History ComicBook / IronMan

* {{Clark Kenting}}: For most of the character's history, Iron Man had a secret identity. The cover story was that Iron Man was Tony's bodyguard...despite the fact that he hardly ever was seen in the same place as Tony, which would make him one of the worst bodyguards ever. Plus, when trouble struck, Tony would run off, and then Iron Man would show up a second later. Despite Tony being a global celebrity, no one put two and two together for several decades.

* OnlyInItForTheMoney: After Tony lost his company to Obadiah Stane, he moved out to California with some friends to start a brand-new electronics company. Rhodey used the Iron Man armor as a hired mercenary to obtain seed money.

Tony Stark was a playboy billionaire industrialist until a battlefield explosion left him with a damaged heart that threatened to kill him. Captured by the enemy forces, he is forced into manufacturing weaponry to aid them. Instead he secretly designed and built a suit of armor ''[[MemeticMutation in a cave, with a box of scraps]]'' to keep his heart beating and to escape from the people who captured him, and in the process became the superhero known as Iron Man. The character first appeared in ''Tales of Suspense'' #39 (March, 1963), created by writers StanLee, and Larry Lieber, along with artists Don Heck and JackKirby. He has served as the protagonist of several series since that time.

Tony Stark was a playboy billionaire industrialist until a battlefield explosion left him with a damaged heart that threatened to kill him. He designed and built a suit of armor ''[[MemeticMutation in a cave, with a box of scraps]]'' to keep his heart beating and to escape from the people who captured him, and in the process became the superhero known as Iron Man. The character first appeared in ''Tales of Suspense'' #39 (March, 1963), created by writers StanLee, and Larry Lieber, along with artists Don Heck and JackKirby. He has served as the protagonist of several series since that time.

Tony Stark was a playboy billionaire industrialist until a battlefield explosion left him with a damaged heart that threatened to kill him. He designed and built a suit of armor ''[[MemeticMutation in a cave, with a box of scraps]]'' to keep his heart beating and to escape from the people who captured him, and in the process became the superhero known as Iron Man. The character first appeared in ''Tales of Suspense'' #110 (March, 1963), created by writers StanLee, and Larry Lieber, along with artists Don Heck and JackKirby. He has served as the protagonist of several series since that time.

Not to be confused with ''TheIronGiant''. And please for the love of God, don't confuse this with TetsuoTheIronMan. [[{{Squick}} Much]] [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel pain]] [[BodyHorror will be spared from you.]]

Not to be confused with ''TheIronGiant''. And please for the love of god, don't confuse this with TetsuoTheIronMan. [[{{Squick}} Much]] [[HighOctaneNightmareFuel pain]] [[BodyHorror will be spared from you.]]

** Emphatically inverted when he confronted the Goddess (the villain from ''Infinity Crusade'' - basically, a religious nutjob with the power of, well, a goddess), who wanted him to forgo the cold truths of science for the (admittedly bogus) spirituality she offered. In response, Tony virtually read her a catechism of science, ending with a jab at her own evil and greed that is ''very satisfying'' for any card-carrying atheist.

Until the end of [[CrisisCrossover Secret Invasion]], there was a second title, ''Iron Man: Director of S.H.I.E.L.D'' -- a politics and espionage-based book, dealing with Stark's role as head of the international security organization. The last few issues were handed to Iron Man's ally War Machine, who has now been granted his own solo series, called "Iron Man 2.0", which is his third (after the 1994 and 2009 ongoing series).

**** Literal as of the dawn of the Heroic Age. [[spoiler: Stark now contains the ENTIRE SUIT INSIDE HIS BODY. No not just the undersheath, not just some systems and such EVERYTHING!]] Sadly, there are only sweet sweet visuals of the suit itself. No info on what it can REALLY do. Oh and. [[spoiler:The whole issue basically reveals that this whole new armor makes Extremis Armor look like Nintendo 64 compared to Playstation 3]]

** Hell, Tony and his father could count as mad scientists, at least in the movies. They're not insane, but exuberant and willing to do risky (and cool) things in the name of science, and Tony's dad even sports a lab coat and goggles at one point in the Captain America movie.
* MagicVersusScience: Stark is smarter than the average FlatEarthAtheist, acknowledging that DoctorStrange and other magical characters are doing ''something'' beyond his understanding, but he finds magic and its defiance of physical laws, even those of a superhero universe, profoundly irritating and uncomfortable. This has had some negative consequences recently, as [[spoiler:his taking a sample of [[TheMightyThor Thor]]'s DNA in an attempt to figure out how his "godly" powers work resulted years later in Civil War's Thor clone, who ended up killing one of Tony's friends on the other side of the war.]]
** Subverted to hell and back in a [[AlternateUniverse What If]] issue where Tony becomes the Sorcerer Supreme instead of Doctor Strange...and [[SoCoolItsAwesome combines the Sorcerer Supreme magic with his Iron Man technology.]]

* MonsterModesty: The villain FinFang Foom is a giant space dragon that only wears a pair of purple underwear.

** Also, after [[spoiler:being rebooted in Stark Disassembled, he was then shown a record of the Civil War. He ''[[HeroicBlueScreenofDeath breaks down in tears]]''.]]

* RyuAndKen: Tony and Rhodey, when they are at "work." This is more obvious in [[CapcomVsWhatever the video games.]]

** Emphatically inverted when he confronted the Goddess (the villain from "Infinity Crusade" - basically, a religious nutjob with the power of, well, a goddess), who wanted him to forgo the cold truths of science for the (admittedly bogus) spirituality she offered. In response, Tony virtually read her a catechism of science, ending with a jab at her own evil and greed that is ''very satisfying'' for any card-carrying atheist.
** Also inverted in the Invincible Iron Man series. Stark agrees to an interview with a very MichaelMoore-esque documentarian, who wants to understand why Tony does what he does. (And actually intends to peg him as a heartless profiteer of war.) After being constantly railroaded by the interview, Stark cuts off the documentarian and admits yes, he creates weapons of war for use by the United States government, but goes on to explain that every microchip he manufactured for use in American smart-bombs has since being widely developed for civilian purposes; the technology itself isn't inherently 'good' or 'bad'. In short, he regards the development of weapons as an unfortunate, but necessary evil that finances his humanitarian projects.
** The Mandarin decides on this in the ''Hands Of The Mandarin'' arc.

* ShootTheDog: Tony as Director of SHIELD.

* ShoutOut: The British Iron Man tech in Ultimate Armor Wars is suspiciously reminiscent of a certain ''{{Halo}}'' protagonist.
** In part three of Iron Man Vs Whiplash Tony hides out at a Swiss hotel, when the receptionist says he looks familiar he claims to be Robert Downey Jr.

* StalkerWithACrush: ''Three''. Kathy Dare, who shot him for rebuffing her and then tried to claim he was the abusive one at her trial, Tiberius Stone, who tried to lock his mind in a virtual program after a strategic isolation campaign, and one of his own armors, who was practically an abusive boyfriend when it became sentient.

** It would seem that the official stance on Iron Man has changed significantly. As a result of ''World's Most Wanted'' and ''Stark Disassembled'', he does not remember any of the actions from the time he was modified with Extremis until the current day. He even reacted with horror when he discovered that the Civil War had occurred. He still maintains that he was sure that he was doing the right thing (even if he can't remember doing it), but no one agrees with him in the least.

* TechnologicalPacifist: Tony eventually becomes one

* VillainProtagonist: YMMV, in the civil war.

* YourUniverseOrMine: When placed opposite of pretty much any female character in MarvelVsCapcom3. This ranges from [[HotMom Crimson Viper]] to [[{{Jailbait}} Tron Bonne]] to [[ChineseVampire Hsien-Ko]] to [[HornyDevil Morrigan]]. The only exception? Amaterasu, who is a ''dog.''

** An exception is the AI in the Hypervelocity miniseries, which saved his life and later sacrificed itself so a nuclear bomb wouldn't be detonated.

* AmoralAttorney: As the head of Stark Enterprises' legal department, Bert Hindel was assigned by Tony to protect his technology by legal means after it was stolen by Spymaster and then resold by Justin Hammer during the Armor Wars arc. Unfortunately, Hindel completely fumbled the ball, forcing Tony to resort to attacking everyone who was using his stolen tech and forcibly deactivating it. Tony fired Hindel for his poor performance...and then when he was shot and nearly killed by [[{{Yandere}} Kathy Dare]], Hindel reappeared as her defense attorney. He tried to portray her as an innocent victim reacting to Tony's [[BlatantLies drunken abuse]], with the hope of parlaying the trial into a lucrative book deal. Unfortunately, he [[EpicFail screwed up once again]] when Tony's new lawyer introduced testimony from Dare's psychiatrist, and Dare ended up being confined in a mental institution.

* {{Antihero}}: Usually [[SlidingScaleOfAntiheroes Type II]], including going by the manner Matt Fraction is currently writing him, as he is is here portrayed as a very idealistic philanthropist who, [[ReedRichardsIsUseless unlike the other Marvel supergeniuses]], is actually attempting to let the world population benefit from his revolutionary inventions; and WarrenEllis gave him an TheAtoner angle regarding the previous (inherited from his father) weaponry-dealing phase (during which he could easily be argued to have been a villain). However, many others think that he has slipped to type IV or V at times (such as during the "Armor Wars", or more controversially MarkMillar "Civil War"), and to some even a VillainProtagonist. It should be noted that he actively tried to legally fight the superpower registration legislation before congress, and everything he did during the infighting was due to the government having much more extreme plans otherwise (massive Sentinel-manufacturing among other things). The part that actually pushed him into in VillainProtagonist territory was Paul Jenkins going off-track by establishing that Stark planned to start a war with Atlantis as a [[IDidWhatIHadToDo necessary evil]] outside distraction/"threat" to unite both factions against, which could potentially kill millions of civilians. [[HandWave Nobody has referred to it since]], which may be just as well.

* BackFromTheDead: If the Iron Man suit is destroyed, Tony Stark can just make a new one as long as he himself escapes harm. Even if he is harmed, Stark has an incredible resilience. He's been shot and paralyzed by a crazy girlfriend, he faked his death after his nervous system starting shutting down, and he was rebooted entirely after Heroes Reborn. Plus, most "future Marvel Universe" stories have Tony saving his brain patterns in his armor or in a computer after his death.

* BeleagueredBureaucrat: Tony Stark during his Director of SHIELD period had some serious aspects of this. Especially during the Knauf's run.

* BroughtDownToNormal: The recent storyline World's Most Wanted has Tony feeling this way as he deletes his brain and loses his intellect, though his abilities decrease well below average (Tony doesn't really see the difference). In the current story Stark Disassembled, [[spoiler:Pepper feels this way as her heart-mounted repulsor generator and armored suit are dismantled to reboot the brain-dead Tony Stark. [[GotTheCallOnSpeedDial She's not going to sit down and take it, though.]]]]

** And again in the Post-Civil War Marvel Universe, where Tony Stark became the DesignatedVillain.

* FaceHeelTurn: for his crimes during Marvel's ComicBook/CivilWar -- made worse by trying to force an unbelievable KarmaHoudini stunt (including ExecutiveMeddling that almost begs readers to treat his Civil War activities as a DorkAge to be forgotten) instead of admitting how wrong he was.

* FanService: For very bizarre and silly reasons, there was a scene in one comic book involving Tony having to fight another super hero. Only the two men were only allowed to do so naked, and wrestling.

* ForgingScene: In the ''IronMan'' film, there is the scene of Robert Downey, Jr., hammering away on a metal sheet, sweating in the forge-light...which makes the women ([[EvenTheGuysWantHim and some of the men]]) in the audience go weak at the knees. Also, The second intro to the ''WesternAnimation/IronMan'' animated series features one of these. Most other versions have a slightly different kind of montage, but that one has the scene complete with hammering.
* ForHalloweenIAmGoingAsMyself: Averted in ''Iron Man'' (vol. 3) ''#33'' - Tony went on costume party dressed as Captain America.
* FreakyFridayFlip: In IronMan issue 255, a bizarre mutant with the ability to manipulate radio signals (who settles on going by "Freak Quincy") inadvertently links up with the Russian microwave satellite that was empowering Devastator during a training exercise against the Crimson Dynamo, somehow switching the minds of Tony Stark (who was trying to stop Quincy as Iron Man) and Valentin Shalatov (the Dynamo). Shalatov's lack of familiarity with the Iron Man armor resulted in a rather... [[NightmareFuel unfortunate accident for Quincy]], but Stark and Shalatov were able to find a way to reverse the process.\\

* FriendshipMoment: In IronMan issue 184, James Rhodes and two other guys were working on creating their own tech company, they were getting ready to leave for California. [[TheAlcoholic Tony Stark]] came up asking for a job. In the past few months he had [[HumiliationConga lost his company, lost access to his money, gave up being Iron Man and is homeless.]] Not only that but he had only spent a week being sober. Tony was afraid that he would be rejected for what happened. [[CrowningMomentOfHeartwarming But Rhodey and the others promptly accepted him.]]

* HollywoodCyborg: He's become more and more this over the decades. Early on, he relied in his chestpiece for survival. Then came the extremis which was bound with his nervous system. Now the entire suit is part of his body.

*** [[spoiler: AND NOW STORES THE WHOLE THING IN HIS BODY! THE WHOLE #@#* $* $* SUIT! Justified by now having a new power source that makes even Extremeis look obsolete, in fact, the newness is heavily modified from dormant Extremis tech that survived the Disassembly purge.]]

* KarmaHoudini: over his ComicBook/CivilWar crimes -- repeatedly failed

** And it's not as though he didn't suffer repercussions. He lost his friendship with all of the anti-reg heroes, and about half of the pro-reg, eventually lost his top-spot to Norman Freakin' Osborne, and has in universe been treated as the direct cause of a lot of the big problems in Marvel. He's bounced back during the Heroic Age, but still had to basically start from scratch all around.
* KingIncognito: For a few issues [[IronMan Tony Stark]] decided he didn't want to be Iron Man any more so he gave away his fortune and went to Silicon Valley under the alias of ''Hogan Potts''. He worked as a normal grunt at a company. He really didn't last that long.

* KnightTemplar: When Tony's technology was stolen by Spymaster and then resold by Justin Hammer, Tony became determined to get it back and prevent it from hurting anyone...no matter what the cost. This led to the Armor Wars story arc, and Tony eventually even {{Lampshaded}} the fact that he was verging on this trope.

* BadassNormal: Out of their suits, both Stark and Rhodes can handle almost any threat until they can suit up.

->'"'So in the movie, Tony Stark, head of Stark Industries, is a powerful genius billionaire industrialist sex-magnet. Apparently that's not enough for him, so he decides to add 'superhero' to the list as well."''

Until the end of [[CrisisCrossover Secret Invasion]], there was a second title, ''Iron Man: Director of S.H.I.E.L.D'' -- a politics and espionage-based book, dealing with Stark's role as head of the international security organisation. The last few issues were handed to Iron Man's ally War Machine, who has now been granted his own solo series, called "Iron Man 2.0", which is his third (after the 1994 and 2009 ongoing series).

* AmoralAttorney: As the head of Stark Enterprises' legal department, Bert Hindel was assigned by Tony to protect his technology by legal means after it was stolen by Spymaster and then resold by Justin Hammer during the Armor Wars arc. Unfortunately, Hindel completely fumbled the ball, forcing Tony to resort to attacking everyone who was using his stolen tech and forcibly deactivating it. Tony fired Hindel for his poor performance...and then when he was shot and nearly killed by [[{{Yandere}} Kathy Dare]], Hindel reappeared as her defense attorney. He tried to portray her as an innocent victim reacting to Tony's [[BlatantLies drunken abuse]], with the hope of parlaying the trial into a lucrative book deal. Unfortunately, he [[EpicFail screwed up once again]] when Tony's new lawyer introduced testimoney from Dare's psychiatrist, and Dare ended up being confined in a mental institution.

* BootstrappedTheme: Iron Man was slated to appear in both ''VideoGame/MarvelSuperHeroesVsStreetFighter'' and ''VideoGame/MarvelVsCapcomClashOfTheSuperheroes'', but licensing issues due to a film project (that ultimately languished in DevelopmentHell and died) prevented his inclusion. Thus, his friend War Machine (who was pretty much a PaletteSwap of Iron Man) took his place in ''[=MvC1=]''. Come ''[[MarvelVsCapcom3 MvC3]]'' and the return of character themes, Iron Man received [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rNNQBAj10n4 a remix]] of [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IBd3Y8298rU War Machine's theme,]] which was an expansive rearrangment of ''Iron Man'''s [[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxHZbfzSII0 theme]] from ''VideoGame/MarvelSuperHeroes''. Consider this to be the musical equivalent of the ''Demon in a Bottle'' storyline.

* BrilliantButLazy: Somewhat. He can create multiple, formidable armors and a life support system ahead of the current time, which he made with extremely limited resources. While he actually does things with this, he can't be arsed to sit through a ceremony made for a friend and ally without falling asleep during the history recap.

* DrivenToSuicide[=/=]SuicideIsPainless: In the ''World's Most Wanted'' storyline, Tony decides to shut down his own brain to erase all the data in it and thereby foil [[VillainWithGoodPublicity Norman Osborn]], doing so with a big grin, a lot of gallows humour, and a calm explanation to Maria Hill (when she attempts ReversePsychology) that shooting himself in the head just wouldn't be ''reliable''. Sure, he's fighting evil in a very tight corner, but them's not the actions of a sane and happy man.

** Also numerus instances where Tony wears nothing and a little black shadow.

* GeorgeJetsonJobSecurity / UltimateJobSecurity: Both tropes are very much averted. Tony won't fire anyone without good cause, but he ''will'' let the axe fall if he feels a major employee's performance isn't up to snuff. After the Armor Wars storyline, he fired the head of his legal department for repeatedly screwing up Tony's legal attempts to protect his technology. Another time, he immediately drop kicks an executive for making a very profitable technology sale to DoctorDoom, a big time interational crime no-no.

*** [[spoiler: AND NOW STORES THE WHOLE THING IN HIS BODY! THE WHOLE #@#* $* $* SUIT! Justified by now having a new power source that makes even Extremeis look obsolete, in fact, the newness is heavily modified from dormant extremis tech that survived the Dissassembly purge.]]

** Hell, Tony and his father could count as mad scientists, at least in the movies. They're not insane, but exuberant and willing to do risky (and cool) things in the name of science, and Tony's dad even sports a labcoat and goggles at one point in the Captain America movie.

** Within the first episode of the animé adaptation, he's already flirted with 2 women, both main characters, the first within the first five minutes of the show.

* RichIdiotWithNoDayJob: Strongly [[AvertedTrope averted]]. Stark plays hard, but he is quite publicly a sharp dealmaker and a genius engineer with a workaholic streak. He turned a significant fortune into a monumental one, and has lost it and recovered it at least twice. He's also widely considered to be brilliant by both civilians and heroes and is consulted on scientific, engineering and even medical matters.
* RollerbladeGood: When Tony needs to get around fast and he can't fly, such as being indoors, some of his suits have popout roller skate wheels in his boots to skate around on.

** In part 3 of Iron Man Vs Whiplash Tony hides out at a Swiss hotel, when the receptionist says he looks familiar he claims to be Robert Downey Jr.

----

* ForgingScene: In the ''IronMan'' film, there is the scene of Robert Downey, Jr., hammering away on a metal sheet, sweating in the forge-light...which makes the women ([[EvenTheGuysWantHim and some of the men]]) in the audience go weak at the knees. Also, The second intro to the ''Series/IronMan'' animated series features one of these. Most other versions have a slightly different kind of montage, but that one has the scene complete with hammering.

** There's also the [[Series/IronMan animated series]] that has [[SpiderWoman Julia Carpenter]] as a love interest and yes, she's a redhead.

* AnimatedAdaptation: [[Series/IronMan Cartoon series in the 1960s and 1990s]] and a straight-to-DVD animated movie in the 2000s. [[IronManArmoredAdventures Another one]] for Nickelodeon premiered in 2009, focusing on a younger Iron Man (to the dismay of fans who remember [[DorkAge Teen Tony]]), though the show itself has turned out okay. An anime version has just started airing in Japan.

** The second season of the [[Series/IronMan '90s animated series]] also subverted it with HOMER, who not only controlled the Stark Industries computer system and Tony's personal mainframe, but was also connected to the Iron Man suit and could operate it for him if he needed it.

In non-comic media, a movie based on the character, ''Film/IronMan'', was released in May 2008 with RobertDowneyJr in the title role. It did well at the box office, and as of June 2008 had a 94% approval rating at Rotten Tomatoes, making it the best-received movie of the year, tying with ''[[DarkKnightTrilogy The Dark Knight]]''. This movie was followed by a sequel and other works in the MarvelCinematicUniverse. Prior to the movies, Iron Man had animated TV series in 1966 and 1994; for information on those, see [[Series/IronMan here]]. In the wake of the movies, ''IronManArmoredAdventures'' is a cartoon that takes another approach to the mythos by having Tony and his friends be teenagers. Additionally, there is a 2011 [[Anime/IronMan anime]] by MadHouse, well-received by fans in concept partly on the basis that 1) the Japanese know Mecha, and IronMan has a [[PoweredArmor Mecha Suit]], and 2) it wouldn't be that far off the mark for the character to have adventures in Japan, since he's a businessman with corporate branches and rivals all over the world.[[hottip:* :In fact, his arch enemy is called The Mandarin and is a descendant of Genghis Khan. Not Japanese, but at least geographically close.]]

Tony Stark was a [[BillionairePlayboy playboy billionaire industrialist]] until a battlefield explosion left him with a damaged heart that threatened to kill him. He designed and built a suit of armor ''[[MemeticMutation in a cave, with a box of scraps]]'' to keep his heart beating and to escape from the people who captured him, and in the process became the superhero known as Iron Man. The character first appeared in ''Tales of Suspense'' #110 (March, 1963), created by writers StanLee, and Larry Lieber, along with artists Don Heck and JackKirby. He has served as the protagonist of several series since that time.

Tony Stark was a [[RichIdiotWithNoDayJob playboy billionaire industrialist]] until a battlefield explosion left him with a damaged heart that threatened to kill him. He designed and built a suit of armor ''[[MemeticMutation in a cave, with a box of scraps]]'' to keep his heart beating and to escape from the people who captured him, and in the process became the superhero known as Iron Man. The character first appeared in ''Tales of Suspense'' #110 (March, 1963), created by writers StanLee, and Larry Lieber, along with artists Don Heck and JackKirby. He has served as the protagonist of several series since that time.

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