Iron Man books reviewed

[selenak]

The US: among other things, country where you can get American comics way cheaper than a month late and very expensive in Germany. Hence my aquisition of three trade volumes.

Comments

[the_sandwalker]

I read Extremis as it was coming out, which was a task. The artist (I'm blanking on his name now) was just completely unable to stick to a schedule. Months would pass between issues. I'm still not sure that I've read the last one.

I do love me some Ellis, though.

Man, I miss working in a comic book store. I got to read everything for free...

[selenak]

Adi Granov (she says, volume in hand), and I suppose I was lucky to have waited for the trade volumes then.*g*

[likeadeuce]

I haven't actually read the Extremis volume -- that's one I ought to track down -- though it's interesting Ellis uses the crusading reporter as a foil for Tony, as such was the hero of his Transmetropolitan series.

Rubicon came out very late in Civil War -- it was a fill-in issue when it took them so long to get issue 7 together -- so it was almost certainly after Execute Program.

[selenak]

I promise you'll find Extremis worth tracking down. It so reminded me of your Tony voice for tm.

Rubicon: then the Knaufs get the credit for using the argument first!

[likeadeuce]

It might actually make me care about Maya, too.

[selenak]

It worked for me, but then I wasn't anti-Maya before, either. But her introduction here is excellent.

[papajoemambo]

Actually, it's too bad that the Civil War issue where Happy Hogan is mercy-killed in his hospital bed isn't part of the set, because that's the story that convinced me that the Knaufs really had quite a good grasp on Tony as a character.

I'm quite enjoying the run as it is. I strongly recommend Joe Kelly's issues as well - especially the recently-begun "Enter The Mandarin: miniseries.

[selenak]

I had read the Civil War issue with Happy Hogan's death in the Civil War: Iron Man trade, and I agree it's outstanding and definite proof of the writers having a grasp on the character, but presumably there is a Marvel mandate to put all the CW-related issues only in CW collections?

Thank you for the Joe Kelly tip: I'll look him up.

[likeadeuce]

but presumably there is a Marvel mandate to put all the CW-related issues only in CW collections?

Nope, a lot of the CW issues get double-published. They're handling Iron Man oddly.

[papajoemambo]

I think we may see the Knaufs' material in one omnibus volume, eventually, as they have recently collected the the first 25 issues of the Brubaker material in Captain America for release soon. Might not be until the Iron Man movie is closer to being in theatres.

I'd also recommend Kelly's Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes books - plenty of good Tony Stark in that, particularly the first one, in how he relates to Cap and Thor early in his career (he has a rough time accepting that Thor is an ancient heathen god, for example), and it has a good batch of the Jarvis/Tony relationship as well.

[harmonyangel]

It's very late, so I don't really have anything coherent to say, but this is a very good, thoughtful analysis of the series, and I very much enjoyed reading it. :)

[selenak]

Thank you; coming from the expert, that means a lot!

[harmonyangel]

Haha, I wouldn't exactly call myself an expert on anything; in fact, there are still a few issues of Execute Program that I never got around to reading. But thank you.

Also, you certainly made more sense of all the issues at play in "Extremis" than I did at the time. I'm glad I'm not the only one who thought the actual villain was a little weak.

[selenak]

He was, but then again, he was only the MacGuffin, and his being a little weak was made up for by Maya and Sal being anything but.