Invincible Iron Man #14: Review

Part 7 of 12 of the story behind Iron Man's no-show in Dark Reign.

The Marvel Chronology Project and the Index put a large gap between this issue and the last, with lots of Norman Osborn activity and these are some of the highlights. He fought War Machine for control of Ultimo technology in WM's 2nd series. (Part of this storyline appeared to have Tony Stark doing business as usual, but it turned out to be his cousin Morgan.) He tried to transform his son Harry into his armoured protégé American Son in Amazing Spider-Man #595-599. He formed the Dark X-Men, and was involved in the X-Men's exodus to Utopia island. He tried to subvert Captain America's rebirth in the Reborn mini-series.

While all this was going on Norman was running his Thunderbolts team including a crossover with Deadpool and another with Secret Warriors. He also ran the Dark Avengers including the Utopia xover with the X-Men, fighting the New Avengers and several members having their own mini-series. There was also a continuing conflict with Punisher.

Recently Osborn made a list of people he wanted dealt with, which played out through a series of Dark Reign: The List 1-shots. I began with DR:L Avengers (mainly Hawkeye), included DR:L Punisher (where Dark Avenger Daken cut Frank Castle into pieces, leading to the FrankenCastle series) and ended with DR:L Spider Man. After that he lead the DAv as Iron Patriot into Might Av #32-33, and in Daredevil #504 he began to suffer the consequences of DD taking control of the Hand ninjas in DRL:DD.

But now back to the current story.

Stark is supposed to be destroying caches of Iron Man armour so they don't fall into Osborn's hands. The ArmorMap showed lots of sites still active last issue. Probably Tony destroyed a lot in the gap.

Tony Stark is now in a different, much earlier armour than before. The idea is that he's been working his way back through ever-simpler armours as he mental state deteriorates.

While she's supposedly been looking for Stark, Madame Masque has also been with Hood in his Dark Reign: Hood mini-series and New Avengers #52-60. But then Hood has also been in loads of other Dark Reign stories without her, so that left her plenty of time for Stark-hunting.

Black Widow hasn't been inactive during Dark Reign. She's been having adventures with Captain America (Bucky), with Thunderbolts (including both xovers) pretending to be then *other* Black Widow, featured in her own Deadly Origin, and figured strongly in CA: Reborn. After that she cameoed in Nomad: Girl Without A World and Wolverine: Weapon X #10.

This Crimson Dynamo is Dmitri Bukharin, the 5th and longest-running person to wear the armour and name. He débuted in Iron Man #109 and often served as part of the Soviet Super-Soldiers and then the Supreme Soviets. In Soviet Super-Soldiers 1-shot due to political in-fighting after the fall of the Soviet Union Valentin Shatalov was given the CD armour and DB was given new armour as Airstrike in the renamed group People's Protectorate. However whenever he appeared in the PP it was as CD despite VS appearing as CD in the same period. But he hasn't been seen since Hulk #393, and others have used the armour since then.

I presume Dmitri doesn't give Tony his *only* Crimson Dynamo suit.

But I don't know how come he's important enough to have the power to refuse HAMMER entry to Russia.

I'm not sure how exactly various people are tracking Tony. JARVIS seems able to detect the use of (modern) Stark tech, but this obviously doesn't apply to the Crimson Dynamo armour, and probably not to the older Iron Man suits Tony's been wearing lately. So maybe he can only detect when Tony uses stuff in an armoury like that at Kirensk.

I think HAMMER can't track any Iron Man suits (but strangely they can track the Rescue armour). But in #10 Tony said HAMMER would know whenever he powered up one of his armouries.

Presumably JARVIS and HAMMER could both track Stark through the armouries I figure he's visited since last issue. So why didn't Pepper go to any earlier ones? And why didn't Osborn send Madame Masque to any of them?

In fact Osborn and Masque have been proceeding even more strangely. Osborn showed Masque the Armormap computer system last issue, detailing where all Iron Man's armouries were. But they don't seem to have been actively using it to chase Tony. Instead Masque appears to have gone off on her own, because Norman doesn't know where she is and what she's doing this issue until she rings him up. And somehow she's arrived at Kirensk at the right time.

***** The rest of the comments after this are an old copy of parts of this comment.

But now back to the current story. Stark is supposed to be destroying caches of Iron Man armour so they don't fall into Osborn's hands. The ArmorMap showed lots of sites still active last issue. Probably Tony destroyed a lot in the gap. Tony Stark is now in a different, much earlier armour than before. The idea is that he's been working his way back through ever-simpler armours as he mental state deteriorates. While she's supposedly been looking for Stark, Madame Masque has also been with Hood in New Avengers #52-60. But then Hood has also been in loads of other Dark Reign stories without her, so that left her plenty of time for Stark-hunting. Black Widow hasn't been inactive during Dark Reign. She's been having adventures with Captain America (Bucky), with Thunderbolts (and Deadpool), featured in her own Deadly Origin, and figured strongly in CA: Reborn (in more or less that order). This Crimson Dynamo is Dmitri Bukharin, the 5th and longest-running person to wear the armour and name. He debuted in Iron Man #109, but he fell out of favour with the Soviet rulers and was stripped of the armour in Soviet Super Soldiers #1, but took up new armour as Airstrike. Several other people have briefly used the Crimson Dynamo name since then. But now Dmitri seems back in favour with the post-Soviet regime, and back in the armour. I presume Dmitri doesn't give Tony his *only* Crimson Dynamo suit. But I don't know how come he's important enough to have the power to refuse HAMMER entry to Russia.

At this point , as I write this, we are surfing the breaking wave of the Marvel Chronology Project and the Official Indexes (which have an overlap of creators). As it says in the last Wolverine Index issue, the chronology for 2010-2012 has mostly not been worked out yet. One of the reasons for this is long storylines like this one. With the average story these days being 6 issues (designed for later collections), you have to wait a couple of years before being sure how to fit the various series all together. And I also find that the leading edge of the chronology is uneven and chaotic. Some parts cover Siege, others don't even venture into 2009's Dark Reign. And what's there is quite sketchy and sometimes contradictory. All the evidence that does exist suggests that the compilers have placed all pre-Siege Dark Reign before this issue and the following ones. So for instance all of Steve Rogers appearances between CA:Reborn and Siege are listed before here. This has the effect that, after his reboot in the next story, Tony Stark leaps straight from his hospital bed into Siege as Iron Man. I don't see the absolute necessity for this. I could envisage some Cap appearances moved to after this sequence. And some of Dark Reign, e.g. the Dark Reign List stories. This would give Tony more recovery time.

Part 7 of 12 of the story behind Iron Man's no-show in Dark Reign. The Marvel Chronology Project and the Index put a large gap between this issue and the last, with lots of Norman Osborn activity. He fought War Machine for control of Ultimo technology in WM's 2nd series. (Part of this storyline appeared to have Tony Stark doing business as usual, but it turned out to be his cousin Morgan.) He tried to transform his son Harry into his armoured protege American Son in Amazing Spider-Man #595-599. He formed the Dark X-Men, and was involved in the X-Men's exodus to Utopia island. He tried to subvert Captain America's rebirth in the Reborn mini-series. Along the way he fought off attacks by Zodiac in the Dark Reign: Zodiac limited series, by Ronin in Dark Reign List: Avengers, and by Punisher in his own series and Dark Reign List: Punisher. And lots more stuff. CA: Reborn has to be placed this early. It's publication date coincides with the end of this storyline, where Tony will be reduced to a vegetable, and the start of the much shorter next one wherein he gets rebooted. But Cap plays a role in the reboot, and there is no gap between this issue and that story, so Reborn has to happen before now.