This is the fourth and final part of Akatsuki’s Marvel Legends Iron Man Retrospective, the finale to our Iron Mania week. Part 4 covers the Iron Man figures produced by Hasbro after they took over the Marvel Legends line. It includes the Ultimate Iron Man from HML Series 1 through the Stealth Iron Man from the ML 2-Packs.
Huge thanks to Akatsuki for putting together a great look at the Marvel Legends Iron Man figures!
Hasbro Marvel Legends Series 1: Ultimate Iron Man
First Appearance: The Ultimates.
When Toy Biz sold the Marvel license to Hasbro, many fans feared that Marvel Legends as they knew it would end. That debate is still continuing, but when it comes to Iron Man, it is clear that Hasbro continued to put out a lot of hard work and effort. In a wave of some sub-par Marvel Legends figures, Ultimate Iron Man retained most of what collectors came to love about Marvel Legends. Like his Toy Biz predecessors, the Ultimate Iron Man figure retained our beloved biceps swivels, double joints, and even 90-degree hips. The figure also boasted a nicely detailed sculpt and even shading on the grey sections of the armor, which is a step beyond some of the paint applications that other early Hasbro Marvel Legends received. Unfortunately the figure did lose the side-to-side ankle articulation as well as the hand articulation.
What Ultimate Iron Man did gain is vac-metallized armor. Harkening back to the super-shiny vac-metallized armor pieces of Toy Biz’s 1990s line of 5” Iron Man figures, vac-metallization made some of collectors nostalgic for the old days (they were some of my favorite toys as a youth). Other people note that vac-metal detailing can be brittle over time. Fortunately, Ultimate Iron Man’s vac-metal helmet, torso armor, and ankle armor remain bright and shiny on my figures. But while the vac-metal details may impress some of us, Tony Stark’s face under the removable helmet disappointed many fans. While Toy Biz coated its figures with paint, creating heightened realism, contrast, and the occasional stuck joint, Hasbro initially tried to mold its figures in the correct color so as to avoid paint applications. This left Ultimate Tony’s face rather pale and plasticky. In addition, the eyes lacked the realism of Tony Biz paint jobs.
In the comics, Ultimate Iron Man is actually far-removed from his current mainstream Marvel Universe (616) counterpart. A publicly known superhero, playboy, and heavy-drinker, Ultimate Tony Stark is much more like the original Tony Stark prior to his obsessive quest for redemption. In part, this is because of the dramatically different origin of Ultimate Tony. In the Ultimate comics, Tony’s mother was a research scientist who was studying neural cells. A lab accident left Tony’s mother fatally injured and altered the unborn Tony’s body. The procedure caused neural cell tissue to form throughout Tony’s body. Essentially, Tony’s entire body acts like his brain, processing information, and granting Tony a superhuman intellect. However, this advanced mental ability came with the curse of greatly increased tactile sensitivity, which caused Tony constant intense pain. Another side effect of Tony’s unique body structure is an extremely rapidly healing ability. Similar to Wolverine, Tony can experience severe physical trauma without fatal consequences. In fact, Tony can regrow missing limbs and body parts at a very fast pace. Because of these unique abilities, Tony quickly developed a taste for alcohol (to dull his senses and constant pain). And Tony began to use himself as a test pilot in variety of dangerous tests, experiments, and real life threats.
Hasbro Marvel Legends Ares Wave: Heroes Reborn Iron Man
First Appearance: Iron Man: Heroes Reborn #1.
The late 1990s were dark days for Iron Man. Corrupted and manipulated by Kang/Immortus, Tony Stark betrayed The Avengers (defeating Hawkeye with comical ease). Calculating that the only person who could beat the immense intellect and power of Iron Man was Iron Man, the Avengers managed to find a young Tony Stark from an alternate reality. Infuriated when he discovered that someone had stolen his armor, the real Tony Stark severely injured “Teen Tony”, who now bore the same heart injuries that plagued the real Iron Man. The real Tony Stark sacrificed himself to save the Avengers, and Iron Man fans were tortured by the adventures of Teen Tony, our debonair hero now a underage college student.
Fortunately, we were saved by the intervention of the incredibly powerful psychic being, Onslaught. The battle against Onslaught brought most of the Marvel Universe together (imagine The Avengers and The X-Men actually caring about the same thing!). In some grand and crazy scheme, the Avengers and the Fantastic Four sacrificed themselves to destroy Onslaught, but not before Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Woman’s son, Franklin Richards, used his reality altering powers to save all the heroes by placing them in an alternate reality. The Heroes were Reborn!
The Heroes Reborn universe returned the adult Tony Stark, but this was not quite the same man. Back in college, the young Tony Stark was best friends with Reed Richards, Victor von Doom, Connor “Rebel” O’Reily, and Bruce Banner. The group of aspiring scientists called themselves the Atomic Knights of the Round Table. But all that changed when Rebel perished in a catastrophic failure of Tony’s Prometheus Armor. Feeling responsible for the death of Rebel, Tony seemed to die inside, becoming cold-hearted and arrogant beyond measure. Bruce Banner is now a gamma scientist under Stark’s employ, while Stark himself continues to fiddle with the Prometheus Armor, wondering what went wrong and killed Rebel.
Now it gets confusing. Dr. Doom has grand plans, and he wants to take Stark Industries and all the technologies developed by Stark and Banner. Using his robotic abilities, Doom creates a realistic android he calls The Mandarin. Doom uses the Mandarin to give orders to Madame Hydra and her large Hydra terrorist organization, which Doom also setup. Doom uses Hydra to attack Banner’s gamma research facility, which is Stark property. The attack triggers an alarm, and Tony comes rushing to investigate, flying in by helicopter. In order to prevent widespread gamma radiation poisoning, Banner tries to sacrifice himself, and predictably, he transforms into the Hulk. Angered and confused, the Hulk destroys Tony’s helicopter, severely wounding Tony in the process. The only way for Tony to survive is to don the cursed Prometheum Armor. Tony emerges and battles the Hulk in an epic duel, and this armor really packs a massive punch, with repulsors capable of temporarily K.O.ing the Hulk. The entire encounter radically alters Tony’s life. Being a hero gives Tony a new reason for living, and he turns all of his attentions to heroism and humanitarian efforts. But not before long, Doom resurrects Rebel, now clad in golden power armor, and when the dust settles, Tony eventually traces the entire series of events back to Doom. But the long-awaited duel never comes to pass as Iron Man and Doom are pulled back and forth in time together (This seems to be a recurring theme. Iron Man and Doom go back in time to the Middle Ages on multiple occasions in the comics, and they even recently traveled back in time together in the pages of Mighty Avengers). The two armor-clad warriors have to join forces to prevent the destruction of the entire Heroes Return Universe. It was all convoluted.
Hasbro’s Heroes Reborn Iron Man action figure faithfully recreated this unique armor design. This is actually one of the first Iron Man armors to abandon the smooth spandex look of pseudo-muscle and instead embrace a more mechanical design. Metal plating and wires became the hallmarks of this design, as did the characteristic smoke stacks on its back. Iron Man could use the smoke stacks offensively, for example using them to engulf Crimson Dynamo in flame. The armor also had a distinctive green energy signature, with its boot contrails and most of its repulsor blasts glowing an eerie green.
The Heroes Reborn Iron Man figure is wonderfully designed. Although it uses the ball-jointed “elbro” elbow joints, the design took the sculpt into account, and the resulting figure actually features very good range of motion. Meanwhile, the ab-crunch provides for outstanding flexibility, as do the double-jointed knees, allowing the armor to get into a nice variety of poses. Even the 45-degree hip design, which can seem like a frustrating Rubix cube on some action figures, actually works quite fluidly here. The only problem here is that Hasbro failed to paint Iron Man’s chin guard the gold color that it was in the comics. Perhaps they were misled by the cover art of the first issue, where the flowing red and gold colors and shininess make it look like the chin guard might be red. Overall, Hasbro nicely integrated good articulation with a great sculpt to create a very cool action figure. The nice poseability and durable Hasbro construction actually make this figure feel like one of the sturdiest Iron Man figures to date.
HML Ares Wave: Ultimate War Machine
First Appearance: The Ultimates.
A repaint of Ultimate Iron Man, Ultimate War Machine is sometimes labeled as a cheap repaint. The figure may be a repaint, but it is a legitimate repaint. In The Ultimates, Tony Stark gave an all-black version of the Iron Man armor to Black Widow as a wedding present. She wore the armor on a couple occasions, but not frequently. However, the back story of the actual Ultimate War Machine was explored in the Ultimate Iron Man title. Jim Rhodes was a highly intelligent youth and good friend of genius Tony Stark. Together they attended a special school for the gifted. Tony and Rhodey both worked on their respective power armor designs. Ultimately, the two friends tested their armors together out in the field. Aesthetically, the armors were virtually identical.
Hasbro’s Ultimate War Machine features the same great sculpt and good articulation of the original figure. It also features a decent paint scheme, including a nice metallic color gunmetal color, and over-sprayed blue paint on the armor’s uni-beam and other lights, which seem to evoke a light glow (or maybe the paint is just messy).
If you like thinking outside the box, the Ultimate War Machine armor makes for a nice 6” scale version of the SHIELD Capekiller soldiers who served under Iron Man during the Civil War story arc. Because the Capekillers wore black armor designed by Iron Man, the Ultimate War Machine armor actually fits the bill quite nicely.
Hasbro Marvel Legends 2-Packs: Classic Armor Iron Man
First Appearance: Tales of Suspense #85 (1967).
Official Name: Mark IV.
After months of no new Marvel Legends product, Marvel Legends returned with a triumphant, although short-lived bang, with Hasbro’s new Two-Packs. Featuring deluxe versions of Marvel Legends figures, the Two-Packs included a brand new version of Iron Man’s Classic Armor, harkening back to the ML 1 Iron Man released seven years earlier. Although not without its flaws, the 2-Pack Classic Iron Man figure ranks up there as one of my all-time favorite action figures.
Although the original ML 1 Iron Man will always have a place in my heart, the 2-Pack version is sleek and streamlined the way armor was technically supposed to be. This figure looks like it stepped right out of the old Iron Man comics! The Classic Armor’s golden yellow sections were theoretically supposed to conform to the shape of the pilot’s body. Meanwhile, the 2-Pack armor did away with the ML 1 Iron Man’s unique hinged shoulder design. While this old design allowed for some great posing, it was key structural weak point in the figure, which often resulted in breakage. I personally rescued a broken figure to repair it and learn more about the internal design of the figure.
2-Pack Classic Iron Man also features nearly all the articulation that Marvel Legends fans crave. The figure has biceps swivels, double-joints, functional 45-degree hips, a great ab-crunch, and an outstanding range of motion in its neck. The neck design allows Iron Man to get into really nice flying poses and more dynamic lunges. Adding to the figure’s personality are the multiple interchangeable hands. We get a fist for punching, a clawed hand for repulsor blasting and for holding his helmet, and two fully-open repulsor-blasting hands. Plus, the figure comes with a great alternate head, depicting Tony Stark.
The figure is significantly enhanced by a sparkling metallic red paint application. Although the yellow plastic sections of the armor are unpainted and are quite bright, this actually seems to increase the figure’s comic accuracy, to my eyes. However, the lack of paint shading on Tony’s face does make his skin seem a bit bright and plasticky.
2-Pack Iron Man features a great sculpt for this version of the Iron Man armor. However, the top portion of the figure’s torso does not line up with the rest of the waist. Specifically, the obliques sculpted along the ab-crunch articulation curve inward too much, making the torso appeared pinched, and almost wasp-like. While this armor is supposed to be quite streamlined, this pinched torso does make the torso seem less powerful. Remember, this armor once K.O.ed the Hulk with a single punch! So the armor should be decently broad and strong throughout the abdominals. In addition, the Classic Armor feels a bit small and short compared to the ML 1 Iron Man figure and some of the older Toy Biz figures, although it admittedly works well with many other figures (many of the Avengers were sculpted shorter, even in the Toy Biz era). But despite these drawbacks, the 2-Pack Classic Armor does look like it jumped right off the pages.
Overall, the 2-Pack Classic Armor Iron Man recreated the joy I had when I first discovered ML 1 Iron Man. This really is a piece of poseable artwork, and the extra hands and head makes it feel like a deluxe version of the figures I have loved for so many years.
Hasbro Marvel Legends 2-Packs: Stealth Armor Iron Man
First Appearance: Iron Man, Vol. 1, #152 (1981).
Official Name: Mark VII.
Mirroring the original ML 1 variants, the Stealth Armor returns as a variant of the Classic Armor. But unlike the ML 1 Stealth armor, the 2-Pack Stealth Armor features a great two-toned color scheme that more accurately reflects the coloration of the armor in the comics. In the comics, the Stealth Armor was intended to be jet-black in color, as the dialogue reflected; however, blue highlights were used to show the armor’s details. This made the armor overall look bluish in color. Hasbro gave us a two-toned Stealth Armor, much like the comics. The helmet, torso armor, gauntlets, and boots are very dark blue, almost black. Meanwhile, the faceplate, arms, and legs are a deep navy blue, still dark, but lighter than the other sections of the armor. It’s a nice detail, and I appreciate the touch.
Like the primary 2-Pack Classic Armor Iron Man, this Stealth variant features all the same great articulation and the same pinched waist. Overall, it’s a fantastic representation of the armor. However, the original Stealth Armor is actually distinguishable from the Classic Armor. Technically, the Stealth Armor should feature bigger, curvier shoulder pauldron armor, gauntlets, and boots.
With 2-Pack Iron Man, Hasbro proved that it is capable of recreating the high level of articulation and detail that made Marvel Legends so popular. As Iron Man 2 brings even more exposure to Marvel characters, hopefully Iron Man and all the other great characters at Marvel will grow increasingly popular.
Big thanks to Akatsuki for this awesome Marvel Legends Iron Man retrospective. It was so massive I had to split it up into four parts – he sent over thirty-four pages of text in the Word document of the review, as well as 212 high resolution pictures!
And that’s a wrap for our Iron Mania week (plus a day). Iron Man 2 opened in the US on Friday, taking in over $133MM domestically over the weekend, and bringing its total to $300MM worldwide (it opened outside the US a week ago).
I’ve been a fan of this site for years now from the great articles to recent toy news and much more. It truly is a site for toy fans. I read your Iron man retrospective series and immediatly signed up and became a true member to tell you how much I enjoyed the series. Even though personally I own all aforementioned Iron man figures your words and pictures gave the true feel of works of art than just plastic figures crammed inside a glass cabinet. Thanks for your hard work on this project, you should be proud.
wow. great articles and even greater pics. thank you.