Iron Man... Extremis

Yes, I'm talking about Iron Man... but not that, not yet...

I had heard (and it was generally presumed) that one of the sources of the latest film was the Extremis storyline by Warren Elis with art by Adi Granov. And the first thing I want to say is: the art is very nice! A painterly style gives it a different tone to the usual comics, while not being overly photorealistic. Stark looks different, and the characters are nicely differentiated. The Iron Man suit is... very samey, it has to be said, lots of gold and red, and I took the change in style to be as read more than I checked explicitly to see what Adi did. The art did give a more subdued note to the fights, with the lack of bright stand out colours meaning the fights lost some of their power. Still, I liked the art.

The story on the other hand... is very much on the other hand. Why are people so excited by this? We get another retelling of the Iron Man origin, and the big point of the story is the step up in the way Tony interacts with his suit. Is there more in the on-going story line with him becoming more powerful or something? From the way I've heard people talk about it, I thought he was going to be able to exude the whole armour from his skin, but it's not that exciting. It's just a new method for wearing a thin undersuit... yay? The Extremis plot device sounds like it could be a way to give more people superpowers, but other than it being a test with Tony being a guinea pig, there's no hint that it will be used for more. (Again I ask, was more done with this?)

I heard this was something different. And remain underwhelmed.

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