Iron Man (Tony Stark)

Anthony Edward Stark

• N/A; all abilities derived from various Iron Man suits he designs.
• Genius intelligence in fields of physics and especially engineering.

• Ordinary human; can be hurt or killed by conventional means.

In his own words; "genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist." Tony Stark can best be described as someone who lives and breathes quippage and sarcasm. Constantly making sarcastic remarks at the annoyance of others is seemingly a charm of his. Nevertheless, Stark is a brave, genuine soul who is more than willing to give his life to protect other people.

Born to engineer and billionaire Howard Stark, head of the company Stark Industries, Tony had a turbulent childhood. Howard put on a frequent appearance of disappointment and disapproval of his son. Tony's only real source of comfort was the family's butler, Edwin Jarvis. Later in life, Tony named his personal A.I. assistant, J.A.R.V.I.S., after the butler.

When Tony was 21, his parents were killed in a car accident. As a result, he became the C.E.O. of Stark Industries, elevating the company to new heights over the next fifteen years.

Stark took a trip to Afghanistan, demonstrating to the U.S. military a variety of experimental weapons, including the Jericho, a new kind of missile that could inflict massive damage to enemy forces in the region. However, Stark was captured by agents of the terrorist group known as the Ten Rings under the orders of their mysterious leader, the Mandarin. Allying with fellow engineer and prisoner Ho Yinsen, Stark constructed a battlesuit that enabled him to escape, at the cost of Yinsen's life.

Returning to the United States, Stark, realizing the error of his ignorance, renounced weapons' development and refined his armor, becoming the Golden Gladiator known as Iron Man. To maintain a secret identity, Tony came up with a cover story explaining that Iron Man was his bodyguard. He built several successor models in his early career; the current model he uses is the Mark VII.

Not long after Tony's debut as Iron Man, he found himself caught up in a day unlike any other, when he and four more of Earth's Mightiest Heroes, Ant-Man (Henry Pym), Wasp (Janet van Dyne), Thor (Sigurd Jarlson), and the Hulk (Bruce Banner), found themselves united against the time-traveling warlord of the forty-first century Kang the Conqueror, who had come to subjugate the twenty-first century. Working together, the five heroes defeated Kang and sent him fleeing back into the future. In the aftermath, the group stayed together as a team on Ant-Man's suggestion, with Wasp suggesting the dynamic moniker "the Avengers," which stuck.