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I finished the Iron Man Omnibus a few months ago and that covered Vols. 1-3, and I have Vol. 4, but I haven’t had a chance to read it yet. Since this was next in my queue (I did read it the same week I bought it), I’ll just have to guess what happened in Vol. 4. Luckily, you don’t need to have Vol. 4 in order to enjoy this one. Anyway, Archie Goodwin wrote all the issues in here, while Johnny Craig drew issues 2-4 and George Tuska finished up the rest of the collection. Volume 5 collects Invincible Iron Man #’s 2-13, which were originally printed from June 1968 to May 1969.
Spoilers Ahead
-Invincible Iron Man #2- Drexel Cord hates Tony Start for being smarter and better-looking than him, and more successful, so he does whatever anyone else does that is overcome by jealousy, he builds a big green robot to take out Stark! Well, he doesn’t know Stark and Iron Man are one in the same, Iron Man shows up, Drexel has a change of heart probably due to his daughter, Janice, and sacrifices himself to save her. Stark’s broken up about this, since if he weren’t Iron Man this wouldn’t have happened.
-Invincible Iron Man #3- So Iron Man flies home, still broken up by what happened, finds his plant blowing up, and swoops in to save his employees. He burns out suit and goes home, only to collapse and come very close to dying. He calls on his friend, Happy Hogan, to help, and he does, building Stark a new armor. Of course, something goes wrong and Happy becomes the FREAK, a super-strong beast. Iron Man defeats him without hurting him, but really, his torment has just begun! He has to deal with another person falling under the terrible shadow that him being Iron Man casts.
-Invincible Iron Man #4- Iron Man saves Freak Hogan and he returns to his Happy self. Meanwhile, Unicorn gets even more super-powered and goes after Iron Man. Iron Man stops him and Unicorn falls to the ocean and doesn’t come up! He’s a Marvel villain, he MUST be dead!
-Invincible Iron Man #5- This would be Tuska’s first issue and as the preface suggests, this could be a try-out for Tuska as it’s sort of out of continuity with what is going on. Anyway, Tony Stark is brought to the future so he can be killed there to stop something he created in the past to be created that is wrecking havoc on their world now. Tony escapes and beats the machine he builds by using a logical comment on him (if you kill me now, you won’t exist) and Tony comes back to the present (well, the past) and he never says he won’t create that machine. At least he didn’t go to a future where he initiates a Civil War with the heroes he knows that ends up killing the greatest Avenger and WWII hero.
-Invincible Iron Man #6- The Crusher shows up and Iron Man beats him. The main plot movement of this issue dealt with minor character Jasper (a SHIELD agent assigned to security at Stark) and his girlfriend, Whitney, who is actually the head of the Maggia, and a little conflict caused by, who else, Iron Man. One more thing for the Iron Avenger to feel guilty about!
-Invincible Iron Man #7- Whitney, leader of the Maggia, needs to save face and attack the Stark company. Of course, Gladiator’s appearance sends things out of whack, as Whitney now must attack and not delay any longer. Gladiator’s great idea was to kidnap Stark to draw out Iron Man (not knowing Iron Man was Tony Stark). Tony has to leave (making himself look like a coward) and don the suit. He battles Gladiator but damages his suit in the process.
-Invincible Iron Man #8- Gladiator and Iron Man have an epic battle as we take a look at the origin of Whitney. Gladiator ends up losing and Jasper eventually Whitney go, but breaks his heart in the process.
-Invincible Iron Man #9- Iron Man must battle the Hulk who is rampaging in New York! It seems to be set up by a mysterious foe. It turns out that the Hulk is actually a robot and the whole thing was set in motion by Mandarin! Now Mandarin knows Stark’s secret identity and plans to trap Stark.
-Invincible Iron Man #10- Mandarin makes Stark seem like a traitor in order to finally destroy him. Mandarin captures Iron Man and has one last wish, to see the face of Stark before he kills him.
-Invincible Iron Man #11- Mandarin unmasks Iron Man, and it isn’t Tony Stark? Yeah, Tony had a mask on and Mandarin was tricked! So this leads to Iron Man defeating Mandarin with the female sidekick of Mandarin sacrificing herself to save Stark and defeat Mandarin.
-Invincible Iron Man #’s 12-13- This two-parter features a villain named the Controller who uses the power of other people to walk and gain incredible strength. He manages to fight Iron Man and although he wins the first battle, Iron Man ends up winning the war. A decent two-parter to end the volume.
-Not Brand Echh #2- This is a great poke at not only Iron Man but also Magnus the Robot Fighter. It was just a really entertaining story that really showed that Marvel could not only laugh at themselves but also the other companies, too.
-The Bottom Line- Dewey Cassell writes the introduction to this volume, and he basically talks about what’s in these issues and talks about artist George Tuska who took over in Issue #5. This was a good, not great, volume of Iron Man tales. They were solidly written and drawn, and there is a great Mandarin tale in there, but I don’t know if I would go out of my way and call these classics of the Marvel Silver Age. If you buy it you get a solid read that you’ll enjoy, but it lacks that big classic issue or storyline that makes it an easy recommendation. I think this is for the Iron Man purists, only.
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