Iron Man #200
Resolutions!
Obadiah Stane has blown up Tony Stark’s new tech start-up, Circuits Maximus. One of his friends was caught in the blast and at the hospital, a doctor tells Tony that there is nothing that could be done and that his friend is now dead. The victim of the blast was none other than Morley Erwin. Tony is relieved that both Jim Rhodes and Morley’s sister Clytemnestra were only injured in the blast. However, Cly is deeply upset that her brother — her only family member — is dead and holds Tony responsible due to Obadiah Stane’s vendetta against him.[1]
Although Tony has refused to become Iron Man since he got clean and sober, he realizes that he no longer has the choice in the matter if he wants to end things with Stane.[2] Moreover, he needs to become Iron Man again if he wants to rescue his friends who have already been kidnapped by Stane. When Jim offers up his suit of Iron Man armor, Tony declines as he is almost finished building a brand new suit of armor and will use that instead.[3]
Meanwhile, in New York, Obadiah Stane and Bethany Cabe are continuing their plot against Tony Stark. Stane is pleased that the bomb he sent didn’t kill Tony, as he hopes that the death of one of his friends will drive him back into drinking. When they go to check on Madame Masque, who is being held in stasis, Cabe asks what they are going to do with her. Obadiah assures her that they’ll find a use for her later. When asked if she resents what he did to her, Beth tells him that she adores him.[4]
That afternoon, Tony Stark arrives at Avengers Compound. When Hawkeye tries to chat it up with him, Stark tells Clint to stand aside. He then heads into the lab where he puts the final touches on his new suit of Iron Man armor and puts it on for the very first time. Seeing Tony back in the saddle comes as a surprise to both Hawkeye and his wife, Mockingbird, but Clint is happy that he was present to see the rebirth of the one true Iron Man.
Using his new rocket boots, Iron Man flies up just past Earth’s atmosphere and triangulates his descent so that he arrives in New York in a matter of minutes.
As Tony makes his way to Stane International, Obadiah shows Bethany the psyche imprint work that Doctor Atlanta is working on. He then takes her down to a secret underground lab where Stane has had technicians working around the clock to unlock the secrets of one of Tony Stark’s old notebooks. It contained early designs for his original Iron Man armor. Finally cracking their secrets, Stane has built his own improved version of this armor so that when he finally faces down Tony Stark they will be on equal terms.
As Iron Man arrives at Stane International, he uses his new cloaking system to get past security and begins searching the property for his friends. While down below, Stane and Bethany catch Doctor Atlanta as he is about to experiment on Pepper Potts. He is stopped before he can do any harm and Obadiah assure the mad scientist that he’ll get an opportunity to work on his experiments very soon.
Meanwhile, Iron Man crashes into Obadiah Stane’s office and tells the secretary to call her boss. Stane is pleased that the final battle is finally afoot and mobilizes an attack helicopter and his Chessmen to battle Stark first. However, none of them are prepared for Iron Man’s newly upgraded armor. He first disables the chopper with a disruptor field and smashes it to bits.[5] He is then attacked by two of Stane’s Knights and a Bishop. Unsure if any of these men are the same he faced before, he orders them to stand down. When they refuse, Iron Man quickly disables their high tech weapons, rendering them harmless.[6]
Seeing that he has to take matters into his own hands, Stane puts on his Iron Monger armor and heads out to battles Tony Stark one-on-one. The resulting battle causes damage all over the property and puts its staff at risk. Iron Man finds himself on the defensive, fending off Stane’s attacks and saving those put in harms way. When an explosion sets the entire facility on fire, Iron Man breaks off from the battle to find his friends who have been taken prisoner. Using his scanners, Tony is able to locate Happy Hogan, Pepper Potts, and Bambi Arbogast being held in stasis in Stane’s underground lab. Contacting via a television feed, Obadiah warns Tony that attempting to free his friend will trigger a trap that will electrocute them all to death. He tells Tony to come up to his office for their final battle. However, Iron Man uses his uni-beam to melt the power source for Stane’s death trap and frees his friends.
After making sure they are all unharmed, Tony then goes looking for Stane. He finds Obadiah waiting for him in his former office with the infant Timothy Anders. He threatens to kill the child if Tony doesn’t comply with his orders moving forward. However, Tony has deduced that Stane’s suit is powered by an external power source. Using his plasma blasters to destroy this supply causes Stane’s armor to deactivate and fall out of the sky. Iron Man then swoops in and saves Timothy. Handing the orphan off to the firefighters who have just arrived on the scene, Tony goes looking for Stane for the final showdown. When he finds Obadiah, the madman has removed his helmet. Having decided that he has lost the battle and deciding that he is just like his father, Stane blows his brains out with his repulsor rays.[7] Iron Man tries to stop Stane but he is too late. Emerging from the burning building, somebody asks what happened and all Iron Man can say is that somebody lost.
Recurring Characters
Iron Man, Iron Monger, Chessmen (Bishop, Knight (Halward), Knight (Thorpe), Rook), Jim Rhodes, Cly Erwin, Pepper Potts, Bethany Cabe, Theron Atlanta, Madame Masque, Hawkeye, Mockingbird, Happy Hogan, Bambi Arbogast
Continuity Notes
In case you’re late to the party, Obadiah Stane made it his mission to utterly destroy Tony Stark since Iron Man #162. He succeeded in driving Tony back into drinking in issue #167 and took over his company in issue #173. After Tony sobered up in Iron Man #182, Stane took renewed interest in destroying Tony back in issue #189.
Tony gave up being Iron Man in Iron Man #169-170, passing the mantle to Jim Rhodes. Since getting sober in issue #182, Tony has refused to become Iron Man again because he blames his double-identity for his drinking problem. However, in Iron Man #313, Tony eventually realizes that his addictions stem from generational trauma passed on by his step-father who was an abusive alcoholic.
Pictured among the kidnapped is Happy Hogan, which doesn’t make any sense since Happy was rescued by Jim last issue. Happy is seen interacting with the other prisoners in this story and next issue, so this isn’t a simple artists error. Iron Man #210 confirms Stane made a second successful attempt to kidnap Happy Hogan and hence why he is a prisoner here.
If you haven’t picked up on it yet, Stane did a mind swap between Bethany Cabe and the bio-duplicate that is posing as Madame Masque. This will be revealed in Iron Man #203. However, nobody will know that this is a bio-duplicate and not the real Madame Masque until Avengers (vol. 3) #32.
Tony recounts how this was similar to the technique he and Jim used to destroy Stane’s Circuits Breaker drone. That was in issue #198.
Tony recounts his past encounters with the Chessmen, this happened from Iron Man #163-166. Are these the same guys he fought before? Well that’s a little complicated:
Tony originally fought the first Knight, Fletcher Heggs, in Iron Man #163. When Heggs failed to defeat the hero, he was killed while in jail the following issue.
His successor was Raleigh Halward, whom battled Tony in Iron Man #167. He also appeared again in issues #170 and 174, battling Jim Rhodes after he took over the mantle of Iron Man. Raleigh is one of the Knights present here.
This second knight seen here is a third operative by the name of Basil Thorpe and this is his first appearance. As explained in Iron Man #170, Stane has at least two operatives representing a single chess piece.
The Bishop seen here is Alban Emond, the first Bishop sent against Tony Stark back in issues #163-164.
When Emond was originally defeated by Iron Man, Stane sent a second Bishop — named Orrick Rallison — after Iron Man in issue #167. He is not present here in this story and his whereabouts are (as of this writing on January, 2022) are unknown.
Who is who and the Chessmen’s real names are not fully explained in any of these stories. All clarifications and identities were made in Iron Manual Mark 3 #1.
As explained in Iron Man #198, Obadiah Stane’s father — a compulsive gambler — accidentally shot himself in the head trying to show his son how to play Russian Roulette. The experience taught Stane a very rigid idea of being a winner or a loser.