Source: marvel.com
6. What It Was Like, What Happened, and What It’s Like Now
(Invincible Iron Man #500.1)
Sometimes, you just want a quick, simple, done-in-one-shot story out of your comic books. That’s where What It Was Like, What Happened, and What It’s Like Now comes in.
The story with a title too long for an acronym to help is one quick issue with a simple premise: Tony Stark tells his story at an AA meeting. It’s an awesome recap of what the character’s been through, with the added comedy of Stark’s vague words being paired against comic book-y visuals.
It’s a fantastic starting point for anyone who’s doubtful about whether or not this comic is for them. If you like this issue, it is. If not, move along. The comic is also great for how much it frames Tony’s decades-long story under one uniform light: addiction. Tony Stark is an alcoholic superhero.
That’s ludicrously important to his character, and ignoring it does you no service toward writing him. This issue is the first Iron Man comic I’ve read in a long time that truly addressed that.
