give him a diluted, specifically-tailored dose of her incredible restorative…

As the serum goes to work, reconfiguring his system and incorporating elements of armour and processing systems within his body, Stark’s mind wanders back to the distant day when he was captured by Al Qaeda insurgents in Afghanistan.

Wounded, with shrapnel pressing against his heart, he and fellow prisoner Ho Yinsen were ordered to make weapons for their captors, but instead built a device to hold the lethal metal shards in place. The chest-plate soon evolved into a mobile weapons system and Stark broke free – but not without terrible consequences…

History repeats itself now as Stark again contrives a weapon-suit to overcome his problems – but this time he’s not wearing or piloting it. Now he truly is an Iron Man inside and out…

All that’s left for the new Avenger is the final battle against Mallen, one last duel between brutal past and shining future, and one more breathtaking betrayal…

Short, sweet, shocking and surprisingly engaging, this compelling Fights ‘n’ Tights thriller offers breakneck pace, astounding action and superbly suspenseful realpolitik, ethical and philosophical quandaries that will satisfy any fan who likes their fantasy tinged with a touch of contemporary hyper-authenticity.

This book also includes a stunning cover-gallery by the artist and a selection of features taken from Marvel Spotlight: Iron Man Movie from 2008, such as the Granov interview, ‘Iron Man to the Extreme’, more stunning art samples in ‘Covering Adi Granov’ and a history and appreciation of the Extremis project in Mike Conroy’s ‘Extreme Visions’.

Gritty, clever and hard-hitting, this is another explosively entertaining yarn to delight established fans with the added distinction of being self-contained and readily accessible to new, returning or casual readers.

™ & © 2013 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. All rights reserved. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Ultimate Comics Iron Man: Demon in the Armour


By Nathan Edmondson & Matteo Buffagni (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-526-0

The upcoming third Iron Man film has naturally inspired a few new releases and this one, following the latest refit of the alternate Ultimate Marvel Universe (in the Divided We Fall/United We Stand publishing event), is a pretty good place for new or returning readers to get acquainted with the franchise…

The Marvel Ultimates project started in 2000 with a thoroughly modernizing refit of key characters and concepts to bring them into line with contemporary “ki-dults” – perceived to be a completely different buying public to us baby-boomers and our declining descendents.

Eventually even this streamlined new universe became as crowded and continuity-constricted as its predecessor, and in 2008 the cleansing publishing event “Ultimatum” culminated in a reign of terror which apparently (this is comics, after all) wiped out loads of heroes and villains as well as millions of ordinary mortals.

Even after, slowly rebuilding this darker, grimmer continuum, it had to happen again in 2012 as a perilously destabilised world sank into international metahuman anarchy and America succumbed to a mass secession of rogue states resulting in a second Civil War before the remaining heroes, surviving mutants and a new Spider-Man brought a measure of peace and stability to the planet…

From this latest aftermath comes a post-apocalyptic thriller (reassembling issues #1-4 of Ultimate Comics Iron Man from October 2012-January 2013) which simultaneously explores the past and future of Tony Stark: über-genius weapon-smith, world-class philanderer, amiable drunk, cancer victim and the latest arrogant financial Master of the Universe from a dynasty of armaments manufacturers and profiteers.

Demon in the Armour (and yes, it has been spelled differently for this British Edition) opens with the Golden Avenger spectacularly stopping a railway theft of super-guns before flashing back to earlier times when the rebellious son broke away from his overbearing father Howard Stark and attempted to set up his own company with cherished pal and partner Josey Gardner.

It was one of the last times he defied his dad’s demands.

Despite everything Tony tried, Stark senior was determined that his son would assume control of the family business, and as always, what the old man wanted he got. Six months later, Josey died in a plane crash but by then Tony was too busy in his new role to notice much…

Howard Stark was a complex man: over four decades he had built his small firm into a globe-girdling colossus, and although he never had time for family or sentiment there was always room for one more lesson on how Tony should run it once the old boss was gone…

Back in the present, the current owner is apprised of a brutal sabotage attack which masked a hacking attack. When Iron Man investigates the multi-pronged security breach he is completely outmanoeuvred by a mysterious “Mandarin” organisation which has infiltrated the company databases and even overridden control of Stark’s impregnable armoured suit.

The enigmatic ghost company claim they now own Stark Industries, just as they always have…

With the grudging assistance of ex-girlfriend, former boss super-spy and current White House Insider Carol Danvers, Tony and his major domo Jarvis track Mandarin to shell-company South Pacific Financial in Hong Kong, but the group has such strong ties to the Chinese Government – and the clout to make almost any problem go away – that even the USA officially considers them too big to mess with…

None of which matters one iota to Stark who, hot for answers and payback, ignores advice from friends, orders from the government and simple common sense to invade the company HQ in Hong Kong, only to again fall victim to the mal-ware and unlimited resources of Mandarin…

Barely escaping intact and with China personally suing him, the unrepentant Stark calls in a favour from military man James Rhodes (pilot of the US Air Force iteration of Stark armour dubbed War Machine)… who cheerily refuses…

A dedicated patriot, Rhodey has no time for the self-absorbed inventor and his headstrong manner, but when the latest Mandarin ploy compromises America’s Stark-built automated drone-system and causes untold damage, he joins Carol in a last-ditch scheme to destroy the sinister phantom cabal.

Stark and S.H.I.E.L.D. satellite data pinpoints an uncharted PacificIsland as the probable home base of Mandarin, but when Iron Man blazes in, Tony is easily overwhelmed. Mandarin has him exactly where it has always wanted him and the overmatched, outfoxed inventor subsequently discovers the family secrets and appalling obligations he could never have imagined as well as an unobtrusively all-pervasive foe unlike any other he has ever faced…

Luckily the unlikely hero always had plans and allies to match his impulsive nature and selfish indignation…

Cunning, devious, fast-paced and action-packed, this sharp, straightforward thriller perfectly fills the bill as a place to jump on to the Iron Man experience as writer Nathan Edmondson & artist Matteo Buffagni (ably augmented by colourist Andy Troy) fill in some questions about Tony Stark and reboot the Technological Titan just in time for the next movie…

With covers and variants by Frank Stockton & Gabrielle Dell’otto, this is a deliciously wry, cynical shocker: another breathtakingly effective yarn only possible outside the Marvel Universe and one which will resonate with readers who love the darkest side of science fiction and superheroes as well as casual readers who know the company’s movies better than the comicbooks.

Heavy on attitude and action and over almost too quickly, this is another splendid tale that leaves the reader genuinely hungry for more…

™ & © 2013 Marvel. All rights reserved. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. A British Edition published by Panini Publishing, a division of Panini UK, Ltd.

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Thor/Iron Man: God Complex


By Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning, Scot Eaton, Jaime Mendoza, Jeff Huet, Lorenzo Ruggiero & Veronica Gandini (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-936211-4911-8

Two of Marvel’s oldest stars and perennial fan favourites, the Norse God of Thunder and Armoured Avenger, have in their long and chequered careers been the staunchest of allies, fiercely squabbling brothers-in-arms and latterly sworn foes.

In this short, sweet and fabulously straight-shooting traditional team-up however, past grudges are largely forgotten as old foes return with a formidable new master on a fantastic crusade to forever change the world.

Re-presenting the bombastic 4-issue miniseries from 2010, God Complex opens with a horrific assault by a brooding brute on Baron Mordo, resulting in the theft of the evilest of magicians’ mightiest talisman. Simultaneously, the latest ultra-high tech orbital weapons platform of avaricious armaments magnate Moses Magnum is destroyed and its key systems stolen by a mysterious armoured figure…

In Oklahoma the rubble that was Asgard (see Siege and Siege: Dark Avengers) is being slowly checked and cleared by Earthling Emergency teams and latter-day Norse Gods when the workers free a very excitable and ticked-off dragon. Happily, recently reunited Avengers Thor and Iron Man are there to control the irked fire-drake until the beast’s owner Volstagg can calm the poor pet down…

With the infernal rampage suppressed, the work is then interrupted by Steve Rogers – former Captain America and current Chief of National Security – who dispatches the Armoured Avenger toRussia to investigate a runaway Particle Accelerator…

It’s a trap and Iron Man is ambushed by the latest upgrade of the Crimson Dynamo just as back in Oklahoma, Thor is ambushed by ultimate troll Ulik, tasked with retrieving the formidable, unstoppable Asgardian war-armour dubbed the Destroyer.

Although more than a match for their old enemies, the heroes are surprised and subsequently defeated by hidden adversary Diablo and former ally the High Evolutionary…

The latter – an obsessive human geneticist who evolved animals into New Men before turning himself into a cosmic deity – has long dreamed of creating his own gods and now, allied with the malign immortal alchemist, has embarked on his latest experiment: to marry science to sorcery to produce a new supreme being – the one true God of the 21st Century…

For raw material his willing subordinates have been gathering magical artefacts and the most cutting-edge technological components. The last thing needed was a suitable human Petri-dish and vessel. Brilliant, bold Tony Stark ideally fits that bill…

However even as the Evolutionary begins Iron Man’s enforced apotheosis, the hero counterattacks, whilst the bruised but unbowed Thor – and an unlikely ally – hunt for the villains who stole the Destroyer, tracking the sinister god-makers to their unlikely lair…

The consequent catastrophic clash looks set to end in victory for the heroes when the demonic Diablo turns the Avengers against each other with his mystic potions…

Even as the triumphant High Evolutionary begins his the longed-for final transformation, Diablo finally shows his true colours and hijacks the metamorphosis, just as he’d always intended, transcending his merely human villainy to become an omnipotent modern God of  Evil…

However even with the ambitions of centuries at last fulfilled, Diablo has not reckoned on the unfailing courage and determination of heroes or the anger of a master of science frustrated and betrayed…

Splendidly spectacular and visually stunning, this blistering action-epic concludes with one of the best and certainly most literal Deus ex Machina in comics to leave lovers of the genre breathless in wonder and appreciation.

This tumultuous tome also finds space to include text features from the movie tie-in Thor Spotlight, including ‘Abnett/Lanning on Iron Man/Thor: a DnA Q&A’ by Jess Harold, the comedic ‘Iron Man/Thor: Behind the Scenes’, a look at ‘Classic Thor/Iron Man Team-Ups’ from Dana Perkins and a fabulous sneak-peak at Scot Eaton’s many Design Sketches for Crimson Dynamo, Mordo’s Amulet, Ulik and his upgrades and the all-important Cloaking Circuit…

Impossibly recapturing and even improving upon those hallowed and traditional clear-cut, uncomplicated cataclysmic cosmic conflicts of yore, scripters Abnett and Lanning, penciller Eaton, inkers Jaime Mendoza, Jeff Huet & Lorenzo Ruggiero and colourist Veronica Gandini all splendidly combine here to make God Complex a pure joy that will delight fans and readers old and new.
© 2010, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Iron Man: War of the Iron Men


By Fred Van Lente, Matteo Casali, Steve Kurth & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4730-5

First conceived in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis at a time when the economy was booming and “Commie-bashing” was an American national obsession, the emergence of a new and sexy young Thomas Edison using Yankee ingenuity, wealth and determination to safeguard the Land of the Free and better the World seemed an obvious development. Combining the then-sacrosanct faith that technology and business in unison could solve any problem with the universal imagery of noble knights battling evil, the Invincible Iron Man seemed an infallibly successful proposition.

Of course whilst Tony Stark was the acceptable face of 1960s Capitalism – a glamorous millionaire industrialist and a benevolent all-conquering hero when clad in the super-scientific armour of his alter-ego Iron Man – the turbulent tone of the 1970s soon relegated his suave, “can-do” image to the dustbin of history, and with ecological disaster and social catastrophe from the myriad abuses of big business the new zeitgeists of the young, the Golden Avenger and Stark International were soon confronting a few tricky questions from the increasingly politically savvy readership.

With glamour, money and fancy gadgetry not quite so cool anymore, the questing voices of a new generation of writers began posing uncomfortable questions in the pages of a series that was once the bastion of militarised America …

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Stark has had many roles in the Marvel Universe since his debut in Tales of Suspense #39 (March 1963) when, as a visitor to an East Asian war-zone, he was critically wounded and captured by sinister, cruel Communists. Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first Iron Man armour to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors.

Since then the inventor and armaments manufacturer became a liberal capitalist, eco-pioneer, space pioneer, Federal politician, Statesman and even Director of the world’s most scientifically advanced spy agency, the Strategic Hazard Intervention Espionage Logistics Directorate.

…And, of course, one of the world’s most prominent superheroes with the Mighty Avengers…

At this time in the mainstream Marvel universe, the perpetually shell-shocked citizenry of the planet are still recovering from an interminable series of major and almost annual catastrophes such as the Civil War and a Secret Invasion by shape-shifting Skrulls, and technical wizard and billionaire weapon-smith Stark has been publicly revealed to the world as the armour-clad superhero Iron Man – or at least one of them…

In this brief but decidedly back-to-basics compilation (collecting from 2010 the first 5-part story-arc of the on-going series Iron Man Legacy, plus a tale from the one-shot Iron Man: Titanium), Stark has cut himself loose from all his Governmental affiliations and returned to the life of a maverick entrepreneur, happily endangering the profits of global energy interests with his new, clean and cheap Arc Reactor technology.

Even as Iron Man is quelling rioting “environmental activists” – actually saboteurs in the pay of “Big Oil” – ancient ethnic strife in the Balkan country of Transia is turning into a very one-sided genocidal bloodbath as the Muslim Romani are targeted by Slavic death-squads calling themselves Zmaj and wearing old versions of Stark’s Iron Man armour.

It is the inventor’s worst nightmare come to life again. As the son of America’s greatest munitions maker, Tony is tormented by the generations of innocent blood spilled by the Stark dynasty’s genius, but whereas his father Howard always looked for more effective methods of carrying out combat, his heir has always believed his own inventions saved more lives than they cost. However, night after night the news shows helpless men, women and children slaughtered by barbaric travesties of his greatest creation…

With Russiaand China- both protecting illegitimate energy interests in the region – stalling the debate, the UN is locked in interminable useless argument over the situation and Tony is ordered by the American authorities not to interfere. But ignoring the advice – and commands – of the powers-that-be and his closest friends and allies, the tormented inventor goes undercover, invading the blood-soaked combat zone masquerading as one of his own bodyguards, leaving an android Tony Stark in charge of his company, programmed to placate the press and deter Federal gadfly Henry Peter Gyrich of the Metahuman Affairs Commission.

Utilising all his latest upgrades and innovations and with the aid of old Romani woman Nina, Stark begins hunting down and destroying the Iron Man knock-offs but soon discovers some are equipped with tech and kit that hasn’t even made it off his drawing board yet. Somehow, the rabid killers have a pipeline into the most secure crannies of Stark Enterprises…

Moreover, Transia’s neighbour Latveria is eagerly offering the assistance the UN is unable to expedite, but Doctor Doom never does anything for anyone but himself…

Still believing himself to have the upper hand, Iron Man is unexpectedly overwhelmed in blistering battle against his purloined creations and becomes a prisoner of the Zmaj leader Darko and his armourer Svarog, a being claiming to be the Slavic god of blacksmiths…

Once more put to work building weapons for bloody monsters, Stark meets fellow prisoner Dragana, a mutilated Romani genius forced into building and repairing the unstoppable Iron Warriors, knowing full well they are being used to exterminate her own people.

Those oppressed folk have a champion of their own now: Stark’s old foe Dreadknight has come to save the Romani at the express command of Doctor Doom, but what the Master of Latveria really wants is the pod of Stark Tech the infuriated but too-trusting inventor left in Nina’s barn…

History repeats itself as Stark again builds himself a weapon suit to escape his captors. But as he blasts free promising to return for the wheelchair-bound psychologically broken Dragana, the American is intercepted by Dreadknight…

Despite overwhelming odds Stark is victorious, but in Americahis deception has been discovered and his trusted assistant Pepper Potts arrested by Gyrich. Moreover Russiaand Chinahave dispatched super-powered assets to the region to clean things up quickly and quietly, but such ruthless agents as Crimson Dynamo, Titanium Man and the Radioactive Man are chronically incapable of doing anything subtly, especially when their oldest enemy is there to muddy the waters and stubbornly resist their unmatchable nationalistic might…

The Iron Dictator, meanwhile, has incorporated the stolen Stark Tech into his latest generation of Doombots and moved to his long-planned endgame: annexing Transia and all its unimaginably secret untapped resources at the request of its endangered minorities, making it an autonomous Protectorate of Latveria…

As Iron Doombots invade the conflicted country, only Stark’s erstwhile enemies and a newly minted-national champion forged in this moment of final crisis are able to protect Transia until the original and genuine Iron Man finally triumphs over Doom…

Even then there’s that traitor to find at Stark and a hidden American instigator behind all the bloodshed to expose and punish…

Short, sweet, shocking and surprisingly engaging, this compelling Fights ‘n’ Tights thriller by Fred Van Lente & Steve Kurth offers breakneck pace, astounding action and superbly suspenseful global realpolitik underpinnings that will satisfy any fan who likes their fantasy tinged with a touch of contemporary hyper-authenticity.

This book also includes a stunning cover-gallery displaying the artistic talents of Francis Tsai, Brandon Peterson, Salvador Larroca, Pascal Alixe, Bill Pressing, Ryan Meinerding and a photographic movie variant cover-spread, as well as finding time and space for a blockbusting brief encounter between the Golden Avenger and a giant alien robot in ‘Heavy Rain’ by Matteo Casali & Kurth, originally seen as part of the Iron Man: Titanium one-shot.

Gritty, clever and hard-hitting, this is another explosively entertaining yarn that will delight regular fans, with the rare added bonus of being self-contained and readily accessible to new, returning or casual readers.
© 2010, 2011 Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

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The Death of Captain America: The Man who Bought America


By Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting, Fabio Laguna, Luke Ross & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-2971-4

I’m usually a little at odds and uneasy with today’s all-pervasive, consumer-crazed “Have it First! Have it Now!” philosophy. I generally prefer to see things working well and a bit worn in before I commit myself to an opinion or risk time and/or money on an item.

I also find that this policy pays dividends when looking at comics and graphic novels. Something you love at first sight often palls and pales into insignificance on re-reading, whilst often a little mellowing and maturation offers insights into material that might not have impressed on initial inspection…

A perfect case in point is the unceasing cacophony of collections which poured out of Marvel during their headline-grabbing stunt of having legendary patriotic icon Captain America assassinated as the climax of the publishing event Civil War. Despite being superbly crafted and gripping material, the sheer manic hyperbole of the press machine involved at the time turned many folks off and I quickly turned my attention elsewhere…

The Star Spangled Avenger was created by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby at the end of 1940 and launched in his own title (Captain America Comics, #1 cover-dated March 1941) with overwhelming success. He was the absolute and undisputed star of Timely (Marvel’s early predecessor) Comics’ “Big Three” – the other two being the Human Torch and Sub-Mariner. He was also the first to fall from popularity at the end of the Golden Age.

When the Korean War and Communist aggression dominated the American psyche in the early 1950s he was briefly revived – with the Torch and Sub-Mariner – in 1953 before sinking once more into obscurity until a resurgent Marvel Comics once more brought him back in Avengers #4.

It was March 1964 and the Vietnam conflict was just beginning to pervade the minds of the American public…

This time he stuck around.

Whilst perpetually agonising over the death of his young sidekick (James Buchanan Barnes AKA Bucky) in the final days of the war, the resurrected Steve Rogers first stole the show in the Avengers, then promptly graduated to his own series and title as well. He waxed and waned through the most turbulent period of social change in US history, but always struggled to find an ideological niche and stable footing in the modern world.

Eventually, whilst another morally suspect war raged in the real world, during the Marvel event known as Civil War he became an anti-government rebel and was ambushed on the steps of a Federal Courthouse.

Naturally, nobody really believed he was dead…

Over the course of three volumes he was replaced by that dead sidekick. Years previously Bucky had been captured by the Soviets and used as their own super-assassin – The Winter Soldier. There’s no truer maxim than “nobody stays dead in comics”, however, and after being rescued from his unwanted spy-role the artificially youthful and part cyborg Barnes reluctantly stepped into his mentor’s boots…

Whilst Bucky was coming to terms with his inheritance; still largely unknown and unwelcome to the general public, S.H.I.E.L.D. agent Sharon Carter – pregnant with Steve’s baby and a prisoner of Nazi über-menace the Red Skull – was undergoing a subtle program of brainwashing by perfidious psychologist Dr. Johan Faustus.

Although the mind-bending had succeeded in making her shoot Captain America on the Courthouse steps, the doped and duped operative was slowly clawing her way back to sanity, but received a huge shock after she discovered a comatose Steve alive and in captive in an underground cell…

The Skull – a disembodied malign consciousness trapped in the head of ex-Soviet General Aleksander Lukin – is well on the way to conquering the USA at last and also determined to have a new perfect body of his own again. Closeted with his body-swapping, gene-warping wizard Arnim Zola, a mysterious plan for Sharon’s baby and the body in the basement are coming to fruition…

Marvel’s extended publicity stunt was building to a blockbusting, revelatory close in this third volume (collecting issues #37-42 of Captain America volume 5 from 2008) written by master planner Ed Brubaker with art from Steve Epting, Mike Perkins, Luke Ross, Fabio Laguna, Rick Magyar & Roberto De La Torre, with the promise of a new Captain America in situ at the close…

In a close-fought election year, the sudden rise of independent candidate Senator Gordon Wright and his Third Wing Party takes America by storm. Backed by corporate colossus Kronas and monolithic security division Kane-Myer and very publicly targeted by conservatives, radicals, liberals and nut-jobs alike, Wright seems the perfect and only candidate for the sensible ordinary man-in-the-street…

Whilst S.H.I.E.L.D. Director Tony Stark orders The Falcon to partner up with the still reluctant Bucky and track down Faustus, in Lukin’s lair Sharon has escaped again and gone searching for Steve…

What she finds is the deranged duplicate who briefly played Captain America in the 1950s. After a few short months the reactionary patriot had been forcibly “retired” when the super-soldier serum he’d used soured and turned him into a raving, racist paranoid. The fascistic facsimile had a tenuous grip on reality at best and attacked the real Sentinel of Liberty many times after escaping government custody…

Before she can shoot the horrific travesty of the man she loved, the Skull and Faustus recapture Sharon. Taking careful steps not to harm her, they restrain the dazed agent in the infirmary. Meanwhile Falcon and the new Captain America clash with Zola and agents of Advanced Idea Mechanics, destroying one of the Skull’s hidden facilities. Despite the heroes’ stunning triumph the Skull’s overall progress seems unchecked and unstoppable…

His next move is to release the reconditioned 1950s Cap and convince the public that the replica is their real fallen hero miraculously returned. When the Avenger then endorses Wright on live TV the political outsider suddenly seems a certainty for the White House, but things go awry when the Cap impostor clashes with Barnes and the young replacement defeats the veteran fake.

His nerve and spirit broken, the ersatz Avenger disappears, just as another disaster strikes at the plotters, when the Skull’s deeply disturbed daughter Sin attacks Sharon and causes her to lose the baby she’s carrying…

When AIM agents recapture the counterfeit Cap, Barnes and the Falcon are watching and get an unexpected hand from Faustus, who knows exactly when to leave a sinking ship. After triggering Sharon’s long disabled GPS chip the sinister shrink also makes a few last-minute adjustments to her memory and programming…

The disparate paths converge at a televised Presidential Debate – which now includes Wright – where, the Senator believes, one of his rivals will be assassinated and the Third Wing’s National Security stance will make him a shoo-in for the Oval Office. However the Skull has never played straight in his life and has agendas within schemes inside his plot…

As Falcon and Russian super-spy Black Widow spearhead a devastating rescue raid on the Nazi’s base, the new Captain America saves all the candidates on live TV before spectacularly capturing the assassins. In the midst of yet another Götterdämmerung the Skull and Zola play their final card and attempt to transfer the Machiavellian maniac’s mind out of Lukin’s body, but gravely underestimate the paranoid rage of their fake Cap and Sharon’s sheer determination to stop them at any cost…

In the shattering aftermath, Sharon is recuperating with S.H.I.E.L.D., Wright is disgraced, and Bucky Barnes is publicly acclaimed as the only Captain America, but although defeated the Red Skull is not dead.

Zola, it seems, has saved his master again, but the process has not met with approval and might be seen more as a punishment than salvation by the bitterly frustrated fascist overlord…

With covers and variants from Epting, Jackson Guice and Frank Cho, this concluding tome in The Death of Captain America triptych is a dark, tension-packed action-extravaganza that probably depends a little too much upon a working knowledge of Marvel continuity but, for those willing to eschew subtext or able to ignore seeming incongruities and go with the flow, this sinister conspiracy-thriller epic with guest-shots from Avengers luminaries Nick Fury, Hawkeye, Black Widow and Tony Stark is genuinely enthralling and well worth the effort.

The saga of the new Sentinel of Liberty resumed in Captain America: the Man with No Face and if you’re a full-on fan of the Fights ‘n’ Tights genre you’re assured of a thoroughly grand time there too.
© 2008 Marvel Characters Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Essential Avengers volume 6


By Steve Englehart, Roy Thomas, Jim Starlin, Gerry Conway, Bob Brown,
Don Heck, Dave Cockrum, Joe Staton, Rich Buckler, John Buscema, George Tuska & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-3058-1

The Avengers have always proved that putting all one’s star eggs in a single basket pays off big-time: even when all Marvel’s classic all-stars such as Thor, Captain America and Iron Man are absent, it merely allows the team’s lesser lights to shine more brightly.

Of course all the founding stars were regularly featured due to the rotating, open door policy which means that most issues includes somebody’s fave-rave – and the boldly grand-scale impressive stories and artwork are no hindrance either.

This monolithic and monumental sixth tome, collecting the ever-amazing Avengers‘ world-saving exploits (presenting in crisp, stylish monochrome the astounding contents of issues #120-140 of their monthly comic book between March 1974 and October 1975, plus Giant-Size Avengers #1-4 and crossover appearances in Captain Marvel #33 and Fantastic Four #150), saw scripter Steve Englehart examine the outer limits of Marvel history and cosmic geography as he took readers to the ends of their universe and the beginning of time…

Opening this epochal tome is ‘Death-Stars of the Zodiac!’ from Avengers #120, by Steve Englehart, Bob Brown & Don Heck, wherein terrorist astrological adversaries and super-criminal cartel Zodiac attacked again with a manic plan to eradicate everyone in Manhattan born under the sign of Gemini, with heroes Thor, Iron Man, Vision, Scarlet Witch, Swordsman and Mantis seemingly helpless to stop them.

In the blistering battle of #121’s ‘Houses Divided Cannot Stand!’, illustrated by John Buscema & Heck, even the added assistance of Captain America and the Black Panther is of little advantage and with Mantis injured the team begin to question her mysterious past, only to be lured to their seeming doom and ‘Trapped in Outer Space!’ (Brown & Mike Esposito) before at last turning the tables on their fearsome foes after the criminal Libra revealed a shocking secret…

Avengers #123, depicted by Brown & Heck, began a vast and ambitious saga with ‘Vengeance in Viet Nam – or – An Origin For Mantis!’ as Libra’s claim to be Mantis’ father (a story vigorously and violently denied by the Martial Arts Mistress) brought the team to Indo-China.

The criminal ex-mercenary declared that he left the baby Mantis with pacifistic Priests of Pama after running afoul of a local crime-lord, but the bewildered warrior-woman has no memory of such events, nor of being schooled in combat techniques by the Priests. Meanwhile the gravely wounded Swordsman has rushed to Saigon to confront his sadistic ex-boss Monsieur Khruul and save the Priests from being murdered by the gangster’s thugs… but was again too late. It is the tragic story of his wasted life…

Issue #124 found the team stumbling upon a scene of slaughter as clerics and criminals lay dead and a monstrous planet-rending alien horror awoke in ‘Beware the Star-Stalker!’ by J. Buscema & Dave Cockrum…

Mantis was forced to accept that her own memories were not real after Avengers #125, which unleashed ‘The Power of Babel!’ when a vast alien armada attacked and, in combating it, the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes were trapped out of phase with their home-world.

This blockbuster battle bonanza was a crossover, and the penultimate episode of the spectacular Thanos War Saga that had featured in Captain Marvel, Marvel Feature and Iron Man, and included in this compendium is ‘The God Himself!’ scripted by Englehart from Captain Marvel #33 (plotted and illustrated by Jim Starlin & Klaus Janson) wherein the mad Titan Thanos finally fell in combat to the valiant Kree warrior: a stunning piece of comics storytelling which stands up remarkably well here despite being seen without benefit of the preceding ten chapters…

It was back to business in #126 as in ‘All the Sights and Sounds of Death!’ (Brown & Cockrum) villains Klaw and Solarr attacked Avengers Mansion in a devious attempt to achieve vengeance for past indignities, after which Roy Thomas, Rich Buckler & Dan Adkins returned to the fold to delve into superhero history with ‘Nuklo… the Invader that Time Forgot!’ for the first quarterly edition of Giant-Size Avengers.

The stirring saga reintroduced 1940 Marvel sensation Bob Frank AKA The Whizzer in a tragic tale of desperation as the aged speedster begged the heroes’ help in rescuing his son: a radioactive mutant locked in stasis since the early 1950s. Unfortunately within the recently unearthed chrono-capsule the lad has grown into a terrifying atomic horror…

Moreover while in the throes of a stress-induced heart-attack the Whizzer let slip that he was the also the father of mutant Avengers Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver…

In Avengers #127 Sal Buscema & Joe Staton signed on as regular art team with ‘Bride and Doom!’ when the team travelled to the hidden homeland of the Inhumans for the marriage of the aforementioned Quicksilver to elemental enchantress Crystal only to stumble into a uprising of the genetic slave-race known as Alpha Primitives.

Once again the robotic giant Omega had incited the revolt but this time it was controlled by an old Avengers enemy who revealed himself in the concluding chapter of the crossover…

Fantastic Four #150 featured ‘Ultron-7: He’ll Rule the World!’ by Gerry Conway, Buckler & Joe Sinnott, in which an impossible battle of FF, Inhumans and Avengers was ended by a veritable Deus ex Machina after which, at long last ‘The Wedding of Crystal and Quicksilver’ ended events on a happy note.

But not for long: in Avengers #128’s ‘Bewitched, Bothered, and Dead!’ (Englehart, Sal Buscema & Staton) the FF‘s nanny Agatha Harkness began tutoring Wanda Frank in actual sorcery to augment her mutant power, unwittingly allowing dark mage Necrodamus access to the Mansion and their souls, whilst the increasingly troubled Mantis began making a play for the Scarlet Witch’s synthazoid boyfriend The Vision; heedless of the hurt and harm she would bring to her current lover The Swordsman…

In #129 ‘Bid Tomorrow Goodbye!’ kicked the simmering saga into high gear when Kang the Conqueror appeared, determined to possess the legendary female figure he called the Celestial Madonna.

Apparently this anonymous creature would birth the saviour of the universe, and since no records survived disclosing which of the three women in Avengers Mansion at that crucial moment she actually was, the time-reaver was determined to abduct all three and forcibly make Kang the inevitable father of the child…

This time not even the assembled Avengers could stop him and, after crushing and enslaving them, Kang made off with Wanda, Harkness and Mantis, with only the swiftly declining Swordsman free to contest him…

The tale continued into Giant-Size Avengers #2 with ‘A Blast from the Past!’ (illustrated by Cockrum) as reluctant returnee Hawkeye rushed to the team’s rescue, reuniting with old adversary Swordsman and an enigmatic entity named Rama-Tut who claimed to be Kang’s reformed future self…

Against all odds the merely mortal heroes managed to free the enslaved Avengers and rout the unrepentant Kang – but only at the cost of the Swordsman’s life…

Avengers #130’s ‘The Reality Problem!’ (Sal Buscema & Staton) found the heartbroken and much chastened Mantis joining the team in Vietnam to investigate her mysteriously clouded past, only to be drawn into pointless combat with Communist exiles Titanium Man, Radioactive Man and Crimson Dynamo, thanks to the petty manipulations of sneak thief  The Slasher…

The brief battle concluded and the trail then led to ‘A Quiet Half-hour in Saigon!’ during which the American Adventurers were again attacked by Kang who trapped them in Limbo and unleashed a Legion of the Unliving against them…

With another time-villain Immortus added to the mix, ‘Kang War II’ saw temporarily resurrected heroes and villains Wonder Man, 1940’s android Human Torch, the Monster of Frankenstein, martial arts assassin Midnight, the ghostly Flying Dutchman and Baron Zemo decimate the Avengers and the trauma and tragedy were further exacerbated as Mantis kept seeing the spectre of her deceased lover…

This absorbing thriller by Englehart, Thomas Sal Buscema & Staton segued inexorably into Giant-Size Avengers #3’s ‘…What Time Hath put Asunder!’ illustrated by Cockrum & Joe Giella, which saw Earth’s Mightiest Heroes pull victory from the ashes of defeat and receive a unique gift from one of the assembled Masters of Time…

Avengers #133 began ‘Yesterday and Beyond…’ (Englehart, S. Buscema & Staton) as the team followed Mantis to the beginnings of recorded Galactic history and the unravelling of her true past, whilst Vision was dispatched to glimpse his own obscure and complex origins; a double quest which encompassed the Kree and Skrull empires, the defeated Star-Stalker and deceased Priests of Pama and Thanos, and the telepathic Titan dubbed Moondragon, as well as a goodly portion of classic superhero history in ‘The Times That Bind!’ before #135 revealed that ‘The Torch is Passed!’ (illustrated by George Tuska & Frank Chiaramonte) and brought all the disparate elements together in Giant-Size Avengers #4.

‘…Let All Men Bring Together’ (art by Heck & Tartaglione) climaxed the long-standing romance between the Scarlet Witch and Vision and another far more cosmic union with a brace of weddings and the ultimate ascension of the Celestial Madonna – even though demonic extra-dimensional despot Dormammu did try to spoil the show…

A new era was supposed to begin in Avengers #136 but a deadline was missed and instead ‘Iron Man: DOA’ by Englehart, Tom Sutton & Mike Ploog was reprinted from Amazing Adventures #12, wherein the newly mutated and furry Hank McCoy AKA the Beast had attacked the Armoured Avenger whilst mind-controlled.

Although an excellent story in its own right, it rather gave the game away for the next issue after the painfully depleted team declared ‘We Do Seek Out New Avengers!!’ (art by Tuska & Vince Colletta) and amongst the applicants – which included Moondragon, Yellowjacket and the Wasp – was an athletic, enigmatic guy bundled up in a raincoat…

No sooner had the introductions begun than a cosmic interloper attacked, hunting for the honeymooning Witch and Vision, but the ‘Stranger in a Strange Man!’ was far from his expected level of puissance and the heroes soon smelled a rat – unfortunately not before the Wasp was gravely injured…

After all the intergalactic hyper-cosmic extravaganzas and extended epic-ing, Avengers #139 ‘Prescription: Violence!’ and #140’s ‘A Journey to the Center of the Ant’ end this volume on a comfortingly down-to-Earth scale as the malevolent Whirlwind tried to murder the bed-ridden Wasp and her devoted defender Yellowjacket succumbed to a growing affliction which doomed him to exponentially expand to his death until the refreshed, returned Vision and the bludgeoning Beast saved the day…

Roy Thomas and Steve Englehart were at the forefront of Marvel’s second generation of story-makers, brilliantly building on and consolidating the compelling creation of Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko: spearheading and constructing a logical, fully functioning wonder-machine of places and events that so many others were inspired by and could add to. In this volume, between them they also showed how much more graphic narratives could become and these terrific tales are perfect examples of superhero sagas done just right.

Although not to every reader’s taste these fantastic Fights ‘n’ Tights masterpieces can still boggle the mind and take the breath away, so no lovers of Costumed Dramas can afford to ignore this superbly bombastic book.
© 1972, 1973, 1974, 2006 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

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Marvel Platinum: the Definitive Avengers


By Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, Roy Thomas, John Buscema, Neal Adams, John Byrne, Kurt Busiek, George Pérez, Brian Michael Bendis & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-507-9

The Avengers have always proved that putting all one’s star eggs in one single basket pays off big-time: even when all Marvel’s all-stars such as Thor, Captain America and Iron Man were absent, it merely allowed the team’s lesser lights to shine more brightly.

Of course all the founding stars regularly featured due to the rotating, open-door policy which meant most issues included somebody’s fave-rave – and the boldly grand-scale impressive stories and artwork were no hindrance either.

As the new Avengers film screens across the world, Marvel has again released a bunch of tie-in books and trade paperback collections to maximise exposure and cater to those movie fans wanting to follow up the cinematic exposure with a comics experience.

Under the Marvel Platinum/Definitive Editions umbrella, this treasury of tales reprints some obvious landmarks from the pantheon’s serried history, specifically Avengers volume 1 #1, 4, 57, 93, Avengers West Coast #51-52, Avengers volume 3, #10-11, Avengers volume 1 #503, Avengers Finale and New Avengers #3 which, whilst not all absolutely “definitive” epics, certainly offer a sublime snapshot of just how very great the ever-shifting team of titans can be.

During the Marvel Renaissance of the early 1960’s Stan Lee and Jack Kirby aped the tactic which had worked so tellingly for DC Comics, but with mixed results. Julie Schwartz had incredible success with revised and modernised versions of the company’s Golden Age greats, so it seemed natural to try and revive the characters that had dominated Timely/Atlas in those halcyon days. The JLA inspired Fantastic Four featured a new Human Torch and before long Sub-Mariner was back too…

As the costumed hero revival brought continuing success, the next stage was obvious and is covered here at then end of the volume by historian Mike Conroy’s informative essay ‘The True Origin of the Avengers’…

The concept of combining individual stars into a group had already made the Justice League of America a commercial winner and inspired the moribund Atlas outfit of Stan Lee, Jack Kirby and Steve Ditko to invent many “super-characters” after the Fantastic Four. Nearly 18 months later the fledgling House of Ideas had a viable stable of leading men (but only sidekick women) so Lee & Kirby assembled a handful of them and moulded them into a force for justice and even higher sales…

After a period of meteoric expansion, in 1963 the burgeoning Marvel Universe was finally ready to emulate the successful DC concept that had truly kick-started the Silver Age of comics and this stunning historical retrospective begins as it should with two stories from the groundbreaking Lee/Kirby run which graced the first eight issues of the World’s Mightiest Heroes.

Seldom has it ever been done with such style and sheer exuberance. Cover-dated September, The Avengers #1 launched as part of an expansion package which also included Sgt Fury and his Howling Commandos and The X-Men…

‘The Coming of the Avengers’ is one of the cannier origin tales in comics. Instead of starting at a zero point and acting as if the reader knew nothing, Stan & Jack (plus inker Dick Ayers) assumed readers had at least a passing familiarity with their other efforts and wasted very little time or energy on introductions.

In Asgard Loki, god of evil, was imprisoned on a dank isle, hungry for vengeance on his half-brother Thor. Observing Earth he espied the monstrous, misunderstood Hulk and engineered a situation wherein the man-brute seemingly went berserk to trick the Thunder God into battling the monster. When the Hulk’s sidekick Rick Jones radioed the Fantastic Four for assistance, Loki diverted the transmission and smugly waited for the mayhem to manifest.

Unfortunately for him, Iron Man, Ant-Man and the Wasp also picked up the SOS….

As the heroes converged in the American Southwest to search for the Jade Giant they realized that something was oddly amiss…

This terse, epic, compelling and wide-ranging yarn (New York, New Mexico, Detroit and Asgard in 22 pages) is Lee & Kirby at their bombastic best and one of the greatest adventure stories of the Silver Age and is followed by the long-awaited return of the last of the “Big Three”…

Avengers #4 (March 1964) was a true landmark of the genre as Marvel’s greatest Golden Age sensation was revived. ‘Captain America Joins the Avengers!’ has everything that made the company’s early tales so fresh and vital. The majesty of a legendary warrior (that most of the readers had never heard of!) returned in our time of greatest need, stark tragedy in the loss of his boon companion Bucky, aliens, gangsters, Sub-Mariner and even wry social commentary. This story by Lee, Kirby & George Roussos just cannot be bettered.

In #57 (October 1968) Roy Thomas, John Buscema & George Klein produced a Golden Age revival of their own as ‘Behold… the Vision!’ introduced a terrifying android apparition designed by arch-foe Ultron to destroy the heroes. Sadly not appearing here is the conclusion wherein the eerie, amnesiac, artificial man with complete control of his mass and density discovered a fraction of his origins and joined the human heroes….

Avengers #89-97 comprised perhaps the most ambitious and certainly boldest saga in Marvel’s early history: an astounding epic of tremendous scope which dumped Earth into a cosmic war the likes of which comics fans had never before seen and creating the template for all multi-part crossovers and publishing events ever since.

The Kree-Skull War captivated a generation of comics readers and from that epic comes the extra-long ‘This Beachhead Earth’ (Avengers #93 November 1972, by Thomas, Neal Adams & Tom Palmer) as the Vision was almost destroyed by alien invaders and Ant-Man was forced to undertake ‘A Journey to the Center of the Android!’ to save the android’s unconventional life. Thereafter the Avengers became aware of not one but two alien presences on Earth: bellicose Kree and sneaky shape-shifting Skrulls, beginning a ‘War of the Weirds!’ on our fragile globe.

Acting too late, the assembled team were unable to prevent the Scarlet Witch, Quicksilver and Captain Marvel from being abducted by the Skrulls…

That cliff-hanging drama is followed by a revelatory two-part tale from Avengers West Coast #51-52 (November and December 1989) by John Byrne & Mike Machlan which opens with ‘I Sing of Arms and Heroes…’ wherein the Scarlet Witch hunted for her missing children only to discover some horrifying truths about them and her own powers. The tragedy was only resolved when demonic foe Master Pandemonium and supernal arch-tempter Mephisto deprived her of everything she had ever believed, wanted or loved in ‘Fragments of a Greater Darkness’…

Avengers volume 3, #10-11 (November and December 1998) by Kurt Busiek, George Pérez, Al Vey & Bob Wiacek) recaps the history and celebrates the team’s anniversary with a parade in ‘Pomp and Pageantry’ until the ghostly Grim Reaper hijacked the affair and attacked them through the medium of their own dead yet resurrected members Wonder Man, Mockingbird, Swordsman, Hellcat, Dr. Druid, Thunderstrike and Captain Marvel. At the same time the increasingly unstable Scarlet Witch learned the true nature of her reality-altering powers in the catastrophic concluding clash ‘…Always an Avenger!’

A few years later the “World’s Mightiest Heroes” were shut down and rebooted in a highly publicised event known as Avengers Disassembled. Of course it was only to replace them with both The New and The Young Avengers. Affiliated comic-books Thor, Iron Man, Captain America, Fantastic Four and Spectacular Spider-Man ran parallel but not necessarily interconnected story-arcs to accompany the Big Show.

Said Show consisted of the worst day in the team’s history as a trusted comrade betrayed the World’s Mightiest Superteam resulting in the destruction of everything they held dear and the death of several members, all of which originally appeared in issues #500-503 plus the one-shot Avengers Finale.

From that epic event comes the closing chapter ‘Chaos part four’ (#503, December 2004, by Brian Michael Bendis, David Finch, Olivier Coipel & Danny Miki) wherein the uncomprehending, surviving heroes discovered and reluctantly despatched the true author of all their woes and losses, after which the moody and elegiac Avengers Finale signalled the end of an era in a powerful tribute by a host of creators including Bendis and artists Finch, Miki, Frank D’Armata, Alex Maleev, Steve Epting, Lee Weeks, Brian Reber, Michael Gaydos, Eric Powell, Darick Robertson, Mike Mayhew, Andy Troy, David Mack, Gary Frank, Mike Avon Oeming, Pete Patanzis, Jim Cheung, Mark Morales, Justin Ponsor, Steve McNiven, George Pérez, Mike Perkins, Neal Adams & Laura Martin.

It is undeniably one of the best superhero “Last Battles” ever created, and loses little impact whether it was your five hundredth or first experience with these tragic heroes.

Shocking and beautiful, there was a genuine feeling of an “End of Days” to this epic Armageddon.

The final comics tale in this sturdy volume comes from New Avengers #3 (March 2005) as, in the aftermath of a massive breakout of super-villains, Captain America and Iron Man tried to put the band back together with a whole new generation including Luke Cage, Spider-Woman and the Amazing Spider-Man.

‘Breakout Part 3’ is just a fraction of a longer epic by Bendis, Finch, Allen Martinez, Miki & Victor Olazaba, but ends this action-adventure compendium on a solid note indicating that the best is still yet to come…

Also contained herein is an extensive prose feature covering the history of the team, the aforementioned ‘true origin’ piece and a raft of classic covers to tantalise and tempt…

This book is one of the very best of these perennial supplements to cinema spectacle, but more importantly it is a supremely well-tailored device to turn curious movie-goers into fans of the comic incarnation too. If there’s a movie sequel, I’m sure Marvel has plans for reprinting much of the masterful material necessarily omitted here, but at least until then we have a superb selection to entice newcomers and charm the veteran American Dreamers.
™ and © 1963, 1964, 1968, 1972, 1989, 1998, 2004, 2005, 2012 Marvel & subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A, Italy. All Rights Reserved. A British edition published by Panini UK, Ltd.

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Marvel Masterworks Invincible Iron Man volume 2: Tales of Suspense 51-65


By Stan Lee, Don Heck, Jack Kirby & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-0886-3 or 978-0-7851-1771-1

There are a number of ways to interpret the life and moonlighting career of Tony Stark, glamorous millionaire industrialist/inventor and his armoured alter-ego, Iron Man.

Created in the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis and at a time when “Red-baiting” and “Commie-bashing” were American national obsessions, the emergence of a brilliant new Thomas Edison, using Yankee ingenuity and invention to safeguard and better the World, seemed inevitable. Combine the then-common belief that technology could solve any problem with the universal imagery of noble knights battling evil and the proposition almost becomes a certainty. Of course it might simply be us kids thought it both great fun and very, very cool…

This glorious full colour deluxe hardback compendium of the Golden Avenger’s early days reprints his further early adventures, with a smattering of feature pages and pin-ups from Tales of Suspense #51 (cover-dated March 19664) through #65 (May 1965), a period when Marvel built steadily and irresistibly on their creative inspiration and began scoring solid commercial successes: a time that would see them start to topple DC Comics from a position of dominance, but before the flashy underdogs became the darlings of the student counter-culture. In these tales Tony Stark is still very much the patriotic armaments manufacturer, and not the enlightened capitalist dissenter he would become.

Behind the first of fifteen fabulous Jack Kirby covers the wonderment begins with TOS #51 and ‘The Sinister Scarecrow’ (by Stan Lee & Don Heck) wherein the Golden Avenger tackled a tricky contortionist who quickly became a major menace after stealing vital weapons plans, after which Soviet femme fatale The Black Widow debuted with a savage partner who almost destroyed Iron Man in a Russian-made armour-suit when ‘The Crimson Dynamo Strikes Again!’ scripted, as was the next issue, by the enigmatic “N. Kurok”.

She was back in #53 when ‘The Black Widow Strikes Again!’ a far deadlier threat on her own after stealing an anti-gravity ray but nevertheless still failed to hit her gleaming target and the oriental mastermind who would become Stark’s greatest enemy returned in Tales of Suspense #54 to exact ‘The Mandarin’s Revenge!’; a two-part tale which concluded in ‘No One Escapes the Mandarin!’

Happily Iron Man did, and after bonus factoid-featurettes ‘All About Iron Man’ and ‘More Info About Iron Man’, plus pinups of devoted friends and confidantes Happy Hogan and Pepper Potts, our hero was attacked by Commie super agent ‘The Uncanny Unicorn!’

The Widow resurfaced to beguile budding superhero ‘Hawkeye, the Marksman!’ into attacking the Golden Avenger in #57, before a true landmark event occurred in the next issue. Iron Man had monopolised Tales of Suspense since his creation but ‘In Mortal Combat with Captain America’ (inked by Dick Ayers) an all-out battle between the two heroes – resulting from a clever impersonation by evil impressionist The Chameleon – hinted at a big change in the title.

The clash was a primer for the next issue when Cap would begin his own solo adventures, splitting the monthly comic into a shared anthology featuring Marvel’s top patriotic heroes.

Iron Man’s outing in TOS #59 was against high-tech bandit ‘The Black Knight!’ as a result of which Stark was unable to remove the armour without triggering a heart attack, a situation which hadn’t occurred since the initial heart injury forced Stark to devise his iron-shod alter-ego. Up until this time he had led a relatively normal life by simply wearing the life-sustaining chest-plate under his clothes but now he was a trapped by his own tech…

The introduction of soap-opera sub-plots were a necessitated by the shorter page counts, as were continued stories, but this seeming disadvantage worked to improve both the writing and the sales.

With Stark’s “disappearance,” Iron Man was ‘Suspected of Murder!’ – a tale which featured the return of Hawkeye and the Black Widow – leading directly into ‘The Death of Tony Stark!’ and after another stunning pin-up, ‘The Origin of the Mandarin!’.

After that extended epic, a change of narrative pace occurred as short, complete exploits returned. The first was #63’s industrial sabotage thriller ‘Somewhere Lurks the Phantom!’, followed by the surely self-explanatory ‘Hawkeye and the New Black Widow Strike Again!’ (inked by Chic Stone and disclosing the sultry spy’s conversion into a wall-crawling super-character), before this gold-plated triumph ends with ‘When Titans Clash!’ (inked by Mike Esposito under the pseudonym Mickey Demeo) as a petty thief steals the new armour and Stark must defeat his greatest invention clad only in his clunky old suit.

Iron Man developed amidst the growing political awareness of the Viet Nam Generation who were the comic’s maturing readership. Wedded as it was to the American Military-Industrial Complex, with a hero – originally the government’s wide-eyed golden boy – gradually becoming attuned to his country’s growing divisions, it was, as much as Spider-Man, a bellwether of the times.

That these tales also remain such a thrilling rollercoaster riot of classic super-hero fun is a lasting tribute to the talents of the superb creators who worked on them and this sturdy invincible tome is absolutely the best way to review these masterpieces of Marvel mettle.
© 1964, 1965, 2005 Marvel Characters, Inc. All Rights Reserved.