Iconic, Invincible, Insurgent
Observing the political and cultural cross sections of Spencer Ackerman's Iron Man #1-5 (2024)
How does a billionaire grapple with the world shaped by his company? What does “The Futurist” do when he is lagging behind? Where does a comic book go when guided by an award winning national security journalist? Spencer Ackerman’s 2024 series “Iron Man” written for Marvel Comics follows the titular Iron Man as he regains control of his company and must confront the troublesome legacy of his influence on the world. “Iron Man” tackles familiar themes like the surveillance state and the military industrial complex as well as unique themes like genocide and labor organizing. To understand the ties between The Armored Avenger and the parallels to our real world, we have to look back to where it all started.
“The truth is…I am Iron Man.” In 2008, Marvel Studios took flight with Iron Man. Bringing the character to the forefront of popular culture with a film that would kick off a decade plus of box office supremacy. Robert Downey Jr’s portrayal of Tony Stark aka Iron Man would become one of the most iconic performances of modern cinema. This performance however wouldn’t come if 60 years prior, one man hadn’t decided to take a little risk. Stan Lee is one of the most influential creators in all of comics. During his time in the industry Lee penned thousands of stories and created hundreds of characters. Without Lee and longtime partner Jack Kirby we don’t get characters like Spider-Man, Black Panther and Doctor Doom. Following years of successful books with deeply relatable characters, Lee would decide to try his hand at making an unlovable figure relatable to readers. Joking in an interview with Kevin Smith in 2006 “ At the time we did Iron Man, I was really feeling a little cocky. I’m a little ashamed of myself but it was at a time of the war, young people throughout the country hated war, they hated the military industrial complex and everything, and rightfully so. So I said I’m going to come up with a character that represents everything everyone hates and shove it down their throats.” Tony Stark was introduced to the world as the CEO of arms manufacturer Stark Industries in Tales of Suspense #39. A dashing womanizer with seemingly unlimited wealth and technical ingenuity in equal measures. Stark’s origin story would see him injured by a landmine while demonstrating a new weapon for the Department of Defense, captured by terrorist Wong-Chu and forced to build weapons for his organization. With assistance from a fellow captive, Professor Yinsen, Stark would create a device to keep the shrapnel from the landmine from entering his heart then go about creating the very first Iron Man suit to escape his captors. In the years that would follow, we would see Iron Man do battle with countless villains, invent new, bold suits and team up with other iconic heroes to form The Avengers, Earth’s mightiest heroes. Many writers would helm Iron Man stories over the decades and many would come back to a simple question. How do you make this deeply unrelatable, rich, arms dealer, relatable to the average reader?
What many writers would discover is that question is difficult to tackle in its entirety. A few ideas have been explored over the years. We’ve seen Tony lose his company, lose his technology and even lose his life. Issue one of Ackerman’s run opens with Tony having just regained control of his company after losing it in the pages of the previous run, arriving at the scene of a disturbance at one of his factories. This disturbance however, is a little different than usual. Instead of a world ending threat a la Thanos, its workers from said factory being denied entry. These workers find themselves face to face with two enhanced guards, transforming into hulk like beasts to send them scattering. The very same workers face another kind of threat as well, a threat to their collective organizing. Workers are the backbone of society. All workers deserve the opportunity to organize and collectively bargain for fair wages, benefits and workplace safety. This is often debated, in bad faith, by people who simply wish to keep their thumb on the working class. While these debates play out all the time in our real world, we have never really seen it approached in a mainstream comic. Ackerman’s time in the world of journalism allows him to explore this topic with an interesting perspective. Ackerman is undoubtedly pro-worker and even in this brief scene presents the workers as engaged, intelligent and diligent in their work. This scene also presents an organizing model fairly unknown to American audiences, a model where workers have a say in not only their compensation but also their actual production. “You make weapons, you won’t make weapons, you make this, you make that. We actually make the stuff. We get no say.” says one of the workers. It’s often said that it’s easier to imagine the end of the world than the end of capitalism. The idea of an equitable model like this seems quite farfetched but why should it be? Odds are, if you’re reading this, you’re not white collar executive. You are much like me and almost every other person you encounter on a daily basis. You work an hourly job, trying to live within your means, and find joy and community in a world running low on them. While only about 10% of the US labor force is organized in their workplace. Many are finding communal organizations to join. Whether along political, leisure or moral lines, we need a community to function as humans. While not a long scene, it sets the tone for the book immediately. We soon follow Tony on a small mystery, his suit suddenly plummeting from the sky as he takes off from the factory. Recovering in the hospital, Stark begins investigating the cause of his tech failure. Losing all track of time in his investigation, Tony finds himself on the morning of his first board meeting since regaining his company. Suiting up and flying to the meeting, Tony quickly finds himself the outsider on the board as he reunites with old SHIELD colleague, Melinda May, but the two find themselves at odds with the remainder of the board. The board has begun negotiating a merger with long time corporate player, the Roxxon Corporation. Headed by Scientist Supreme, Monica Rappaccini, Roxxon is making a boardroom power play to acquire Stark Industries. As Stark broods, we soon find the first of many injections of both humor and adventure in the book. “Its still an action packed comic” Ackerman would chuckle while describing the political nature of the book on the Graphic Policy Radio podcast. Tony’s recovery progressing he begins engaging in the time honored tradition of posting through his crashout, in his case a more literal crash. In a sly dig at the right wing trolls inhabiting many online social media platforms, Tony begins a twitter back and forth with (@)nomoremutants1488. This back and forth leads to a real world clash as an explosion rocks a nearby building, suiting up for action Iron Man soon finds himself clashing with villains Tiger Shark and Flying Tiger. Upon wrapping up the fight with the two small time villains, Flying Tiger drops the first crumb for the driver of the Stark Roxxon War arc. “…and you didn’t even think about wearing your magic armor.” Iron Man takes off for the warehouse where he has stored his Mysterium armor. First introduced in the pages of Gerry Duggan’s run on the character, the Mysterium armor would prove to be one of Stark’s most powerful non “buster” suits. The metal it was crafted from being the titular Mysterium, retrieved by Tony and his then wife, Emma Frost, during the Orchis assault on the Hellfire Club. Arriving at the warehouse Tony would be ambushed by the two Hulk like guards he encountered at the beginning of the issue but mid battle we find out their true employer Justine Hammer, daughter of long time villain Justin Hammer. The new Iron Monger has some new tricks up her sleeve, no longer a strictly tech based villain, and now using the Mysterium to complete the new Iron Monger. “But you’re still not getting it. You’re beaten, want to know why your armor fell out of the sky? Because I said so. Armor. Drop.” Mocks Justine as Iron Man once again crashes to the ground answering the cause of the earlier crash that left Tony hospitalized. The Iron Monger now wields magic from a new benefactor. The villainess leaves the disabled Iron Man and the warehouse with her new suit. Issue one ending with a call back to that introductory Tales of Suspense issue. Tony in the dark, hammer in hand, forging a means to fight back.
Issue two begins exploring the equally important balance, it’s not just the suit that makes Tony powerful but his natural intellect as well. We find Tony trying to socialize the idea of not merging with Roxxon with other board members. A two fold scene as we see both the negotiations and the back-up plan of bombing a major Roxxon pipeline with the aid of mandarin goon Tuatara in a little cameo. The Stark-Roxxon war arc is littered with callbacks and references to past arcs for Shellhead. It’s hard to understate the reverence and child-like glee Ackerman carries for the character. This issue also features a cameo from an often forgotten former Avenger. Tony soon finds himself in Colorado, aiming to do more disruption at one of Rappaccini’s facilities and in a brief skirmish with C list villain, Force. A makeshift suit and a flawed “Iron.GPT” AI that incorrectly identifies Force as “Whiplash” have Tony on the back foot when the fight is stopped by Rappaccini’s assistant who invites Tony in to talk and have lunch. Monica and Tony begin their verbal sparring over the board, Tony’s improvised suit and the merger. Their lunch is soon brought by the Avengers traitor Monica mentioned in the previous issue, Doctor Druid. A brief member of the Avengers and often forgotten character in Marvel’s history, Druid may not have had a marked impact on the history of the Avengers but his sole defining one was his hubris which led to manipulation by Kang Nebula. Pride cometh before the fall and Druid did fall, deceived into undermining Captain Marvel and taking over leadership of the team. Fallen in disgrace, Druid would fall from popular media until resurfacing seemingly under Monica’s thumb. Under Monica’s instruction, Druid casts a spell plunging Tony into a nightmare and also the most visually stunning segment of the arc. Julius Ohta’s art is very fitting to the story. Solid backgrounds and character details and while not personally my favorite design, a very unique steampunk inspired suit for Tony. For the first three issues Ohta draws with Alex Sinclair on colors create a very grounded world which serves the story quite well. This nightmare segment however are where the two really flex their muscles with callbacks to Tony’s past struggles and history laying framework for a stunning visual landscape of horrors. My favorite of these sequences being the callback to the Demon in a bottle arc from 1979. A beautiful homage to a quintessential Iron Man tale shows us the weight of Tony’s past struggles with alcoholism.
Plunged into some of the darkest parts of his memory Tony finds himself face to face with ex-wife, Emma Frost. While not an exceedingly long relationship which started mostly as a strategic partnership, Frost would serve as a poignant reflection of the impact of Stark’s legacy on the wider Marvel world. This would come during the loss of his company to the fiendish Feilong in service to the cabal Orchis. Under their command, Stark Industries would begin producing one of the most devastating tools on the Mutant population, the Stark Sentinels. The robots originally designed by Bolivar Trask in the pages X- Men have served as a persistent threat to Mutants for decades. The X-Men and Mutants as a whole have always faced threats from humans in their history, often serving as parallels for oppressed group’s struggles in our real world. From non-white communities to LGBTQ communities, the Mutants have served as representatives of the power of collective groups against marginalizing forces. During the onslaught of Orchis however so many Mutants would face death that the time could labeled as nothing short of genocide. Stark’s contribution while not direct stuck with me as another piece in the character’s long history of troubled connections. Speaking on the Lever Podcast, Ackerman would say “He just lived through witnessing a genocide unfold and because he was not the target of that genocide he would probably have a lot of doubt and uncertainty about whether he would be entitled to his trauma.” This statement would stick with me after hearing it for several weeks because I have had the exact same feeling for the last two years. Since October 2023, the world has witnessed the first ever livestreamed genocide of the Palestinian people by Israel. Countless atrocities and crimes against humanity have been broadcast to the world in real time with undeniable proof. Israel’s attempted ethnic cleansing of Palestinians has gone on for a century, ratcheting up and down in intensity but truly hit a fever pitch in 2023 as the United States bankrolled this genocide with our tax dollars. Obviously, an outsider like myself has no room to speak except to amplify the voices and experiences of the victims but Ackerman’s quote has rung in my head and heart for weeks on end. What can any of us do in the face of such atrocities done in our name, with our tax dollars, and championed by countless elected officials? I had the opportunity to ask Ackerman about this during his stop at the Baltimore Book Festival to discuss his national security journalism, his book “Reign of Terror” which follows the post 9/11 era, and the Stark-Roxxon war arc. In an open form conversation, Ackerman would go on to connect many dots in the US’s constant war on freedoms domestic and abroad. When I asked about the quote Ackerman would provide two insights that left me with much to consider. The first insight was previously known to me, that Gaza has been a “laboratory for unfreedom” and the idea of the imperialist boomerang. Gaza being a “laboratory of unfreedom” has proven so true, many tactics of surveillance and censorship of the Palestinian people have made their way here. Companies like Meta have buried Gazan voices and pro-Palestinian advocates’ attempts to spread awareness regarding the crimes currently happening to them. The second insight being the imperialist boomerang, the idea that oppressive tactics used abroad on foreign populations have a way of making their way back home to be used on the US population. Mass surveillance systems used in Gaza have created a network of oppression as Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) have found new ways of tracking and harassing undocumented immigrants. When fielding questions from the audience Ackerman would address this very topic when asked “What do you say to someone who has had many bad experiences with immigrants and wants to provide information to ICE to assist in their arrest?” The question truly rattled me in a way that I still think about especially in the process of writing this piece. To me, the idea of enabling the continued rise of fascism and oppression to satisfy your own vindictive “karma” lust is genuinely terrifying. I truly would not know how to answer out of a place of empathy but Ackerman absolutely did. While not entertaining the idea in the slightest, he would frame the problem plainly. “Systems of oppression used to harm your neighbors with absolutely be used against you as well in time.” All we have is each other and the instant we start sacrificing our neighbors, loved or otherwise, to those who hate them we fail to even have a community anymore. Plenty of writers have given additional perspective to their books but getting Ackerman’s insight into how his tale ties into our lives was a special experience. While the grief many of us carry for our fellow humans, Palestinian community members and those still facing constant attacks and ethnic cleansing in Gaza and around the world may seem endless, it is our responsibility to carry their message to all who would hear it. We grieve communally for all that has been lost, lives, livelihoods and cultural artifacts but no one is free until we all are. Stand together or fall apart.
Rousing from the state Druid placed him in, Iron Man finishes up his scrap with Force. Brandishing the newest and coolest part of his suit, a gigantic repulsor sword. Taking off for New York for one last try at reasoning with the board members. Under Monica and Justine’s thumb though, the board approved the merger of the newly title Starxxon Corporation. As Tony leaves the meeting, vowing a battle for the heart of his legacy, Justine demands his current armor. Not kneeling to the final slight, the Iron Monger and Iron Man go toe to toe one final time. The extended battle ending in Tony’s victory, they are soon met by Druid who informs them that the hidden hand behind these events and Justine’s new magic, would like a word. The two armored fighters plus the board are transported to the Limbo realm and are met with the evil benefactor, Belasco. While not a widely known or used character, Belasco has often used trickery and devious intentions against heroes like Magik of the X-men. Working as a middle man for even darker forces, Belasco would reveal their intentions to be capitalist in nature. Looking to bring a soul poison to global markets with endless revenue in it for the Starxxon beneficiaries. Again we find Tony in a situation much harder to punch his way out of and thus his own tact becomes his arsenal once again. The reasoning Tony uses is simple, Roxxon has been defeated by Tony, on the small scale, and the Avengers, on the large scale, countless times. Why would these dark forces ally themselves with a company that are proven losers? Appalled at the news and with his benefactors pulling their support for this endeavor, Belasco’s wrath quickly turns to the board members. Bringing one last act of kindness to the undeserving board, Tony allows the board one final vote, the entire board resigns and turns the company back over to him and in exchange Belasco gets the Mysterium from the Monger. With no real choice save suffering in Limbo, the board agree and all are returned to earth by Druid. The issue ending with Justine abandoning her ambitions and the Monger with Tony. “You’re the Iron Monger now.”
The conclusion of the corporate plotline leads Tony to pursuing the actual magic behind the Iron Monger suit. Recruiting the help of fellow Avengers Iron Heart and Scarlet Witch for this endeavor. Before that though, we get a brief scene of several shadowy goons calling themselves “The Heat” rounding up people in Chicago, including Iron Heart side character Xavier. As Riri pursues the technical analysis, Wanda handles the mystic portion. Battling the evil within the suit she leaves Tony and Riri with a stern warning “It will corrupt the wearer, watch him Riri.” Riri continues the technical analysis, learning the suit could be used to purge the bug infecting the Stark network and thus all the other Iron Man suits. Upon beginning this process they are alerted to one facility on the network the suit cannot access, a SHIELD facility in California. Riri and Tony suit up and recruit the help of Melinda once again for her SHIELD knowledge and make their way to the facility only to find the warehouse being raided by several former SHIELD agents turned mercenaries. A battle ensures that the trio quickly wrap up and look to gleam whatever information they can from the mercs, who also happen to be members of the aforementioned Heat. The goons point them to Chicago as their city of incursion and the iron duo take off for the Windy City, leaving Melinda to wrap up the SHIELD business. Tony’s armor guides them to a facility formerly owned by his father called Hellman Circle. These locations and themes confirmed by Ackerman to be an allusion to Homan Square, the Chicago Police Department facility that gained notoriety following Ackerman’s own investigative reporting in 2015. While some legal minds and the CPD themselves would weakly refute Ackerman’s work, his endeavors would uncover a series of citizen’s rights violations including police brutality, shady lack of detailing regarding detainee booking and restricting access to lawyers for detainees. It’s quite clear that the facility has been flexed as a strong arm of the CPD, echoing the Blacksites used by the CIA in foreign nations to detain, interrogate and harass those deemed suspicious by the entity. The Homan Square allusion proves even more prescient now, in 2025, as the current administration has spent the better part of this year strong arming large cities in the US. Predominantly minority cities have been targeted. Locations like Baltimore, Washington DC, New Orleans and even Chicago finding themselves under threat of a weaponized National Guard in one of the most egregious rights violations in recent memory. Accompanying the ICE invasions of numerous cities, these National Guard incursions would dominate headlines and strike fear into the hearts of these cities’ denizens, as was the intended goal of the administration. It is no secret that the crumbling capitalist structure only has one means with which to defend itself from the will of the people, authoritarianism. As unjust structures from threats to workplace organization and civil rights oppression no longer hold their social sway over us, the powers that be must employ the use of their thugs to try to crush the people. While things may seem bleak it’s important to remember, we have power of our own. Two quotes spring to mind, one from Black Panther Party leader Fred Hampton and one from current New York Mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani (MAYOR ELECT ZOHRAN MAMDANI LETS FUCKING GO). “You can kill a revolutionary but you can never kill a revolution” Hampton would say, a motto for all under the thumb of oppression. “They have all the money in the world and all we have is you” Mamdani would crack in a statement for his race for guiding hand of one of the most important cities on Earth. Both statements echo a similar idea, violent power may lie with the state but moral and collective power will always lie with the people. The revolution is carried on in the hearts of those who look upon our structures and recognize their inherent injustice. The moneyed interest may be wielded by capitalists but the collective “you” will always remain. Issue four concludes with the reveal of who is really behind the Hellman square detention facility, Lucia Von Bardas, successor to the Latverian ruler, Victor Von Doom. Issue five wraps up the arc with a lengthy battle, both ideologically and physically, between the Iron duo and Von Bardas. Trading barbs over US foreign intervention and the role of Stark in these incursions, the battle concludes with Von Bardas defeated and Stark using his suit to empower the tools of the citizens to destroy the facility, quite literally returning power to the people.
Spencer Ackerman’s Stark-Roxxon war is an arc with so much to chew on. An arc that truly seemed daunting and inspiring to engage with and even led me to beginning this amateur writing series. From workplace organization to genocide to immigration injustice, this arc has been a true behemoth to try to boil down to a digestible ramble from a long time nerd. I originally intended to launch this piece and thus this series in late September but following the book festival and rereading the arc several times, days turned into weeks and late September turned into early November. It’s not a flawless arc, no books are. There are elements of the art that don’t click for me personally, I’m not a steampunk fan so the makeshift suit doesn’t tickle my fancy. Some jokes land such as the Iron.GPT aping the continual fuck ups of commercial AIs and (@)nomutants1488 mocking right wing twitter users, and others don’t. I often say comics are an exploratory medium, they are a canvas not many truly know what to do with but the broadest and brightest minds create worlds difficult to replicate with other mediums. The intersection presented by Spencer Ackerman’s lived experience with the comics medium cannot have its importance understated. We’ve seen established comic writers, musicians, artists and social commentators pick up the pen and carve their own space in the industry. Personally, I find Ackerman’s footsteps into the medium to be among the most engaging, well researched journalism accessing the toy box of Marvel brings ideas to minds that would never search for them in The Guardian. Ackerman has been on the frontlines, bringing information and clarity to the people. Ackerman makes no obfuscation of his beliefs in his work. The exact same content in his story, you’ll find on his social media and his newsletter, “Forever Wars”. The message is clear throughout Ackerman’s work, the threats are real but their roadblock is us. That roadblock gets bigger when we’re united. The Stark-Roxxon war is just the first arc of two by Ackerman on Iron Man, I will be visiting those following issues in the future but for now I’m left pondering the end of the Stark-Roxxon war arc. Lucia Von Bardas is truly a deep cut for an adversary but she isn’t the first Latverian ruler to trouble Stark. Tony has previously found himself facing off with a monarch equally iconic and impassioned in his motives. A man clad in armor much like Iron Man and even carried that mantle for a time. His suit
covers the raw flesh torn asunder by his own hubris. His name is Doctor Doom, he’s my favorite villain in all of fiction and I’ve got plenty to say about him in MY next issue.
Resources:
https://www.marvel.com/comics/series/39348/iron_man_vol_1_the_starkroxxon_war_2025
You can find Spencer’s work in the following places and on Bluesky/Instagram (@)attackerman
https://www.forever-wars.com/
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/19/homan-square-chicago-police-disappeared-thousands
For more insight on Palestine check out “The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine” by Rashid khalidi