Review: Invincible Iron Man # 500.1
Fanboying over Matt Fraction and Salvador Larroca‘s Invincible Iron Man # 500.1 which looks to introduce Marvel’s shell head to new comic book readers via Marvel’s “point one” program.
Before we begin, let us all say MISSION ACCOMPLISHED to our dear Matt who not only successfully follows the agenda of the .1 issues but in true awesomeness manages to tell a great story in the life of one Tony Stark.
While Fraction displays his knowledge about Iron Man and the past struggles he has encountered to be where he is right now, it is the actual narrative done by Tony Stark in an Alcoholic’s Anonymous meeting that really gets the job done. From a problematic and understandable childhood to the ups and downs, Salvador Larroca hits all the high notes in this issue.
Most of the important stuff in Stark’s life has been touched upon in this great issue including the formation of the Avengers to even the very weird 90s storyline where Marvel turned Stark into a teenager after the older Stark gets mind-controlled by Kang from the future (believe me I know its hard to understand)…
Larroca’s art while a bit jarring at first for usual readers (or for the casual comic book reader) but once you get the hang of it, you really start to appreciate it. Give the guy a great colorist and you can definitely go “Wow” give him a bad colorist and you still say “wow”. 500.1 just does that intentionally. Splitting the timeline between the flashback scenes and what is currently going on, there won’t be a lot of times that you’ll go “is this in the present?” thanks to the colors that were integrate in the issue.
Overall, I love the timing, the execution and the art and narrative for the book. It’s simple and concise and tells you everything you’ll really need to know about the Armored Avenger and his exploits.
And it won’t be an Iron Man book without Tony Stark getting a clever line or two that makes hims so unique and so quirky a character in the Marvel Universe.
Earl Maghirang runs www.thefanboyseo.com and is currently getting his Kamen Rider fix….
