Essential Iron Man, Vol. 1
Inventor, business-man, playboy…super hero! Gravely injured in combat, billionaire genius Tony Stark saved his own life by designing a life-sustaining shell – the hi-tech protective covering that transformed him into the invincible Iron Man! Now, the world believes him to be Tony Stark’s personal bodyguard. In this dual role, he faces boardroom intrigue and super-powered menaces. A modern-day knight in armor, he fights injustice wherever it rears its ugly head! Collects Tales of Suspense #39-7
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{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
Not bad,
Iron Man has not been one of my favorite Marvel characters, but it was interesting to see more of his early appearances. With the short stories as they appeared in Tales of Suspense, character development is limited, and there is a lot of repetition from story to story (“If only they knew their indifferent boss is really Iron Man!” “If only I could tell Pepper how I really feel about her!” “If I can’t get my chestplate plugged in, my heart will fail!”). I have a feeling when the stories get full-length, they’ll be better. It will be interesting to see how they re-develop his origin in the upcoming live-action movie.
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|Classic or Dated?,
This early Iron Man stuff probably needs two reviews to do an honest job. Old-time comic fans will appreciate this collection of these early stories and the introductions of so many classic Iron Man enemies. The 1960s writing is a nice bit of nostalgia, and the art by people like Steve Ditko and Don Heck is very fun to look at.
But to a younger person, perhaps coming to Iron Man from seeing the movie…not so much. The stories and enemies will seem hokey and the “red menace” stuff will lack the meaning it had to people my age who lived through the Cold War.
I love the marvel essentials series, but let’s face it…these are pieces of nostalgia. Early marvels were pretty poorly written stuff. Once Stan Lee established the formula of a hero who whined and carped about his personal life all the time, it became formulaic very quickly. These stories fit in that mold, 18 pages of fighting some communist and a few panels of Stark whining about the metal plate on his chest.
If you understand what you are getting this is a great inexpensive way to grab all these early Iron Man comics…but I wouldn’t buy it for a kid.
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|Iron-Man’s First Big Adventures!,
Essential Iron-Man Volume 1
For those of you who have no clue who Stan Lee is (and yes, there are people like this, as shocking as that may seem), you would do well to read the early adventures of Iron-Man from the 1960s, written by Stan Lee, art by Don Heck, Jack Kirby and other great artists, in this compilation Essential.
The Essentials are reprint books that are black & white reproductions of the early stories of these superheroes. This is a cheap way to get the style of writing and the art of the time, read some exciting graphic storytelling and take a peek at the history of Marvel Comics.
This is a collection of Iron-Man’s first appearance in Tales of Suspense 39 and goes to issue number 72
Since these are from the sixties and mostly boys were reading these issues, there’s bound to be some sexist writing. Example, Iron-Man is told by his girlfriend (while as Tony Stark, millionaire playboy) that Iron-Man would look great painted gold “so his appearance matches his golden deeds!”
Stark later paints his costume gold and remarks, “Wow, what a difference! Leave it to a woman to figure out an attractive appearance!” Oh boy!
Meet Gargantus the Giant One, or stories about Soviet spies. Meet Kruschev, and sneaky Pentagon plots against the USSR. Kirby’s art in Kala, Queen of the Netherworld is very cool. The man knew how to draw villianous women. Slinky!
Marvel prided itself on writing real life stories intermixed with the superhero’ing, and these issues are no exception. Pepper Potts follows Tony around wherever he goes. “How can such a walking dreamboat be such a hard-headed boss??”
And my favorite villain, The Mandarin, as only Don Heck can draw him. Silly stuff too, like Happy taking pictures of Pepper Potts in a swimsuit, but he laments “I’ve been out of film for the past hour! But I’d be nuts to tell Pepper!”, as she slinks around posing for the camera.
Silly, charming and fascinating — The Invincible Iron-Man!
OK, you know who Stan Lee is now, right?
Other Marvelous Marvel Essentials:
Essential Iron Man, Vol. 3 (Marvel Essentials) (v. 3)
Essential Power Man and Iron Fist, Vol. 1 (Marvel Essentials)
Essential Daredevil Volume 5 TPB
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