Invincible Iron Man #199: Review

Oct 1985

Dennis O'Neil, Herb Trimpe

Story Name:

And One of Them Must Die

Review & Comments

Rating:

Invincible Iron Man #199 Review by T Vernon (August 23, 2016)

Comments: Part two of three parts. First appearance of Mrs. Arbogast since issue #178, first Pepper Potts since #165, first Happy Hogan since #112. Odd echo: the second panel on page 11 is a reverse image of the cover to IRON MAN #2 from 1968. The Anders baby was born in issue #182. Spoiler: final appearance of Morley Erwin.

Review: Now there's a dynamic cover, with Iron Man smashing through a helicopter windshield and into the reader's lap! Meanwhile, matters are coming to a head as Obadiah Stane kidnaps everyone who has been important to Tony. Bet this just makes him mad. Anyway, a fine issue with a lot of human drama to go with the superhero pyrotechnics. The two sequences of Iron Man's battle with a helicopter are nicely done as is the largely silent holocaust at the company. And poor Tony, for that last, aghast panel. Kudos to Herb Trimpe, fill-in artist for the ish!

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Invincible Iron Man #199 Synopsis by T Vernon

As the story opens, masked baddies are kidnapping Mrs. Arbogast from her home in Brooklyn. Meanwhile, Tony Stark is at Circuits Maximus headquarters wondering how he can rescue Bethany Cabe, snatched by the same gang in ish #197. Morley Erwin arrives with an attractive local news reporter, Susan Mulwray. Doing a story on local small businesses. Smitten with his new friend, he accompanies her back to the newsroom where he sees the report on Mrs Arbogast and calls Tony immediately. James Rhodes suits up as Iron Man and flies out to warn all of Tony's other old friends. He meets with Vic Martinelli, former security chief, but Vic is now loyal to Obadiah Stane, and leaves Rhodey with a warning about Stane....
The next morning, Rhodey flies to Cleveland and suits up for action; he arrives at the Hogan's apartment building in time to see Pepper Potts Hogan being abducted by the bad guys. He goes in for battle but is blasted by a heat ray from their helicopter. The baddies get away with Pepper before Shellhead can recover—and then he sees that the blast started a fire in a nearby building; he detaches the rooftop restaurant from the building, lowers it safely to the ground. He comforts the Hogan children and forces one of the baddies left behind to tell him that the gang is going after Happy Hogan next. Iron Man arrives at Happy's office building as they are snatching him; the Golden Avenger rips up their copter and saves Happy....
Tony Stark, meanwhile, has returned to New York, where he finds the masked gang snatching a baby from an orphanage; it is the child born to Gretl Anders during the snowstorm. Tony intervenes—and is beaten up by the thugs....
The masked villains deliver Pepper and the baby to Stane who takes further action....
A package is delivered to Circuits Maximus while Clytemnestra is picking Tony up at the airport. As they return, the building goes up in a massive explosion. As the paramedics are taking away a critically injured person, Tony forces himself to see who it is....