Iron Man was created by Marvel's leading creator Stan Lee (above) and Don Heck in 1963. Iron Man first appeared in Tales of Suspense # 39, and was a founding member of the Avengers. In his own title, the first series was 332 issues that lasted from 1968 up to 1996 when the series was cancelled during the Onslaught Saga. In this series we saw a lot of ups and downs for our hero. Company buy outs, alchoholism, many near death experiences, love and death, helped shape the hero inside, and out of the armor Tony Stark is even to this day.

      In 1996, Iron Man appeared in Heros Reborn, Iron Man. This series existed out of the normal Marvel Universe, and inside a pocket universe created by Franklin Richards to save heros from Onslaught. This series had a darker look on the Avenger. His origin was retold as a battle with the Hulk sent shrapnel to his heart. Tony donned the experimental Promethium armor which previously killed his friend Rebel. Tony's attitude also changed towards his work and friends. He seemed shadier, and colder to the people he cared about.  After 13 issues the series was canceled.

       Recently Iron Man starred in Heros Return: Iron Man which started in 1997 and was canceled in 2005. Running from issues 1 through 89, This series is back in the regular Marvel universe and mostly continues from volume one; While the whole second series and events, is forgotten about.  In this series Tony lost Stark Enterprises, but later aquired it back. (This all started way back in the later issues of Vol 1.) He created Stark Solutions, a consulting firm. In this series his armor became alive and tried to kill him, publicly announced he was Iron Man, became the Secretary of Defense, and even has something of a mini "Armor Wars." The series was abruptly cancelled after weak plots, and to tie in with "Avengers Dissasembled" event.

      Currently Iron man is in its fourth series, (and hopefully last) In this latest run, his identity is a secret again. His origin remains basically the same as his original, except it happened in Iraq. Stark injected his nervous system with a modified techno-organic virus known as "Extremis". This fused Stark's armor to his body, allowing him to store the inner layers of the Iron Man armor in the hollows of his bones as well as control it through direct brain impulses. He is also able to remotely connect to external communications systems such as satellites, cellular phones, and computers throughout the world. Because the armor's operating system is now directly connected to Stark's nervous system, its response time has been significantly improved. The enhancer also re-created Tonys organs, and he is now able to regrow them, and heal wounds at a super human level.
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   Tony Stark built his first armor in Vietnam while over viewing the testing of new weapons he developed in an actual war. A hidden land mine sent shrapnel dangerously close to his heart. He was captured by the warlord Wong Chu, and forced to build a super weapon for him, in return for life saving surgery. Stark had assistance by another captive scientist named Ho Yinsen, and they built a chest plate with a pace maker for Stark's injured heart to beat. And a magnetic field to hold the shrapnel away from his heart. They secretly added to the chest piece and built the entire armor for Stark to get away.

Ho Yinsen lost his life trying to save Stark while he powered the suit, but Tony wreaked revenge for the loss of his friend. He thought he killed Wong-Chu in an explosion. Wong Chu recently came back to the series, and is back exact revenge on Tony, with help of the mysterious followers of Ho Yinsen: The Sons of Yinsen, Iron Man defeated Wong Chu.

     Tony Stark, now plagued with a bad heart, returned to America and continued being Iron Man even though every battle could be his last. With new technology rolling out over time he found new ways to improve the power, and lower the weight of his armor, but his condition kept getting worse. After multiple heart attacks, including one while testifying before Congress as to the identity of Iron Man, in which the world learned he had a bad heart, it finally gave out. He had his heart repaired with experimental synthetics. Any major strain could cause his body to reject it.

    Over the years, Tony has had multiple fixes to his heart. At one point his sentient armor ripped out it's mechanical heart and placed it on Tony who suffered another heart attack. Currently with the Extremis enhancer he has a clean bill of health.

     Now, his current armor is far more advanced thanks to microcircuitry. He can bench approx. 90 tons and now has various devices to regain and reserve his power level so he doesn't worry about recharging much any more. To learn more about his many armors and enemies, click the links below.
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