Looks like not every Krakoa-era plot thread gets wrapped up in time for “From the Ashes.” There’s still the matter of Mrs. and Mr. Emma Frost. Or, more accurately, Tony Stark and Emma’s image-induced alter ego, Hazel Kendal.
Now, I have no inside insight into the minds of Marvel editorial or Gerry Duggan or anything like that, but I think we can color by numbers here.
Iron Man, like the X-Men, is due for a reset. Now that the mutants are moving on, Tony doesn’t need to be their armored ally anymore. Back to all the Avengers being people they have misunderstanding-based fights with. (Although who knows, with Jed MacKay writing both teams, maybe that will change.) And back to Tony being a miserable multimillionaire who makes bad life choices.
If this is a break-up issue as my Iron-sense tells me — the constant fight-or-flight stress of the Orchis era over, Tony and Emma find they have little in common and must go back to their separate lives on amicable but still sad terms — it would be Tony’s second run-ending heartbreak in as many creators. The Christopher Cantwell era preceding this ended with Patsy Walker, Hellcat, rejecting a marriage proposal from Tony. And I’m sure something bad happened to Tony and Janet Van Dyne, the Wasp, during the Dan Slott run, but I don’t care to look that up.
Anyway, check out Kael Ngu’s cover to Invincible Iron Man #20, out July 17, and keep scrolling for the basic deets.
INVINCIBLE IRON MAN #20
Written by GERRY DUGGAN
Art by ANDREA DI VITO
Cover by KAEL NGU
THE WAR IS OVER.
The war with Orchis is over. What does the future hold for Tony and Emma Frost?
On Sale 7/17
Dan Grote is the editor-in-chief of ComicsXF, having won the site by ritual combat. By day, he’s a newspaper editor, and by night, he’s … also an editor. He co-hosts WMQ&A: The ComicsXF Interview Podcast with Matt Lazorwitz. He lives in New Jersey with his wife, two kids and two miniature dachshunds, and his third, fictional son, Peter Winston Wisdom.
