You’ll have a hard time finding a more
recognizable and iconic Marvel superhero these days than Tony Stark aka Iron Man, and
that is almost entirely due to his role in the MCU as it became the biggest franchise in movie
history. So today I thought we’d take a closer look at this character, and now that his journey
is seemingly well and truly finished, recap his life and his MCU journey in chronological
order. Spoilers for all the Iron Man MCU stuff, obviously, let’s just jump into it.
Anthony Edward Stark was born in Manhattan on May 29 1970. His father is Howard Stark, a
genius millionaire who founded his own weapons manufacturing company Stark Industries and who had
helped the US in several ways during World War II. However, he’s a very cold and distant father
to young Tony, and one of the few things Tony recounts that his father talked about was his
admiration for Steve Rogers aka Captain America, a super soldier from World War II who Howard worked
with and made the super soldier serum for, so throughout his childhood Tony is not too fond of
Steve Rogers. Tony is quite close with his mother Maria, and Edwin Jarivs, his dad’s friend and
butler, who helps raise him along with his mom. He also finds passion in inventing, with himself
also being a genius. Some of his accomplishments, age 4 makes his first circuit board, age 7 a
V8 motorbike engine, while he’s in high school at Phillips Academy in Massachusetts from age 7
to 14 he hacks the Pentagon on a dare, and then gets into MIT early, where he studies engineering,
he also wins some awards for his accomplishments, including for robot design. While there he meets
James Rhoades aka Rhodey and they become BFFs, Tony then graduates at age 17.
So the next few years presumably go pretty damn well for Tony, he’s a genius
with lots of money, lots of friends, he’s a charismatic snarky fun guy, I think it's safe to
assume he’s living his best life for these years. However, everything changes in December
1991 when Tony’s parents leave for vacation and are assassinated by a mind-controlled
super soldier working for a Nazi superevil terrorist cult. If you’re not familiar with
the MCU that’s a pretty sharp handbrake turn but let’s be real you all know the story,
it's Bucky, but the world, including Tony, is led to believe that the Starks died in a
car crash. For a few months Obadiah Stane, one of Tony’s dad’s friends and business partners,
becomes the interim CEO of Stark Industries, but eventually Tony takes over, which Obadiah
isn’t too happy about but we’ll get to that. So at age 21 Tony is now the CEO of Stark
Industries, and he works in partnership with Stane to make it a hugely successful company.
This is helped in part by his BFF Rhodey being in the Air Force and becoming the liaison
between Stark Industries and the military, which in case you can’t do the math,
weapons manufacturer and military equals a lot of money for Tony Stark. With Tony’s genius
leading it Stark Industries quickly starts making more advanced weapons, and Tony tinkers in his
spare time making himself an AI that he names after his family’s butler JARVIS, to basically be
his version of an Alexa, except way more advanced. Tony who was already a sarcastic clever guy
becomes a bit more of a dick as success just keeps finding him over and over again, and he also likes
alcohol, and having completely platonic encounters with women. On New Years Eve in 1999, when Tony
is 29, he goes to a conference in Switzerland and at the after party he gets suitably hammered.
He’s also hanging out with scientist Maya Hansen, and he also hired a bodyguard with a
sweet hairstyle called Happy Hogan. While at the party, a scientist called Ho Yinsen
tries to introduce Tony to a guy called Doctor Wu, but Tony’s like I’m drunk, nothing matters,
this'll never come up again. In a similar vein, another scientist, Aldrich Killian, comes up to
Tony asking him to discuss funding this idea he has for a scientific R&D organization known as
AIM, and Tony’s like for sure let’s talk about it up on the freezing rooftop, even though he
doesn't have any intention of going. Is it just cuz he forgot, is it cuz he’s a dick, probably a
bit of both. But Tony goes back to his hotel room, talks to Maya about her scientific idea
Extremis which could help grow back human limbs but unfortunately also makes things explode,
and after they spend the night together Tony leaves her the solution to her exploding Extremis
problem that he figured out on the fly, and dips. Aldrich Killian spent the night on the roof, he
is not too happy about what Tony has done, we’re seeing the beginnings of Tony’s dickishness just
making enemies that end up being super powerful, and yeah he’s gonna hold that grudge for a while.
One day Tony is confronted in his office by a lower level Stark employee, Virginia Potts, who
noticed an error in some numbers and then got fired for it and long story short she tells
Tony himself about what she found and Tony admires the way she does things and hires her
as his personal assistant, also giving her the nickname Pepper because she claimed she had pepper
spray with her when security tried to remove her. They become friends over the next little while,
though Tony is a bit of a dick in his Tony ways, forgetting her birthdays and making her
get rid of the women he spends the nights with the next morning, that kind of stuff.
Tony and Rhodey are out doing a weapons test in Arizona and Tony’s doing his usual playboy
partying in prep for a trip to Afghanistan soon to show off a new Stark missile the Jericho, and
Rhodey’s like hey maybe don’t go to Afghanistan and Tony’s like nah man it's cool. He also
gets attacked by a woman’s boyfriend because of course he does but Rhodey helps him with that.
More billionaire douchebag things, not caring about the awards he’s receiving, showing up late
to his own private jet, all that good stuff. He sleeps with reporter Christine Everheart, then
gets on his plane with Rhodey to Afghanistan where the flight attendants are strippers.
Things soon stop going swimmingly though as after a successful weapons presentation, the
military convoy that Tony is with is attacked by the terrorist group the Ten Rings. Tony gets away
for a second but is soon after in close proximity to an explosion of a Stark Industries missile,
which sends lots of shrapnel directly into his chest. He’s then kidnapped by the Ten Rings but
kept alive by Ho Yinsen, the scientist he met in Switzerland who has also been kidnapped by
the Ten Rings, performing life saving surgery and putting an electromagnet in his chest that
keeps the shrapnel from getting into his heart. The terrorists are demanding that Tony build them
a Jericho missile, which Tony isn’t too keen on, which leads to him getting tortured. He
also finds out that the Ten Rings somehow have lots of Stark Industries weapons that
they’ve been using, which is obviously not good news for many reasons. The terrorists
are like yeah we’ll let you go if you do this, but that’s obviously not true, and Tony and Yinsen
start on a new sneaky plan to act like they’re building the missile when really they're building
a weaponized suit for Tony to wear to help them escape. The idea is for the suit to be powered
by an arc reactor, which is this massive energy source that Tony’s dad had built many decades ago
with a Russian scientist Anton Vanko. Tony makes a smaller version of the arc reactor and it’s put
in his chest in place of the electromagnet, and it also helps to keep the shrapnel out of his chest
for the time being. Throughout this process Tony and Yinsen become friends and Tony learns
a little more about humility and life, with them discussing their families and Tony telling
Yinsen he doesn't have any family to return to, with Yinsen replying “you have nothing”.
Things start to get pretty tense in the cave, so Tony and Yinsen speed up to finish production
of the suit and the time to break out comes. Tony kills a bunch of terrorists in a crazy badass
action scene, but Yinsen sacrifices himself to give the suit enough time to initially boot up.
With his last words he tells Tony to not waste his life, something that will stick with Tony for
a long time to come. Tony then gets out of there using the jet packs installed in the suit, not
before causing some more explosions, and crashes in the desert, where he’s picked up by Rhodey.
Tony comes back to America, meets Pepper who is happy to see him again, and instead of
getting medical attention gets a burger and press conference. Obadiah Stane is there and
he's like ah Tony I’m so happy you're alive I’m totally not behind this whole thing, and
after Tony saw his weapons used by terrorists, and the lasting impression Yinsen left on him,
and the whole experience Tony decides that Stark Industries will no longer make weapons, much to
Stane’s surprise and unhappiness. Tony wants to work on more arc reactor stuff which Stane
again doesn't love, but before anything Tony has to change out his current arc reactor since
that was mostly just meant to power the suit, so he gets Pepper to change it to a new
one he’s built, which goes….flawlessly? Tony has now gotten the idea that this armored
suit thing could have more to it and so he starts tinkering away making improvements to his design,
making it smaller, more advanced, and especially focusing on flight control using repulsors
in his hands and feet, which he discovers can also be used offensively. He eventually
learns how to fly after a few accidents. Obadiah also stops by and tells him the Board has
voted Stark out of the company which Tony isn’t happy about and Stane’s like can I see your new
work by the way and Tony’s like nah. He then keeps working on the suit, implementing JARVIS into it
as well, eventually taking it out for a test fly which is pretty spectacular, until he discovers
that if he goes too high up, the suit freezes, which is an issue he then works to fix. Tony also
is given his old arc reactor which Pepper put in a little case with a cute message as a gift to
him, which is sweet and also potentially useful later on we’ll get to that. Tony also finds
someone, which he doesn't know to be SHIELD, the Strategic Homeland Intervention, Enforcement
and Logistics Division, trying to hack into his database, and he's like hmm that's weird, I’ll
do the reasonable thing you do in this situation, fly up and destroy their satellite. Simple.
Tony then finds out there’s a charity event being held under his name that he hasn’t even been
invited to, so he shows up partially to show the public he’s a-ok. While there he says hey to
a Watcher Informant and is greeted by Agent Phil Coulson of SHIELD, who wants to talk to him
about everything that’s been happening lately and Tony is like yeah yeah sounds good goodbye.
He then dances with Pepper and they flirt, before almost kissing. Tony then goes to get
them a drink but he’s confronted by Christine Everheart who lets him know his weapons are being
sold to the Ten Rings, which he didn't know about. Tony confronts Obadiah Stane about this, who
without actually saying he did it, basically says he did it. He’s also like by the way, the Board
voting you out of the company, that was actually just me teehee. Tony then leaves, forgetting
Pepper’s still waiting for him, though at least this time it won’t make him a mortal enemy.
Tony thinks screw all of this and takes his newly weaponized and gold and hot rod red colored suit
to Gulmira, to the village that Yinsen was from, and brutally kills all the terrorists there, and
he leaves one of his former captors to the people that were being terrorized. He also gets in a
bit of a chase with the US military and reveals to Rhodey that it’s actually him in the suit.
Once he gets back he asks Pepper to get info from the Stark Industries database on where the
other weapons to the Ten Rings are being sent, she initially refuses because it would
endanger Tony to go on more of these missions, but Tony tells her about what he learned in the
cave and his new found purpose for helping people rather than just making weapons, and it convinces
her to do it. Tony is then however paralyzed by this fancy little device from Obadiah Stane, who
reveals that it was him who arranged for Tony to be kidnapped and killed because he wanted
control back of Stark Industries. He also now has his own weaponized suit of armor that
was able to be conceived of and put together thanks to the pieces that Tony left behind in
the desert, and also he’s gonna kill Pepper. He then takes the arc reactor in Tony’s chest
and leaves him to die, but thanks to his robotic arm buddy Dummy Tony is able to get the old arc
reactor that Pepper gave him that saves his life. He suits up and goes to save Pepper, who also got
Phil Coulson to work with her to take down Stane. A big armored suit on armored suit battle
ensues, lots of repulsor blasts and punches and explosions, however, Stark briefly gets the
upper hand when Stane’s suit does not have the tech to deal with freezing at high altitudes,
ending up with them on the Stark Industries rooftop. Tony’s arc reactor is the old, not
great one though so he doesn't have a ton of juice either. He creates a plan to have Pepper
fire up the giant Stark Industries arc reactor beneath them to kill Stane, which eventually
happens, and Tony barely makes it out alive. After the battle, Coulson again tries to talk
to Tony, telling him that with SHIELD training he can be a real badass and make proper use of
his suit. The next day at a press conference Coulson gives Tony a detailed made up story that
involves this superhero alter ego, which the press has called Iron Man, being his bodyguard, however,
Tony’s not really about that and tells the world “I am Iron Man”. Later on, Nick Fury, director of
SHIELD, shows up in Tony’s house to tell him he isn’t the only superhero in the world and he wants
to talk to Tony about the Avengers Initiative, a team of superheroes. These SHIELD people do not
leave Tony alone. Tony’s like ehhh please leave. Tony then starts using his newfound
superhero life to try to create world peace, going on some Armored Adventures, if you will,
which leads to him being Time’s Person of the Year. This includes a lot of fighting and
defeating Ten Rings members, though he also saves a crashed pilot in the Democratic Republic
of Congo and recovers some stolen art in Germany. But anyway, being Iron Man comes at a cost, and
Tony’s arc reactor is currently poisoning him, there isn’t currently a way to make an arc reactor
that can power the suits but also not poison Tony, while the US government specifically Garry
Shandling see a weapon of horrible destruction and say “mine”. Tony however distracts himself with
booze and dancing girls and fame, starting up the Stark Expo again, a showcase of inventions and
weapons that his father had held several times. Anyway Shandling aka Stern aka a secret HYDRA
agent, don't worry about it says give us the Iron Man tech, Tony says you can kiss my ass, if other
countries and companies got access to his tech they could use it against America and for lots
of bad stuff. Justin Hammer, one of Tony’s rivals in the tech and weaponry world, is also present,
also against Tony, and Tony shows off that Hammer and others have been trying to make Iron Man-like
suits but they’ve failed miserably. However, Tony, with all of the stresses of his life currently,
is back to being not just fun arrogant Tony but dick-ish arrogant Tony. He also hasn’t been
taking much care of Stark Industries since he’s busy being Iron Man so he’s like hey Pepper you’re
CEO now cool, I’m such a good person. Pepper gets a new notary, Natalie Rushman, who prompts
Tony to think that he also needs a notary. Tony essentially believes he doesn't have that
long to live now because of the poisoning, so he’s more impulsive, if you can believe that,
and as a result while at the Monaco Grand Prix he steps in to race in it himself. However his fun
is cut short by a guy with electric whips and his very own arc reactor, awkward, stepping on to the
track and trying to murder Tony. Luckily Tony has a briefcase suit with him that Happy gets to him
so he’s able to beat up the whip guy, some might call him Whiplash, by some I mean no one in this
film, but Tony’s like huh that’s kind of weird no one should have this tech. Tony talks to the guy
in prison who turns out to be Ivan Vanko, son of Anton Vanko, the Russian scientist who Tony’s dad
made the original arc reactor with. Anton wanted to use it for profit so Howard had him deported to
the USSR where he was exiled to Siberia and didn't live a great life, so now his son Ivan is out for
revenge. Tony leaves him in jail where he’ll soon escape, and the Senate now has much better ground
to stand on in terms of demanding Tony hand over the tech now that someone else has it. Rhodey
talks to Tony about the military wanting his tech and finds out about the poisoning which Tony
otherwise has kept to himself, and he tells him he doesn't have to do the whole lone gunslinger
act, but Tony promises him it’s all good. Tony now has a week to live, and after Natalie
flirts with him a bit, he decides he’s still gonna go through with a birthday party he had
planned and gets absolutely hammered. He uses the Iron Man suit for not its intended purposes, let’s
say, although some of them are intended I suppose, much to the horror and annoyance of Rhodey and
Pepper. Rhodey eventually puts on the Mark II suit, and he and Tony duke it out throughout
Tony’s mansion, it’s a pretty even fight given one is a novice and one is an expert who's plastered.
Eventually they both fire their repulsor blasts at each other at the same time which causes a massive
explosion. Rhodey flies off to give the suit to the military, and Tony goes off and does the
obvious thing to do when you’re gonna die soon, get donuts. Nick Fury of SHIELD shows up again
and after revealing that Natalie is actually SHIELD spy Natasha Romanoff who was sent to keep
an eye on him, he basically tells Tony, get up, get your ass into gear, fix this poisoning
problem it's possible, after injecting him with some chemical to slow down the poisoning.
Tony’s given some of his dad’s stuff to look through while Phil Coulson keeps an eye on him,
and he finds out that his father was one of the founders of SHIELD. He finds a video of his father
actually saying he’s proud of him and that Tony is his greatest creation, pretty emotional stuff for
Tony. He then goes to try and apologize to Pepper, it doesn't really work cuz he still acts like
a bit of an asshole while doing it, but while there he finds his dad’s old model for the Stark
Expo, and in that model he discovers the formula for a new element that his father discovered while
researching the Tesseract but couldn’t synthesize with his technology at the time, so he left it
for his son to discover in the future secretly hidden in a model of the Expo that he happened to
spot while leaving Pepper’s office exactly when he needed it. Yeah this part of the plot is a little
thin, but just go with it. Tony has now finally gotten his mojo back and after a construction
destruction montage with the brief help of Coulson he manages to synthesize this element,
put it in his chest, and boom, poisoning solved! However, there isn't too much time to celebrate as
Tony gets a call from Vanko who has escaped from prison, and has worked with Justin Hammer to make
a bunch of drones and a new Iron Man suit with the tech that Rhodey brought the military and Hammer,
all of which is soon to be presented at the Stark Expo with Rhodey inside the new suit. Tony suits
up in what is now the Mark VI new and improved suit, with his new and improved arc reactor, and
heads over to the Expo. Once he gets there Vanko takes over all the drones and the Rhodey suit and
sends them all after Tony, who manages to evade them using his superior mobility and intelligence,
saving a young kid called Peter Parker along the way. Natasha Romanoff hacks through Rhodey’s suit
and gives him back control after a bit of a chase, and now Tony and Rhodey team up in their suits
to take out, I believe the technical term is an asston of drones. They successfully do so, it's a
great action scene, but then Vanko shows up in a new and improved question mark? Iron Man
suit of his own with his signature whips. Tony and Rhodey fight him for a while before using
their repulsor blast explosion trick they learned earlier to mortally wound Vanko, who before his
death sets all the drones to self destruct. Tony saves Pepper from the explosions, they have
a freaked out argument conversation which ends in Tony telling her how much he cares
about her and they kiss. Hammer is arrested, and Fury talks to Tony telling him that based on
everything they’ve seen, he’s not suited for the Avengers but they want to have him work for
SHIELD as a consultant, which Tony agrees to so he can have Stern present him with a medal
as one last screw you in typical Tony style. Tony does his job as a consultant by going to
talk to General Thaddeus Ross, who recently came off a bit of a disaster in trying to track
down this super powerful being called the Hulk, more on him later, during which he created his
own super powerful being known as the Abomination, who he now has been told by the World
Security Council, a group of powerful people who oversee SHIELD who also may be
partially HYDRA, to put on the Avengers team. SHIELD is like, yeah the Abomination seems
like bad news, we don’t want that to happen. So Tony does what Tony does best and irritates
General Ross so much that he refuses to hand over the Abomination to be on the Avengers.
Tony is now living a relatively more humble life? Relatively being the operative word there,
he starts working on building Stark Tower in New York, run entirely on clean energy along with
a source of clean energy for the city. He also takes Rhodey’s suit back and makes him
a new one so he now too can be a super advanced suit having superhero, War Machine.
He’s also now dating Pepper, very sweet. Stark Tower finally lights up and Tony and Pepper
are celebrating when Phil Coulson shows up again and is like hey I know we told you we didn't
want you for the Avengers but now we need you cuz an angry space god has showed up and stolen
The Tesseract, that super powerful object aka Infinity Stone that Tony’s dad did experiments
on. Tony’s like fine I guess I’ll do this, and flies over to Germany where he finds some of the
Avengers have already been assembled, including Natasha and his dad’s old friend from the 40s
Steve Rogers aka Captain America, who was recently unfrozen from the Arctic where he had been for
70 years, long story. Anyway Steve’s getting his ass handed to him by Loki so Tony just blasts him
and Loki is taken captive. Tony, who doesn't play well with others at the best of times and remember
doesn't have a particular fondness for Cap given how much his father talked about him growing up,
automatically doesn't get off on a great foot with Steve, they have some back and forth until Loki’s
space god brother Thor shows up to take Loki back to their space god home of Asgard. Tony’s
not crazy about this idea and so tackles Thor, and they fight after having some more back and
forth. In their fight Thor tries to electrocute Tony but since Vanko sent electricity through his
suit Tony has updated it to use that electricity to power itself, so he gets a nice moment in the
fight. It’s ultimately ended by Cap showing up, who then has a moment with Thor, but eventually
they realize they’re all on the same team and Thor comes with them to take Loki back to SHIELD
HQ, which is a giant floating fortress known as a Helicarrier. Before going up there Tony does his
research on thermonuclear astrophysics, and he also realizes that Loki needs a power source for
the Tesseract….hmmm. Anyway he meets Bruce Banner aka the Hulk, and they get along really well both
being science bros, and he also decides to hack into SHIELD’s systems to find out their secrets.
While Tony and Banner have a pretty nice conversation comparing the burden of the Hulk to
Tony’s kidnapping and arc reactor, Tony and Steve still aren't getting along, their pretty opposite
personalities clashing, although Tony does plant a seed in his head that SHIELD could be up to more
than they’re letting on. Tony soon discovers that SHIELD was planning on making weapons of mass
destruction using the Tesseract, after Thor came to Earth so they could fight off other alien
threats, which Cap then confirmed after having found some of HYDRA’s old tech from World War
II. Nick Fury is confronted with all of this, and all the Avengers start getting into a bit
of an argument, including Tony and Steve in particular, who talk about which of them is a real
hero and almost start physically fighting, before Bruce picks up Loki’s scepter inadvertently,
hinting that maybe Loki and the scepter are having a bit of a bad influence on the already somewhat
fragile stability of this team. Loki's plan kicks off as his crew led by a brainwashed Clint Barton
aka Hawkeye, soon to be Avenger, breaks into the Helicarrier to bust Loki out, leading to damage
to the propeller and the Helicarrier starting to fall. Tony and Steve put aside their differences
and work together to make sure the entire ship doesn't come crashing down, but when that's done
they find out that Banner Hulked out and left, and Thor was dropped from the sky by Loki who also
escaped, and Phil Coulson was murdered by Loki, which in essence gives these heroes a personal
stake and something to finally avenge. Also on the plus side, they got Hawkeye back.
Tony and Steve are discussing Coulson’s death and Loki’s plan when Tony realizes Loki is going
to use Stark Tower to power up the Tesseract, which by the way will open a portal and send an
alien army to Earth. So with this the remaining Avengers suit up and head to New York, where Tony
finds Loki at Stark Tower exactly as expected. They engage in a battle of wits, one of Tony’s
strong suits, with Tony eventually delivering this iconic line. Loki has had enough
of it and throws Tony out the window, who thanks to these neat little bracelets is able
to call a suit to stop himself from splattering. He blasts Loki but then the portal opens and the
Chitauri alien army at Loki’s command starts to come through, and the battle of New York is on.
Tony is fighting aliens in his suit and calls Rhodey to come help but Rhodey says he’s busy
fighting Ten Rings terrorists and he’ll come ASAP, cuz those two are definitely comparable problems
James. Anyway the battle continues and Thor and Banner show back up again, and the Avengers are
now truly assembled. Cap gives out instructions, Tony’s job is to secure the perimeter and make
sure the aliens don’t leave New York, and lots of crazy battle ensues, including team ups like
Tony shooting his repulsor off of Cap’s shield, and Tony going through a Chitauri Leviathan and
blowing it up from the inside. The battle’s going pretty well as Natasha has found a way to close
the portal but the World Security Council has decided to send a nuke to blow up Manhattan to
stop the aliens, despite the loss of human life that would accompany, so Tony tells Nat to keep
the portal open, he grabs the nuke, flies it out into space and launches it towards the Chitauri
mothership, blowing it up and thus killing all the Chitauri. On the way he tries to call Pepper,
as he imagines he might not make it back. It’s a pretty surreal experience for Tony, seeing space
and losing consciousness up there, thinking he’s going to die. He falls back down to Earth, is
caught by the Hulk and survives, and although he’s joking around in usual Tony fashion afterwards,
yeah that’s an experience that’ll mess him up for a bit. But for the time being Tony wants
shawarma to celebrate their victory, but first the Avengers gotta go take care of a defeated Loki.
Back at Star Tower as they’re taking Loki away, Hulk is forced to take the stairs because
Tony’s elevator has a weight capacity, sadness for Hulk, and as they’re leaving, Tony
and the gang are confronted by Alexander Pierce of the World Security Council who definitely isn’t
a secret Nazi, whose like hey give us Loki and the Tesseract and both Tony and Thor are like hell no,
so there’s a bit of a scuffle but ultimately they keep both the Tesseract and Loki, which are to be
sent off to Asgard with Thor. Before this though, the Avengers do get their shawarma, with Loki
I guess just chained up outside? And at this time Rhodey finally arrives, way too late
to actually be of any help. Way to go James. Anyway, the Avengers meet in Central Park to say
goodbye, with a nice respect now built between the team including between Tony and Steve who shake
hands. Thor heads off with Loki and the Tesseract, and they all go their separate ways, though
they’re now a team who are realistically gonna end up assembled at least a few more times. Tony goes
home and starts working on rebuilding Stark Tower, he and Pepper move out to stay at his Malibu
mansion in the meantime, and also creates Damage Control, a project to clean up New York after the
Chitauri invasion and other future Avengers stuff, which I’m sure doesn't piss anyone off.
Quick reminder here that if you’re enjoying this video, drop a like, subscribe, and
comment your thoughts on this down below! Also afterwards check out my podcast The Poorly
Planned Podcast, alright back to the vid. However, Tony is pretty messed up from his near
death experience in space facing a Chitauri mothership, he has frequent anxiety attacks and
as a result he sleeps less and spends his time building more and more Iron Man suits, the
Iron Legion, including now one that can be called to him in individual pieces. There’s also
a terrorist leader of the Ten Rings known as The Mandarin who is taking the credit for multiple
bombings which Tony has his eye on, but Rhodey’s like hey relax let the government take care of
this one. Rhodey now also has a new rebrand, going from War Machine to the Iron Patriot, as
requested by President Ellis. Anyway Tony’s also made Happy his head of security and he lets Tony
know that Pepper is meeting with Aldrich Killian, that guy who he didn't meet up with back in
1999, who's now all sexy Guy Pearce CEO guy. Happy follows him and his bodyguard cuz they’re
giving off kind of weird vibes, and meanwhile Tony is having a bit of friction with Pepper due
to his suit building obsession, also maybe due to this giant bunny Christmas gift, but he talks
more openly about his anxiety problems with being just a dude in a world with giant alien
invasions and his worries about Pepper somehow getting hurt which leads to Pepper comforting him.
However there are still problems cuz with his new suit technology he accidentally calls a suit to
himself in his sleep as he’s having nightmares, which Pepper is obviously pretty scared by.
Things go from bad to worse as Happy while trailing Killian’s bodyguard is severely
wounded in another Mandarin bombing, and Tony’s now in a pretty bad state of mind
and very angry so he calls out the Mandarin, calling him a coward, and giving him his
home address so they can throw down properly, great idea. Pepper is reasonably like “what the
f*ck '' and starts trying to pack up so they can leave, while Tony does some detective work with
the bombing scene and discovers a clue that leads to Rose Hill, Tennessee. All this is interrupted
by Maya Hansen, that scientist from 1999 who was working on Extremis, who shows up to tell Tony
she needs to talk to him about the Mandarin, however the mansion is attacked by The Mandarin’s
forces, cuz of course it is, and while Pepper and Maya get out ok with Pepper briefly having the
Mark 42 suit on, Tony engages in a bit of a battle that he ultimately loses and barely escapes from,
with the world now thinking he’s dead. He passes out and wakes up to find JARVIS’ flight plan took
him to Rose Hill, after which the Mark 42, which is just a prototype really, shuts down, and Tony
has to make his way through this with no suit. He breaks into a garage and is confronted by Harley
Keener, a kid with a potato gun, but they end up getting along pretty well, and Tony gets him to
let him use his garage to hide out and help him in his Mandarin hunting quest. The two of them bond
and also figure out some more clues on what this whole Mandarin bombing thing is about, with Tony
having another anxiety attack along the way, and eventually find Mrs. Davis, mother of a man who
supposedly was part of a suicide bombing in Rose Hill which Tony thinks is linked to the Mandarin
bombings. Mrs. Davis gives Tony a file about this but realizes he’s not who she’s actually been
waiting for, which turns out to be this woman, who is also working with Aldrich Killian's bodyguard
who's also there. Turns out these people have fire based powers, they can walk through fire, they
can also regenerate limbs, have super strength, and a big action scene ensues in which Tony
uses some of his quick wit and genius to kill this woman and then with the help of Harley and
this device that he gave him to handle bullies, bit extreme, temporarily defeat this guy. Tony get
out of Rose Hill and gets in touch with Rhodey, and along with an encounter with a superfan is
able to find out some more info about what’s going on, with it turning out AIM, Aldrich Killian’s
company, has been injecting people with Extremis which regrows limbs, gives superstrength and all
that but can also lead to them blowing up in some cases, which would explain the Mandarin bombings
and their peculiar nature with a lack of bomb shelling being found. Tony then gets on his way to
find the Mandarin who he’s found out is in Miami, but has another panic attack while getting there.
Harley talks to him about why don’t you just build some stuff if you don’t have your suits, use your
smarts, and this calms Tony down quite a bit and virtually cures his panic attacks. He then gets
a bunch of supplies and builds some makeshift weapons, breaks into the Mandarin’s complex,
only to of course discover that it is Trevor, Trevor Slattery. Yes the feared terrorist the
Mandarin is actually a British actor who is a bit of a fool. It turns out that the one
actually behind all of this was Aldrich Killian and the Mandarin was just a front, and then Tony’s
knocked unconscious and taken prisoner by Killian. When he wakes up he’s confronted by Killian and
also discovers that Maya Hansen has been working with him, and Killian wants Tony to finally fix
the Extremis problem of the people blowing up once and for all, and as a little incentive he
injects Pepper with Extremis so Tony kind of has to find a solution. Maya Hansen at this point
is like you know what this is a bit much for me, she threatens to kill herself and Killian is
like, ok. He leaves Tony with some henchmen, who Tony is able to defeat, eventually. Once his
armor is charged up and released from Tennessee. He has a bit of an action scene with only some
pieces of the armor, and then runs into Rhodey who is not in the Iron Patriot suit he just saw jet
off. Turns out that’s one of Killian’s henchmen in the suit going to kidnap the President on Air
Force One, and so Tony remotely controls the Mark 42 suit to go and stop that. Unfortunately the
henchman manages to get the President into the Patriot suit which then flies off, and he has
a fight with Tony which ends poorly for him. However, he’d already planted a bomb, and so
the plane is blown wide open with everyone on board being flung out. Tony uses his smarts
to figure out a plan in a split second and catches all the falling people by getting them
to join together with their hands as they fall, eventually dumping them safely in a river.
Tony and Rhodey locate Killian’s position and now that what’s left of his mansion has been
cleared up Tony now has access to his entire Iron Legion, which he calls to help in this big final
confrontation. Killian is planning on killing the President on live TV, cuz he also has a deal with
the Vice President, long story short, so Rhodey goes off to save the President while Tony goes
off to save Pepper and the Iron Legion takes on all these Extremis soldiers. Also apparently the
armors are only able to be worn by Tony because they’re coded to him….sure. Rhodey manages to
save the President, Tony finds Pepper and is trying to save her but Killian shows up and starts
using his fancy fire powers to try and kill Tony. As the whole thing falls into chaos Tony almost
manages to save Pepper but whoops she falls into a fiery fiery pit of death and doom. Now it’s
time for Tony to face off with Killian again, in a crazy fight that involves Tony getting in
and then promptly getting out of various suits as Killian is able to pretty much cut through
them like tinfoil. Eventually Tony gets the Mark 42 armor to the scene, and after correcting
Killian for saying Pepper was almost perfect, he traps him in the Mark 42 and blows it up,
escaping with lots of grace in the process. However, lots of twists incoming, Killian survived
because of his Extremis powers but Pepper also survived because of her Extremis powers, and she
actually kills Killian along with taking out one of Tony’s suits that’s targeting her because
of the Extremis. She then goes did I do that, and Tony’s like yes yes you did. They embrace, and
as a sign that he’s moving on from his Iron Man obsession and is ready to be a better boyfriend,
Tony blows up all of his Iron Man suits and it’s a nice little firework display for him and Pepper.
Tony, because he’s rich, finds a way to have the Extremis taken out of Pepper, and while he’s at
it he thinks it’s about time to get that shrapnel taken out of his chest, leaving no more need for
an arc reactor. He throws the arc reactor in the ocean, but even without the armor, he is Iron
Man. And as you’ll soon see he’ll continue to be Iron Man with the armor anyway, but for the time
being, he and Pepper move into Avengers Tower. After all this stress Tony could use some therapy,
actually a lot of therapy, but instead of getting a therapist he calls Bruce Banner, who promptly
falls asleep listening to all of these stories. Needless to say, Bruce Banner would be
bored out of his mind by this video. Anyway Tony is kind of done being a superhero,
though he still helps SHIELD out, like he helps them design repulsors for some new Helicarriers
of theirs and presumably other work like that. He also notices when SHIELD is actually revealed
to have been filled with HYDRA agents for several decades, in case I didn't mention
a Nazi supervillain cult from World War II, and so SHIELD is pretty wrecked for the time
being. Tony was a target of HYDRA’s plan to shoot lots of people with Helicarriers but luckily
Cap stopped that from happening. With all of this going on the Avengers are like we should probably
get back together to stop this Nazi cult, and that coupled with the fact that although Tony doesn't
have extreme panic attacks anymore he’s still a bit haunted by the idea of an otherworldly threat
coming to conquer or destroy Earth, Tony takes the excuse to start building lots of Iron Man suits
again, suit up, and start being a superhero again. Pepper is not too crazy about this.
The Avengers reassemble to take out some HYDRA people in Sudan, before eventually finding
the HYDRA base in the Eastern European country of Sokovia, which they successfully attack. Tony
finds a secret door, and behind it finds a giant Leviathan from the Battle of New York and Loki’s
scepter, and just at that moment he is enchanted by a superpowered witch mutant being named Wanda
Maximoff, who along with her brother Pietro have been working for HYDRA, and she gives him a vision
of all the Avengers dead and aliens invading Earth and for Tony who just barely was getting over his
alien nightmares this is pretty distressing. He takes the scepter, and the Avengers head back to
HQ. The plan was for Thor to take the scepter to Asgard but Tony’s like hmmm….let me actually take
a look at this thing now. He confides in Banner that he wants to build an AI called Ultron which
can then use Iron Legion-like suits to keep the world safe, thus allowing the Avengers to retire
without having to worry about alien invasions, and the Mind Stone which is inside the Scepter
could be the key to creating this AI. Banner’s initially a little skeptical but then he’s like
ah what’s the worst that could happen. They work on this for a few days but it looks pretty
hopeless, so they give up and go out to party. And by go out I mean stay in Tony’s giant tower.
It’s a fun old time, with Rhodey somewhat embarrassing himself, Tony and Thor comparing
girlfriends, Cap’s new BFF Sam Wilson is there, and eventually as the party starts winding down
the Avengers take turns trying to lift Thor’s hammer, which you can only lift if you are worthy
of the powers of Thor, which Tony is not. It’s all a great time until a messed up Iron Legion
suit bursts in that sounds like the Lizard King, revealing that he is in fact Ultron, he’s gained
sentience/intelligence, and he’s here to destroy the Avengers. Not great news but the Avengers
are able to defeat the Iron Legion suits that come at them, however, Ultron digitally escapes
and the Avengers are left wondering what to do now. Tony discovers that Ultron found the Avengers
files and learned about humanity, killed JARVIS, and he’s now gone to make himself a new body.
The Avengers aren’t super psyched about this, especially Thor who’s like, shouldn’t have messed
with that mind stone Tony (oh yeah Ultron also stole the Scepter), but eventually they get
it together and locate Ultron, who has also recruited the Maximoff twins. They realize he’s
going to meet with Ulysses Klaue, a South African arms dealer and generally bad dude who stole
some vibranium, what Cap’s shield is made of, from the country of Wakanda. Ultron probably wants
vibranium for his new body, let’s go find Klaue. They head off to South Africa to find Ultron
already there, who Tony starts fighting with after a brief exchanging of wits, but after he
defeats this Ultron body, he realizes Wanda has messed with the minds of all the Avengers, almost
all, including Banner’s who is now going full Hulk rampage mode in Johannesburg. Tony dons the newly
made Hulkbuster armor to try and subdue the Hulk, which takes quite a while and includes lots
of face punches, but eventually he hits him with an absolutely devastating cross
that knocks Hulk out, ending the carnage. The team for lack of better words have gotten
their asses absolutely handed to them, so they retreat to Hawkeye’s farm, cuz Hawkeye has a
secret family that Nick Fury helped him hide on a farm. They regroup there, Tony and Steve are doing
manly man stuff like chopping wood when they start arguing about maybe it wasn’t a great idea to make
an AI, but before they can really get into it Tony has to go meet Nick Fury, who tells him hey that
was all just a trick by Wanda get your head in the game, and Tony’s like ahhh I still think
that stuff could happen. Fury gives the team a motivational speech, Thor goes off to learn about
Infinity Stones, Cap and the team go off to Seoul where they’ve deduced Ultron is trying to create
the ultimate body for himself, and Tony goes off to Oslo to find out what has been stopping Ultron
from accessing the nuclear codes, which turns out has been JARVIS, who didn't die but hid in the
internet, foiling Ultron’s schemes like getting the nuclear codes. With this info, Tony gets back
to Avengers Tower where he finds the Avengers have gotten that ultimate body of Ultron, and he’s
like hey Bruce remember when we made that robot that’s now gonna destroy the world, let’s do
that again, and after about 10 seconds Bruce is like yeah alright. Steve isn’t crazy about
this idea, Tony isn’t crazy about him having recruited the Maximoffs, a bit of a fight breaks
out but Thor shows up and zaps the body which JARVIS was being uploaded into and has the Mind
Stone in it's head and boom, Vision is created, and luckily he’s good and on the Avengers side.
With this new ally the Avengers head to Sokovia to stop Ultron, who's gonna pick up a big piece
of the capital city, dump it on the Earth like a meteor which will destroy all life, because that
will bring peace, I guess. Robots, I don’t know. The Avengers show up and start evacuating the
city, with Nick Fury and Rhodey showing up to help, and Tony fights Ultron and saves civilians
while the Avengers battle Ultron’s minions. Tony realizes they’ve gotta destroy the city once
it’s evacuated so it doesn't crash down to Earth, and in the meantime they have to defend this
thing that will send the city crashing down from the Ultron bots. It’s an intense battle but the
Avengers do come out on top, Ultron is defeated, Tony and Thor manage to blow up the city, and
the day is saved! Except Pietro died. Hulk also goes off to….no one actually knows where.
Anyway after this Tony thinks we need a new Avengers base so I’ll turn one of my dad’s
warehouses that hasn’t been used for a while into a new base. He then decides to retire from
Avenger-ing, again, and he goes to say goodbye to his fellow teammates, including a nice little
convo with Steve about retirement and building houses in the woods. Pepper has not been a
fan of all this Iron Man-ing though and so her and Tony break up for the time being.
Now as we all do after a breakup Tony is presumably aimlessly browsing through YouTube
one day when he discovers a superhero in New York known as Spider-Man, who has some pretty
impressive abilities. He’s strong, agile, he’s got cool stuff going on. Tony looks into it and
finds out he’s actually a 14 year old in Queens, and he also finds out he’s pretty smart,
having made his own web shooters. Being super rich and having some time on his hands, Tony
designs a new upgraded super suit for this kid in case he ever wants him to join the
Avengers, which he might before too long. Anyway Tony is now just kind of floating around
doing rich person stuff, one of his employees Quinten Beck makes this hologram tech that helps
you relive memories and process them and all that, and he calls it BARF, he gives a talk at MIT,
gives the kids some money for science, good stuff. However he is approached by the mom of someone
who died during the Sokovia Battle and she’s like this is your fault, you and the Avengers
kill a lot of people when you save the world, shame, which gets Tony thinking, who’s already
feeling a bit guilty about all that damage that pretty much was entirely his fault if you think
about it. A little while later Wanda who's now on the Avengers team is involved in another
incident that while saving the day a bunch of innocent people were killed, and so General Ross
from earlier shows up and he’s like here are the Sokovia Accords cuz you guys kill a lot of people
and cause a lot of damage when saving the world, this will let the government have control of
where you guys go and what you do as a team. Tony thinks, brilliant, a way to stop killing
so many people whilst saving the world, we need to be put in check, this will help everyone.
Plus signing it could help win Pepper back by showing her I’m a changed man and this whole
Avengering thing isn’t just some crazy dangerous endeavour I undertake but part of a government
program. Pretty much half the Avengers agree, while the other half totally don’t, including
Steve, whose like I don’t want the government telling me I can’t save a cat from a tree, and
so a disagreement is born. A Civil War, perhaps you could call it, actually it’s mostly just a
disagreement with a bit of punching involved. Anyway Steve goes off to attend the funeral
of his girlfriend from the 1940s Peggy, and there’s a gathering in Vienna of world leaders
to sign the Accords and make them official. It is blown up by what Tony is led to believe
is the Winter Soldier, Steve’s friend from World War II who was brainwashed by HYDRA but now
is allegedly unbrainwashed, who is arrested, and Tony goes to help with cleaning the whole
situation up. He asks Vision to keep Wanda in the Avengers complex to keep her out of trouble.
He also finds out that Cap and Sam were trying to help The Winter Soldier aka Bucky, and he sits
down to talk with Steve about the Accords again. They actually start to get somewhere, talking
about some more personal stuff like Pepper, Bucky, Steve starts to consider it,
but when the topic of Wanda comes up they start arguing again and Steve leaves.
After this Bucky escapes and starts going on a Winter Soldier rampage, which Tony is able to
briefly….slow? But he’s ultimately thrown to the side, and even facing the likes of Natasha
and T’Challa, the Wakandan Prince who also is the superhero Black Panther, Bucky is able
to escape. After this Tony notices that Steve and Sam are gone too. Ross is like I’m gonna go
send my guys to kill them, cuz sending soldiers to take care of superheroes always works out,
and Tony’s like wait gimme a little bit of time to bring them in myself. He puts together a
team of sorts with Natasha, Rhodey, Vision, Black Panther, and he’s like you know what
we could use some extra reinforcements like a superstrong spider powered 14 year old. He goes
to basically conduct a job interview with Peter, also flirting with his aunt along the way,
and reveals to Peter he knows who he is, and that he could be an asset to the Avengers.
Tony also finds that he and Peter share some of the same moral beliefs about the responsibility
of being a hero, so Spider-Boy (Spider-Man) is now on the team. Tony tells Happy to get the kid the
suit he designed for him and get him to Germany. Why Germany? Well there’s an airport there that
Captain America and his team of superfriends is planning on escaping from, so Tony has the
airport evacuated and stops Steve in his tracks. Tony’s like hand over Bucky and turn yourself in,
Steve starts going about some nonsense about this guy Zemo who actually caused the bombing
and who's manipulating them and planning on releasing lots of Winter Soldiers, blah blah
blah too many words Tony isn't here for it. If he can’t make Steve come willingly he’ll force the
cooperation, at which point Spider-Man is sent in, after which Ant-Man and Hawkeye come in, and now
it’s a fight. Tony goes after Wanda and Hawkeye, but that doesn't go so well. The Captain America
team is not being subdued, quite the opposite, so Tony calls in Vision to help out as well.
Steve’s team still won’t stand down so it's time for an epic running at each other moment
(Assassin’s Creed running) and more epic battle. Tony gets knocked back by one of Hawkeye’s arrows,
and then more arrows come at him, god Hawkeye was really going for Tony in this battle, and through
this Ant-Man ends up in Tony’s armor (a shrinky superhero long story short). Tony manages to get
rid of him, but because the tide was turning in favor of Tony’s team, Ant-Man turns himself into
Giant-Man. After a little tussle with Falcon, Tony Rhodey and Peter work together to take down
Giant-Man, ultimately getting their strategy from Peter’s suggestion about The Empire Strikes
Back, and it’s super effective. Peter hits the ground hard and Tony’s like oh man did
I really get this 14 year old killed within minutes of his first real mission, but luckily
Peter’s ok, but it’s time for him to go home. Tony and Rhodey fly after Cap and Bucky who are
in a quinjet with Falcon hot on their tail, Tony’s like get rid of Falcon for me Vision, Vision
tries but accidentally shoots down Rhodey instead, and in a super high tech suit that unfortunately
does not have a parachute Rhodey crashes into the ground with Tony just barely missing him.
This leaves Tony understandably not too happy, luckily Rhodey is not dead but he is paralysed
from the waist down, and Tony’s like Vision what the hell, and Vision’s like I don’t even know
dude. Tony then talks to Natasha who actually helped Cap get away, thanks for double crossing
me Natasha, and then goes to talk with the now captured team Cap. On the way there however he
does find out that whoops Cap was actually right, it was this guy Zemo, Bucky was framed,
and Tony was wrong. So at the prison, after getting roasted and handing out roasts,
he talks to Falcon about where Cap is going, now that he knows he was wrong and that Cap needs
all the help he can get. Falcon tells him Siberia, and so that’s where Tony heads, where he finds
Cap and Bucky, and they manage to make a truce. They find all the Winter Soldiers dead and Zemo
there, who reveals he’s from Sokovia and his family died in the Ultron attack there which
he blames the Avengers for, and he’s now gonna tear them apart as revenge. He then shows Tony
video footage of The Winter Soldier murdering his parents, which is pretty upsetting, obviously, and
Tony then discovers that Cap knew about this for a while and decided to not share that information
with him. Now for those who think Tony’s blind rage moment here is unrealistic, let’s just be
clear that he’s a stressed out superhero with severe anxiety regarding aliens invading Earth
who is already guilty for all the destruction he’s caused, he’s broken up with the love of his life,
he’s spent the last few days arguing and fighting with Cap and his team, and now has discovered that
the man who murdered his parents is standing right next to him, and someone he considered his friend
didn't tell him that even though he knew it. I think the blind rage here is understandable.
Tony freaks out and tries to murder Bucky, like straight up murder he tries to shoot a
missile directly into his face, and this leads to a long extended battle between him and Bucky
and Cap, with the tides turning at multiple points throughout. Eventually Tony is able to use his arc
reactor repulsor blast to blast Bucky’s metal arm off, and then beat down Cap using his superior
technology, but then things are turned on him, and Cap starts beating the everloving crap out of
him, but stops short of killing him, leaving him a bloody angry mess on the floor. As they’re leaving
Tony tells Cap that his father made that shield, so Cap leaves it behind for Tony who now has
to get himself home. Zemo was captured by Black Panther who followed Tony there by the way.
Tony eventually gets back and one of his first orders of business is dropping Peter Parker
back off in New York, which he does and also lets him keep the suit he made for him, so Peter can
keep superheroing in a more professional way on a small scale. He tells him to tell Happy about
what he does, which Happy will then tell Tony. Tony gets back to Avengers HQ where Rhodey is
using some advanced tech to slowly allow him to walk again, although it’ll be a long journey.
Tony’s like well this whole Avengers thing isn’t looking so good now, but he does get a package
with a letter from Cap along with a phone, the letter apologizing for Steve not telling
him about his parents and also saying if you need me to save the world just gimme
a call. Tony is then informed that Cap has freed his team from prison and Ross wants to
talk with him, but Tony just puts him on hold, and he does the same when Ross contacts him
about finding where Natasha Romanoff has gone. After all this Tony decides to take a
bit of a break from Iron Man-ing again, focusing more on the usual billionaire stuff
like attending big fancy parties and such, and in this time he also gets back together with
Pepper yay love prevails. He also catches up with Spider-Man’s activities from Happy, and while at
a party in India discovers that Peter has fallen into a lake and is about to drown so he sends a
suit to go save him and then talks to him about what he’s doing. Apparently he’s found some arms
dealer who has dangerous tech, ah just don’t get involved with it kid there are people who handle
this stuff, not Avengers level people but people a little lower, you worry about stopping bike
thieves and that kind of stuff. The arms dealer thing does seem a bit serious though so Tony
hands it off to the FBI and after seeing Peter saving his class in Washington DC a few days later
calls him up to apologize and congratulate him, but he realizes that Peter has royally screwed
something up, so he dons the armor and sees he has gone after the arms dealer (called the Vulture)
himself, exactly the opposite of what Tony asked, and in the process split a ferry down the middle.
Tony helps clean up the mess but is pretty pissed off, he trusted and believed in Peter despite his
age and now he could’ve killed someone or gotten himself killed, which Tony wouldn't be able to
live with, so he takes the Spidey suit he made back so Peter can learn his lesson. However,
a few days later Tony sees that without the super suit Peter actually stopped the Vulture
from getting tons of tech from Avengers Tower, so he’s like alright, he seems to have learned his
lesson and has learned how to be a hero, good kid, let’s make him an official Avenger. When Tony
offers Peter the gig along with a new supersuit and a room at Avengers HQ next to Vision, Peter
turns it down cuz he wants to keep superheroing on a small scale, and Tony’s like damn that’s
really humble and smart and responsible….not used to that kind of attitude but good on you. So,
to appease all the reporters that he gathered for the Spider-Man reveal press conference, Tony
does something he’s thought about doing for a while anyway and proposes to Pepper! Sweet stuff.
After this, that little pestering threat in the back of Tony’s head of the end of the
world via alien invasion is still lingering, so he starts working on his 50th suit of armor,
the Mark 50, which uses super advanced nanotech, since without the Avengers assembled, it may just
be him who has to defend the world. SHIELD agent, or former SHIELD agent I guess Maria Hill drops
by at one point and is like hey call Steve Rogers up and work all this out you two teaming up could
be useful if the world were to be attacked. Tony considers it but ultimately doesn't do it. He is
also told that Vision has left and turned off his transponder, so you know that’s great. Hopefully
this one doesn't try to destroy the world. Tony’s living the good happy life with Pepper now,
one night having a dream that they have a kid who they name Morgan after one of Pepper’s uncles,
and the next morning he’s telling her about this dream, they’re seemingly ready to properly
settle down a bit for a nice peaceful life, maybe, when he is confronted by Doctor Stephen
Strange, a sorcerer, yes those exist in this world too. Strange says he needs Tony’s help,
Tony’s like I’m good this seems sketchy, but then Strange reveals he has Bruce Banner
with him, who Tony hasn’t seen in several years, so Tony decides to go along with him, and finds
out that basically his worst nightmare is about to come true, aliens are coming to Earth
with bad intentions, and not just any aliens, aliens from the same guy who sent aliens to
New York back in 2012 that caused all of this anxiety for Tony. Loki was actually working with
a big angry space titan called Thanos back then, and now Thanos is back, he wants to collect
all six Infinity Stones, super powerful objects some of which Tony has encountered throughout
his journey, and use them to snap half of all life in the universe out of existence. Not great
news, especially considering Thanos already has 2 stones. One of the remaining four is with
Doctor Strange and another is with Vision, so they gotta get someone who can find Vision, and
that guy is probably gonna be Steve Rogers. Tony is about to call Steve when he’s interrupted by a
giant alien ship landing in the street, with two of Thanos’ minions demanding Doctor Strange hand
over his Infinity Stone. The heroes refuse, and a battle ensues, with Tony suiting up with his new
nanotech armor, and along the way Spider-Man shows up to help out. Strange’s friend Wong saves Tony’s
life and is thus invited to his wedding. Strange is captured by the aliens and taken aboard the
ship which starts taking off, so Tony heads after it into space, deploying that fancy Iron Spider
armor to save Peter’s life and also take him back down to Earth. Tony gets a call from Pepper,
who is not happy about this situation, but the connection isn’t great in space and she cuts off.
Tony finds Strange being tortured by the alien, and turns out Peter stowed away on the
ship which Tony isn’t crazy about since Peter was just saying he was gonna be a friendly
neighborhood Spider-Man and now is literally on the end of it all epic space mission, but Peter
manages to convince him of why he should be there and also it's not like they have much choice
now. They manage to free Strange with the help of more pop culture references, and while
Strange wants to turn the ship back to Earth, Tony thinks it’d be a better idea to take it to
Thanos’ backyard and attack him on his home turf where he’s not expecting it, which Strange
eventually and begrudgingly agrees to though he assures Tony he’ll let him and Peter die for
the sake of the Time Stone. Considering they’re going on a space mission to fight Thanos, Tony
decides to finally make Peter an official Avenger. They eventually get to the ship’s destination,
the planet of Titan, and kind of land the ship when they’re attacked by various kinds of humanoid
aliens, who turn out to be some space superheroes called the Guardians of the Galaxy, and after a
brief scuffle over them not understanding that they have the same goal of stopping Thanos, they
team up and try to make a plan for how they’re gonna do that. After discussing they eventually
settle on the plan to draw Thanos in, pin him down, get the Infinity Gauntlet, everyone’s happy.
Doctor Strange also delivers the great news that they have a one in 14 million six hundred and five
chance of succeeding, so you know let’s try not to mess this up. They wait until Thanos eventually
does show up, and after a back and forth with Strange the heroes jump on him, all using their
powers to try to neutralize him. Tony uses his missiles and firearms and everything the suit can
throw at Thanos, though he gets a bit thrown back at him as well, but eventually they do actually
manage to hold Thanos down and are very close to get the Gauntlet off of him. However, one of the
Guardians Peter Quill finds out his girlfriend and Thanos’ daughter has been killed by Thanos, a
lot of stuff Tony doesn't really get the details of but it’s pretty apparent to everyone that Quill
is upset, Tony tries to calm him down but it’s too late, Quill gives Thanos a big whack in the face
and suddenly he’s free, and he is pissed. In this pissedness, Thanos grabs a moon out of the sky
with his Infinity Stones and hurls it at the heroes, which Tony manages to navigate, or at the
very least get through. Thanos incapacitates the other heroes and eventually Tony is the only one
still fighting, and he finally comes face to face with the being who essentially has haunted him for
6 years. Tony finds out that Thanos is actually familiar with him as well, and they go toe to toe
with Tony throwing absolutely everything he’s got left at him, only to get a drop of blood out of
Thanos. Thanos kind of starts manhandling Tony and is beating him up pretty bad, it’s not looking
great, and eventually Thanos snaps off one of Tony’s suit made swords and stabs him right in the
gut with it. Tony is now taken out of the fight, and as Thanos gets ready to kill him he tells
him he respects him and he hopes the people who are left after half the universe is killed
remember Tony. Before Tony is killed though, Strange goes back on that promise that he’d let
Tony die for the Time Stone and hands it over to Thanos in order to spare Tony’s life. Tony
is not too grateful because this means Thanos is one step closer to winning, and now all there
is left to do for the heroes is to wait and hope the Avengers back on Earth have better luck
against Thanos. Unfortunately, they do not, and Tony finds this out in a pretty brutal way. As
a result of Thanos’ snapping with all the Infinity Stones, half the living beings in the universe are
killed via dusting, and slowly most of the heroes start turning to dust, first the Guardians besides
Nebula, then Strange, and finally to his horror, Peter Parker slowly starts disintegrating and
whimpering begging for his life, before he eventually disappears in Tony’s arms. Side note,
having not seen Infinity War in a while, really forgot how truly emotionally brutal this scene is.
Now Tony and Nebula are just stuck on this planet way out in space, having to cope with the fact
that they failed, the bad guy won, half the universe has been killed, and there’s nothing
they can really do. Including anything about getting home, as although they manage to get the
Guardians ship up and running and out into space, they run out of fuel and are just stalled there
for a few weeks, with eventually the food and oxygen starting to run out. At least Tony and
Nebula get to play some games and bond a little, but it’s looking like this really is the end of
the line, so Tony records a final goodbye message for Pepper. However, just as it seems like it’s
all over, Tony is woken up by a very bright light that turns out to be superhero Captain Marvel, who
is now working with the Avengers and who they had asked to go find and bring home Tony. She does
just that and a very tired and presumably hungry Tony Stark is brought back to Earth, where he’s
greeted by the Avengers including Steve Rogers, and also Pepper who Tony’s very relieved to see
is still alive. They head inside and start talking about strategy, how to find Thanos and fix what’s
been done. Tony’s in a pretty bad emotional state, given he just saw someone he kind of viewed
as a son die in his arms in the process of failing to save the universe and also he’s
been stuck in space for several weeks, so he starts going off a bit on Steve for not
being with him to stop Thanos, saying this is what he feared for so many years, this is why he
tried to build Ultron and keep the world safe, you should’ve shut up about those Accords and just
signed them and together we could’ve stopped this and the world wouldn't be completely ruined now.
He takes off his arc reactor (the nanotech one that’s not actually connected to his chest),
gives it to Steve as basically a big fuck you, and then from exhaustion passes out. When he wakes
up he finds out the Avengers actually found where Thanos was, good news, they went there and killed
him, bad news, he had destroyed the Infinity Stones and thus there was no way to reverse
the damage that had been done with the snap. Tony’s thought process now is….well, we lost. We
failed. Tried to fix it but we couldn’t. So what do you do now? You move on with life, you keep
going. And so that’s what Tony does. While the rest of the Avengers try to keep protecting the
universe, Tony decides to retire and properly settle down with Pepper. He gets himself a
nice cabin out in the woods, probably builds it actually, he gets married to Pepper, and
they have a daughter who they name Morgan. And over the next five years Tony does just raise
a family and live a very quiet life, and although he is still haunted by the events that transpired
with Thanos for a while, eventually he’s able to accept it and find peace and acceptance and
happiness in raising his daughter with Pepper. All of this is interrupted in the year
2023 when one peaceful day Steve, Natasha, and Scott Lang show up at his cabin and tell him
hey, we have an idea for reversing the snap, and it's time travel! We travel back in time, grab the
stones, and bring everyone back. Tony’s like yeah that’s not gonna work, it's way too complicated
and dangerous, and oh yeah, impossible. Besides I’ve got my new family, I’m not risking all of
this for something that has such a tiny chance of working. But you guys can stay for lunch.
However, later that night, Tony comes across an old photo of him and Peter, and along with the
seed planted in his mind earlier that day about trying this time travel thing, he decides why
not see if it could maybe hypothetically work, and lo and behold it totally can, which Tony is
pretty surprised by. After he says goodnight to Morgan who tells him she loves him 3000, he goes
down to talk to Pepper about what he’s found, and he’s like I can just put this away and never
think about it again and we’ll just keep living our lives, and Pepper reminds him that not saving
the universe when he’s got a chance to is not in Tony’s character. And with that, Tony decides to
help the Avengers with their time travel plan. He drives up to Avengers HQ where the Avengers
are unsuccessfully trying time travel without him, and he says I solved your problem, I’m here to
work with you guys. Tony and Steve finally make up after all the problems they’ve had, and to seal
that friendship Tony gives Steve back the shield. Now it’s the team of Tony, Steve, Banner who is
now smart Hulk, Natasha, Clint, Rhodey, Scott, Nebula, and Rocket, a raccoon looking alien who
was with the Guardians, and they have to decide how they’re gonna pull this so-called Time Heist
off. They decide to drop to various points that they know from their own histories of where the
stones have been, which includes New York in 2012 where 3 of them will be, Asgard in 2013, and two
alien planets in 2014, but hey Tony is gonna go on the New York mission cuz that’s the one he’s most
familiar with, along with Steve, Hulk, and Scott. They do some tests, they do their research, and
design special suits that will combine with some of Hank Pym’s (Scott Lang’s friend and mentor and
genius) technology to help them travel in time, although they only have enough Pym Particles
to go to one place in time and back again. Before they head off, Tony takes a few precautions
if this doesn't work, one being recording a little video message for his family and friends with
a nice little message for Morgan in there, and he also puts a program that controls lots
of Stark Industries weapons and satellites in a pair of glasses that he calls Even Dead I’m The
Hero, or EDITH, which if their plan is successful but he were to die he wants Nick Fury to give to
Peter Parker, as he trusts him to handle it and it can help him and hopefully nothing will go
wrong with giving a kid access to an arsenal of high tech weapons, anyway, that’s all done, it’s
time for the Time Heist. They suit up, Cap gives them a motivational speech about the importance
of their mission, and then they shoot off to New York 2012, and the time travel is successful!
After they arrive they all have their specific missions, Steve goes after the Scepter, Hulk
gets the Time Stone, Tony and Scott get the Tesseract. Tony and Scott head up to Stark Tower
where the Battle of New York is wrapping up with the capture of Loki, and after commenting
a little on America’s ass, Tony gets Scott onto his past self near the Tesseract and he
gets himself a SHIELD uniform as a disguise. As they head down to when there was a bit of a
confrontation with Alexander Pierce, Tony orders Scott to crawl into his past self’s arc reactor
and give him a mild heart attack, which Scott does, and Tony uses the distraction to grab the
Tesseract and get out of there. Psych, Hulk busts through the door and sends the Tesseract flying
to the feet of Loki, who takes it and teleports somewhere else in the world, probably to go on
some adventure where he learns about love and the meaning of who he is and how time works in
this universe I don’t know. Anyway, this is bad news for 2023 Tony, they messed up the plan and
they only have enough Pym Particles to get home. They meet back with Rogers who actually did
get his stone and tell him the bad news, but as they’re arguing Tony has a revelation that there’s
a point in time where they could get the Tesseract and enough Pym Particles to get them home, that
being a SHIELD base in New Jersey in 1970, so him and Steve head there while giving a confused
Scott the scepter to take back to the future. Upon arriving, Tony goes to get the Tesseract while
Steve gets the Particles. Using future tech in the 70s Tony gets it pretty easily, but then runs into
a SHIELD security guard and oh my god it’s not a security guard it’s Tony’s dad Howard. Tony pulls
himself together and starts talking with his dad, specifically about fatherhood as Howard is about
to become a father….to Tony. Tony, without letting on he is his son from the future cuz you know
that’d get kind of awkward, talks about his own experiences raising his child and what he learned
from his father, and also that his father taught him that no amount of money ever bought a second
of time. With all of this, Tony has not only gotten the Tesseract but actually finally gotten
the chance to make up and have closure that he’d never gotten with his father, and he gives a
somewhat confused Howard a hug before heading back to meet Steve, who was also successful. With
that they travel back to 2023, and although Tony’s feeling pretty good that the mission worked and
he got to see his dad one last time properly, the cheerful mood quickly evaporates as the
team discovers that Natasha had to sacrifice for the mission to work. The team mourns her
before going on with the plan, including an epic bench throw from Hulk, but eventually they
get back to the Stones, with extra motivation to make sure her sacrifice wasn’t in vain.
Tony Rocket and Hulk build a gauntlet out of Tony’s nanotech that can hold the Stones,
which goes off without a hitch. *boom* There’s a bit of a discussion on who should wield
the Gauntlet, with Thor offering his services, though and I haven’t really mentioned it but ever
since the snap Thor went off the deep end a bit and has not been quite the same, and the team
thinks this probably wouldn’t be the best idea. The task goes to Hulk, who is strong enough
hopefully not to be killed by the power. Hulk puts on the Gauntlet and although it’s very
tough, eventually is able to snap his fingers, reversing Thanos’ actions and bringing every
creature that was killed back to life. This is great news obviously but celebrations are cut
short by a past version of Thanos arriving in 2023 who had followed them from 2014 cuz the Nebula’s
were switched out. Long story short Thanos is here to cause problems again, starting with destroying
Avengers HQ. All The Avengers survive though, with Tony finding Cap’s shield and giving it back
to him, and they join Thor in confronting Thanos. Thanos has decided that this whole halving the
population thing clearly doesn't really work out, so he’s just gonna destroy the whole universe
and start from scratch. The three heroes then start battling Thanos, with Tony using Thor’s
lightning to power him up, clearly this suit design was inspired by some previous events,
and although things are pretty back and forth, eventually Tony is incapacitated and knocked out
while the other two are left to battle Thanos. When Tony comes to though, he sees something
incredible, hundreds of portals opening up and thousands of soldiers and heroes from across the
universe coming to the aid of the Avengers to stop Thanos, including all the previously dusted
heroes, which includes Peter Parker and also Pepper shows up dawning her own Iron Man suit. The
heroes gather in front of Thanos’ massive army, and right before they jump into battle, Cap
summons Thor’s hammer to him, which Tony thinks huh that's new, before the words Avengers
Assemble are said and the battle begins. It’s a crazy battle, with Tony at one point going back to
back with Pepper to destroy Thanos’ minions, and then being saved by none other than Peter Parker,
who Tony is overjoyed to see and can’t do anything but just give him a big hug. He also asks Doctor
Strange if this is that one possibility they had of winning, and Strange is like I can’t tell you.
The battle continues to be crazy, there’s a bit of a hot potato situation going on with the
Gauntlet trying to keep it out of Thanos’ hands, Captain Marvel shows up to help at one point,
and then Tony has another little scuffle with Thanos but is unsuccessful in stopping him,
although he then sees Strange letting him know that this is in fact the one scenario and
he’s gotta do something drastic and definitive. Tony understands his fate, and engages Thanos
once again, who now has the Gauntlet on, with Tony sneakily using his nanotech to steal
the Stones away from Thanos in the commotion. Thanos thinks he’s won and delivers another
classic Thanos line, snaps, and to his dismay nothing happens. He then sees in horror that Tony
in fact has the Stones, and, you know the rest. Tony snaps his fingers, and with that
disintegrates Thanos and his entire army. Now depending on what you count as canon Tony’s
mind is also transported to a plane after the snap where he sees his daughter but an older
version and they have a quick chat about what he’s done and how he feels about it and that she’s
proud of him, but you know that isn’t officially in the movie so make of that what you will.
Back in the real world, the energy from yielding the literal power of the universe in his hand has
destroyed Tony’s body and he’s on his way out, with Rhodey and Peter coming up to him and
emotionally trying to say their goodbyes. Pepper comes up to Tony’s body and Tony uses the last
energy he has to say his final words, Hey Pep, before Pepper tells him he can rest now. And with
that, Tony Stark dies, having sacrificed his life to save the universe. Yinsen would be proud.
Tony’s legacy is honored with all the heroes kneeling, a big funeral being held for
him, his family and friends listen to his recording, there’s a biopic made of him,
he leaves an incredible legacy behind. He evolved and grew over the years from a selfish,
arrogant playboy billionaire to a selfless man, a father, and above all, a hero who
gave his life for the universe. And that is the end of Tony Stark’s journey in the MCU.
So there you have it. Tony’s Stark MCU journey, chronological order, one of the most
iconic characters in modern pop culture. What do you think of his MCU journey, is he your
favorite MCU character, and do you think we’ll ever see him again properly? Personally I hope
not, I think they wrapped it up pretty perfectly, but you never know. Anyway, let me know all
of your thoughts down below in the comments. While you’re at it, be sure to like this video,
check out my Instagram and Twitter @bhl_hudson, my TikTok @bhlhudson, check out this podcast
that I do with a friend of mine where we talk about movies, TV shows, a bunch of nonsense, it’s
called The Poorly Planned Podcast, and subscribe for more videos like the one you just watched.
Thanks for watching and I’ll see ya next time.
