Marvel's overhaul of the Avengers line continues this week with Iron Man #1.  This would be the fourth Iron Man #1, despite the book never having been cancelled.  Evidently that renumbering gimmick still gets the sales in...

The new creative team is Warren Ellis and Adi Granov, an unusual duo in some respects.  Ellis has never exactly been a big fan of superheroes, and Granov's computer-enhanced art is time-consuming, making him an awkward choice for a monthly title.  Marvel's solution to that is to ship the book on a six-weekly schedule, which is fair enough - although it has the knock-on effect that the opening six-part "Extremis" arc will last for over seven months.  Given that Ellis' stories over the last couple of years have scarcely been notable for their blistering pace, that might cause its own problems.

But Granov's art is ideally suited to the character.  He gives Iron Man an inscrutably pristine look which seems strangely appropriate.  As for Ellis, he may not be a superhero fan, but he does love his futuristic technology.  (Especially if it comes with a phone.)  Iron Man's a perfect character to explore that; there's something about Tony Stark's engineering which is more immediate and concrete than Reed Richards' brand of pseudo-science, which is closer to magic.  If you want to do technology in a mainstream superhero comic, Iron Man's the character for the job.

As might be expected from recent Ellis, the first issue doesn't exactly get off to a racing start - there is a plot, but it moves at more of a gentle stroll, really.  Much of the issue is given over to re-establishing the Iron Man concept and Ellis' take on it.  Encouragingly, Ellis seems to have grasped two of the points where writers have persistently missed the character's potential.

First of all, as originally envisaged, Tony Stark is a fascinating character because he insists on behaving in ways that no longer carry the ring of heroism.  For one thing, he was an ultra-rich businessman.  For another, more specifically, he was a bloody arms dealer.  Whatever one's views on arms dealing, littering war zones with landmines is hardly a heroic pastime.  At best it rates as "necessary evil."  Writers have consistently regarded Stark's capitalism and his arms dealing as intrusive nuisances to be avoided - he was given a crisis of conscience so that he would stop making arms, and his company has been hugely downplayed as a source of stories over the last decade or so.  Kurt Busiek even turned it into a charitable foundation.

Ellis, on the other hand, meets both of these points head on.  He hasn't restored Stark to his position as an arms dealer (which would be rather implausible in the light of history), but he does have Stark being challenged on his past actions, and reacting to it on a somewhat more complex level than "Oh god, I've done bad things."  I'm much more interested in reading about Tony Stark, capitalist superhero, than Tony Stark, bleeding heart liberal.  I might agree with the liberal version more, but the capitalist is a much more distinctive character.

Secondly, via a nice little analogy to the decline of Coney Island, Ellis points out something that has gone badly wrong with the handling of the character.  As Stark points out, "Iron Man used to represent the future."  Instead, he's been allowed to settle into a rut; he no longer really represents anything other than the desirability of keeping a Silver Age superhero in print because he's perceived as an A-list character.  Rather than looking forward to anything, he looks back to happy comics of yesteryear.  Ellis is unlikely to take such a nostalgia-tinged approach, clearly.

Not a perfect start by any stretch of the imagination - it's slow, the threat isn't particularly engaging, and there are a couple of stock Ellis characters wandering around the margins.  That personal secretary woman can go, for a start.  But it's beautiful to look at, and Ellis has strong, and correct, ideas about what to do with a character who's been floundering for a long, long time now.  That goes a long way.

Rating: A-

back | continue