Before Thanksgiving, I hadn't touched the Marvel Ultimates line at all. But now that I've read the two trades pictured above (which you can pick up here and here), I can finally say: I like them. They're the opposite of idealistic, but the art (at least in these volumes) is incredible, and the stories are solid.
They're definitely guilty pleasures if you're a Tony-stan, though. And I say this because - uh - Ults Tony is the most unapologetic playboy of all the versions of Tony that exist (as far as I know, anyway). Like I remarked on Facebook, if Ults Tony met 616 Tony and MCU Tony at a multidimensional shindig, he would playfully scold his counterparts for being too damned serious. (He would especially boggle at the domesticity of Endgame MCU Tony. Good grief!)
Ults Tony likes to fly around the city in his armor and wave at the "very, very pretty" office girls. He's also a heavy drinker -- but doesn't see it as a problem. Actually, he says at one point that vodka is an absolute necessity for the line of work he's chosen -- that he wouldn't have the nerve to climb into the armor if he weren't sloshed beforehand. And every time something remotely grim comes up - like his terminal cancer or Natasha betraying him - he flatly refuses to dwell on it.
No one would get away with writing a character like Ults Tony in Current Year. (Though, to be fair, I have my doubts that MCU or 616 would pass muster either.) Which just goes to show how joyless our current era is, really, because Ults Tony makes me laugh -- a lot. How could I not giggle at Tony singing drunkenly as he's picking enemies off during a battle, declaring that despite being utterly wasted, he's an excellent shot?
Plus, there's still something weirdly noble about Ults Tony -- even though, as his death approaches, he's firmly decided to pursue the CHIPS regimen (CHIPS: cocaine, Hawaii, intoxication, parties, and sex). He doesn't give up, for one. In his first major engagement in volume one, he gets physically and emotionally overwhelmed at one point. But when he sees how much the assembled crowd is depending on him to pull through and save the day, he gets right back up. The upshot? The guy does have depths. And he's admirably resilient.
Do I like Ults Tony as much as I like my sweet, tortured sons in the 616 and the MCU? Not yet. But he's roguishly lovable in his own way.
Bonus: Pallbearers, my fanfiction tribute to MCU Tony, is now complete.
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