{"id":29864,"date":"2024-05-24T08:00:26","date_gmt":"2024-05-24T08:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/?p=29864"},"modified":"2024-05-23T16:50:39","modified_gmt":"2024-05-23T16:50:39","slug":"iron-man-epic-collection-volume-6-the-war-of-the-super-villains-1974-1976","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/2024\/05\/24\/iron-man-epic-collection-volume-6-the-war-of-the-super-villains-1974-1976\/","title":{"rendered":"Iron Man Epic Collection volume 6: The War of the Super Villains 1974 – 1976"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\" \"\"
\nBy Mike Friedrich<\/strong>, Barry Alfonso<\/strong>, Tom Orzechowski<\/strong>, Bill Mantlo<\/strong>, Len Wein<\/strong>, Archie Goodwin<\/strong>, Roger Slifer<\/strong>, Jim Shooter<\/strong>, Steve Gerber<\/strong>, Gerry Conway<\/strong>, George Tuska<\/strong>, Herb Trimpe<\/strong>, Arvell Jones<\/strong>, Keith Pollard<\/strong>, Chic Stone<\/strong>, Tuska<\/strong>, Sal Buscema<\/strong>, Marie Severin<\/strong> & various (MARVEL)
\nISBN: 978-1302948801 (TPB\/Digital edition)<\/p>\n

Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark<\/em> has changed his profile many times since his debut in Tales of Suspense<\/strong> #39 (March 1963) when, whilst a VIP visitor in Vietnam observing the efficacy of the munitions he had designed, the inventor was critically wounded and captured by sinister, savage Communists.<\/p>\n

Put to work building weapons with the dubious promise of medical assistance on completion, Stark instead created the first of many technologically augmented suits to keep himself alive and deliver him from his oppressors. From there it was a simple – transistor-powered – jump to full time superheroics as a modern Knight in Shining Armour…<\/p>\n

First conceived in the wake of the Cuban Missile Crisis at a time when Western economies were booming and \u201cCommie-bashing\u201d was an American national obsession, the emergence of a new and shining young Thomas Edison, using Yankee ingenuity, wealth and invention 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, Stark –The Invincible Iron Man<\/strong> – seemed an infallibly successful proposition.<\/p>\n

Of course, whilst he 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, \u201ccan-do\u201d image to the dustbin of history. 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.<\/p>\n

As glamour, money and fancy gadgetry lost its chic and grew evermore tarnished, 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<\/p>\n

This chronological compendium concludes that transitional period: reprinting Iron Man<\/strong> #68-91 and Annual<\/strong> #3 (June 1974 – October 1976) and opens without fanfare on an ambitious action epic. IM <\/strong>#68-71 comprised the opening sortie in a multi-part epic which saw mystic menace The Black Lama <\/em>foment a covert clash amongst the world\u2019s greatest villains, with ultimate power, inner peace and a magical Golden Globe as the promised prizes.<\/p>\n

Written by Mike Friedrich and illustrated by George Tuska & Mike Esposito, it begins in Vietnam on the \u2018Night of the Rising Sun!\u2019<\/em> where The Mandarin <\/em>struggles to free his consciousness – currently locked within the dying body of Russian super-villain The Unicorn<\/em>. This is probably the ideal moment to remind potential new readers that these stories were crafted in far less accepting times with racial and gender stereotypes used as narrative shorthand and occasionally so on the nose that they could make a caveman chuck up. If you can\u2019t look past that historically accurate accounting it might be best to seek your fun elsewhere…<\/em><\/p>\n

Stark\u2019s ardently pacifist love interest Roxie Gilbert<\/em> had dragged the inventor to the recently \u201cliberated\u201d People\u2019s Republic in search of (part-time Iron Man) Eddie March<\/em>\u2019s lost brother. Marty March <\/em>was a POW missing since the last days of the war. Before long, however, the Americans are separated after Japanese ultra-nationalist, ambulatory atomic inferno and occasional X-Man <\/strong>Sunfire<\/strong> is tricked into attacking the intrusive Yankee Imperialists…<\/p>\n

The assault abruptly ends once Mandarin shanghaies the Solar Samurai and uses his mutant energies to power a mind-transfer back into his own body. Reinstated to his original form, the Chinese Conqueror-in-waiting commences his own campaign of combat in earnest, eager to regain his castle from rival oriental overlord The <\/em>Yellow Claw<\/em>.<\/p>\n

First though, he must crush Iron Man – who has tracked him down and freed Sunfire in \u2018Confrontation!\u2019<\/em> That bombastic battle ends when the Golden Avenger is rendered unconscious and thrown into space…<\/p>\n

\u2018Who Shall Stop… Ultimo?\u2019<\/em> finds the revived giant robot-monster targeting Mandarin\u2019s castle (claimed by the Claw in a previous battle) as the sinister Celestial duels the ancient enemy to the death, with both Iron Man and Sunfire arriving too late and forced to mop up the sole survivor of the contest in \u2018Battle: Tooth and Yellow Claw! (Confrontation Part 3)\u2019. <\/em>After all that Eastern Armageddon, a change of pace is called for, so Stark takes in the San Diego Comicon in #72\u2019s \u2018Convention of Fear!\u2019<\/em> (by Friedrich, Tuska & Vince Colletta, from a plot by Barry Alfonso), only to find himself ambushed by fellow incognito attendees Whiplash, Man-Bull <\/em>and The Melter<\/em> – who are made an offer they should have refused by the ubiquitous and iniquitous Black Lama…<\/p>\n

Next issue the Super-Villain War kicks into high gear with \u2018Turnabout: A Most Foul Play!\u2019<\/em> (illustrated by Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard & Jim Mooney and derived from a premise by letterer Tom Orzechowski). After secret-sharing confidantes Pepper Potts-Hogan<\/em> and her husband Happy<\/em> settle a long-festering squabble with Tony at Stark International\u2019s Manila plant, Iron Man returns to Vietnam and dives into a deadly clash with Crimson Dynamo <\/em>in a hidden, high-tech jungle city subsequently razed to the ground by their explosive combat.<\/p>\n

Inked by Dick Ayers, Iron Man<\/strong> #74\u2019s \u2018The M.O.D.O.K. Machine!\u2019<\/em> brings Black Lama\u2019s contest to the fore as The <\/em>Mad Thinker <\/em>electronically overrides the Avenger\u2019s armour, setting helpless passenger Stark upon the malevolent, mutated master of Advanced Idea Mechanics…<\/p>\n

Without autonomy, the Golden Gladiator is easily overwhelmed and \u2018Slave to the Power Imperious!\u2019<\/em> (Chic Stone inks) sees the hero dragged back to The Thinker\u2019s lair and laid low by a strange psychic hallucination, even as M.O.D.O.K. finishes his cognitive co-combatant and apparently turns the still-enslaved steel-shod hero on his next opponent: Yellow Claw.<\/p>\n

As this is happening, elsewhere radical terrorist Firebrand<\/em> is somehow sharing Stark\u2019s Black Lama-inspired \u201cpsycho-feedback\u201d episodes…<\/p>\n

The tale wraps on a twisty cliffhanger as the Claw destroys M.O.D.O.K.\u00a0 and his clockwork puppet Avenger, only to discover that the Thinker is not only still alive but still holds the real Iron Man captive. That\u2019s quite unfortunate as issue #76 blew its deadline and instead reprinted Iron Man<\/strong> #9 (represented here by its cover) before Friedrich, Jones & Stone\u2019s \u2018I Cry: Revenge!\u2019<\/em> finds the fighting-mad hero breaking free of the Thinker\u2019s control, just as Black Lama teleports the Claw in to finish his final felonious opponent…<\/p>\n

Still extremely ticked off, the Armoured Avenger takes on all comers before being ambushed by late-arriving Firebrand<\/em> who has been psionically drawn into the melee. As Shellhead goes down, the Lama declares non-contestant Firebrand ultimate victor, gratuitously explaining how he has voyaged from an alternate universe before duping the unstable and uncaring flaming rabble-rouser into re-crossing the dimensional void with him. Although a certifiable loon and cold-blooded killer, Firebrand is Roxie Gilbert\u2019s brother and groggily reviving Iron Man feels honour-bound to follow him through the rapidly closing portal to elsewhere…<\/p>\n

Deadline problems persisted however, and the next two issues are both fill-in tales, beginning with #78\u2019s \u2018Long Time Gone\u2019 <\/em>Crafted by Bill Mantlo, Tuska & Vince Colletta it harks back to the Avenger\u2019s early days and a mission during the Vietnam war which first brought home the cost in blood and misery Stark\u2019s munitions building had caused. IM <\/strong>#79 then shares a \u2018Midnite on Murder Mountain!\u2019<\/em> (Friedrich, Tuska & Colletta) wherein our hero emphatically ends scientific abominations wrought by deranged geneticist\/mind-swapper Professor Kurakill…<\/em><\/p>\n

At last, Iron Man<\/strong> #80 sees Friedrich, Stone & Colletta return to the ongoing inter-dimensional operations as \u2018<\/em>Mission into Madness!\u2019<\/em> follows the multiversal voyagers to a very different America where warring kingdoms and principalities jostle for prestige, position and power. Here the Lama is revealed as King Jerald of Grand Rapid<\/em>: a ruler under threat from outside invaders and insidious usurpers within. He\u2019d come to Earth looking for powerful allies but had not realised travel to other realms drives non-indigenous residents completely crazy…<\/p>\n

With the mind-warp effect already destabilising Iron Man and Firebrand, it\u2019s fortunate treacherous Baroness Rockler <\/em>makes her move to kill the returned Jerald immediately, and the Earthlings are quickly embroiled in a cataclysmic \u2018War of the Mind-Dragons!\u2019<\/em> before turning on each other and fleeing the devastated kingdom for the less psychologically hazardous environs of their homeworld…<\/p>\n

With an extended epic spanning the world and alternate dimensions completed, long-term writer Mike Friedrich moved on, and Iron Man<\/strong> #82 began a new era and tone as Len Wein, Herb Trimpe, Marie Severin & Jack Abel revamped the armour just in time for the Red Ghost<\/em> and his super simians to kidnap super genius Stark in \u2018Plunder of the Apes!\u2019 <\/em>Debuting in that tale was NYPD detective Michael O\u2019Brien<\/em>, who holds Stark responsible and accountable for the tragic death of his brother Kevin<\/em>. The deceased researcher had been Stark\u2019s confidante until his mind snapped. He had died running amok wearing a prototype suit of Guardsman<\/em> armour. Here and now, Mike smells a corporate cover-up…<\/p>\n

Inked by Marie Severin, IM<\/strong> #83 exhibits \u2018The Rage of the Red Ghost!\u2019<\/em> as the rogue Russian forces Stark to cure his gradual dispersal into unconnected atoms, only to realise, following a bombastic battle, that the inventor has outwitted him once again, after which Wein, Roger Slifer, Trimpe & John Tartaglione detail how the infamous never fully tested Enervator ray again turns grievously injured Happy Hogan<\/em> into a mindless monster. This time, the medical miracle machine saturates him with so much Cobalt radiation that he becomes a ticking inhuman nuke on the \u2018Night of the Walking Bomb!\u2019<\/em><\/p>\n

The tense tick-tock to doom is narrowly and spectacularly halted in \u2018…And the Freak Shall Inherit the Earth!\u2019<\/em> (Slifer, Wein, Trimpe & Severin) after which Mantlo, Tuska & Vince Colletta revive and revamp one of the Golden Avenger\u2019s oldest and least-remembered rogues when disgraced thermal technologist Gregor Shapanka<\/em> sheds his loser status as Jack Frost<\/em> to attack Stark International in a deadly new guise.<\/p>\n

In # 86 we learn \u2018The Gentleman\u2019s Name is Blizzard!\u2019 but d<\/em>espite his improved image, the sub-zero zealot can\u2019t quite close \u2018The Icy Hand of Death!\u2019<\/em> in the next instalment, leading to mid-year spectacular Iron Man Annual<\/strong> #3 (June 1976) which unveils \u2018More or Less… the Return of the Molecule Man!\u2019<\/em> courtesy of Steve Gerber, Sal Buscema & Abel.<\/p>\n

When Tony Stark looks into redeveloping some soggy Florida real estate, a little girl finds a strange wand and is possessed and transformed by the consciousness of one of the most powerful creatures in existence. Although Iron Man is helpless to combat the reality-warping attacks of the combination petulant girl\/narcissistic maniac, luckily for the universe, the shambling elemental shocker dubbed Man-Thing<\/strong> had no mind to mess with or conscience to trouble…<\/p>\n

Iron Man<\/strong> #88 signalled the too-brief reunion of veteran scribe Archie Goodwin with Tuska as \u2018Fear Wears Two Faces!\u2019<\/em> finds the Armoured Avenger battling escaped aliens The Blood Brothers<\/em> after the vicious space thugs are psychically summoned to a mystery rendezvous by another old enemy of Iron Man. Inked by Colletta, the tale concludes in \u2018Brute Fury!\u2019<\/em> as Daredevil<\/strong> deals himself in to the cataclysmic clash and just barely tips the scales before the hidden manipulator is exposed in #90 \u2018When Calls the Controller!\u2019 <\/em>(Jim Shooter, Tuska & Abel). The life-force thief seeks to escape months of entombment by enslaving and feeding off hapless down-&-outs, but his rapid defeat is only a prelude to greater catastrophe as Gerry Conway scripts and Bob Layton inks #91\u2019s \u2018Breakout!\u2019<\/em> as the fiend tries too hard, too fast and again fades into helpless captivity…<\/p>\n

Closing the covers on this stellar compilation are Gil Kane\u2019s stellar front to all-reprint Giant-Size Iron Man<\/strong> #1 (1975 and including the original artwork prior to edits), House ads and an 8-page gallery of original art covers and pages by Kane, Jones, Esposito, Ed Hannigan, Frank Giacoia, Jim Starlin, Sal Buscema & Pollard.<\/p>\n

From our distant vantage point the polemical energy and impact might be dissipated, but the sheer quality of the comics and cool thrill of the eternal aspiration of man in partnership with magic metal remains. These Fights \u2018n\u2019 Tights classics are amongst the most underrated tales of the period and are well worth your time, consideration and cold cash…
\n\u00a9 2023 MARVEL.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Mike Friedrich, Barry Alfonso, Tom Orzechowski, Bill Mantlo, Len Wein, Archie Goodwin, Roger Slifer, Jim Shooter, Steve Gerber, Gerry Conway, George Tuska, Herb Trimpe, Arvell Jones, Keith Pollard, Chic Stone, Tuska, Sal Buscema, Marie Severin & various (MARVEL) ISBN: 978-1302948801 (TPB\/Digital edition) Arch-technocrat and supreme survivor Tony Stark has changed his profile many times … <\/p>\n

Continue reading “Iron Man Epic Collection volume 6: The War of the Super Villains 1974 – 1976”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[85,66,120,293,146,79,107,70],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29864","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-daredevil","category-horror-stories","category-iron-man","category-man-thing","category-marvel-horror","category-marvel-superheroes","category-science-fiction","category-x-men"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4AFj-7LG","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29864","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29864"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29864\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29868,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29864\/revisions\/29868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29864"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29864"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.comicsreview.co.uk\/nowreadthis\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29864"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}