Iron Man 2.0 #12

As I mentioned in #8 James Rhodes never actually gets called Iron Man 2.0 in this series. (But I don't think he gets called War Machine either.) At the end of this issue he asks Stark about modifying the armour. And when he returns to the Iron Man series in armour in #513 he's back to being openly called War Machine, but also has what looks like the old War Machine type of armour, with prominent guns and no sign of stealth capabilities. Rhodey makes several guest appearances around the end of this series. In all of them he's called War Machine (if named at all). He continues to make sporadic apps in Secret Avengers. In #20 he has the 2.0 armour, but in #21 (a different story) he has the old armour with guns. He guests with the SA team in Hulk (2008) #42-43. Here he has the 2.0 armour but with pop-up guns. I don't think he uses his stealth capabilities. In X-Men (2010) #20-23 he has the old-look armour, but the guns are retractable. Again I don't think there's any sign of stealth. This suggests a sequence SA#20, H#42-43 and some order of XM#20-23 and SA#21 (and some more SA). They all probably happen after this series, and before IM#513-515. Just to confuse things, in IM#517-524 Rhodey will wear yet another suit, with familiar stealth functions, which the Previews blurbs refer to as Iron Man 2.0. Although once again no-one in the comic calls it that. And just to confuse things even further, the blurb to #521 claims that Iron Man 2.0 and War Machine are *both* in the story.

The end of the arc and the end of the series. This issue boasts 4 artists again. Once again I reckon one is the colourist (Andy Troy). I think the other 3 are penciler & inker for their own sections. I'd Carmine Di Giandomenico does the most pages this time, starting from the beginning. Mirco Pierfederici does the last 5 pages, and Ariel Olivetti the preceding 5. This is a pretty good finale to the series. The stakes ratchet up and Suzi Endo gets to be heroic (and hand-waving science explains what's happening). As usual in comics the villain's scheme doesn't make too much sense. But then he *was* insane. It seems he was going to take over the world by having his virus self take over every individual in it. (There is no indication that any master copy of the virus would rule the rest, from say Tony Stark's mind. Everyone would just *be* Palmer Addley.) But if that was the plan, then why all the terrorist acts, and why the murderous crowd rage? Probably because he was a sick b*st*rd and liked it that way.