In the latest Comic Book Legends Revealed, see how close Iron Man came to having to explain why his company was involved in making Sentinels.
Welcome to Comic Book Legends Revealed! This is the eight hundred and thirty-first installment where we examine three comic book legends and determine whether they are true or false. As usual, there will be three posts, one for each of the three legends.
NOTE: If my Twitter page hits 5,000 followers, I’ll do a bonus edition of Comic Book Legends Revealed that week. Great deal, right? So go follow my Twitter page, Brian_Cronin!
COMIC LEGEND:
Iron Man’s company was almost going to be responsible for manufacturing Sentinels.
STATUS:
True Enough for a True
Many moons ago, I did a legend about Len Kaminski’s strong run on Iron Man in the early to mid 1990s. The legend was that Kaminski replaced Tony Stark with James Rhodes as Iron Man (before spinning Rhodes off into his own series, War Machine) because Kaminski did not think that a capitalist like Stark could be a hero. Kaminski debunked that legend, noting to me at the time:
Actually, I never said thing one about Tony not being able to be a hero because he was a capitalist. Heck, I’M a capitalist. I suspect that rumor got its start as a misquote of some comments I made in an interview (possibly MARVEL AGE?), in which I made comparisons between Stark and actual billionaire-industrialist-technocrats (such as Bill Gates). My point was twofold: first was that we DON’T often see “real-life” guys in Stark’s position acting in ways we normally associate with the heroic ideal – and that meant there was something special about Stark besides the huge IQ, bank account and gagetry. Something deep and noble, learned from battling his health problems and personal demons. Something that demands he fight the fight personally, rather than do the “sensible” thing and hire a platoon of Iron Men. The other point I was on about – which I tried to address in CRASH AND BURN – is that Stark believes in a business model rooted in altruism over short-term gain, that making a profit is NOT incompatible with doing right – in fact, it may be essential to long-term growth. Which had nothing at all to do with Rhodes tenure as CEO…
However, as Kaminski noted, that debate specifically DID come up as part of his “Crash and Burn” storyline that followed up the anniversary 300th issue (the final storyline pairing Kaminski with Kev Hopgood, who was his main creative partner on his run to this point)….
(Hopgood, by the way, also drew the cover for my second book, just throwing that out there).
You see, during Denny O’Neil’s run on Iron Man in the 1980s, Tony Stark lost his company to the villainous Obadiah Stane as Tony fell into a downward spiral of alcoholism. Eventually, Tony recovered his company, but in “Crash and Burn,” he learned that during the time that Tony was gone, Stane got up to some nasty stuff with the company that now is kind of Toy’s responsibility since it technically was done by HIS company. In an interview with Patrick Daniel O’Neill in Wizard Magazine #30, he noted, “One of the things that has always made me uncomfortable with Iron Man is that he’s a multibillionaire head of a giant corporation – and he’s a good guy. Usually, in the real world, those guys are not the good guys – although I’ll admit that portraying them as bad guys is something of a cliché in comics these days, as well. I’m trying to split the difference – his company has, in the past, been up to no good, although he himself is a good guy.
That’s probably what the original legend was reacting to, actually. In any event, the set-up of “Crash and Burn” was that various Marvel characters learned about the shady stuff Stark International was up to when a disgruntled employee leaked all of the news and they each tried to confront Stark ad Iro Ma.
It’s funny, I recently did a piece about “Sales boost guest stars” in the 1990s, and that is definitely what the real life influence was behind this storyline, with Thunderstrike guest-starring
and Venom…
and also the Hulk…
The Hulk issue was particularly notable because it was the debut of a famous suit of armor (maybe I should just write about that itself in the future, actually).
Anyhow, as to today’s legend. Reader Paul B. wrote in to ask whether Stark International was originally going to have been caught up in producing Sentinels. I asked Len about it and he said he didn’t recall that, as he always had such a hard time getting permission to the use the X-Me that he didn’t think he would have even bothered to ask. Well, in Wizard Magazine #30, Len noted a similar point, but at the same time, said that “I’m still negotiating [for the] use of the X-Men – sometimes that’s like pulling teeth, but if I get use of one of the mutant groups, I’ll reveal that Stane was the contractor who built Sentinels for the government, so the mutant groups are not pleased.”
So yeah, 21st Century Len recalled how hard it was to get use of the X-Men so he thought that he didn’t even try, but 1994 Len at least did first try to negotiate for their use before he was obviously told no, so there was a chance that Iron Man could have been tied in with the Sentinels!
Thanks to Paul B. for the question and thanks to Len and Pat for the information in 1994 (and Len for the info a lot more recently)!
SOME OTHER ENTERTAINMENT LEGENDS!
Check out some entertainment legends from Legends Revealed:
1. Was Denise Crosby Fired From Star Trek: The Next Generation Because She Posed Nude in Playboy?
2. Did the Kid Who Played Eddie Haskell Grow Up to Become Alice Cooper?
4. Did Pat Boone’s Recording of “Tutti Frutti” Result in the Song Being “Sanitized”?
PART TWO SOON!
Check back soon for part 2 of this installment’s legends!
Feel free to send suggestions for future comic legends to me at either [email protected] or [email protected]
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