Iron Man #117-#119

I’ve talked a little about how comics took a turn for the goofy after the 1954 Senate investigation into the effects of comic books on juvenile delinquency. (Spoiler alert: There were none.)  As a result of the hearings and the bad publicity they engendered, the Comics Code Authority was established.  Its job was to prevent such wayward influences as bad grammar, “sex perversion” (read: non-straight people), and say-no-to-drugs messages from infiltrating our comic books. By the early 1970s, the CCA’s influence slackened just enough to allow two important supporting characters—Harry Osborn from Marvel and Roy Harper from DC—to be revealed as drug addicts without their respective publishers running into significant trouble.  Ten years later, having a comic book tackle such serious topics as race relations, homelessness, and addiction was practically the norm.  That’s not to say these topics were all handled well, but a wobbly first step is better than none at all.

And that brings us to today’s topic: Demon in a Bottle, one of the more famous of Marvel’s Bronze Age attempts at sincerity.  It’s a big ‘un, so be sure to check back throughout the next few weeks to see how this arc develops.

Incidentally, if you have a subscription to Marvel’s website and read these comics online the way I do, you’ll probably notice that they claim the beginning of the Demon in a Bottle arc is issue #120.  This is a pack of lies.  It plainly starts with issue #117, as you shall soon see, and I genuinely have no clue why Marvel would tell you otherwise.  They’re missing out on a chance to sell you more comic books, for crying out loud.

Anyway.

Our story begins with the mercenary Spymaster shooting Tony Stark in the head.

 
Well, that was a quick review.  Who wants Twinkies?

No, of course not.  That was just a life model decoy that got shot while Tony, as Iron Man, hid in the next room.  He tries to pursue the would-be killer but loses his trail.  Then he returns to his penthouse to brood about how it was recently blown up (long story), but he finds that the building’s other tenants have signed a petition to have him evicted.  And judging by the names on said petition, it would appear that Han Solo, Luke Skywalker, Richard Burton, Fred Hembeck and Helena “Earth-2 Huntress” Wayne all have a grudge against Tony Stark.

 

Great sitcom idea… or GREATEST sitcom idea?

Meanwhile, there’s no rest for the heroic, as Tony has to go to a party held in honor of some vaguely European ambassador, where we get this bit of foreshadowing.

 

This is the first hint in what proved to be a very slow, year-long build-up to Tony’s full-blown alcoholism, which I genuinely appreciate.  In this sense, alcoholism is treated realistically and dead-serious—it’s not something that pops up overnight for no reason.  It builds gradually over time, sometimes without the alcoholic or the people around him/her even realizing what’s happening until things have completely spiraled out of control.  I’m hardly an expert in the field, but to have the entire story arc take up only one or two issues would have cheapened it considerably.  Here, we really get to see how and why Tony made the choices, conscious or otherwise, that he did.  As a result, we identify and sympathize with him all the more.  Or at least we will, once I stop yapping and get on with the review.

At the party, Tony meets a bodyguard named Bethany Cabe.  We’ll see much more of her later.  For now, Spymaster is, well, spying on the party in a disguise I somehow doubt he’d get away with today.

 

It’s right around now that Spymaster realizes he failed to kill Tony after all.  He follows Tony home, only to bump into Iron Man first.  The rest of the issue is basically just one big fight scene that ends with Spymaster being punched through a building.

 

I’m sure he’ll be fine.

Iron Man discovers Spymaster was trying to steal information about Stark Industries’ shareholders in addition to trying to off Stark.  What he doesn’t know—but the audience does—is who hired Spymaster in the first place…

 

 

I love the fact that Fury was apparently drinking out of this elegant little teacup.  Lookit that thing, it’s smaller than his hand!  And I especially love the expression on the guy sitting next to him.  "My God, the unshaven, cigar-chomping man covered in guns is CRAZY!!!"

(And for you young whippersnappers in the audience, yes, Nick Fury used to be a white guy.  You think that’s weird, wait’ll you see what they’ve done with Jarvis.)

The next issue begins when Tony notices that Spymaster’s weapons were all built by Stark Industries and sold to SHIELD back when Stark Industries actually built weapons.  And since he’s been invited to the SHIELD/NATO defense symposium we saw last issue, Tony decides to do some investigatin’ while he’s in SHIELD’s HQ. 

Speaking of SHIELD HQ…

 

You’d think SHIELD would train its agents to come up with better one-liners.

The minute Tony arrives, he starts snooping through their computer files and steals some particularly suspicious ones for later examination.  Unfortunately, his actions have attracted the attention of our resident evil SHIELD agents, who pump the entire helicarrier full of knock-out gas.  By the time Tony wakes up, they’ve got him doing an impression of Piper and Trickster from Countdown.

 
Unlike Piper and Trickster, Tony manages the quick change to Iron Man before going kersplash (the suit is in that briefcase he carries around with him).  Now thoroughly ticked off, Iron Man races back to the helicarrier in time to hide and overhear the agents helpfully exposit about how they joined SHIELD so they’d have access to the materials needed to kill Stark and take over Stark Industries.  The motive?  They want him to start manufacturing weapons again for the protection of AMERICA!!1!!  Should have known real SHIELD agents would be wittier than these losers.

And then this happens.

 

Well gee, it’s almost like walking around with a giant flashlight on your chest is bad for stealth or something.

Iron Man manages to beat them up anyway, at least until one of the baddies puts a gun to the still-unconscious Fury’s head.  He threatens to shoot unless Iron Man offs himself with his repulsor rays.  (Dear Spellcheck: ‘Repulsor’ is totally a word, shut up.)

And that’s where Issue 119 picks up.  Iron Man does get the gun away from Fury… but he’s just in time to discover a wee tiny problem.

 

Yeah, remember how I said everyone on board is unconscious thanks to the bad guys’ knock-out gas?  Apparently that includes the pilots.  True men of genius.  Especially since the Russians, having tried and failed to contact the (unconscious) pilots by radio, are now firing missiles at the helicarrier. 

Iron Man goes outside to fight them off.  Fury finally comes around, notices what happened, and is not pleased.

 
I have no idea what the heck he just said, but I desperately want it on a t-shirt.

Iron Man destroys the Soviet jets (being careful not to hurt the pilots) just before the helicarrier squeaks back into friendly territory.  Iron Man once again returns to the helicarrier to… um… interview for a job at Sonic.

 

Why does Iron Man have roller skates built into his suit?  And why the heck is he using them now?  Unless the helicarrier has a roller rink on board.  Which would actually be kind of awesome, if I weren’t busy having flashbacks to Batman and Robin.

After leaving the bad guys to Fury’s tender loving care, Iron Man conveniently vanishes in time for Tony Stark to reappear.  He asks Fury to drop him off at the Paris branch of Stark Industries.  There, he examines the files he stole from SHIELD and discovers that the bad guys weren’t quite as autonomous as he thought.

 

In other words, while SHIELD doesn’t want Tony dead, they do want him reduced to a figurehead of his own company while our favorite spies fill their own stockings with sharp explodey things.  Which makes Tony a very unhappy man.

 

Yes, Tony, you go ahead and take all the time you need to drink think things out.  (Seriously, though, I love these panels.  I can’t even explain why, I just do.  Though I do have to wonder what that random bottle of alcohol was doing there.)

Not a whole lot has happened so far, so I’m sorry if a lot of this review felt like exposition, but that is kind of what it was.  But now we have all the things we need—characters, motivations, plots, and set-ups—to really get the ball rolling on this most famous of story arcs.  Hopefully they take the hint and do so.

Next Time: Tony Stark deals with a renegade model from the “It’s Raining Men” video and Iron Man's performance issues.

Images from Iron Man #117, Iron Man #118 and Iron Man #119