| Vic |
| Tuesday, November 21 2006 @ 11:43 AM EST |
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Thought I'd jump back into things with a look at Marvel's biggest jackass... Tony F'n Stark.
Name the one person in the Marvel U that has created the most pain and suffering and you might say Dr. Doom, Galactus, or the Red Skull. You’d be wrong, but you could say those things. No, the biggest A-hole and tormentor of heroes in the Marvel 616 is none other than the time hopping, alcohol guzzling, Captain America selling out piece of crap known as Iron Man.
I want to like Tony Stark. I do. After all, he is the Hal Jordan of the Marvel Universe. He looks like flippin’ Tom Selleck. Magnum P.I. people... what’s not to like? Well we can start with Marvel’s first move to jackassify Iron Man. Alcoholic.
Back in the early 80’s heroes started to get darker and have more human failings. Tony got to be a worthless alchie. That’s how we got James Rhodes to originally put on the Iron Man suit and eventually become War Machine. It was also another step in Marvel copying DC who then copies Marvel etc. DC has John Stewart become a Green Lantern. Marvel says, “hey we need a minority to take over the mantle of an A list hero.” James Rhodes becomes Iron Man/War Machine. DC then says, “hey, we need a minority hero in a metal suit because that’s apparently the hot idea for the 90’s.” John Henry Irons becomes Steel. Comics editorial decisions make my head hurt, but apparently not as much as the booz makes Tony’s head hurt as seen below. Worthless jackhole. 
But hey, everyone has problems and Tony did overcome this one. And he walked away a smarter, stronger, Tony. If only. Welcome to stage 2 of Tony Stark’s evolution into a super jackass. Meet Teen Tony! 
Yep. In the mid-nineties when the country had moved on to harder drugs than alcohol, Tony needed a new problem to be pertinent. Hey, I know. Lets have him go through the ULTIMATE MID-LIFE CRISIS. He won’t just try to relive his alcoholic youth… He’ll be a complete traitor to the Avengers, be mind-controlled by Kang, and die to be replaced by a teen-age version himself from another time line. This is a great idea because DC at the time had replaced Hal Jordan with a younger hipper Green Lantern named Kyle Rayner and that turned out to be such a great idea! Incidentally, Hal had also turned traitor and tried to wipe out an entire universe of heroes. Were these two separated at birth or what?!?
On the bright side both companies had major crossovers that seemed to end in only putting back the status quo for both characters... the only problem.. Tony was still an A-hole.
Sure he seems ok. He brought back the Avengers and even included Spidey this time. He bankrolled the entire thing. But just like an episode of South Park, beware an Eric Cartman bearing gifts. Tony Stark is so Eric Cartman, and Captain America and Spidey are Kyle and Stan. And Eric can’t wait to kill the Jew, er… living legend of World War II and his buddy the Jew sympathizer, Spiderman.
Welcome to Marvel’s company crossover that will never end… Civil War. Tony Stark has to one up his previous jackhole levels by selling out half the heroes in the Marvel U, making CAPTAIN AMERICA A F’N CRIMINAL, placing some of Marvel’s most noble heroes in prison in the flippin’ Negative Zone, breaking up Reed and Sue Richard’s marriage, and convincing Spidey that it would be a great idea to out his secret ID on national TV. Is Tony really afraid that Johnny Knoxville is a bigger jackass so he had to play the ultimate trump card? Who knows. But Thank you Tony Stark. You are, without a doubt, comics’ biggest jackass. How can anyone read his book anymore?
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