Invincible Iron Man #1: Prologues and pariahs…

After the loss of Tony Stark’s fortune due to buying up all of the black market weapons from Source Control, Tony is trying to rebuild from the ground up. Again. It’s a status quo that we’ve seen several times over, to the point it’s almost became one of his standard starting points, along with his technology falling into the wrong hands, or falling into a world of addiction. With this story we get a little from all three of these categories, so how will the team go from here? 

Gerry Duggan’s become one of Marvel’s go-to franchise writers, who has tackled almost all of the bigger franchises, minus a few staples, like the Fantastic Four and Captain America, so checking this box was just a matter of time, while Juan Frigeri is quickly becoming one of Marvel’s rising artistic stars, to the point that I can see him being a part of the Stormbreakers class of 2024. Duggan’s voice for Tony is…okay. It’s similar enough to others voices for him, nothing strikes me as being off kilter, or off key, but it’s also not groundbreaking, giving us a take that could give us a Tony that’s an actual futurist, but it’s not really looking forward if all we do is rely on the past? 

Juan Frigeri, on the other hand, is here, and he’s just getting started. Frigeri’s style is sharp, and the figure work is great, with the tech looking high tech and next level, which is something that’s crucial to any Iron Man yarn. Mix this with the dynamic way he gives us scenes from the ‘80s, where Tony had a sick mullet, and Rhodey had a high top fade, like Kidd N Play used to rock, to the neoclassical design of Tony’s retro inspired armor, the Mark 70, which was designed by Alex Ross for the last volume, and he makes it work flawlessly. Frigeri’s an artist that’s been on my radar after I saw his work on the last arc of Guardians of the Galaxy with Al Ewing, and he’s kept impressing me with every new project since. I’m especially a fan of his run on Captain Marvel, with Kelly Thompson, hopefully this will top that. 

There’s a new, or possibly new, threat that’s gunning for Stark at his (supposed) absolute lowest and after the events of the last series, he’s not at a personal high point in his life. Not only has he lost his fortune, but he’s become a pariah in the superhero world, as well as public opinion. Someone figured out a way to hit Tony where it hurts most, which is to make everyone in his world distrust him, and if Tony can’t be trusted by those who know him best, what about the rest of this world? If the last chapter was Tony’s Fall From Grace, will this be his Born Again? Could the focus on Tony’s past be the preview of a bold new era? Only time will tell, but I’m ready for a change of pace. You can only hit the same notes so many times before they lose all meaning.