Say hello to the new Iron Woman

[Something Amyss]

Pretty sure it's the Batman Effect. Regular Dude is able to go toe to toe with the Big Boys, due to his intellect and creativity...and a massive, bottomless bank account to fund all the shit he needs to actually compensate for being a regular human. The power fantasy of most nerds, that their intellect can literally make them a superhero. It's the Everyman scenario, sort of the same with why people like Ghostbusters so much. The idea that anybody off the street, with a little training and some equipment, can literally defeat the undead, and tell an ancient god to go fuck off, 'cause this is how we do things downtown!

That's why, I think, he's popular. That and the movies galvanizing him back into the public mindset revitalizing the series.

I imagine the cool toys play a part in that, too. Batman "has a plan" for everything, but Stark has an armour for it, and that's super marketable.

 

[JustAnotherAardvark]

a scrunchy or some ergonomic consideration based on how the helmet gets put on would do the trick.

Can it at least be an unstable scrunchy? I mean, like, do you even super-science?

Still, I'll go with Unstable Molocules, because having a 15 year old MIT student rip those off would piss Reed Richards off to no end. It'd be hilarious.

Rip them off? Reed gives 'em away; wouldn't be surprised if there's a vending machine at MIT.

 

[Zontar]

I mean, sure, her hero's journey is completely over if you have less than a basic understanding of what the hero's journey actually is and think that beating up one bad guy means you've finished it. To everyone else Rey's ending will probably have more to do with Snoke and dealing with her past and something to do with the Jedi rather than that one fight she had with a heavily wounded and emotionally distraught man in the snow.

So basically her ending is going to be the thing the internet has second only to her being Luke's daughter on the list of "things people hope doesn't happen"? I mean hell, the whole point of the movie was to be a quasi-remake of the original, so if you have not-Vader there why would we expect him to be anything other then the primary antagonist to be overcome? Everything else is a beat-for-beat repetition of the original, and it's not as though there's much place else for her to go up given she's already a Jedi master in terms of her abilities.

Besides that, if the audience doesn't see Kylo Ren as a threat then the audience is filled with nothing but idiots who weren't paying attention.

His scenes are almost exclusively of him being a whinny man-child and he got his ass kicked by a literal novice who had no idea what she was doing because she had no experience with the weapon and fighting style being used. The nerf to the gut should have been used to emphasise just how out of her leagues he was by having him win despite the injury, not have her because of it. But that would result in dramatic tension, and you can't have that in an Abrams movie.

It also makes the person this man serves seem extra threatening considering that, since I paid attention, I'm aware that this man is still in training.

A lifetime of training against a person who was a starving scavenger who should consider it a miracle that she managed to just look anything other then sickly due to her circumstances.

This is the Star Wars equivalent of a US Navy Seal who's the top of his unit and spent the decade before joining using his free time in thee cadets and the boy scouts at the same time loosing a fight to a homeless kid who can't even manage a proper meal just because of an injury that isn't that big of a deal all things considered (sure it would kill a normal mook, but he isn't a normal mook). I mean he managed to literally walk it off enough to sprint faster then Rey could and take a path at least twice as long as the one she and Finn did to catch up to them and somehow cut them off. At this point he's mastered the force too much to have his physical abilities compared to a baseline human.

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if one of the later movies retcons the fight as his having thrown it because Smog wants to see what she can do or some other bullshit that tries to make it come off as less stupid then it already was.

 

[Areloch]

Also, "Riri is a science genius who enrolls in MIT at the age of 15. She comes to the attention of Tony when she builds her own Iron Man suit in her dorm. " Dear lord the amount of mary sue in 2 sentences.

I mean, Tony Stark built the first suit in a cave, so it's not exactly the most improbable thing. 'Joined [insert prestigious institute] at [insert improbably young age]' seems pretty par-for-the-course in terms of superhero backstories, especially for a tech-centric one. I really wish it wasn't though.

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

 

[happyninja42]

Pretty sure it's the Batman Effect. Regular Dude is able to go toe to toe with the Big Boys, due to his intellect and creativity...and a massive, bottomless bank account to fund all the shit he needs to actually compensate for being a regular human. The power fantasy of most nerds, that their intellect can literally make them a superhero. It's the Everyman scenario, sort of the same with why people like Ghostbusters so much. The idea that anybody off the street, with a little training and some equipment, can literally defeat the undead, and tell an ancient god to go fuck off, 'cause this is how we do things downtown!

That's why, I think, he's popular. That and the movies galvanizing him back into the public mindset revitalizing the series.

I imagine the cool toys play a part in that, too. Batman "has a plan" for everything, but Stark has an armour for it, and that's super marketable.

Oh absolutley, I'm just saying, they are basically the same heroic archetype. Normal Guy + High Tech Sciencey Stuff = Superhero capable of taking on gods and other crazy shit. And considering how popular Batman is, it doesn't surprise me that Iron Man is popular. Though I don't know if he was always popular? Or if the movies revitalized him in the comic world? Speaking from my own experience, I never read Iron Man, but I knew of him in the general sense, but never really paid him any mind. Then Iron Man 1 came out, and I loved it, still do. So it wouldn't surprise me if Downey was the shot in the arm for the character to become more prominent in the comic world. Or maybe he was always popular, I dunno.

As to why in another post, someone asked why they don't just use that one girl who is already established, probably because nobody knows who she is? She sounds pretty obscure of a character, but if you are trying to target a younger market, and a demographic that is under-represented in the comic scene, your best choice is to come up with a new character that is young (roughly the age bracket of your target audience), and put them in the spotlight. It's self insertion power fantasy at it's most basic. And it works. Most people hate Wesley Crusher, but as a kid actually named Wesley, who was roughly the same age/size/hairstyle/personality/interests as that character, you bet your ass I was totally invested in that show, because I wanted to see how this kid that was almost a clone of me did in the fantasy science world I dreamed of living in.

So yeah, a young, intelligent girl, suddenly becomes a hero? You bet your ass it's going to draw attention of audience members that previously might not have bothered buying an Iron Man comic. It's brilliant marketing, is hardly a new tactic on their part, and expands the readership to a new, less catered to demographic. I fail to see why this is a problem from any angle.

Though I do find it funny that people are saying "Why don't they just make new characters/heroes?!" But then when they did do that with this character (not the new hero bit I admit), others are saying "Why don't they just use this already established character?! Why make a new character?!" Seems highly contrary to me.

Also, "Riri is a science genius who enrolls in MIT at the age of 15. She comes to the attention of Tony when she builds her own Iron Man suit in her dorm. " Dear lord the amount of mary sue in 2 sentences.

I mean, Tony Stark built the first suit in a cave, so it's not exactly the most improbable thing. 'Joined [insert prestigious institute] at [insert improbably young age]' seems pretty par-for-the-course in terms of superhero backstories, especially for a tech-centric one. I really wish it wasn't though.

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

Uh...she's at MIT where they have that stuff for the students to mess with and build shit? An Institute of Technology (in the Marvel universe no less), having access to crazy technology. It boggles the mind! xD

 

[Zontar]

maybe the internet should stop expecting that the protagonist with a mysterious past will learn nothing about their past and will never come into contact with the villain.

Or maybe people are just sick and tired of mysteries from Abrams that never pay off and are always underwhelming, assuming you can't figure it out from the trailers alone (which happens about half the time anyways).

Beyond that, considering how many people complained endlessly about how The Force Awakens was literally the exact same as A New Hope, you'd think "the internet" would want it not to do it some more, but that'd be consistent.

Hey, just because one tiny thing was different doesn't meant that difference was good.

And let's not pretend the internet is homogeneous enough to be consistent on issues.

That whiny man-child seems pretty scary

Well I any many others seem to feel differently. I know quite a few people in the screening I went to where laughing at him.

That starving scavenger seemed to have plenty of food (especially after leaving whatsitsname) and was able to tap into the Force in order to beat a heavily injured and emotionally distraught man.

Yes, that is what happened. And it didn't make a lick of sense from a basic storytelling perspective.

. Apparently, if you're capable of doing something immediately after being wounded, you should still be the picture of power and vitality well afterwards.

Or maybe it's just the fact with how much emphasis was placed on the character being far beyond what a baseline human is, the expectations are placed at where the movie implies his actual level is instead of down to where it goes out of its way to state it isn't.

I would be, but then I'm not purview to the perfect world of fiction that only exists in your fantasies. All I have is the real world that I bothered paying attention to.

Well I would hope that at least the later movies aren't as by-the-numbers, no-risk, no-creativity, 100% nostalgia driven where anyone with even a passing understanding of the cliches of cinema would see everything coming 10 minutes before it happens (how many people under the age of 8 didn't know Han was going to die the moment he yelled "Ben!"? The answer is probably pretty low)

 

[EternallyBored]

Also, "Riri is a science genius who enrolls in MIT at the age of 15. She comes to the attention of Tony when she builds her own Iron Man suit in her dorm. " Dear lord the amount of mary sue in 2 sentences.

I mean, Tony Stark built the first suit in a cave, so it's not exactly the most improbable thing. 'Joined [insert prestigious institute] at [insert improbably young age]' seems pretty par-for-the-course in terms of superhero backstories, especially for a tech-centric one. I really wish it wasn't though.

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

This is the Marvel Universe, New Jersey public High Schoolers have access to that shit. Mile Morales' High School apparently built a giant energy generator that collects static electricity in large enough amounts to be commercially viable. Kamala Khan's high school class built a flying bubble controlled by an intelligent shark for a science fair project (refer to my posted image of skyshark a couple pages back). One of her classmates is not a superhero and cloned a biomechanical t-rex.

The Spiderman villain Shocker built super high tech vibro gauntlets and a suit immune to those same vibrations in a prison machine shop. In a lot of places its shown you can just buy superscience technology off of mercenaries and villains if you've got the money. Superscientists in comics treat technology like a sort of magitech or tinkertech, it doesn't need some complicated industrial base to create superscience, or any sort of complicated mechanisms, you can create death rays in your basement out of old microwave parts.

M.I.T. is actually one of the few places where it makes sense for superscience technology to exist. As for the age, not even going to comment on that, comics often advertise themselves to kids, pretty much every supergenius that gets flashbacks to when they were 10-15 years old was building stuff just as stupidly advanced as a knockoff Iron Man suit that breaks on its first real test.

 

[Zontar]

So she shouldn't learn about her past or encounter the villain, because "people" are sick of mysteries?

No, what she should have had was a past that wasn't needlessly mysterious for a multi-movie mystery that got old before the credits.

I mean, I laughed a little to when he threw his tantrums, but then I'm not someone who has to actually encounter an emotionally unstable man child who can stop bullets with his mind, strangle me from across the room, and only lost when the person he was fighting was empowered by the ultimate power of the universe and he was heavily wounded.

A child with a shotgun is still a child, and a villain who's only a threat to mooks and those contractually destined to die is not a threat to Our Heroes.

Was this your first time experiencing a piece of Star Wars media? Because the Force showing up and empowering people to do incredible things is kind of Star Wars' thing.

Frankly only someone new to Star Wars could have enjoyed that little scene. Even ignoring the fact that The Force was completely redefined in Force Awakens from what it has been for the totality of Star Wars until now, there's nothing magical about a character who learned space magic exists having a sudden mastery of it 5 minutes after learning it exists and using it at a level one can only describe as a master.

Other than all that, this thread isn't really about Star Wars or Mary Sues so it's best to just call it now (or, I should say, I'm calling it now barring any significant changes) since this won't go anywhere and it was never going to go anywhere.

Well at least there's one thing we can agree on.

 

[Areloch]

Also, "Riri is a science genius who enrolls in MIT at the age of 15. She comes to the attention of Tony when she builds her own Iron Man suit in her dorm. " Dear lord the amount of mary sue in 2 sentences.

I mean, Tony Stark built the first suit in a cave, so it's not exactly the most improbable thing. 'Joined [insert prestigious institute] at [insert improbably young age]' seems pretty par-for-the-course in terms of superhero backstories, especially for a tech-centric one. I really wish it wasn't though.

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

This is the Marvel Universe, New Jersey public High Schoolers have access to that shit. Mile Morales' High School apparently built a giant energy generator that collects static electricity in large enough amounts to be commercially viable. Kamala Khan's high school class built a flying bubble controlled by an intelligent shark for a science fair project (refer to my posted image of skyshark a couple pages back). One of her classmates is not a superhero and cloned a biomechanical t-rex.

The Spiderman villain Shocker built super high tech vibro gauntlets and a suit immune to those same vibrations in a prison machine shop. In a lot of places its shown you can just buy superscience technology off of mercenaries and villains if you've got the money. Superscientists in comics treat technology like a sort of magitech or tinkertech, it doesn't need some complicated industrial base to create superscience, or any sort of complicated mechanisms, you can create death rays in your basement out of old microwave parts.

M.I.T. is actually one of the few places where it makes sense for superscience technology to exist. As for the age, not even going to comment on that, comics often advertise themselves to kids, pretty much every supergenius that gets flashbacks to when they were 10-15 years old was building stuff just as stupidly advanced as a knockoff Iron Man suit that breaks on its first real test.

Really? Haha, wow, Marvel is more insane a setting than I remember. Feels like something like that would hit a critical mass where if anyone has access to hyper-science, what the purpose of dedicated superheroes are. I mean, OTHER than printing money with 0 effort.

 

[Areloch]

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

Uh...she's at MIT where they have that stuff for the students to mess with and build shit? An Institute of Technology (in the Marvel universe no less), having access to crazy technology. It boggles the mind! xD

Hm, didn't get a notice about this quote, sorry. As per my reply to EternallyBored, I hadn't been privy to just how ludicrous the base tech level in Marvel had gotten(I only periodically catch up on major story arcs and stuff). So yeah, I guess contexted like that it would fit. Just, compared to reality, even MIT students wouldn't have access to materials to build a compact nuclear reactor in their dorm room, super genius or no.

I dunno, I guess my sense of relative scale to a totally normal, non-giga-super-genius character in Marvel is completely screwed at this point. I mean, obviously writers are gunna shoe-horn in any reason or plot device to do whatever whimsy they want, but it feels like about the time that any random person can fart and build a trans-dimensional teleporter, it undermines all interest and intrigue of the characters we should be finding special.

 

[Ryotknife]

I hope they introduce some freakin flaws to her. People who are 100% perfect are boring. That is the one thing I like about Iron Man from the movies. Yea he is smart and rich, but he is a horrible broken person.

Hell, even Rey from Star Wars wasnt this perfect, and she became a Jedi master and one of the best pilots in the galaxy in like 5 minutes without any training/experience whatsoever.

 

[EternallyBored]

Really? Haha, wow, Marvel is more insane a setting than I remember. Feels like something like that would hit a critical mass where if anyone has access to hyper-science, what the purpose of dedicated superheroes are. I mean, OTHER than printing money with 0 effort.

Marvel and DC superscience pretty much work because the timelines get reset at some point, so all those awesome inventions that should have turned Earth into a sci-fi Wonderland 30 years ago just kind of poof out of existence.

For the timelines, DC and Marvel tend to reset the time period and technology through events, so technically every decade or so all the superscience and its potential effect on civilians or society at large gets reset with whatever major event happens, you'll see stuff like heroes curing major diseases or the super rich and superscience heroes coming up with all kinds of gadgets they talk about releasing to the public, but then Superboy Prime punches reality, or Darkseid get a hold of the anti-life equation, or someone finds a cosmic cube, and suddenly the heroes are back to being relatively new while the world has advanced to the 1970's,80's, or 90's technology wise. Some are time locked, like Magneto always being involved in WWII, but most heroes get their origin stories updated every decade or two, like how Iron Man went from being captured in Vietnam, to captured in the Middle East.

Also, the "Reed Richards is Useless trope", which is still used, but not as often anymore, back in the day it was the preferred method of handling superscience, have a hero invent something world changing, have them use it once, then never mention its existence ever again. Which is why Tony Stark has been building Ark reactors since Vietnam, but cars in 2016 Marvel still run on gasoline.

Its a bizarre effect of comics companies trying to merge all their superheroes into one world while still keeping it looking recognizably like our Earth today, its very complicated, and I honestly don't blame non comics fans for thinking its a pointlessly convoluted mess.

 

[shrekfan246]

Just, compared to reality,

It's probably not a good idea to start comparing comic books to reality.

For one thing, literally none of the most famous superheroes would even still be alive to care that their legacy is being adopted by other people.

 

[happyninja42]

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

Uh...she's at MIT where they have that stuff for the students to mess with and build shit? An Institute of Technology (in the Marvel universe no less), having access to crazy technology. It boggles the mind! xD

Hm, didn't get a notice about this quote, sorry. As per my reply to EternallyBored, I hadn't been privy to just how ludicrous the base tech level in Marvel had gotten(I only periodically catch up on major story arcs and stuff). So yeah, I guess contexted like that it would fit. Just, compared to reality, even MIT students wouldn't have access to materials to build a compact nuclear reactor in their dorm room, super genius or no.

I dunno, I guess my sense of relative scale to a totally normal, non-giga-super-genius character in Marvel is completely screwed at this point. I mean, obviously writers are gunna shoe-horn in any reason or plot device to do whatever whimsy they want, but it feels like about the time that any random person can fart and build a trans-dimensional teleporter, it undermines all interest and intrigue of the characters we should be finding special.

Well I've seen one article state that she reverse engineers one of his suits. Pretty sure it was from Bendis himself but I could be wrong. Not sure how she would get her hands on a suit of his to reverse engineer, but if that is the case, then that's way easier to deal with, if you are worried about believability in a world with time travel, fortune telling, space science gods, spider people, mutants, and every other crazy thing under the sun. But sure, let's worry about the access level for tech in a school and make sure that's accurate to life! xD

I'm teasing a bit, I just find, considering all the other crazy stuff that we accept as fans, to draw the line at "where did she get this tech?" seems a bit off. I mean if Peter Parker can (at least in some variations), come up with wrist mounted web shooters, AND come up with a chemical concoction that has the tensile strength of actual spider webbing, but on a human scale (something today's science can't do mind you), and he was able to do that by scrounging for parts, when people like Tony didn't even think of it, I'm willing to allow a girl to make a rocket suit. Besides, we don't know if it has an arc reactor in it. For all we know, her original mockup suit only has enough power for like, one flight. It's a proof-of-concept or something, and that get's his attention.

Bottom line, we know nothing about what's actually going on with the character's origin, other than some very basic concepts and details. Until the actual issue comes out, we should probably give her the benefit of the doubt.

 

[Areloch]

That's been brought up as a counter-example a few times now, and while I don't remember how it was handled in the comics so well, if it's even remotely like the movie, he was also surrounded by millions of dollars of military-grade equipment and told to build stuff. Sure, he sidestepped their orders and somehow built a robo suit without them noticing, but lacking for expensive, fancy material he wasn't.

How on earth does a 15 year old MIT student get access to that kinda stuff?

Uh...she's at MIT where they have that stuff for the students to mess with and build shit? An Institute of Technology (in the Marvel universe no less), having access to crazy technology. It boggles the mind! xD

Hm, didn't get a notice about this quote, sorry. As per my reply to EternallyBored, I hadn't been privy to just how ludicrous the base tech level in Marvel had gotten(I only periodically catch up on major story arcs and stuff). So yeah, I guess contexted like that it would fit. Just, compared to reality, even MIT students wouldn't have access to materials to build a compact nuclear reactor in their dorm room, super genius or no.

I dunno, I guess my sense of relative scale to a totally normal, non-giga-super-genius character in Marvel is completely screwed at this point. I mean, obviously writers are gunna shoe-horn in any reason or plot device to do whatever whimsy they want, but it feels like about the time that any random person can fart and build a trans-dimensional teleporter, it undermines all interest and intrigue of the characters we should be finding special.

Well I've seen one article state that she reverse engineers one of his suits. Pretty sure it was from Bendis himself but I could be wrong. Not sure how she would get her hands on a suit of his to reverse engineer, but if that is the case, then that's way easier to deal with, if you are worried about believability in a world with time travel, fortune telling, space science gods, spider people, mutants, and every other crazy thing under the sun. But sure, let's worry about the access level for tech in a school and make sure that's accurate to life! xD

I'm teasing a bit, I just find, considering all the other crazy stuff that we accept as fans, to draw the line at "where did she get this tech?" seems a bit off. I mean if Peter Parker can (at least in some variations), come up with wrist mounted web shooters, AND come up with a chemical concoction that has the tensile strength of actual spider webbing, but on a human scale (something today's science can't do mind you), and he was able to do that by scrounging for parts, when people like Tony didn't even think of it, I'm willing to allow a girl to make a rocket suit. Besides, we don't know if it has an arc reactor in it. For all we know, her original mockup suit only has enough power for like, one flight. It's a proof-of-concept or something, and that get's his attention.

Bottom line, we know nothing about what's actually going on with the character's origin, other than some very basic concepts and details. Until the actual issue comes out, we should probably give her the benefit of the doubt.

Yeah, I know. I'm just grousing because I find the general handling of Marvel/DC profoundly absurd from a setting standpoint. Frankly, I think comics as a storytelling medium would probably be better served by having separated, beginning-middle-end arcs rather than constant reboots, recycles, rehashes and remixes.

But that's never happening, so not much point in hoping.

Just, compared to reality,

It's probably not a good idea to start comparing comic books to reality.

For one thing, literally none of the most famous superheroes would even still be alive to care that their legacy is being adopted by other people.

To be fair, they do a lot to ground it all in a modern setting, while simultaneously making it so incredibly detached from reality it makes you wonder why they bother with Trump-expies or setting anything in what looks like a 1:1 replica of modern-day New York. If they're gunna completely toss out reality so you can have whatever crazy story they're rolling at the time, it feels aggressively lazy to hamstring themselves to a modern, real-life proxy setting for everything - except when it isn't.

Like I said to HappyNinja, mostly just grousing because I dislike how they do storytelling, but my grousing doesn't really impact anything and it's not gunna change, so eh.

Really? Haha, wow, Marvel is more insane a setting than I remember. Feels like something like that would hit a critical mass where if anyone has access to hyper-science, what the purpose of dedicated superheroes are. I mean, OTHER than printing money with 0 effort.

Marvel and DC superscience pretty much work because the timelines get reset at some point, so all those awesome inventions that should have turned Earth into a sci-fi Wonderland 30 years ago just kind of poof out of existence.

For the timelines, DC and Marvel tend to reset the time period and technology through events, so technically every decade or so all the superscience and its potential effect on civilians or society at large gets reset with whatever major event happens, you'll see stuff like heroes curing major diseases or the super rich and superscience heroes coming up with all kinds of gadgets they talk about releasing to the public, but then Superboy Prime punches reality, or Darkseid get a hold of the anti-life equation, or someone finds a cosmic cube, and suddenly the heroes are back to being relatively new while the world has advanced to the 1970's,80's, or 90's technology wise. Some are time locked, like Magneto always being involved in WWII, but most heroes get their origin stories updated every decade or two, like how Iron Man went from being captured in Vietnam, to captured in the Middle East.

Also, the "Reed Richards is Useless trope", which is still used, but not as often anymore, back in the day it was the preferred method of handling superscience, have a hero invent something world changing, have them use it once, then never mention its existence ever again. Which is why Tony Stark has been building Ark reactors since Vietnam, but cars in 2016 Marvel still run on gasoline.

Its a bizarre effect of comics companies trying to merge all their superheroes into one world while still keeping it looking recognizably like our Earth today, its very complicated, and I honestly don't blame non comics fans for thinking its a pointlessly convoluted mess.

Ah, man I totally forgot about that trope. Yeah, like I've said, it feels super lazy to just have all that build up, soup up everything, fix everything, make everything better and then boop, we hit the reboot button and we're back at the beginning! Again! Only THIS time, all the characters are exactly the same! Unless they're not! See you all next year for the next reboot!

Just let the characters die and come up with some original stories! (Which will never happen because reboots are like printing money with even less effort than owning a printing press)

 

[Redd the Sock]

Honestly, comparing Riri's and Tony's mary sue level is a bit unfair. Iron Man was created in the early sixties for an age demographic of people in single digits. We were young, stupid, and none of these tropes had been as badly overused as they are, and most didn't even have a name. I mean, starting from that point, what will she fight: an evil twin that wants to destroy good things because evil is better? Someone in million dollar power armor stealing a few thousand from a bank? A lot of stuff that worked when comics started doesn't fly anymore. Hell, stuff from the bronze age can be hard to swallow (just re-watch some old Superfriends episodes, or everyone's favorite from the 80s FF cartoon, Reed beating Magneto by holding him up with a fake wooden gun.)

I don't know. I think it's reasonable to ask if you're creating a new character, why start with an origin point people have long since called tired and overdone? Moreover, unless the complaints are right and she was created to be "look how awesome and perfect I am" and you don't want to admit it, why be hostile to the question? Are we so anxious to shout racism / sexism we can't stop to say, okay, I see how you get that, but fault X Y or Z is coming down the pike to add to her character? She isn't going to get the decades Tony did to develop alcoholism, a guilt complex over how her armor is used, or the general arrogant shitiness Tony's had the last 25 years or better (fun fact, Tony lying and manipulating Rhodey is what lead to him becoming "War Machine" and not just a replacement Iron Man). Hell, even the first movie didn't get halfway before establishing Tony as a bit more Rainman than genius (engineering savant, can't remember social security number).

Though the thing I have the most problem with is the age. Savantness aside, when did the old guard lighten up on full time superheroing from teenagers? In my day you couldnt' be an Avenger until you were 18, and those under that were discouraged from getting involved. Yeah, some sliped through in the past, and they did eventually get the need to provide training, but full on stick in the mud Iron Man saying, you 15, sure, go face the Mandarin and Fin fAng Foom", yeah, I don't see it.

 

[Something Amyss]

Yah...

And yes, I know... 'We still have the old stuff we love.' All the same... something sad about the entire universe being trashed. It's not even like Star Wars, where the core material still counts - It's like if they rebooted Star Wars, but the only thing they kept was the lightsabers.

At least we get rid of SGU!

>.>

Which some people liked, I guess!

<.<

The most disappointing part is that they basically said "hey, you know that 20 years of creativity that made you all love the franchise? Well, fuck that, we're going back to the guy who hasn't made a good movie since Independence Day!"

Which, in fairness is what SYFy did with the series anyway, minus the Independence Day part.

still, I can't bring myself to care. Mostly because SyFy wasn't going to give it any love anyway, so I can not watch Stargate 2: Will Smith is dead in this one, too! as well as I could not watch a movie that didn't come out.

Would it, though? Pretty sure Iron Maidens predate the band (Though their still not as old as people used to claim).

It has nothing to do with that, though. You can brand a name like Iron Maiden and not only has Iron Maiden done it in most entertainment niches, but other people have done it for metal companies and the like. They could probably get away with it in comics, maybe even in film, but there are so many trademarks I doubt they could do any merchandising at all.

Would it? Was there a big legal battle between Iron Man and Black Sabbath for the song? I don't remember one. Granted I didn't really pay much attention to that kind of stuff, but it seemed to be a fairly mutual thing on that angle.

Iron Man is a song title, which doesn't offer the same type of protection. The song Iron Man would at the very least have to provide market confusion, with a judge deciding that there is some reasonable confusion of the brand. It also doesn't hurt that both the band and Marvel apparently enjoy the association, going so far as to have a verasion of the song in the first IM movie and have Tony wearing a Sabbath shirt in The avengers.

Iron Maiden is a band name, trademarked for goods and services, mostly in entertainment, and is a different beast.

I don't know who that is but I'll take your word for it! Still, I just find the mental image of this 15 year old girl in a badass power suit, rocking out to Iron Maiden as she comes swooping in to save the day and kick ass incredibly satisfying. I have no idea if it would actually happen, but it makes me giggle in my head. xD

And it'd be an especially big problem if she was, in fact, rocking out to Maiden.

Anyway, knowing Speedball/Penance requires knowing too much about the comic book version of Civil War. Which is to say, anything. However, Penance could only use his power when he was in pain, so he had a suit with hundreds of spikes poking into him. Not quite the same as an iron maiden, but close enough for jazz.

Oh absolutley, I'm just saying, they are basically the same heroic archetype. Normal Guy + High Tech Sciencey Stuff = Superhero capable of taking on gods and other crazy shit.

Well, yes, but the number of toys you can sell is important to getting someone into kids' homes. I used to have multiple Iron Man figures before I'd read an Iron Man comic. I imagine this has something to do with his ubiquity, when there are so many guys like him out there.

As to why in another post, someone asked why they don't just use that one girl who is already established, probably because nobody knows who she is?

Pepper Potts and Happy Hogan are pretty much the main (stable) supporting cast of Tony's life in the comics, something which carries over into the movies. Not so much Hogan, but Pepper is vital to Tony's functioning on any even remotely adult level. Pepper even gets injected with Extremis in 3.

Granted, I don't collect comics like I used to. They may have both been killed off by now. Several times, if Marvel is still Marvel.

I would think just the fact that Pepper has been featured in the movies would be a good selling point for her being Iron Woman.

Though I do find it funny that people are saying "Why don't they just make new characters/heroes?!" But then when they did do that with this character (not the new hero bit I admit), others are saying "Why don't they just use this already established character?! Why make a new character?!" Seems highly contrary to me.

Because you have to operate under the idea that there's any internal consistency to these complaints. Legacy heroes aren't new, and they didn't really seem to be a problem until they started introducing women and people of colour. You'll notice the complaints shifted when the identity of Thor was revealed, for example.

Comic books spent over half a century pandering to straight white boys. And now that they're not the only audience, it's a problem. It's a problem if they create new characters if they create legacy characters, and if they use established characters. The only way to stop the complaints is to uphold the status quo and market solely to straight white male nerds. Which is sort of amusing to me, since most of the "fans" who are upset only exist because the Big Two changed their focus in the 70s and 80s. And to an extent, I'm one of them.

All of my original comment should be taken with a side of sarcasm. Even if the Slurm thing is probably going to happen

I was just having fun with it. Though the Slurm thing is totally going to happen.