Iron Man #107
And in the End…
Iron Man has led Jack of Hearts, Jasper Sitwell, Eddie March, Jean DeWolff, the Guardsman, and the Wraith on an attack of the former Stark International facility, recently acquired by the ruthless Midas. The battle was going well until Midas unleashed an army of robots constructed out of spare suits of Iron Man armor. As everyone begins to fall, Iron Man smashes through the robots in order to check and make sure his lover, Madame Masque has not been injured. Distracted by his concern for her well being, Iron Man leaves himself open to Midas’ golden touch.
Witnessing Iron Man being turned into a gold statue, Abe Klein apologizes to the hero for his part in Midas’ hostile take over. He did so out of desperation because Midas claimed to have information about his missing wife and daughter whom he had been searching for over thirty years. With Iron Man finally defeated, Midas finally tells Abe the truth. He obtained photos of his wife and daughter while assisting a war criminal flee from his homeland to Argentina decades earlier. At the time, Abe Klein’s scientific genius was already known and Midas obtained the photos knowing that they could be useful blackmail later. He then reveals what Abe feared all along — that his wife and daughter have been dead for years — and gloats over the fact that Abe betrayed his closest friend for nothing.[1]
As Abe Klein comes to terms with his horrible mistake, Marianne Rodgers arrives on the property seeking Tony Stark. She is surprised by how much the facility has changed. As she thinks about her rocky romance with Tony, he wonders how he will react to seeing her again, and hopes he will kiss her before she decides to kill him.[2]
By this time, Iron Man’s allies have also been turned into gold by Midas. The villain then orders his minions to line the golden forms like statues around the building. Unlike the others, Tony Stark’s sealed armor protected himself from being turned into gold. Still trapped, he begins trying to figure out a way to get free. That’s when the Zero Energy that powers Jack of Hearts causes Jack to undo his transformation. While Jack is busy battling the guards, Tony manages to knock himself over causing the golden tomb to shatter onto the ground. With his heart failing, Iron Man scrambles to the remains of the destroyed Iron Man robots and begins cannibalizing their armor so he can get his heart beating again and rejoin the battle.[3]
After making short work of the guards, Iron Man and Jack of Hearts storm the control room where Midas operates.[4] Unfortunately, Jack is quickly taken down thanks to the high tech weapons in the hover chair that Midas uses for mobility. Wanting to crush Iron Man with his bare hands, Midas then activates the exo-skeleton that allows him to move his obese body and tries to turn the Avenger into gold again. With nothing left to lose, Abe Klein tries to rush to Iron Man’s aid, but is struck in the chest by Midas at full force. Furious at seeing his friend get hurt, Iron Man decides to reveal to Midas that he is really Tony Stark, as he is intends to kill Midas for everything he has done.
It’s at that moment, that Marianne Rodgers enters the room, catching Tony by surprise. Luckily, when she fires a deadly mental blast at him, Iron Man laps out of the way causing it to strike Midas instead. The blast leaves Midas a mindless husk that instantly collapses to the ground.[5] In the aftermath of the battle, Iron Man discovers that Marianne is as mentally ill as ever, but the mental blast has somehow stripped her of her telepathic abilities.[6] He then checks on Abe who is hanging on by a thread. Klein asks Iron Man for his forgiveness, and Tony tells his friend that he has nothing to be sorry for. With Abe now dead, Iron Man and Jack of Hearts leave to get Marianne some much needed help.
Recurring Characters
Iron Man, Midas, Madame Masque, Jasper Sitwell, Jack of Hearts, Jean DeWolff, Guardsman, Marianne Rodgers, Eddie March, Abe Klein
Continuity Notes
Abe’s betrayal was revealed last issue. This story states that Abe Klein’s family went missing during World War II. This has some issues with respect to the Sliding Timescale. See below.
They devote a two page spread recounting Marianne’s romance with Tony, which started in Iron Man #36, covering all the following milestones:
The revelation that Tony Stark was Iron Man. Marianne incorrectly remembers Tony revealing his secret to her. In reality, her ESP powers uncovered the truth as Iron Man fought the Slasher and Dimitrius in Iron Man #41.
How Iron Man rescued her from Mikas the Soul Brother in Iron Man #42-43, and the Night Phantom in issue #44.
How Kevin O’Brien went crazy due to his Guardsman armor and jealous of Tony and Marianne’s romance battling Iron Man to the death in Iron Man #45-46.
Attending Kevin O’Brien’s funeral where she questioned why there needed to be an Iron Man. This happened in Iron Man #47.
Iron Man’s subsequent battle with the Super-Adaptoid/Cyborg-Sinister, where Marianne ESP powers kept showing her visions of Iron Man’s death, leading to her abandoning him when he needed help, leading to his ending their relationship. See Iron Man #48-51.
Lastly, that Marianne eventually went mad in Iron Man #52 leading to her being institutionalized until issue #103. What’s not fully explained here is that Marianne was driven mad by the Black Lama’s presence on Earth, as explained in Iron Man #81.
Tony Stark has had a history of heart problems ever since a bomb lodged shrapnel into the organ back in Tales of Suspense #39. Tony had since underwent heart surgery in Iron Man #19 to repair the damage, but his heart is still weakened whenever he is under a great deal of stress.
Iron Man mentions his last battle with Midas. That happened in Iron Man #19.
Midas will eventually recover from this mind blast and returns in Marvel Super-Heroes (vol. 3) #13.
Marianne will return with a vengeance with her mental powers restored in Iron Man #321-325.
Abe Klein and Midas’ Connection to World War II
As I explored in my summary for Iron Man #91, there are issues with Abe Klein’s past connections to World War II with respect to the Sliding Timescale. A lot of this will repeat what was said in my summary for issue #91, but also focus on some other details revealed here.
The crux of the issue is the fact that the Sliding Timescale pushes the Modern Age forward in time making it increasingly impossible for someone with a normal human life span to have been alive during both World War II and the Modern Age. Usually, this is explained away with some means of slowing or stopping the aging process of characters going into suspended animation for decades (IE: Captain America, the Red Skull, Nick Fury, the Black Widow, Wolverine, Winter Soldier, etc.) In the case of Abe Klein, a short lived character who dies in this very issue, it seems unlikely that he has this benefit.
Which raises some issues that are stated in this story as well as Iron Man #91 and 105. These stories state that Abe Klein was a victim of the Holocaust during World War II and spent time in a Nazi concentration camp. Iron Man #91 states that Abe’s father died in the camps. Issue #105 states that Abe lived with a wife and daughter in Poland prior to the Nazi invasion in 1939 and that they went missing.
This story adds an additional fact: Midas states that he helped a Nazi war criminal flee to Argentina in 1945 and that is how he obtained the photos of Abe’s wife and daughter and learned that they were killed during the war.
The problems here are two fold because the Sliding Timescale would then effect both Abe and Midas without further explanation.
The problem is that Marvel (as of this writing in July 2021) has not provided a specific explanation for this situation. However, a clue to how they view these facts can be gleaned from Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe A-Z #7, which includes a profile for Midas. It mentions the events of this story arc including the blackmailing of Abe Klein. What is absent is all reference to World War II, suggesting that in this case all World War II references to the backstories of both Klein and Midas should be considered topical and that is how this index will choose to interpret them.
Acts of genocide are, unfortunately, still a thing that happens in war to this day and there are no shortage of other conflict take the place of World War II. That said, I think it would be wiser to, instead of applying a real-world event to update Abe’s backstory, a fictional conflict would avoid having to constantly change events whenever history comes to odds with the Sliding Timescale (ala the Sin-Cong Conflict).