Tony Stark: (In Universe) Percevied Narcissism vs. Actual Actions
I've been reading a lot of Iron Man and Avengers lately, and while my canon is weirdly spread out (I've read some of the earliest stuff, one storyline from volume 3 Iron Man, the first half dozen issues of Avengers, and the first four New Avengers trades), I'm definitely noticing consistencies and patterns. Which is pretty impressive, actually. I mean, comic book characterization and overall plot style that is consistent over 40 years? That's pretty special.
Not what I wanted to talk about, though. *g* Just letting people know where I'm speaking from. What I actually do want to talk about is an almost bizarre disconnection between Tony Stark's actions and the way he is perceived. I'm going to stick to his perception by other characters in his titles. I could muse on why readers find it so easy to slip into hating him, but that's a whole other post.
I'm going to start off this musing with the scene that started me thinking about it. In "Iron Man: Execute Program" various versions of the Iron Man suit are running amok and Tony is flying around taking them out one by one. The last one is a Hulkbuster suit and in the middle of the battle it grabs Steve and is about to crush him. Tony, realizing that his subconscious is controlling the suit, electrocutes himself to death in order to kill the suit and save Steve.
(Let me pause for a moment here to squee over the incredible slashiness of this scene. I mean, completely aside from the fact that Tony just killed himself to save Steve, his subconscious is controlling the Hulkbuster suit, right? Which means that on a very basic, subconscious level, the best way to hurt or threaten or defeat Tony is to attack Steve. OMG, SQUEE!)
According to the book, Tony is dead for 37 minutes before the paramedics get to him and revive him. If not for the Extremis, he'd be a drooling vegetable, if that. Nick Fury and, um, a black guy whose name I can't recall, are watching Tony in the hospital and the guy says something to the effect of, "I find it hard to believe that someone as narcissistic as Tony Stark would kill himself to save someone else."
My first reaction was, of course, "Of course he did! It was STEVE!"
Then I calmed down and thought about it a bit. *g* And once I thought about it, I thought...WTF? He's surprised Tony would give his life for another person? I mean, this guy knows that Tony Stark is Iron Man. This is the man who spent years fighting crime and defending people while nursing a heart condition that could kill him at any moment. A man who valued his life above all others would have put the armor aside after he got out of trouble in Afghanistan (or Viet Nam, depending on your time line), stuck with the chest plate under his clothes, and carefully avoided excessive stress on his body. More than any other superhero, Tony Stark risked his life everytime he went out as Iron Man. After all, disregarding superpowers and tech, they all started out healthy. Tony started out dying.
Then I started thinking about Tony's typical behavior in a lot of story lines. In "Iron Man: Extremis" he injects himself with an experimental technology whose only other subject went psychotic solely because he believed it was the only way to stop the man from killing more people. He removed safety protocols designed to protect him so that he'd be ready to fight two days faster.
In "New Avengers: The Collective" there's a scene in which Tony takes on the super-powerful bad guy alone, telling the rest of the New Avengers to pull back because he'd "rather they were around to say nice things about [him] when [he's] gone." Given what they'd seen this power do (kill Alpha Flight), they had every reason to believe that it vs. Iron Man alone would be a death sentence for Iron Man. But instead of calling in reinforcements to give them all a fighting chance at survival, he sends an entire team of superheroes away rather than risk their deaths.
This man is the same person people can't believe would give his life to save someone else?
I could, maybe, understand someone who doesn't know about Tony's dual identity believing he would never risk himself. Maybe. But this guy knows that Tony is Iron Man. And it's not like Nick Fury disagrees with him. And through anecdotal conversations, I know that this perception of Tony among insiders in the comic 'verse isn't exactly uncommon.
Which leaves me pretty confused. What is it that makes them see Tony as narcissistic and selfish?
From personal experience and a couple of introductory psychology classes, I know that once people form and accept a cognitive framework (i.e., a belief system, a perception of a situation, an opinion of a person or issue, etc.), it's really freaking hard to change it. People will completely disregard evidence that is contrary to the framework and not even realize that they're doing it.
Now, I assume that most people who don't know Iron Man's identity have a pretty positive perception of him. At least, I haven't seen any non-villains really hating on Iron Man. (Please do correct me if I'm wrong about this; like I said, my canon knowledge isn't exactly comprehensive at this point.) A lot of people (both non-villains and villains) do have issues with Tony Stark. So let's assume that the negative perception people who are "in the know" about Iron Man's identity have towards Tony is a perception they formed prior to learning his identity but which they haven't been able to change due to the aforementioned difficulty in adjusting cognitive frameworks.
(Yes, another parenthetical remark: I'm assuming that Tony's relatively high public profile means that anyone who is going to eventually be in a position to know Iron Man's identity will already have been thoroughly aware of Tony Stark and formed a perception of him. If anyone out there knows of characters who are aware of Tony's dual identity but who had no idea who the heck Tony Stark was before they discovered it, please let me know. I'd be interested to see how they're written.)
This does leave us with the question of why these in-universe characters formed such a powerful negative perception of Tony that even discovering that the man is a superhero isn't enough to shake it. I have some thoughts here, too:
1) When it comes to his own intelligence and competence, there's no question that the man is arrogant. He has an almost dangerously high opinion of his own abilities. Not that it's unfounded, his accomplishments and the fact that the risks he takes based on his intelligence are always successful prove that, but he's definitely arrogant. And not exactly shy about showing it, either.
2) There's a stereotype surrounding successful corporate businessmen and it's not exactly a warm fuzzy one. Not to mention that Tony makes munitions (among other things). When it comes to negatively stereotyped corporate businessmen, the head of a company that makes weapons is probably the worst regarded.
3) Prior to learning of his dual identity, the fact that Tony Stark has to keep running off to be Iron Man makes him look very unreliable. Ah, the ultimate, most common irony of the superhero. But it's true. And relying on someone to put your life before their own is the ultimate form of trust, so of course someone who thinks of Tony Stark as unreliable is going to have a hard time believing he can be trusted like this.
ETA: 4) wordwitch reminded me that Tony Stark is an alcoholic. I can't believe I forgot this! In her words: "In our society, alcoholism is seen as a failure of character and, in fact, a very selfish one, as one pleases oneself (drinks) at the risk of others' comfort, safety, and lives." (I feel the need here to remark that, personally, I consider it a sign of great strength of character for Tony to have sobered up and to remain that way. I believe that there have been canonical slips, but if I recall correctly, he's also been sober for several years now in in-universe time. But alcoholism is seen as a weakness of character, rather than a medical condition, by probably the majority of our society.)
And reinforcing the negative perception of Tony stemming from those sources is the fact that after discovering his dual identity, people generally also discover that Tony lies a to people, even people who know of his dual identity, about really important shit. In older canon when he's been discovered as Iron Man he's repeatedly sworn that someone else was wearing the suit now, while continuing to wear it himself. He's constantly lying about the state of his health, both his heart problem and various illnesses and internal injuries, to people in the know and people who aren't alike. He lies to SHIELD when Director Hill is in charge (not that we blame him for that one), and he lies to Strange, Reed, Namor, and Xavier when they ask if they need to worry about what happened in the Savage Land with SHIELD in the first New Avengers trade. He lies a lot, including to his allies.
For the in-universe characters, who don't know a lot of the things that the readers know about Tony which moderate or entirely tear down these stereotypes (keeping in mind that there are readers who buy in just as much as in-universe characters, despite the readers' inside information), it becomes almost understandable why they have such a negative perception of him. You'd think, though, that after they'd watched him put his life on the line over and over again that maybe they should reevaluate their opinion of him!
I find it interesting, though, that pre-formed stereotypes trump personal experience when it comes to Tony/Iron Man. It seems like no matter how many times he privileges other lives--pretty much anyone else's life--above his own, no matter how much money he pumps into the Avengers, no matter how much hardware he designs and builds for SHIELD, there are always going to be a lot of characters who think of him as a narcissistic and selfish man.
It's kind of sad. But then, Tony is the ultimate woobie.
Thoughts? Other canon incidents to contribute one way or the other? Squee? All are welcome. :-)
Not what I wanted to talk about, though. *g* Just letting people know where I'm speaking from. What I actually do want to talk about is an almost bizarre disconnection between Tony Stark's actions and the way he is perceived. I'm going to stick to his perception by other characters in his titles. I could muse on why readers find it so easy to slip into hating him, but that's a whole other post.
I'm going to start off this musing with the scene that started me thinking about it. In "Iron Man: Execute Program" various versions of the Iron Man suit are running amok and Tony is flying around taking them out one by one. The last one is a Hulkbuster suit and in the middle of the battle it grabs Steve and is about to crush him. Tony, realizing that his subconscious is controlling the suit, electrocutes himself to death in order to kill the suit and save Steve.
(Let me pause for a moment here to squee over the incredible slashiness of this scene. I mean, completely aside from the fact that Tony just killed himself to save Steve, his subconscious is controlling the Hulkbuster suit, right? Which means that on a very basic, subconscious level, the best way to hurt or threaten or defeat Tony is to attack Steve. OMG, SQUEE!)
According to the book, Tony is dead for 37 minutes before the paramedics get to him and revive him. If not for the Extremis, he'd be a drooling vegetable, if that. Nick Fury and, um, a black guy whose name I can't recall, are watching Tony in the hospital and the guy says something to the effect of, "I find it hard to believe that someone as narcissistic as Tony Stark would kill himself to save someone else."
My first reaction was, of course, "Of course he did! It was STEVE!"
Then I calmed down and thought about it a bit. *g* And once I thought about it, I thought...WTF? He's surprised Tony would give his life for another person? I mean, this guy knows that Tony Stark is Iron Man. This is the man who spent years fighting crime and defending people while nursing a heart condition that could kill him at any moment. A man who valued his life above all others would have put the armor aside after he got out of trouble in Afghanistan (or Viet Nam, depending on your time line), stuck with the chest plate under his clothes, and carefully avoided excessive stress on his body. More than any other superhero, Tony Stark risked his life everytime he went out as Iron Man. After all, disregarding superpowers and tech, they all started out healthy. Tony started out dying.
Then I started thinking about Tony's typical behavior in a lot of story lines. In "Iron Man: Extremis" he injects himself with an experimental technology whose only other subject went psychotic solely because he believed it was the only way to stop the man from killing more people. He removed safety protocols designed to protect him so that he'd be ready to fight two days faster.
In "New Avengers: The Collective" there's a scene in which Tony takes on the super-powerful bad guy alone, telling the rest of the New Avengers to pull back because he'd "rather they were around to say nice things about [him] when [he's] gone." Given what they'd seen this power do (kill Alpha Flight), they had every reason to believe that it vs. Iron Man alone would be a death sentence for Iron Man. But instead of calling in reinforcements to give them all a fighting chance at survival, he sends an entire team of superheroes away rather than risk their deaths.
This man is the same person people can't believe would give his life to save someone else?
I could, maybe, understand someone who doesn't know about Tony's dual identity believing he would never risk himself. Maybe. But this guy knows that Tony is Iron Man. And it's not like Nick Fury disagrees with him. And through anecdotal conversations, I know that this perception of Tony among insiders in the comic 'verse isn't exactly uncommon.
Which leaves me pretty confused. What is it that makes them see Tony as narcissistic and selfish?
From personal experience and a couple of introductory psychology classes, I know that once people form and accept a cognitive framework (i.e., a belief system, a perception of a situation, an opinion of a person or issue, etc.), it's really freaking hard to change it. People will completely disregard evidence that is contrary to the framework and not even realize that they're doing it.
Now, I assume that most people who don't know Iron Man's identity have a pretty positive perception of him. At least, I haven't seen any non-villains really hating on Iron Man. (Please do correct me if I'm wrong about this; like I said, my canon knowledge isn't exactly comprehensive at this point.) A lot of people (both non-villains and villains) do have issues with Tony Stark. So let's assume that the negative perception people who are "in the know" about Iron Man's identity have towards Tony is a perception they formed prior to learning his identity but which they haven't been able to change due to the aforementioned difficulty in adjusting cognitive frameworks.
(Yes, another parenthetical remark: I'm assuming that Tony's relatively high public profile means that anyone who is going to eventually be in a position to know Iron Man's identity will already have been thoroughly aware of Tony Stark and formed a perception of him. If anyone out there knows of characters who are aware of Tony's dual identity but who had no idea who the heck Tony Stark was before they discovered it, please let me know. I'd be interested to see how they're written.)
This does leave us with the question of why these in-universe characters formed such a powerful negative perception of Tony that even discovering that the man is a superhero isn't enough to shake it. I have some thoughts here, too:
1) When it comes to his own intelligence and competence, there's no question that the man is arrogant. He has an almost dangerously high opinion of his own abilities. Not that it's unfounded, his accomplishments and the fact that the risks he takes based on his intelligence are always successful prove that, but he's definitely arrogant. And not exactly shy about showing it, either.
2) There's a stereotype surrounding successful corporate businessmen and it's not exactly a warm fuzzy one. Not to mention that Tony makes munitions (among other things). When it comes to negatively stereotyped corporate businessmen, the head of a company that makes weapons is probably the worst regarded.
3) Prior to learning of his dual identity, the fact that Tony Stark has to keep running off to be Iron Man makes him look very unreliable. Ah, the ultimate, most common irony of the superhero. But it's true. And relying on someone to put your life before their own is the ultimate form of trust, so of course someone who thinks of Tony Stark as unreliable is going to have a hard time believing he can be trusted like this.
ETA: 4) wordwitch reminded me that Tony Stark is an alcoholic. I can't believe I forgot this! In her words: "In our society, alcoholism is seen as a failure of character and, in fact, a very selfish one, as one pleases oneself (drinks) at the risk of others' comfort, safety, and lives." (I feel the need here to remark that, personally, I consider it a sign of great strength of character for Tony to have sobered up and to remain that way. I believe that there have been canonical slips, but if I recall correctly, he's also been sober for several years now in in-universe time. But alcoholism is seen as a weakness of character, rather than a medical condition, by probably the majority of our society.)
And reinforcing the negative perception of Tony stemming from those sources is the fact that after discovering his dual identity, people generally also discover that Tony lies a to people, even people who know of his dual identity, about really important shit. In older canon when he's been discovered as Iron Man he's repeatedly sworn that someone else was wearing the suit now, while continuing to wear it himself. He's constantly lying about the state of his health, both his heart problem and various illnesses and internal injuries, to people in the know and people who aren't alike. He lies to SHIELD when Director Hill is in charge (not that we blame him for that one), and he lies to Strange, Reed, Namor, and Xavier when they ask if they need to worry about what happened in the Savage Land with SHIELD in the first New Avengers trade. He lies a lot, including to his allies.
For the in-universe characters, who don't know a lot of the things that the readers know about Tony which moderate or entirely tear down these stereotypes (keeping in mind that there are readers who buy in just as much as in-universe characters, despite the readers' inside information), it becomes almost understandable why they have such a negative perception of him. You'd think, though, that after they'd watched him put his life on the line over and over again that maybe they should reevaluate their opinion of him!
I find it interesting, though, that pre-formed stereotypes trump personal experience when it comes to Tony/Iron Man. It seems like no matter how many times he privileges other lives--pretty much anyone else's life--above his own, no matter how much money he pumps into the Avengers, no matter how much hardware he designs and builds for SHIELD, there are always going to be a lot of characters who think of him as a narcissistic and selfish man.
It's kind of sad. But then, Tony is the ultimate woobie.
Thoughts? Other canon incidents to contribute one way or the other? Squee? All are welcome. :-)