10 Things Everyone Always Gets Wrong About Iron Man

No, he's NOT just another Batman.

by Ewan Paterson
Iron Man Tony Stark Armour
Marvel Comics/Adi Granov

Apart from Harley Quinn, and maybe even Spider-Gwen, no other comic book character has experienced as meteoric a rise as Tony Stark.

Considered an integral part of the Marvel Universe but never as popular as its biggest characters, Stark only really emerged into the public spotlight with the release of 2008's Iron Man, a film now considered to be a watershed moment in the superhero genre, having kickstarted the monolithic Marvel Cinematic Universe with Robert Downey Jr. in the driving seat.

11 years, and over $11 billion later, and Downey Jr. is finally set to depart the role that galvanised his career with Avengers: Endgame. It's going to be pretty emotional, but it also presents the perfect opportunity to reflect on the character of Iron Man, how Downey managed to redefine him, and how the character's resurgent popularity has given rise to a whole host of misconceptions in the process.

Since 1963, Iron Man has been a constant feature of the Marvel Universe, but the Cold War didn't last forever, and with a changing of the zeitgeist has also come a changing of the character himself. As a result, you'd struggle to find a superhero as misunderstood as Stark, and with his notoriety at an all-time high, there's no better time to delve into the character, and see what everyone always gets wrong about him.

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Content Producer/Presenter

WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.