Invincible Iron Man #82: Review

Jan 1976

Len Wein, Herb Trimpe

Story Name:

Plunder of the Apes!

Review & Comments

Rating:

Invincible Iron Man #82 Review by T Vernon (March 25, 2014)

Comments: Part one of a two part story; this story begins a series of (mostly) two-part tales. First appearance of Abraham “Abe” Klein and Michael O’Brien; the latter starts as a bad guy but would go on to many appearances in Captain America and Avengers issues as part of the Avengers’ support team.

Review: A pretty good issue in spite of the bad guys being super-apes. Trimpe and Severin’s art makes this look very nice and Len Wein’s writing overcomes the stigma of those oddball antagonists. In fact, together they make the apes seem almost cool. And then there’s the Red Ghost—but more on him next time….

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Invincible Iron Man #82 Synopsis by T Vernon

As the tale opens, Iron Man is battling a gang of baddies who are trying to steal Stark’s new Cosmitronic Cannon. Easily clobbering the incompetent hoods, he returns to his office where Pepper and Happy have been watching the business while he was away and resumes his duties as head of the firm. His former teacher, Abraham “Abe” Klein shows up looking for work and Tony hires him on the spot. That night, Tony hosts a charity party at his penthouse apartment with Iron Man as co-host (it’s Happy Hogan wearing the armor). Tony brings Roxanne Gilbert so he can show her the philanthropic side of his company. Another guest, however, punches Tony in the face; he is Michael O’Brien, brother of Kevin (the Guardsman, who died in issue #46) and he believes Tony Stark murdered Kevin and covered it up. After he spouts some threats and leaves, a trio of superpowered apes (strong gorilla, shapeshifting baboon, orangutan with magnetic powers) crash through the window and carry Tony off. Since everyone thinks Happy is the real Iron Man, he is forced to jet to the rescue. But Happy is not trained as a hero and the apes overcome him and send him crashing to the street far below. Tony is knocked out…and awakens in the presence of the apes’ master, the Red Ghost—only now he is a real ghost….