Iron Man's Armor - Armors From Alternate Realities and Possible Futures

Armors From Alternate Realities and Possible Futures

• Iron Man 2020 - Arno Stark bought the corporate identity of Stark Industries, and apparently this included Iron Man. Unlike his heroic ancestor (actually, Tony might be his uncle, once removed) he found himself working as a ruthless mercenary to bolster the financial reserves of his company. His armor was recognized to be both more powerful and more combat-oriented than that of the twentieth-century Iron Man. Decades later, this same armor (although possibly upgraded by Doctor Doom) is worn by Andros Stark, the villainous Iron Man of 2093.
• Heroes Reborn "Prometheum" Armor (See also "Heroes Reborn-armor"); originally an experimental self-contained, armored life-support and combat system. It was a joint project of Tony Stark and Connor "Rebel" O´Reilly, but it proved dangerously unstable, and Rebel was killed in the testing stage. The project was abandoned and Tony Stark went into a spiral towards psychological self-destruction. Ironically, years later, when he went to investigate an incident at one of his more remote business annexes, his helicopter was attacked by the newborn Hulk of that reality and crashed where he was impaled by debris. He was forced to don an upgraded version of the experimental armor which had been stored at the annex to save his own life, and from that day on fought on as Iron Man. Later, he comes face to face with a resurrected Rebel, outfitted with another version of his armor which had been completely reimagined by Doctor Doom.
• Iron Man of Earth X/Iron Manor - In the world of Earth-X, the whole world has become exposed to an airborne agent which causes everyone to mutate into superpowered beings. Tony Stark sealed off his factory complex while still inside, fearful of being changed into a `super´-version of himself. Over the years, he constructed an army of Iron Men, intended to be used as a worldwide police force, but never used- again for fear of being corrupted by such power. Instead, he built robotic versions of the deceased Avengers, otherwise remaining mostly passive inside his fortress. Forced into action by the arrival of the Celestials, he reveals that his entire factory was a final, titanic armor; he manages to delay the Host of the immense aliens, but was finally destroyed.
• Marvel Mangaverse Iron Man - In this universe, Tony Stark vanishes after fighting Namor one last time... and his position as both industrialist and Iron Person is taken by his twin sister Antoinette (Toni) Stark, a former agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. She expands the paradigm into an entire army of every conceivable form of Iron Man, from flying weapons platforms (one of which is a clear homage to the RX-78GP03 Gundam "Dendrobium Orchis" from the Gundam anime franchise), to 100-foot (30 m) mechas, to platoons of armored soldiers... all of which proves entirely useless against the Incredible Hulk. Meanwhile, it is revealed Tony Stark is still alive - albeit reduced to a head in a life-support unit because of spinal cancer. He initially equips the Avengers (Captain America, Vision, Hawkeye and the Scarlet Witch) with four super-powerful vehicles, capable of combining into yet another skyscraper-sized Iron Man mecha (bringing new meaning to their classic battle cry, "Avengers Assemble"). This, too is destroyed by the Hulk. Later, when targeted by a conspiracy against all superheroes in the world, the disembodied Tony Stark dons a cybernetic body to once again become Iron Man.
• Ultimate Iron Man - The Tony Stark of the Ultimate Marvel universe wears an armor that is bulkier and more difficult to operate. When the USA was invaded by foreign armies of superhumans, Tony Stark deployed "Iron Man 6," a gunship that might very well be the largest "armor" in any known reality (the flying fortress could be over 1,000 feet (300 m) across). The main armor requires a full behind-the-scenes support team to maintain and operate at full proficiency. In subsequent storylines like Ultimate Comics: Armor Wars, and Ultimates 3, he has built dozens of armors since the Ultimatum wave.
• Iron Maniac - An alternate Tony Stark from a world in which the Avengers were drawn into outer space, lured into interstellar battle and effectively destroyed by a warlike alien race. His spirit shattered, he returned to Earth, apparently to find that Reed Richards had planned to take over the world (to date, the exact circumstances behind his descent are unclear). He decided to take control of the planet himself "to save it" and adopted methods more like those of Dr. Doom, killing, among others, the Human Torch, and adopting a bulkier gray armor that resembled his original suit, although possessing far more advanced weaponry than he had back then, including a weapon capable of temporarily negating the FF's powers and a means of escaping from mystical bonds. He was accidentally drawn into the 616-universe, and after an extended battle with the local heroes- initially facing the Fantastic Four and Doctor Strange before his attempt to escape saw him fighting Captain America, the Black Widow, Spider-Man and X-23 - was incarcerated. He escaped, adapting a hyper-advanced LMD into a new set of armor that could shape itself according to his thoughts and form any weapon he could conceive of, and called himself the "Iron Maniac"; since everything in this world was backwards from his perspective, this was his way of stating he was sane and everyone else was mad. He is a cyborg; at the least his chest is armored.
• The Lord Iron armor from Marvel 1602. A Spanish scientist who was taken captive by the English in the war and forced, through torture by David Banner, to devise weapons for them. He now needs his massive armor to survive; it harnesses electric power from simple chemical cells, but can also absorb lightning bolts. It provides increased strength, electrical attacks and some sensory enhancement.
• Somatic Combat Vehicle from Iron Man: Crash; In the words of Tony himself: "My SCV secondary body protective shielding is formed of a titanium beryllium geodesic alloy doped with nickel iron mylar superstrate and interlaced microcrystalline quartz fiber and synthetic rubber endoform & ectoform substrate layer." This armor's various properties (strength, lightness, structural integrity etc.) are all a result of optimizing the interaction between the properties of various materials, all balanced out on a molecular level. In a sense, this armor is one huge "tile" like the millions of tiny ones the contemporary armor is made out of.
• Overload armor from What If (vol. 1) #64 ("What If Iron Man Sold Out?") - In an alternate world where Tony Stark went public with his armor instead of keeping it for himself, the "arms race" quickly completely escalated, with more and more advanced armor being developed by all parties from the U.S. government and S.H.I.E.L.D. to HYDRA and the Mandarin. Ultimately, the worst threat turned out to be Magneto, who was infuriated by the lack of interest in the plight of the Mutants, who were being hunted by Starktech Sentinels. He used his power over metal to defeat everything that was thrown at him, but was ultimately defeated by Iron Man in a towering suit, which composed completely out of polymers.
• Sorcerer armor from What If (vol. 1) #113 ("What If Tony Stark was Sorcerer Supreme?") - In a reality in which events led Tony Stark to become the main student of the Ancient One (instead of Stephen Strange), he ended up combining his understanding of technology as well as magic to create an armor which incorporated both. It held a vast storage of magical spells in its memory, ready to be deployed at a moment's notice. This armor was lost when Tony Stark sent it on an endless dimensional quest, carrying the body of the dread Dormammu, forcing the dark lord (in his astral form) to pursue it.
• Ironheart armor from Avataars: Covenant of the Shield
• In What If?: Civil War, released in December 2007, Tony Stark died from the Extremis injection and Captain America went on to lead all the heroes in the civil war which broke out when the government tried to enforce the Superhuman Registration Act. To provide the inspiration which Tony had given in life, Steve briefly wore an Iron Man armor with a red, white and blue color scheme.
• In the Marvel limited series Bullet Points, an alternate reality where Dr. Abraham Erskine is killed (along with a young MP Benjamin Parker) one day before injecting Steve Rogers with the Super Soldier formula, thus terminating the Project: Rebirth, and initiating Project: Iron Man, in which Rogers takes place instead, making him Iron Man until he is killed in a fight with this reality's Hulk, Peter Parker. Years later, when Galactus attacks, Tony Stark finally armors up with the suit.
• In What If?: Age of Apocalypse, Captain Britain wears an early model of the Iron Man armor, custom painted as his uniform, as part of the Defenders.
• In Marvel Zombies, Forge is shown using an enhanced version of the original armor against the zombies.
• In the 2008 Black Panther annual story "Black to the Future" (a What If?-type story set in 2057) the USA challenges the nation of Wakanda's global dominance with an army of Iron Men. This force is led by an Iron Man giant robot piloted by Tony Stark himself. This huge machine (easily as big as the New Avengers/Transformers giant suit) could only be controlled by direct neural interface, so Tony Stark was physiologically injured when the suit was damaged by Wakanda's panther-shaped giant robot. Tony's death ended the war and inspired a Wakandan-led global peace.
• In the "House of M" storyline, Tony Stark is still the head of Stark Industries but also the star of the hit TV show Sapien Death Match along with his father, and Johnny Storm. His battle armor for the show is similar to his original gold armor, however, it is then revealed that he was working on a much more advanced armor, more advanced than his current armor in the normal reality. This armor was chunkier, had large wing-like jets coming from the back and a cannon on its right hand. It also has counter magnets built in, to prevent Magneto from controlling it.
• In the 2007 New Avengers/Transformers miniseries, Stark used a giant armor, the size of a Transformer; it allowed Iron Man to go head-to-head with the invading Decepticons. Due to the massive energy requirements, this armor would quickly run out of power, until recharged by Optimus Prime, Jazz and Bumblebee.
• In Incredible Hercules #125, the evil Amazon Artume had used a mystical object to change the world into her vision of it. In this world, men were an oppressed and debased part of society, and a male resistance movement existed. Practically the last member of it was Hercules, who wore cybernetic armor made for him by Tony Stark, who had long since been executed.
• Galactus Buster armor, so far known only to be featured in his ending scenario for the video game Marvel vs. Capcom 3: Fate of Two Worlds.