Ultimate Iron Man II series discussion [Card/Ferry] [spoilers]

Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

Ultimate Iron Man mini does that. Heck, I wouldn't have too many problems with it if it wasn't for the continuity stupidity between UMTU, Ultimates, and UIM.

I just think his abilities are useless or redundant. Having neural tissue thought your body isn't going to make you smarter. And, besides, making Tony a human genius is what set him apart from mutant or other super-powered heroes. Now, he's basically just a mutant. And with the healing factor. . .why does he need the Iron Man suit in the first place? And if it's to protect him inside the suit, like UIMII says, then why does 616 Tony have no problem with it? It was an unnecessary change.
 
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Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

It was necessary in that it becomes the impetus for why the armor technology was created in the first place.

You have a child that is entirely made of neural tissue and therefore is constantly in pain. His father, a genious inventor, finds a way to make sure his son can lead a normal and healthy life by finding a way to protect him from that pain. The Iron Man armor is thus born.

Since OSC knew he was writing an Origin story, why go back to the old standby of "I must find a way to escape from this prison camp or I will be killed" of the 616 Iron Man? We know that story, we've read that story, we don't care about that story any more. We are no longer a generation who resonates with POW camps, arms dealers, and "Great Escape" senarios. That was who 616 Iron Man was trying to serve.

I would argue that we are a generation that understands genetic tinkering, super-viruses, and science-assisted living. That's who Ultimate Iron Man is trying to cater to.

That said: I am not super excited about his uber-healing factor. I didn't realize neural tissue could do that.
 
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Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

So Tony is a mutant... according to the first iron man arc, if i'm not mistaking, doesn't he have neural tissue all over his body, and also he can heal himself like Wolverine apparently, but not as fast?This is just confusing, guess we will have to wait till the issues come out. When is it coming out again?
Actually, he's an illegal gene-whatever-the-term-was-that-Fury-said mutant. He is the way he is due to the monkey and what not.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

I have written all I will ever say on the matter of the first dreadful mini in several threads before. Go searching for my opinion on it....
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

The "body-wide brain" idea Card uses here can be backed up by one theory of human intelligence I've seen. The theory is that the brain structure has a fair amount to do with intelligence levels, particularly in the number of synaptic connections within and on the brain itself. The greater the number of connections, the more intelligent the organism will be. (The article pointed to the fact that the human brain is deeply wrinkled, thereby providing a larger surface area for more connections.)

Expanding on that idea, if Stark has neural tissue throughout his body that functions like brain cells or tissue, the number of synaptic connections becomes exponentially larger, and he would, therefore, be considerably more intelligent than people who don't have this "condition". I'm sure there would be other factors involved, but this is not outside the range of possibility.

One of the other advantages to this explanation is the avoidance of the "oversized cranium" image that's used for characters like The Leader in 616 Marvel. Y'know, where you can tall they're so much smarter than everyone because their brain is noticeably bigger. (Someone needs to explain to me why The Leader doesn't just tip over backwards.... :lol: )

I'll have to see if I still have the link to this article at home. I actually started an essay on the subject, but dropped the idea as being a waste of time and board space, given how much people here seem to hate the series.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

I wouldn't mind the ody wide brain idea so much, if it wasn't for the regenration of limbs that he shows all the time.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

His body is all brain right?

He can regrow limbs, but quite often gets chunks cut off...


Isn't that basically a lobotomy?
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

It was necessary in that it becomes the impetus for why the armor technology was created in the first place.

You have a child that is entirely made of neural tissue and therefore is constantly in pain. His father, a genious inventor, finds a way to make sure his son can lead a normal and healthy life by finding a way to protect him from that pain. The Iron Man armor is thus born.

Since OSC knew he was writing an Origin story, why go back to the old standby of "I must find a way to escape from this prison camp or I will be killed" of the 616 Iron Man? We know that story, we've read that story, we don't care about that story any more. We are no longer a generation who resonates with POW camps, arms dealers, and "Great Escape" senarios. That was who 616 Iron Man was trying to serve.

I would argue that we are a generation that understands genetic tinkering, super-viruses, and science-assisted living. That's who Ultimate Iron Man is trying to cater to.

That said: I am not super excited about his uber-healing factor. I didn't realize neural tissue could do that.

It's not so much that I wanted them to revisit the 616 Iron Man story, but, as it is, I felt something was lost in translation. I always liked that Tony was a self-made super hero using technology rather than genetics or mutations. Hell, I liked the skin-armor idea, too. If he had some sort of genetic defect that caused his skin to burn unmercifully, it would have been the same without the brain body or regeneration explanation.

The "body-wide brain" idea Card uses here can be backed up by one theory of human intelligence I've seen. The theory is that the brain structure has a fair amount to do with intelligence levels, particularly in the number of synaptic connections within and on the brain itself. The greater the number of connections, the more intelligent the organism will be. (The article pointed to the fact that the human brain is deeply wrinkled, thereby providing a larger surface area for more connections.)

Expanding on that idea, if Stark has neural tissue throughout his body that functions like brain cells or tissue, the number of synaptic connections becomes exponentially larger, and he would, therefore, be considerably more intelligent than people who don't have this "condition". I'm sure there would be other factors involved, but this is not outside the range of possibility.

Interesting. I've never heard that before. Well, then my complaint about it not making sense is swept to the wayside, however. . .

One of the other advantages to this explanation is the avoidance of the "oversized cranium" image that's used for characters like The Leader in 616 Marvel. Y'know, where you can tall they're so much smarter than everyone because their brain is noticeably bigger. (Someone needs to explain to me why The Leader doesn't just tip over backwards.... :lol: )

I just felt it was unnecessary in the first place. Tony (And Reed Richards, for that matter) had that human factor. Now, we attribute Tony's intelligence to a mutation. I just feel it takes away what made Tony such a good character in the first place.

I wouldn't mind the ody wide brain idea so much, if it wasn't for the regenration of limbs that he shows all the time.

I'm still against the brain body idea, for reasons stated above, but, thanks to Seldes, I can at least live with it. But, the regeneration is just ridiculous.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

(Someone needs to explain to me why The Leader doesn't just tip over backwards.... :lol: )

:lol: :lol: :lol:
 
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Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

I wouldn't have a problem with Ultimate Iron man if he didn't regenerated or the regeneration was showed in the Ultimates.

I don't care much with Tony being a human or not since even his 616 part isn't human anymore.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

Interesting. I've never heard that before. Well, then my complaint about it not making sense is swept to the wayside, however. . .
To be honest, I'd never heard it before, either; it was something I found while researching the whole idea of human intelligence to see if Card was actually on to something. I'll have to see if I've still got my notes at home so other people can go read the article. I'm not an expert on this subject, and I could have misread it. (Or I could go back and find it again, only to discover that it was a hypothesis put forth by scientists at, say, The Onion. :oops: )

Edit: I do still have my notes. (I'm such a pack rat....) I think this was the article I was remembering: The Question of Non-Human Intelligence. Quote: "The one index that appears to have any correlation with intelligence is the number of connections made by nerve cells. This scale places humans far above any other organisms, in fact "human brains maintain nearly 100 times more contacts per neuron than rat brains and most vertebrates"(2). This measure seems valid because intelligence does rely on the comparison and coordination of many different inputs from many different structures; a process which would be facilitated by an increased number of connections per neuron."

There was also this article: Neuroscience and Intelligence. Quote: "The sheer size of the brain is relevant for two reasons. Most obviously, a small brain simply cannot hold as many brain cells as a large one. Less obvious, but more important, is that the true quality of a brain must be measured by the complexity of linkages between cells."

End edit.

And I will admit that I have no explanation for the whole regeneration thing. I've seen the fan theory that Wolverine's healing factor is actually a controlled form of cancer (which could explain the whole brain tumor thing mentioned in the first arc), but your guess is as good as mine on this one.

I understand why people find this explanation of Stark's abilities unsatisfying. One of my favorite themes in comic books is watching non-super-powered characters who can compete with the super-heroes, just because the regular person has a lot of natural talent or has worked hard to hone his/her abilities. I do, however, have considerably fewer issues with UIM than most people. Part of it is the fact that I have no real emotional involvement in the 616 version of Stark, and don't care much for his adult version in the UU, either. (Card at least made him a likeable kid.)

I'm trade-waiting on this title, so I'll get off here now and let the people who actually read the issue discuss it further. (Without the comments on the mental state of the people who read and/or like this series, please.)
 
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Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

So, I finally got around to reading this.

And you know what? It was decent. The dialog is still a bit off, but the story seemed fairly solid. Even the skin armor and regeneration was used to decent effect. It makes some amount of sense that it'd be too dangerous for a regular human to wear the Iron Man suit (Even though Jim Rhodes does. But, the consequences for doing so are explained). The only other thing I didn't really like was the fact that Tony and Jim were kind of nonchalant about killing people, despite being terrorists. They weren't trained as soldiers and they're still fairly young, so their attitude was a little too far-fetched.

Otherwise, I'm looking forward to more.
 
Re: Ultimate Iron Man II #1 Discussion/Spoilers

Decent is the right word for the issue. Better than anything I expected.
 
Ultimate Iron Man II #2 discussion (spoilers!)

See a preview of this at: http://www.comicscontinuum.com/stories/0801/18/marvelfirsts.htm


Also see preview of IRON MAN #25, MARVEL ADVENTURES IRON MAN #9,
THE ORDER #7, THE PUNISHER #54, SHE-HULK #25, ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR #50, Marvel Zombies II 4, X-MEN: FIRST CLASS #8,
YOUNG AVENGERS PRESENTS #1, WORLD WAR HULK AFTERSMASH: DAMAGE CONTROL #1, & MARVEL ILLUSTRATED: PICTURE OF DORIAN GRAY #2
 

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