Mark Waid and Kieron Gillen wrapped up their run on two
Marvel icons in a strange way. Departing Hulk and Iron Man, respectively, the
last big story by the authors involved tying in to the Marvel crossover
Original Sin. Unfortunately, I’d say that my opinion of this series is the same
as the runs that these creators had on their books. Good concepts, solid
execution, but the story never really hooked me.
The sin that comes to light in this story is that Tony Stark
may have tinkered with the original gamma bomb. Was Stark responsible for Bruce
Banner becoming the Hulk? (Spoilers: No.) There are some neat narrative tricks
here. The best is that Stark can’t remember what he actually did the night
before the gamma test because he had been drinking so heavily. So he has to use
an assortment of technological aids to try to recreate just what happened all
those years ago.
While this is happening, the Hulk is hunting down Tony
Stark. It’s always fun seeing Hulk rip through Iron Man armor, and that holds
in this collection. I also enjoyed the spin of this being an Extremis-focused
Hulk. Thanks to Tony Stark’s brother Arno, Hulk is smart AND angry, which is a
bad combination.
I am a bit bummed that Kieron Gillen’s Iron Man run sort of
petered out in this tie-in mini-series rather than in the core title. I didn’t
collect this as it came out, so it almost seemed like Gillen’s story just faded
rather than going out with a bang like it deserved. The Iron Metropolitan city,
Arno Stark, the black and gold armor… these are all dangling threads that could
have used stronger conclusions.
Mark Bagley is one of the MVPs of the Marvel bullpen, and he
pulls his weight again. It’s not a tough sell to draw Hulk fighting different
Iron Man suits, but it isn’t guaranteed to look this good. I especially enjoyed
seeing Bagley’s take on the black and gold suit. I’ll miss that one, the
current white suit just doesn’t do it for me.
This is a FAIR comic. Perfectly fine, but an odd place to
tuck away story conclusions that should have gone down in the core titles.
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