Iron Man (TV series)
Iron Man, also known as Iron Man: The Animated Series, is an American animated television series based on Marvel Comics' superhero, Iron Man. The series aired from 1994 to 1996 in syndication as part of The Marvel Action Hour, which packaged Iron Man with other animated series based on Marvel properties, the Fantastic Four and The Incredible Hulk, with one half-hour episode from each series airing back-to-back. The show was backed by a toy line that featured many armor variants. Off the heels of the release of the live-action Iron Man film in 2008, reruns began airing on the Jetix block on Toon Disney.
Although only lasting two seasons, Iron Man was the subject of a major overhaul between seasons when its production studio was changed. The result was a massively changed premise, tone, and general approach, which left the two seasons scarcely recognizable as being part of the same series.
Series overview
First season
The first season of Iron Man involves Iron Man battling the Mandarin and his minions, who seek to steal his technology. The Mandarin's army consists of Dreadknight, Blizzard, Blacklash, Grey Gargoyle, Whirlwind, Living Laser, MODOK, Fin Fang Foom, Justin Hammer and series-original Hypnotia. To combat these villains, Iron Man had the help of his own team, including Century, War Machine, Scarlet Witch, Hawkeye, and Spider-Woman.The season consisted mostly of standalone stories, with two two-part episodes late towards the end. The episode "The Origin of Iron Man" recounts a modified and modernized version of Iron Man's comic book origin. This late-run recounting of the title character's origin is symptomatic of what is generally thought of as the season's greatest weakness – despite having such a large cast of characters, very few of the show's heroes and villains were developed, leaving viewers unaware of their personal stories and powers. The show is generally held to have been at its best when telling characters' backstories.
Throughout the season, Mandarin secretly spies on Force Works. This culminates in "The Wedding of Iron Man", when Iron Man realizes that he has been spied on and that Mandarin has acquired enough information to potentially deduce his secret identity. Iron Man ultimately uses a robotic duplicate of himself to fool the Mandarin into believing that he is not Tony Stark.
In this first season, the theme music was composed by progressive rock musician Keith Emerson.
Second season
The second season had a new animation studio, Koko Enterprises; a new head writer, Tom Tataranowicz; and a new theme composed by William Kevin Anderson. The theme features the repeated refrain of "I am Iron Man!", while showing Tony Stark beating iron plates into shape with a blacksmith's hammer. Stark's longer hair style in the second season was based upon artist Mark Bright's depiction of the character from the late 1980s.In the season premiere, "The Beast Within", Iron Man is forced to wear a cybernetic plate over his chest to keep him alive after being injured by a missile. Another major change was that Tony could change armors on the fly, represented as vocalizing the name of the specific armor, which would then appear in place of his usual suit in a ring of energy. In addition to the hydro, stealth and space armors, as seen in the comics, several new armors were invented for the series, specifically magnetic, radiation, inferno, subterranean, and a samurai-themed armor that is not shown being used.
Another change was that Force Works was mostly written out of the series, parting ways with Stark after he deceives them in order to work in secret with the Mandarin when Fin Fang Foom was plotting to eliminate Earth. When Stark's counter plan against Justin Hammer, which includes faking his death without the knowledge of his teammates, leads to a disbanding of Force Works, Julia Carpenter and James Rhodes are the only ones who continue to work with Stark.
The Mandarin is given a significantly reduced role after losing his rings. His appearances are reduced to cameos in the cliffhangers at the end of the story, as he tried to retrieve each ring. Prior to finding his last two rings, the Mandarin claims his eighth ring from MODOK in the episode "Empowered". In the finale, the Mandarin, having regained all of his rings, unleashes a mist using the Heart of Darkness to render everything technological useless. Iron Man reunites with Force Works to stop him. In battle, Iron Man manages to reflect the power of Mandarin's rings, destroying them and leaving the Mandarin with amnesia.
''The Incredible Hulk'' (1996 TV series) and ''Spider-Man'' (1994 TV series) crossovers
Robert Hays and Dorian Harewood reprise their respective roles of Iron Man and War Machine in The Incredible Hulk episode "Helping Hand, Iron Fist". War Machine originally stops Rick Jones from seeing Tony Stark, but relents after Rick explains that he needs Stark's help to find Bruce Banner. He later alerts Stark of the arrival of Thunderbolt Ross and a squad of Hulkbusters. War Machine fights some of the Hulkbusters alongside Iron Man.Iron Man and War Machine make guest appearances in Spider-Man The Animated Series, with Iron Man voiced again by Robert Hays and War Machine voiced by James Avery. They first appear in the episodes "Venom Returns" and "Carnage", where they help Spider-Man battle Carnage. Iron Man later appears in the three-part episode "Secret Wars" in which the Beyonder engineers a war between good and evil. In the end, the heroes win and everyone is sent back to Earth without any memory of the events.
Cast
Main
- Robert Hays – Iron Man / Tony Stark, Living Laser
- James Avery – War Machine / James Rhodes, Whirlwind, Blacklash
- Ed Gilbert – Mandarin, Grey Gargoyle, Ultimo
- Robert Ito – Mandarin
- Jim Cummings – MODOK, Century, stand-in vocals for War Machine, Whirlwind, Grey Gargoyle, and Justin Hammer
- Dorian Harewood – War Machine / James Rhodes, Whirlwind, Blacklash, Stilt-Man
- John Reilly – Hawkeye / Clint Barton, Beetle
- Katherine Moffat – Scarlet Witch / Wanda Frank, Rachel Carpenter
- Linda Holdahl – Hypnotia
- Jennifer Darling – Scarlet Witch, Hypnotia
- Casey Defranco – Spider-Woman / Julia Carpenter
- Jennifer Hale – Spider-Woman / Julia Carpenter, Ghost
- James Warwick – Century, Sam Jaggers, General Hirsch
- Tom Kane – H.O.M.E.R., Century, Stingray, Ghost, Sunturion
Recurring
- Philip Abbott – Nick Fury
- Neil Dickson – Dreadknight
- Linda Holdahl – Hypnotia
- Chuck McCann – Blizzard
- Neil Ross – Fin Fang Foom, Wellington Yinsen, Howard Stark, Blizzard
- Tony Steedman – Justin Hammer
- Efrem Zimbalist Jr. – Justin Hammer, Firepower
Guests
- Dimitra Arliss – Martha Stark
- Sarah Douglas – Alana Ulanova
- Jeannie Elias – Veronica Benning
- Matt Frewer – Leader
- William Hootkins – Crimson Dynamo
- Jamie Horton – Controller, Ghost
- Julia Kato – Dr. Su-Yin
- Todd Louiso – The Hacker
- Gerard Maguire – Titanium Man
- Neal McDonough – Firebrand / Gary Gilbert
- Ron Perlman – Hulk / Bruce Banner
- Peter Renaday – Howard Stark
- Stu Rosen – Crimson Dynamo
- Marla Rubinoff – Elastika
- W. Morgan Sheppard – Dum Dum Dugan
- Scott Valentine – Dark Aegis
- David Warner – Arthur Dearborn
- Lisa Zane – Madame Masque
Episodes
Crossovers
''Spider-Man''
- Tony Stark also had a cameo in "The Spot" episode of Spider-Man.
- Although he never spoke, Iron Man had a few cameos in a few of the Fantastic Four episodes, including the Season 2 episodes "To Battle the Living Planet" and "Doomsday".
- * He also cameos in "Tolerance is Extinction Part 3" of X-Men '97 where he is with Captain America at the White House and protects President Robert Kelly from the Prime Sentinels attacking.
Home media
Europe
On October 8, 2007, Maximum Entertainment released a three-disc DVD set that contained all twenty-six episodes of the series. Maximum released all twenty-six episodes as separate three-disc sets in April 2008, with each disc also including two Iron Man segments from The Marvel Super Heroes. These discs also came bundled together as a boxset titled Iron Man: The Ultimate Super Hero. The third was also released separately as Iron Man: Special Edition. In April 2008, Maximum released a 5-disc boxset containing both complete series sets for this show and the one for The Marvel Super Heroes segments.Clear Vision later took over European rights and released a 4-disc complete series set exclusively to their website on April 19, 2010. A six-disc set that was released on the same day bundled both series together.