History WesternAnimation / IronMan

** This also led to ExecutiveMeddling for comics at the time: ''West Coast Avengers'' was canceled in favor of the more Iron Man-centric ''Force Works'' in preparation for the hoped-for Iron Man fad.

* BeingGoodSucks: Nick Fury is certain in "The Armor Wars, Part II" that Justin Hammer is using Firepower to attack Stark Enterprises. Without proof, though, he can't intervene, so he presses Tony to bring back Iron Man.

* MythologyGag: Wanda Maximoff being renamed "Wanda Frank" is a reference to the period in the comics (before Magneto was revealed to be her father) where she and her brother were thought to be the children of Robert Frank, the [[UsefulNotes/TheGoldenAgeOfComicBooks Golden Age]] hero known as the Whizzer.

* AdaptationSpeciesChange: Firepower is revisioned as a mecha, as opposed to the man in a MiniMecha from the comics.

* AngerBornOfWorry: Twice in Season 2. In "The Beast Within", Iron Man fakes his death by the Mandarin's hands, leading the rest of the team without their leader and to battle with Fing Fang Foom and the other dragons without him. Just as they seem to be losing, Iron Man appears out of the sky, and teams up with the Mandarin to stop the dragons. The scene has War Machine sound overjoyed at his best friend's survival, but in literally the next scene, Rhodey knocks Tony to the ground and chews him out for not having enough trust in the team to let them know he's alive. This is actually what led to Force Works disbanding.
** During the "Armor Wars" two-parter, after Tony discovers that his designs that been stolen, he goes on a crusade to disable the armored heroes and villains using his technology to keep them falling into the wrong hands. It gets to the point that he "fires" Iron Man as Stark Enterprises can't associate with a CorporateSamurai gone rogue, and acts more rashly - while shutting out his friends and allies, even attacking one of them. Julia goes out her way to call him out on the crap he's pulled over the years - not just recently, and when he fakes his death again but lets Julia and Rhodey know he's alive, the former goes through the emotional ringer - first in grief to Tony'ss "death", then elation, and later takes Tony to task again for his recklessness and selfish actions, and makes it very clear to him that he hurt both Rhodey and herself in his paranoia over the stolen Stark tech, even if he hadn't set out to do so.

* ThreeDEffectsTwoDCartoon: The first season featured a completely CG-rendered [[TransformationSequence suit-up sequence]] whenever Tony donned his Iron Man armor. It looked out-of-place and was replaced in season two with an animated 2D sequence in the intro.

** Season 1 featured the lengthy ConspicuousCG clip of Tony suiting up as Iron Man and dubbing in new dialogue for different episodes.

* AbridgedSeries: Some ''WesternAnimation/MarvelMashUp'' segments feature this show.

* ConspicuousCG: The first season featured a completely CG-rendered [[TransformationSequence suit-up sequence]] whenever Tony donned his Iron Man armor. It looked very cheap (even for an animated series of its time; the fact that it was done in part with a '''''college''''' of all places doesn't help its case) and was replaced in season two with a much more fitting and better animated 2D sequence in the intro.

** The show's version of Force Works replaces U.S. Agent with Hawkeye. Strangely, U.S. Agent still received an action figure in the show's toyline, possibly indicating that he ''was'' planned to be part of the team at one point. (It should be noted that the figure never received a wide release thanks to issues at Toy Biz; the figure later surfaced via semi-illegal means, and the mold was eventually repurposed-- first as Living Laser, but when the ''IM'' line was cancelled along with the show, Toy Biz remolded it more into [[WesternAnimation/XMen Astral Armor Professor X]].)

*** Hawkeye replaces [[ComicBook/CaptainAmerica the Captain]] as the Avenger who fights Iron Man at the Vault.

** The show's version of Force Works replaces U.S. Agent with Hawkeye. Strangely, U.S. Agent still received an action figure in the show's toyline, possibly indicating that he ''was'' planned to be part of the team at one point. (It should be noted that the figure never received a wide release thanks to issues at Toy Biz; the figure later surfaced via semi=illegal means, and the mold was eventually repurposed-- first as Living Laser, but when the ''IM'' line was cancelled along with the show, Toy Biz remolded it more into [[WesternAnimation/XMen Astral Armor Professor X]].)

* GettingCrapPastTheRadar:
** "Armor Wars: Part 2" has a scene where Rhodey becomes extremely worried after Tony locks himself in his lab and stops answering when anyone tries to communicate with him. Julia's response implies (but doesn't outright state) that the two of them are worried that Tony may have committed suicide after his latest bout of depression.
-->'''Julia''': You don't think he's gone and -?!
** Part 1 ended with Julia chewing out Tony about his actions. WordOfGod revealed that Jennifer Hale was instructed to read her lines as if Julia had been drinking before confronting him.
** Part one of "The Origin of Iron Man" at one point had the Mandarin call Fin Fang Foom a "reptilian jackass".

* NamesTheSame: The Mandarin's team of supervillains are collectively known as the Hand, the same name used by the evil ninja clan seen in the ''Comicbook/{{Daredevil}}'' and ''Comicbook/XMen'' comic books.

* StockFootageFailure: The scene where the Bruce Banner Hulks out in "Hulk Buster" was actually recycled from the character's prior guest appearance in the ''Fantastic Four'' animated series. This is why Banner's outfit suddenly changes with no explanation, as well as why the Hulk's design looks drastically different (especially his hairstyle).

The second season featured much [[AnimationBump better animation]] (Due in part by switching to a [[Creator/KokoEnterprises different animation studio]]) and stories more similar to the comic. It was more {{Arc}} based, and the {{Superhero}} team aspect was downplayed with all the teammates besides Spider-Woman and War Machine resigning after Tony [[FakingTheDead faked his death]] without letting them in on the plan. Mandarin was also downplayed, having small cameos in some episodes as he reclaims his powerful Ten Rings, which were scattered during a confrontation with Iron Man in the season premiere.

** The show's version of Force Works replaces U.S. Agent with Hawkeye. Strangely, U.S. Agent still received an action figure in the show's toyline, possibly indicating that he ''was'' planned to be part of the team at one point.

* AmbiguousSituation: It's unclear if the bandits killed the Mandarin at the end of the Season 2 finale, or if they merely cut off his hand.

** While the Mandarin's lackeys were used less frequently in Season 2 in general, Justin Hammer, M.O.D.O.K., Hypnotia, Whirlwind, Blizzard, Blacklash and Titanium Man all made at least one guest appearance each. Grey Gargoyle, Living Laser, Elastika and Dreadknight were far less fortunate, and completely stopped appearing after the first season, save for a few of them having a brief cameo in the Season 2 premier (and Grey Gargoyle having a cameo in prison in the "Armor Wars" two-parter). What makes it odd is that the Mandarin eventually frees Hypnotia, Blizzard, Whirlwind and Blacklash from prison, but neglects to recover the rest of their former teammates.

** Titanium Man is a composite of both comic versions, having the identity of the first (Boris Bullski) and the armor design of the second (the Gremlin). Coincidentally Bullski eventually does adopt Gremlin's armor design for a while in the comics.

** Likewise, in "Hands of the Mandarin: Part 1," Tony says "You don't have to be a cartoon writer to figure out the Mandarin is behind [the terrorist attacks in Hong Kong]."

* MerchandiseDriven: Likely the reason why the first season featured Iron Man and Force Works vs. the Mandarin's LegionOfDoom (it was a very similar setup to ''{{Transformers}}'', ''WesternAnimation/{{ThunderCats|1985}}'', and ''WesternAnimation/HeManAndTheMastersOfTheUniverse1983''), and ''definitely'' the reason that season 2 gave Iron Man the ability to switch armors on the fly to adapt to any situation. Marvel had looked at the success of the multi-colored Batman toys in the wake of ''Film/BatmanReturns'' and were trying to copy its success with Iron Man by giving him an armor for every occasion. It didn't take off as well as Marvel had hoped.

* WolverinePublicity: Netflix listed its streaming of ''The Marvel Action Hour'' under Iron Man's name.

** While the Mandarin's lackeys were used less frequently in Season 2 in general, Justin Hammer, M.O.D.O.K., Hypnotia, Whirlwind, Blizzard, Blacklash and Titanium Man all made at least one guest appearance each. Grey Gargoyle, Living Laser, Elastika and Dreadknight were far less fortunate, and completely stopped appearing after the first season, save for a few of them having a brief cameo in the Season 2 premier.

** While the Mandarin's lackeys were used less frequently in Season 2 in general, Justin Hammer, M.O.D.O.K., Hypnotia, Whirlwind, Blizzard, Blacklash and Titanium Man all made at least one guest appearance each. Grey Gargoyle, Living Laser, Elastika and Dreadknight were far less fortunate, and completely stopped appearing after the first season.

* StockFootageFailure: The scene where the Bruce Banner Hulks out in "Hulk Buster" was actually recycled from the character's prior guest appearance in the ''Fantastic Four'' animated series. This is why Banner [[StockFootageFailure is wearing entirely different clothes during the sequence]], as well as why the Hulk's design [[OffModel looks completely different than it does during the rest of the episode]].

* StockFootage: The scene where the Bruce Banner Hulks out in "Hulk Buster" was actually recycled from the character's prior guest appearance in the ''Fantastic Four'' animated series. This is why Banner [[StockFootageFailure is wearing entirely different clothes during the sequence]], as well as why the Hulk's design [[OffModel looks completely different than it does during the rest of the episode]].

* HeroicSacrifice: [[spoiler:Titanium Man in "Distant Boundaries," taking Dark Aegis with him.]]

** Veronica, Tony's physical therapist, also vanishes after Season 1.

* CerebusSyndrome: The Season 1 finale showed that Julia was in on the fake wedding with everyone outside of Wanda. Season 2, however, had, as a recurring theme between her and Tony, Julia's own resentment about the whole thing.

* ChuckCunninghamSyndrome: While the Mandarin's lackeys were used less frequently in Season 2 in general, Justin Hammer, M.O.D.O.K., Hypnotia, Whirlwind, Blizzard, Blacklash and Titanium Man all made at least one guest appearance each. Grey Gargoyle, Living Laser, Elastika and Dreadknight were far less fortunate, and completely stopped appearing after the first season.

** Madame Masque's past relationship with Tony, as well as the incident that led to her disfigurement, are never really explored in any real detail. The most we get is her blaming Tony for ruining her face and Tony talking about how he had to break up with her because she wanted his company.

** When Iron Man and the Hulk get sent to the prehistoric past in "Hulk Busted," Tony sarcastically asks if someone just changed the channel.

* RememberTheNewGuy: Dark Aegis was introduced as a villain Iron Man had supposedly already fought and defeated in the past, even though he'd never been seen or mentioned before his debut episode.

* SupermanStaysOutOfGotham: The series was generally lighter on special guest stars than other Marvel cartoons of the era, especially ''WesternAnimation/SpiderManTheAnimatedSeries'' and ''WesternAnimation/FantasticFour''. This is especially noticeable in the two-part SeriesFinale, where the Mandarin shuts off all of the technology in New York City. Despite New York being home to the vast majority of the superheroes in the Marvel Universe, no other costumed heroes are seen helping out while the city is devolving into chaos.