Written by Tom Taylor
Art by Yildiray Cinar
Published by Marvel Comics
Superior Iron Man returns to spinner racks and this time with one of the most politically charged and hard hitting issues to date. If the idea of Tony Stark donning Apple styled armor and being hailed as San Francisco’s technological messiah wasn’t on the point enough, this issue puts on the brass knuckles and starts giving out political gut punches. Tony Stark unveils the next stage of his Extremis 3 program, Iron Sight, a mass of flying camera drones with the private information of everyone in the city with specific programing to protect only those who can afford Extremis in the first place. Yep, all within the span of five pages, Tom Taylor sounds off against drone warfare, street monitoring, excessive police action, corporate control of law enforcement, online privacy, and data mining, and he doesn’t give an inch. This sort of brutal takedown is the breed of futurist thinking which lesser writers either lack the intelligence or gall to do. Yet Taylor does it as an opening act.
The comic then goes on to show how Tony Stark is harboring the wanted criminal Teen Abomination on his own personal property to use him as a bodyguard/test subject. This new character was introduced in the first issue and it’s made clear there is much more in store for Teen Abonination than being a one-note villain to live out the rest of his existence as little more than a wiki page. He’s going to be a big player in this story and whichever way he falls, it’s going to be great. This instalment also marks the transition where Tony Stark finally becomes the main player in Superior Iron Man. His battle with Daredevil seems to be on hold for now, but Matt Murdock is clearly not done in this title.
Yildiray Cinar knocks this issue out of the park. He draws everything like it’s been dipped in sunlight. Be it innocent bystanders or San Francisco’s cityscape, it’s all drawn to look hyper-beautified and it plays off Tony Stark’s sleaze and corporate backstabbing perfectly. It’s the Patrick Bateman style of hiding sadism under the handsome corporate look. This book is clearly mounting up for a super-charged and political heavy climax and Marvel needs to keep Cinar onboard for that. Seeing him cut loose and destroy the glorified sunny San Fran is going to be amazing.
This issue reminds the audience exactly who Tom Taylor is. He’s the writer who took Earth 2 and used it to personally beat down Man of Steel, turned the choppy plot of Injustice into an epic, and now is on his way to be one of the biggest breakout talents of the last five years. Money on the table, if Superior Iron Man remains this unforgiving and on the nose, it’s going to be one of the best series of the year. Missing this is to miss out on the title of 2015, read it.