Invincible Iron Man #22 – Review

by Matt Fraction (writer), Salvador Larroca (art), Frank D’Armata (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: Ghost makes his move and the gang brings in some outside help.

What’s Good: Stark Disassembled continues not to disappoint.

For the second month in a row, the scenes in Tony’s mind have improved.  Tony’s new surroundings make him seem a little more pitiful and hence, it’s easier to empathize with him.  We’ve gone from the admittedly same desert and that cycle of repetition to a claustrophobic, indoor, nighttime environment.  The darkness and smaller surroundings add a greater sense of desperation and intimacy.  The changes with respect to those weird robot enemies only enhances this shift in tone; instead of giant, “War of the Worlds” styled walkers, they’re now human sized, going from house to house and hunting in packs.  This new robo-Gestapo makes Stark’s situation feel tighter and more personal.

Meanwhile, in the real world, the comic succeeds on the continuing strength of the bonds between its supporting characters.  Tied together in desperation and danger, they truly feel like a group of friends, and so it’s hard not to root for Pepper, Maria, and company.  Meanwhile, Pepper feels much more realistic and true to character this month, with Fraction’s having abandoned her bizarre jealousy/irritation/whatever over Tony.  She’s back to her good old loving, stressed self.

As an added bonus, Fraction also has this funny little ongoing joke where sooner, now attached to Tony’s party, keeps relating her new circumstances to the soap operas she normally devours on television.  Seeing her gasping expressions in backgrounds of panels during significant developments, or her seeing an odd resemblance between Dr. Lisk and the hero of her favourite show is a lot of fun in a “truth/fiction” sort of way.

Meanwhile, Larroca puts out really enjoyable work this month.  The contrast between the clear real-world scenes and the murkier “mental” scenes is well-done.  Meanwhile, Larroca’s new manhunting robots and his take on Ghost are truly outstanding.  The robots are legitimately creepy, a good mix of old, campy and slick, modern sci-fi, while Larroca’s Ghost may be the best Ghost I’ve ever seen.  Then there are the illustrations of Dr. Strange’s powers, which are simply breathtaking.

Invincible Iron Man #21 – Review

by Matt Fraction (writer), Salvador Larroca (art), Frank D’Armata (colors), and Joe Caramagna (letters)

The Story: The surgery to restore Tony Stark takes place.

What’s Good: The strange desert scenes within Tony’s mind were my high point in this month’s issue.  Last issue, I found these scenes a little too weird and obscure, but this month the meaning and moral lesson are said overtly and are more resonant as a result.  Despite this, the feeling of strangeness and repetition are maintained.  Essentially, Fraction walks the line between weird and meaningful quite a bit better this month, despite these scenes actually having fewer pages.

Much of this issue reads like a “step by step” instructional on how to revive Tony, and it really is fairly cool in this regard.  It’s almost a narrated montage, as we see various heroes following Stark’s recorded manual.  You really get the feel of our assembled party putting Stark back together piece by piece, moving forward one careful step at a time.   It helps that Fraction has always been great when it comes to writing Stark and his voice remains strong and, at times, humorous and the operation is just the right mixture of medical science and ridiculous superheroics.

Beyond that, Pepper’s strange dissent last issue on reviving Tony is fleshed out a little this month.  While her reasoning still seems a bit stretched, the fact she herself recognizes this does help.  While some might say that Pepper’s explaining this through writing a letter, presented on page, is a bit clichéd, Fraction manages to make it work through including Pepper’s bevy of crossouts in the narrative captions, which helps to show Pepper’s state of mind through an authorial tool that is usually guilty of purely telling.

Larroca generally puts in a much stronger performance than he did last month.  The faces are much more acceptable, the desert scenes remain gorgeous, and there’s one particular Thor spread that is simply awesome.