Iron Man (1968 series) #60

Review: Let’s face it: the Masked Marauder is not a very interesting villain. He did fairly well against the unpowered Daredevil, plus there was the mystery of his true identity. But he is no match for Iron Man, being just a loudmouthed mastermind with a ray gun in his goggles. And no one cares about his secret identity anymore. So we can just go along with him defeating Iron Man because the writer wanted this story to cover two issues but what is there to interest us? Surely not the Pepper and Happy soap opera? No. What is interesting is Marvel’s attempt to mirror the times and the shifting social attitudes toward the Vietnam War. When Iron Man was introduced, the war was fairly well supported and so a hero who supplied weapons for the military was acceptable as everyone recalled World War 2 and the fight against tyranny. As the Vietnam conflict wore on, attitudes changed and the war was increasingly unpopular, especially among the younger generation (you know, those of draft age). So Marvel was stuck with a protagonist who (possibly) provided the weapons used to kill non-combatants and this is how they addressed it: Tony is denounced by Roxanne Gilbert and her nurse—and he ends up brooding over doing what he thought was right at the time. The movie took a different tack: with these anti-military sentiments in place for decades, Downey’s Tony Stark had to be portrayed as arrogant and morally obtuse until he got a first-hand look at the devastation he was causing. That was another way to handle it, but in 1973 the issue was fresher in everyone’s mind and Marvel had to walk a fine line to avoid having their hero turn villain (or pacifist) overnight.

Comments: Part one of two. The Masked Marauder was introduced as a foe of Spider-Man and Daredevil in DAREDEVIL #16-19. He was apparently killed in DD #27 when he fell into a disintegrator field; here we learn that the disintegrator field was really a teleportation device and he got away safely.