It’s an incendiary question to be sure. We’re not talking about something as simple as getting all four members of the Fantastic Four in matching costumes (HA!), we’re talking rolling back the clock on almost two decades of action figure manufacture. The Iron Man armory is wide and deep — it spans 50-odd years and dozens of armors. The designs range from art deco to bleeding edge, spanning the gulf between hand-drawn comics and cutting-edge film making, crude cell animation to complex computer-generated imagery. It’s a Herculean task to be sure, but before we can come with with a reasonable answer, we have to ask some very basic questions.
Would Hasbro spend the money to do it right?
Hmmm. That all depends on what you mean by “right,” I guess. Many of the Iron Man suits would need to be dedicated sculpts, which means considerable investment in new tooling. The steel molds that are used to produce modern toys are expensive, and oftentimes toy manufacturers will only invest the recources when they feel the likelihood for profit is high. That’s why every new kid’s movie that comes out has multiple toy lines that feature dedicated sculpts. The argument I’d make is you have to spend money to make money. Companies like NECA and Funko have raised the bar when it comes to collector expectation, and if Hasbro expects to continue to play ball, then they’re gonna need to bring their A-game.
Considering both are Hasbro properties, Marvel product should have at least as much cash dedicated to it as Star Wars; however, unlike the space fantasy franchise, Marvel’s is an infinite universe: Spider-Man fans can choose from Peter Parker, Miles Morales, Gwen Stacy. The same with Iron Man. There’s a dozen versions of Tony Stark: from steam-punk to teen to cyber-God, Tony has an incarnation for every occasion. He’s the perfect subject to be tackled in a comprehensive, in-depth fashion.
Would retail go for it?
Hard to say. I’m guessing if Shellhead had a movie on the horizon, it might make the prospect more appealing to retailers. That said, retail may already consider the franchise to be yesterday’s news, tucked somewhere between Green Lantern and Last Airbender merch. Sure, he works great alongside the Avengers, but variety plays a big factor in that. Iron Man on his own, for all his suits, might be a bit stale for retail. That is, unless Hasbro fat-packs each series with fan-demanded movie and comics-characters, reissues of hard to find figures like the SHIELD Agent, and the most impressive Iron Man sculpts to date. Imagine getting an Extremis Iron Man that you could take home to Sunday dinner instead of “Tiny” Stark.
Would collectors go for it?
Once again, that’s a tough call. Personally, I’m all right with my Armory. The size variation between the twin-pack suits bugs me and a decade-plus of different-style paint applications tend to look weird all together, but I can usually see past that sort of thing. The original ToyBiz Iron Man still hits my sweet spot, and the first appearance armor from series 15 remains a favorite. Hasbro’s newer armors look great alongside modern incarnations of the Marvel characters. But there’s always that sense of what might be. A line of armors with consistent manufacturing, aesthetic, and canonical sensibilities would stand alongside the all-time great toy lines of our time. It’s the temptation for this consistency that drives the fantasy of a new Stark Armory. What we already have is great, but what we might gain could be far greater.
Do we actually need more Iron Men?
Let’s think about it. From ToyBiz we have series one Iron Man, series seven Silver Centurion, series eight Modern Iron Man, series nine War Machine, Mojo series First Appearance Iron Man, MODOK-series Thorbuster Iron Man, Legendary Riders Hulkbuster, both versions of the Face-Off figure, and the House of M armor. On the Hasbro front, we have the Annihilus wave Ultimate Iron Man, the Ares series Heroes Reborn Iron Man, the three varieties of classic armor that came in the Twin-Packs, and everything from the Terrax series Extremis Iron Man on. Including movie versions of the armor, that’s over 50 suits that were deemed “toyetic” by the two major Marvel license holders. That’s a lot of figures, and a considerable amount of investment on the part of both the manufacturer and the collector. Is it worth going back and “updating” every single one of those suits with modern manufacturing and aesthetics in mind?
In Closing
An all-new, all-encompassing Iron Man line featuring all of the relevant suits. It’s a crazy thought, I know. But toy companies love a sure bet and Marvel Legends has been a solid seller for them of late. The continued presence of Marvel characters in film, television, video games, and other media means that, one way or another, Marvel product will continue to appear. The ultimate question is, what form do we want it to take?
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