Invincible Iron Man #275: Review

Dec 1991

John Byrne, Paul Ryan

Story Name:

Dragon Doom!

Review & Comments

Rating:

Invincible Iron Man #275 Review by T Vernon (May 8, 2018)

Comments: Double-sized anniversary issue. “The Stunning Finale of the Dragon Seed Saga.” Part four of four. Includes a pin-up of Iron Man by John Romita Jr and Bob Wiacek. Cameos by Mr Fantastic, Thing, Peter Parker, Mary Jane Watson, Thor (Eric Masterson), Man-Thing. Mandarin will be back in issues #306-309.

Review: An epic battle closes out a story arc that feels like it went on forever (actually only since issue #259) and an oddly mature scene closes out the romance with Su Yin. John Byrne still has a couple of issues to wrap up the Black Widow plot he's introduced and then he's gone, turning the writing chores over to Len Kaminski for some new blood.

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Invincible Iron Man #275 Synopsis by T Vernon

The damaged Iron Man (James Rhodes) pulls himself together and surveys the situation: he sees the real Iron Man—Tony Stark—in action against the Gathered dragons. Shellhead holds his own while Chen Hsu grows angry over the hitch in his plans. Then the dragons melt the slag beneath the hero's feet, clogging his boot jets; he ropes a dragon with a poly-fiber strand, allowing it to pull him free. The dragon tries to shake Iron Man off and Shellhead rides its back until it throws him off, the other dragons moving in for the kill. Rhodey leaps into the fray only to be hurled back into the hills, where he sees an enthroned Mandarin. The villain watches the battle grimly until Rhodey grabs his shoulder to get his attention; Mandarin then blasts Rhodey into the distance. After a few more moments of introspection, the Mandarin enters the battle on the side of Iron Man. Chen Hsu resumes his dragon form and joins the battle. Iron Man tells Mandarin that only he (IM) has the power to use the rings to their full potential; Mandarin refuses to hand them over. A scuffle ends with Iron Man placing his hands over Mandy's, firing his power through the rings, unleashing an unbelievable power which is detected all over the world, by scientists and superheroes. Winds rage shrieking through the valley for sixteen hours; after a search Rhodey discovers Tony clinging to a rock, all the color scraped off his armor by the winds. As they survey the valley, Tony has an idea that the dragons are gone....

Six weeks later: Tony returns from a trip to China; Rhodey notes that he has come back alone. Tony doesn't want to talk about it.... [See the second story for details.]

Epilogue: A grandmother and her granddaughter talk about the mysterious man they found unconscious and with bloody stumps where his hands should be....

The second story is:-

“Moments Unseen”

Writer: John Byrne. Pencils: Tony DeZuniga. Inks: Tony DeZuniga. Colors: Paul Becton. Letters: John Costanza

Synopsis: Tony Stark meets with Dr. Su Yin and she reveals that she was ordered by her superiors to hold out a false hope of recovery to Tony in order to keep him and Iron Man in China. The truth is that there is no hope; his body will continue to weaken until the bio-electric mesh will no longer help him. He asks her to come away with him so they can spend his last days together; she thinks it best they part. Later, Tony goes out to her home to speak to Su Yin once more and meets her husband, confined to a wheelchair after an auto accident years ago. She has kept by his side, a wife in name only, and he wants Tony to take her away from him, since she deserves more than to be married to a cripple. On the way out, Tony meets Su Yin and he thanks her, telling her that he loved her too much to ask her to be married to another cripple....

Story #2