Warning: SPOILERS for Avengers #31
There is more to Tony Stark than just his Iron Man armor. And to prove it, he’s just created his coolest suit of armor in Marvel history – and he’s done it in a cave with nothing but a box of scraps.
Considering just how many versions of the Iron Man armor have already been created (and destroyed), two things are certain: every Avengers fan has their personal favorite, and naming one of them as the most impressive is basically impossible. Fortunately for Tony Stark, his choices are drastically reduced in his latest comic adventure, sending him one million years back in time with no tech or resources beyond those of his armor. And when his battery starts to run out, Tony Stark says goodbye to Iron Man… to become a different superhero entirely.
For those who aren’t reading along with the current Avengers comic, the notion of Tony time traveling will sound straight out of Endgame. But in the standard fashion of writer Jason Aaron, his modern day Avengers series has flashed both to the past AND the future. The past, by introducing the first ancient Avengers of 1,000,000 BC. And the future, by revealing Iron Man would meet the ancient Avengers several issues earlier. Now in Avengers #31, that flash-forward finally arrives.
The events which lead to Iron Man’s time travel are too complicated to explain here – long story short, Tony Stark is secretly the Devil’s son – but after crossing paths with Thor’s father Odin, the first Ghost Rider, and a Brock-Lesnar-looking Starbrand, the strange ‘man of iron’ is forced to flee and crash land in a remote cave. A return to his origin story in a way, but instead of creating a suit of armor to save his own life, Tony is stranded in a cave with his armor powerless to help him survive. Even worse, he knows he has more enemies to face as his power cells drain to empty.
Knowing that he must take a stand against the true enemy who brought him one million years into the past, Tony remembers that the strength of Iron Man was never in the armor. The suit, like the identity it son became, was merely what Tony had on hand to work with. Looking around him and seeing nothing but an Ice Age, Tony becomes the only hero that still makes sense…
Scholars may forever debate the plausibility or the intentionally ambiguous forging of Tony’s suit of Ice Age Man armor, and the effectiveness of icicles as both blades and projectiles. So too may they debate the effectiveness of a suit of ice armor used against the Devil, bathed in fire. But the Ice Age Man armor gives Tony the chance to take a stand against his opponent, and unload the remaining vibranium power cells into him (thereby returning him to the modern day).
Sadly the temperature constraints of the suit are no match for the temporal effects in returning Tony home, meaning this armor created by Aaron and artist Gerardo Zaffino will be lost to time. But that doesn’t change the fact that fans can always appreciate the new high watermark for Iron Man coolness.
Avengers #31 is available now from your local comic book shop.
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