Today, see how Tony Stark recovered from total paralysis following a would-be assassin nearly murdering him.
This is “Never Gonna Be the Same Again,” a feature where I look at how bold, seemingly “permanent” changes were ultimately reversed. This is not a criticism, mind you, as obviously things are always going to eventually return to “normal.” That’s just how superhero comic books work. It’s just fun to see how some of these rather major changes are reversed. This is differentiated from “Abandoned Love,” which is when a new writer comes in and drops the plot of the previous writer. Here, we’re talking about the writer who came up with the idea being the same one who resolved the change. This is also differentiated from “Death is Not the End,” which is about how “dead” characters came back to life, since this is about stuff other than death.
TRUTH OR KATHY DARE
Bob Layton and David Michelinie had already had one iconic run on Iron Man before the pair returned to writing (and inking, for Layton) duties on the series in the mid-1980s. They one-upped themselves by introducing the storyline that became known as “Armor Wars,” where Tony Stark decides to eliminate any armor out there that was based on his technology, because he could not deal with the guilt of knowing that someone might be injured by an armor based on his technology. Of course, the issue is that there were a LOT of armors out there based on his technology, so he ended up having to go rogue and even getting thrown off of the West Coast Avengers, before “Iron Man” is killed in battle and Tony Stark pretends that “Iron Man” went rogue but there is now a NEW Iron Man who replaced him, now with a brand-new suit of armor (as the so-called “Silver Centurion” era was now over).
Once that storyline was wrapped up, Tony Stark started a new chapter in his life in Iron Man #233 (by Layton, Michelinie and penciler Jackson Guice) and during a polo match, he meets a young woman named Kathleen Dare. In the next issue, she meets up with Tony in New York City while he is there on business and the two spend the night together. When Tony returns to Los Angeles the next issue, she repeatedly calls him and is quite upset when she learns that he has a date with another woman…
Dang, Rhodey, she “needs a spanking”? For serious? Anyhow, Kathy Dare just keeps getting more and more unhinged, like showing up in Tony’s hotel room on a trip to Italy, despite him very clearly breaking up with her and everything comes to a head in Iron Man #242 (by Layton, Michelinie and guest penciler Alan Kupperberg), when Tony returns home to find Kathy waiting for him….and she shoots him right in the chest!
A LONG ROAD TO RECOVERY
In Iron Man #243 (by Layton, Michelinie and guest inker Barry Windsor-Smith working over Layton’s pencils), Kathy gets a lawyer who sees this case as a primo opportunity for publicity (and possibly a book deal) and decides to essentially try Tony Stark in the media as being abusive towards Kathy, thereby “forcing” her to retaliate by shooting him in self defense.
Tony survives emergency surgery, but he will never walk again…
By the way, is that really something that a doctor would reveal at a press conference like that? I know, suspension of disbelief and all of that, but still seems really weird that a doctor would make such a declarative statement about a patient (even assuming the privacy issues weren’t a concern, as well).
Tony returns to work in the next issue (Layton and Michelinie, with Layton inking his own pencils), now confined to a wheelchair and obviously he does not handle this well…
He gets seriously depressed, especially since he also needs someone to fill in for him as Iron Man during this time and Rhodey wants no part of the Iron Man armor after he developed serious problems with his brain the last time he wore the suit.
THE IRON MAN SHORTCUT
Ultimately, Tony figures out a way to make it so that he could wear the Iron Man armor himself (and old friend of his also fills in for him in another suit of armor in the issue)…
This is great news, except now think about it….Tony can now walk while in the armor and, you know, fly, have super strength and save people, while when he turns back into Tony Stark, he is stuck in a wheelchair, so he spends more and more time in the Iron Man armor.
MAN OR IRON MAN?
This leads to Tony finally declaring in Iron Man #248 (by Michelinie and Layton, with Layton doing pencils and inks) that he will just now ONLY be Iron Man and that he will turn over the operations of Stark International to Marcy Pearson, his head of public relations (and Rhodey’s girlfriend). Marcy gets handled really oddly during these issues, as she obviously enjoys now being the head of the company and that enjoyment is treated, like, totally evil. It’s a weird angle on a character that has been around for a few years at this point. Her ambition is very much depicted as a negative trait and it doesn’t come off well.
Anyhow, the Kathy Dare trial comes to court and after Tony is painted as an abuser by Kathy’s lawyers, his lawyer gets a number of character witnesses to rave about how great Tony is…
And then the clincher, Tony’s lawyer finds out that Kathy has a history of destructive behavior against people she feel “wronged” her and was previously under psychiatric care and so she is sent to a mental care facility until she is deemed capable of standing trial. Tony has won and now that he sees that the public actually loves him AS Tony Stark, he decides to NOT step down as head of Stark International.
HAPPILY EVER AFTER?
He then buys a small technology company that has a new microchip technology that could get him to walk again and he brings back an old friend, Dr. Erica Sondheim (from Scott Lang’s first appearance years earlier) and she does the surgery and at the end of Iron Man #248, Tony can walk again!
This becomes a whole other thing down the line, and I’ll cover that in a future column, but for the intents and purposes of Michelinie and Layton at the time, Tony is now “cured”!
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