10 Things Marvel Wants You To Forget About Iron Man

4. He's Probably An Ayn Rand Fan

Speaking of celebrated Iron Man story arcs, Armour Wars is one of those. Twenty years before Civil War, Armour Wars introduced the idea of Tony Stark as a total jerk as he realises that he's sold his technology to a load of people that he regrets selling them to, and so he decides he's going to steal it all back and there isn't anything anyone can do about it. Except they can, because they've all got Iron Man-derived weapons and suits of armour with which to war with him. Armour Wars, see. This decision had all sorts of repercussions - including causing a riot in a supervillain prison when he tried to requisition the power armour used by the guards - but Tony Stark just didn't care. His principles were far more important. It was similar to the mindset he had in the second Iron Man film, where the US government rightfully fretted over how safe it was for a private citizen to have a robot suit that gave him the power of a nuclear weapon, and he was doing what he wanted with it. Stark's arguments in both cases were classically Randian. That's not to be confused with being randy, which playboy Tony certainly is, but the philosophy derived from the works of Ayn Rand, writer of such terrible books as Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead. Beloved of Libertarians around the world, in Rand's view nobody had to answer for what they did with their creations and inventions because they are smart and can do what they want. Which is maybe not a political allegiance you want a superhero to have.