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Iron Man #91

Oct 1976

Gerry Conway, George Tuska

Story Name:

Breakout!

Synopsis

Iron Man #91 synopsis by T Vernon

Rating:

Iron Man returns to Stark International with the captive Controller. He heads to Abe Klein’s lab and submerses the villain in a vat of molten super-strong fiber-plastic while he figures out what to do with him permanently. Elsewhere, Controller’s derelict sidekick Scrounger is assaulting people and taking over their minds with slave discs….
As he gets ready to leave for the day, Tony Stark meets his new secretary, Krissy Longfellow. By now Scrounger has affixed enough slave discs to unwilling victims to give Controller all the strength he needs to break out of the vat of plastic and go on a rampage through the plant. Tony excuses himself and dons his armor to fight the powerful villain as Iron Man. The battle is brutal and Iron Man finds himself overmatched. He flies the captive into the sky to gain some breathing room while he figures out what to do….
The Controller uses his psychic powers to cause the one Blood Brother to break out of his vault at Ryker’s Island and fight with the guards. Elsewhere we see Scrounger driving a bus full of captives toward the prison. Picking up news of the riot at the prison, Iron Man flies there carrying the Controller (who has the hero in his strong grip) with him. Shellhead now has two very powerful brutes to battle so he snatches up a slave disc and places it on the Blood Brother’s forehead. Since the alien baddie has a symbiotic connection with his brother, this drains him of all his strength. The Controller’s exoskeleton then burns out leaving the villain helpless. In the confusion Scrounger drags the Controller back to the pit beneath the lot to resume their former master-servant relationship leaving Scrounger the only happy one.

Review / Commentaries

Iron Man #91 Review by T Vernon (June 3, 2014)

Review: And just the other day I was wondering if all the stupid stories were gone forever—and here comes IRON MAN #91! A lot of this story doesn’t make sense: putting a helmet on Controller enables him to go without oxygen? Well, it’s called an oxy-mask so it must have a magical supply of air inside. There are some kind of straps leading away from the helmet that could pump oxygen in but we don’t see them when he’s actually dumped into the vat—and wouldn’t the super-hot molten plastic melt any kind of tubes?. How does Scrounger know to take the bus to the prison? I guess the big bad could have sent him a mental signal like he did for the Blood Brothers. But nothing can account for that absurd explanation of how the slave-disc on BB can short-circuit the baddie’s big suit. But the silliest point comes at the end: how could the skinny little Scrounger carry off the dead weight of the Controller (which must be about 500 pounds) from a prison full of guards? a) he couldn’t lift him, b) the place is swarming with people, and c) the hideout at the lot is a good distance away. Iron Man claims “he must have been dragged off in the confusion” but the Controller was the confusion; was no one watching him? I think Iron Man must have secretly returned the villain to his underground hole and is only pretending not to know where he is. After all, Shellhead never comes looking for him and that lot would be the first place to check. Oh Tony, you’re such a sly dog. Oh, there are a couple of cool points such as giving characterization to Scrounger (he fears losing the attention of his master), and Abe Klein is revealed to be the son of a Holocaust victim and therefore he hates bullies and slave masters.

Comments: Part two of a two part story. First appearance of Krissy Longfellow. Issue features an exceedingly rare appearance by only one of the Blood Brothers.

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Main/1st Story Full Credits

Gerry Conway

George Tuska

Bob Layton

Unknown

Herb Trimpe (Cover Penciler)
Aubrey Bradford (Cover Inker)

Additional Credits

Letterer: Joe Rosen.
Editor: Gerry Conway.

All stories. Listed in alphabetical order.

Abe Klein
(Abraham Klein)

Iron Man
(Anthony Stark)

Controller
(Basil Sandhurst)

Plus: Madame Masque (Krissy Longfellow), Blood Brothers.

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