Invincible Iron Man #15: Review

Feb 2024

Gerry Duggan, Creees Lee

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The river

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Invincible Iron Man #15 Review by Rob Johnson (March 1, 2024)

The cover shows what is obviously James Rhodes in his War Machine armour busting out of prison, and the solicit for this issue was all about *him*. But he and that armour aren't in this issue at all. Instead Tony Stark at last dons his new Iron Man armour while Feilong unveils the War Machine Sentinel whose only connection to the WM armour is big guns and greyness.

Last issue Stark's 'autobiography' voiceover told us that the Orchis assassin was a revived Weapon X body. This time it's a a leftover body of Wolverine, complete with adamantium skeleton. Apparently when Krakoa resurrects mutants they get a new body so the old 1 is still lying around somewhere.

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Synopsis / Summary / Plot

Invincible Iron Man #15 Synopsis by Rob Johnson

Feilong and Orchis have taken over Tony Stark's company and his Iron Man armours. As part of their plot against the mutant nation on Krakoa he's created giant Iron Sentinels. Tony appears to have given up and become the Black King of the Hellfire Club and 'married' his secretary Hazel Kendall. But she is really Emma Frost of the X-Men and he is building new Mark 72 armour with the 'mutant metal' mysterium. They also sent Ironheart and Forge to get the Asgardian Dwarves to build a fleet of mysterium spacecraft.

Last issue they let Orchis 'discover' that the fleet was heading for the Australian Outback and Feilong is going to send all the Sentinels there. But meanwhile others in Orchis have sent a revived Weapon X corpse to kill Stark.

Also throughout this series we've had a voiceover from Tony's autobiography describing the events. Now that voiceover tells us that he's sent a draft of the book to his editors in an email attachment locked for a year, in case he dies in the upcoming battle. The voiceover that continues now must just be Tony's current thoughts.

We see the new armour from the back with machines continuing to work on it as Tony walks past with a present he's made for his 'wife'. He ponders on the fact that their marriage was fake but is getting realer every day (as we saw last issue). But when he enters her apartment in the Club he finds her with a hair stylist and dressed as her X-Men ID White Queen, ready for the final showdown with Orchis. He hands her the box with the present but we don't see what's inside. He follows her outside to her waiting limo and she kisses him with what bitter experience tells him is a goodbye kiss.

As she's driven off he hears a cry from within the Club. Inside he finds someone killing Hellfire Knights. The face is completely masked by a helmet but the hands extrude claws so he knows he's facing some form of Wolverine. Stark throws a bottle of some alcoholic drink at him followed by a candelabra which sets him alight. The 72 armour hasn't got a neural interface yet (to avoid Orchis' detection) so Stark will have to go to it. The adamantium skeleton follows him but the White King (Wilson Fisk) appears and tosses him his mysterium cane. Stark manages to fend the enemy off for a bit but is soon disarmed and his chest slashed open.

Luckily White Queen has come back for something she forgot and now tackles the 'Wolverine' in her diamond form. Tony limps off to get his armour, but he knows the foe might have info from Feilong including Stark's contingency plans to deal with the most dangerous mutants. We see that the assassin has found the inhibitor that Tony gave her to hide her from Orchis. It puts the ring on her finger which cancels her powers. And her body turns from diamond to flesh.

But then Stark bursts up through the floor in the Model 72 Iron Man armour, which we now see is black and red with bits of gold. 'Wolverine' plunges his claws into Stark's chest. Only for them to bend against the mysterium. And IM now crushes the adamantium skull.

Emma removes her ring and is now back to diamond. She and Iron Man leave the (burning) Club. It turns out she came back for his present which she now puts on. They are gold-coloured knuckledusters with the words HELL and FIRE emblazoned on them. And we also discover they fire blasts which is useful when they are attacked by a Sentinel (alerted by her use of her powers). The combined fire of her and IM takes its head off. The Armoured Avenger then leaves her to continue her business. (Editorial comments say that Emma is off to rejoin the X-Men in Fall Of The House Of X #1, and Iron Man takes time out to fight Orchis with the Avengers in their forthcoming #12 before continuing with the rest of this issue.)

Stark makes sure Orchis can track him joining the 5 mysterium spaceships in Australia. He's gambled that Feilong will want be personally responsible for his destruction by sending all his Sentinels against him and the ships. And indeed the villain has all the Sentinels converging on the spot. But then he and Dr Stasis realise what is really happening but it's too late. The ships aren't ships and there are no mutants from Arakko/Mars in them. Feilong rushes to climb into the cockpit of his backup plan, a giant grey armour with big guns called the War Machine Sentinel, and he heads for Australia.

There we see flying Iron Sentinels converging on the new Iron Man. But the 5 mysterium 'ships' combine and transform around him into an extremely large Iron Man suit/weapon/craft he calls the Sentinel Buster.

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