MelvinTheJerk posted:

One of the things Marvel has always done well, perhaps better than the entire comics industry and especially in the Silver Age, was romances. Early Marvel characters in their origins had a habit of making their characters more vulnerable and human and so were their love lives in a way that still translates well and holds up to this day. The Hulk has a classic monsters tale. As Bruce Banner he was in love with Betty Ross, but couldn't be around her for fear of her safety. Her father dedicated his life to murdering him. Spider-Man gained powers that on the surface you would think would solve all his problems, but he was still a shy nerd at heart and spent years pining after the wrong women until Gwen Stacy came into his life and loved him for his faults. The list goes on and on: Reed and Sue. Hank and Janet. Scott and Jean. I don't even have to use their hero names for you to know who I'm talking about.

The romance I'm going to focus on right now is perhaps one you're not familiar with. Despite being a flagship character, Iron Man was not always the greatest selling title. It's no surprise that more people would recognize Green Goblin than Spymaster or Doctor Doom than Crimson Dynamo. Iron Man as a title was always a bit niche. Even if science in comics was your thing, the Fantastic Four was more likely the title you'd grab. It had an ensemble cast, insane space adventures, and a family theme that made people gravitate towards it. Iron Man's tales were, if you can believe it, a lot more grounded in reality and were tech based. Rather than just one guy building portals to the Negative Zone, Tony Stark had a factory that built things. He had employees who made commentary on his actions. It was the first comic that tried to make corporate espionage look exciting.

And the character has had a lot of growth over the years, most of it for the better, but recently I was reminded of this panel from issue #4 of New Avengers: Illuminati and it bothered me quite a bit.

Even though the romance took place over the course of decades, it was all before Iron Man became a title people cared about as a front runner of the Marvel universe, so it's not surprising that the average reader isn't familiar with the romance of Iron Man and Madame Masque. This panel, written by Brian Michael Bendis, shows a basic knowledge of the history of the character, but an utter lack of understanding. It paints Tony as a guy who is so eager to one up his buddies in the "I banged the ugliest woman" department that he'll compare the woman to Doctor Doom. I understand the panel was played for laughs, but it's incredibly far from the true story which to me is one of the most touching romances of all time in Marvel Comics. This is where it begins.

Whitney Frost was born into a life of crime, although it's not what she always wanted. Her father, later known as Count Nefaria, was the head of the Maggia family. In easy to understand terms, just think of them as the mafia but a Marvel comics vision of it. So in issue #7 of Iron Man, Whitney is shown to be leading a small of brand of criminals, both super and not, on a raid of Stark Industries. At the time she was in love with a man named Jasper Sitwell, a man who would later be known for his role as a top S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and Nick Fury's right hand man. Jasper happened to be at the plant, and Whitney was doing everything she could to both convince the criminals she was on board with their plans while at the same time trying to minimize damage and sabotage the raid.


Iron Man #7

It's important to note that at this point all Whitney wants is to lead a normal life. Her mother died giving birth to her, her adoptive parents died in an accident, and she was brought into the organization by her birth father who convinced her she had no where else to go.

The eventual raid on the plant doesn't go well of course. Whitney spends most of Iron Man #8 reminiscing about her origins, think about how much she tried to resist a life of crime only to give into the sorrow and become trained by her father to be the master criminal she is today. At the end of the issue she betrays her own people which leads to the capture of everyone but her and saves Jaspers life in the process. She escapes, but we learn eventually that not everything went well for her and she couldn't escape her past as she'd hoped.

In Iron Man #17 a new villainess has appeared in the form of Madame Masque. The plot of this arc was that a man called Midas (An obese guy with a floating chair that had about 1,000 guns on it) wanted to gain control of Stark Industries because the only thing he lived for was amassing more wealth and taking Stark Industries would help with that. He also had an obsession with gold, hence his name. Believe it or not, this plot actually lasted for years in the comics, but that's not exactly important right now.

So in the story Madame Masque is working with Midas by kidnapping a relative of Tony Starks to help infiltrate the company and install an imposter as the head of Stark Industries. There's actually a side plot which involves an Iron Man robot who wants to take over Stark Industries itself because it believes Tony is fragile and it could do a better job.


Iron Man #17

Madame Masque reveals herself to Morgan Stark setting up a key plot point which impacts everything else about this story: Her face is scarred and damaged beyond repair. So hideous is her visage it actually causes Morgan Stark to faint at the sight of it.

So later when Madame Masque has succeeded in capturing Tony Stark after he'd been ejected from his own company by his own Life Model Decoy, Stark agrees to train with Whitney in order to regain control of his company and hopefully shut the imposter Iron Man down.


Iron Man #18
Tony has been impressed with Madame Masque, and because he can't help himself he starts to flirt with her. She explains that his charms won't work. Something terrible happened to her, and her life was saved but at a terrible cost. Because of this, she knows she'll never find love, because who would love a woman with a face like hers? Better to work for a man like Midas who only cares about wealth. Tony isn't so sure though.

The two of them manage to infiltrate the plant, but of course the LMD knows everything Stark would do because they have the same thought patterns. Tony manages to save her life, and even without armor takes on the Iron Man LMD so Madame Masque can escape harm. This isn't something she takes lightly, despite her devotion and loyalty to her job and employer.



Iron Man #18

It turns out she's not as stone cold as she thought, and for the first time in a long time she feels like it's possible she could be whole again. The issue takes a turn for the tragic though as it appears Tony Stark dies in his battle with the LMD even as Madame Masque escapes. She of course, does not take the news well.


Iron Man #18

The original Midas story arc ends with the news that Tony Stark was miraculously revived by the Avengers and Midas realizes he was duped. It was never an imposter he had trying to take control of Stark Industries, but the actual Tony Stark. He has captured (again) which leads to Madame Masque visiting him in their dungeon.



Iron Man #19


And there's the reveal. Whitney Frost is Madame Masque. The plane she attempted to escape in back in Iron Man #8 went down and she nearly died. Midas saved her but only so he would have a pawn to do his bidding. Tony, a man notorious for chasing super models, teaches a valuable lesson to the readers that true beauty comes from within. The revelation comes as a shock to Whitney who still can't quite believe anyone would love her back.

The parallels between the characters wasn't unintentional. Both lost their parents. Both were forced into lives they didn't exactly want, Whitney becoming a criminal through circumstance and fate and Tony becoming Iron Man as a means of saving his life due to his weak heart. Whitney wore a physical mask to hide her broken face while Tony wore the metaphorical mask of a playboy to hide his insecurities and fears. They were on opposite sides of the law, but they had an undeniable attraction to each other.


Iron Man #19


Whitney tries to help Tony escape, which leads to a showdown with Midas. Baring his soul to Whitney and letting someone into his life also helped Tony with a break though of his own.

Until this point in the comics Tony Stark becoming Iron Man was incidental to the armors real purpose. The Iron Man chest plate was literally keeping him alive and with his heart condition he could go at any time. He had major insecurities about becoming Iron Man and fighting criminals. There was always the fear that each time he donned the armor it could be his last. Now that he was fighting for someone else, those fears stripped away and began to realize his true potential.


Iron Man #19


With all of that he still struggles in fight against Midas and winds up in a situation where taking the steps he needs to save his life might just end up killing him anyway. It's not until Madame Masque returns to save him and is in danger that he finds the inner strength to stop Midas.


Iron Man #19

The pair escape and Midas seemingly dies in an explosion, and the story ends with Whitney lovingly tending to Tony as he lays passed out from exhaustion. She understands what he risked in saving her, and though she wants to be with him she decides the selfless thing to do is to not complicate his life and set him free.

Eventually this leads to Tony falling into a funk. He's bored with life and uninterested in the playboy lifestyle. He misses Whitney and searches for her. Unfortunately, he's not the only one. Jasper Sitwell is also obsessed with finding her as he was in love with her prior to the accident and never forgot about her. He accuses Stark of knowing where she is and continues to grow angry with him as his obsession with finding her grows.

Iron Man #24 had a story which featured the return of Madame Masque, this time washed up on a strange island. A mad scientist there promised he had a radical new treatment which could fix her disfigurement, but in reality he intended to transform her into a beast like creature as a companion for his son whom he had transformed into a minotaur. Jasper had been suspicious of Iron Man, but by pooling their resources they managed to track down her whereabouts and arrived to save the day in the nick of time. For both men it was a relief to see her again and she had made strides in coming to terms with her feelings. In the end she walked off to continue her journey of self discovery relieved to know both men in her life were safe.


Iron Man #24

Whitney would show up in Iron Man semi-randomly after that. Sometimes to aid Iron Man, sometimes just in his thoughts as the one who got away. She was shown in her private life as using life like whole head masks that made her indistinguishable from a regular woman, much like what Chameleon used in the Spider-Man comics. For a couple of years it seemed that she just eventually faded away until we began to approach the 100th issue of Iron Man.


Iron Man #91

With Pepper Potts, Tony Stark's executive assistant at the time, marrying Happy Hogan, Stark's head of security, and leaving Stark Industries, Tony found himself in need of a new assistant. Enter Krissy Longfellow, a spunky girl from Brooklyn who seemed taken with Tony immediately. Sharp readers knew there was something off about her though. Over the next dozen or so issues, she had internal dialogue that suggested she wasn't who she claimed to be. She oddly okay with life threatening situations and more than capable of handling herself. Those issues also saw much corporate espionage, with Tony having patents rejected, his stock price fluctuating, and it was clear there was a mole in his inner circle. Which lead to these revelations:



Iron Man #103

Midas hadn't died and in fact was getting revenge on Stark by taking over his company bit by bit. Harry Key was the mole. but most importantly, Whitney knew someone was attacking Stark and went undercover as Krissy Longfellow to prevent the sabotage without alerting anyone to the fact she knew.


Iron Man #103

What she hadn't counted on was Midas being alive, and she knew she had no chance to stop him one on one. Meanwhile Midas gloated over his plan and watched as Jack of Hearts and Iron Man fought each other in a public battle he manipulated the two into fighting. In the end, everyone figures out the plan, but Stark leaves knowing he can't attack Midas. Midas did everything within the law and legally owns his company. It's not a situation Iron Man can just blast his way out of, he's been defeated fair and square. The only consolation is that he has Whitney Frost, the love of his life, back in his arms.

Issue #104 finally crystallizes Tony's romance with Whitney as everything comes to a head. Tony has had some down time now that he no longer owns Stark Industries and he's living with her. Stark absolutely loves her, but he's not sure if he's ready to just throw in the towel, retire with the woman he loves and a butt load of money or if he needs to step up and reclaim what was taken from him.


Iron Man #104

Tony decides to take Whitney back to the original Stark manor, a home his parents built and he hasn't seen or been to in years. Apparently Stark's current home was a holding of the company and was thus forfeit when Midas took over, but there's no claim on his childhood home. Tony opens up to her about his past and the two share a moment. Unfortunately Jasper has also tracked them down and has been driven crazy with feelings of jealousy and betrayal. Tony decides to get some air while he makes his decision on what he wants to do.




Iron Man #104

As Tony comes back, ready to give it all up and settle down with Whitney for good, he's met with an ambush from Jasper who makes it clear this isn't about his duty to the job. He's after Whitney and if he can't have her, no one can.




Iron Man #104

Tony and Whitney want to give him the benefit of the doubt that he doesn't know what he's doing, but Jasper is having none of it. He makes it clear he's in his right mind and that he came to kill Tony for what he did to him.


Iron Man #104

At this point Whitney knows the only way this fight is going to end is if one of them kills the other. But frankly, she's pissed at the way Jasper is treating her like an object, something he can win if he only somehow defeats Iron Man. She talks him down and in the end makes it known that whatever faulty reasoning he may have cooked up in his mind, he's not going to have her. Her mind is clear, and Tony loves her as she loves him. Jasper finally gets it, but leaves feeling ashamed as Tony and Whitney share a kiss.





Iron Man #104

Their story doesn't end here sadly, but it's where I'm going to leave off. The relationship between Iron Man and Madame Masque lasted a couple more years after that before ending tragically. Even with their break up Madame Masque continued to show up in Iron Man off and on until the late 90's. Even at times when they were at each others throats they both acknowledged that what they had was real, and that was perhaps the reason they fought so hard now given the fine line between love and hate they continually crossed. They had a lot of really touching moments and even today as I go back read their eventual break up again it's always a punch to the gut.

There have been a lot of changes to Iron Man's character in recent years, but this is one plot point I wish wasn't forgotten. I'd even really like to see them get back together at some point and forgive each other. A lot of the great Marvel romances are broken up at some point, perhaps even all of them, but this is one of the few that could actually be fixed today given that both characters are still alive.

In the end, despite the fact that most people have completely forgotten her history with Iron Man, if they ever knew it all, she was extremely influential in his character development. She was the first person he shared his identity with. Their break up is what caused him to hit the bottle. Her love gave him the strength to embrace being a hero. She was his partner and first true love. It would be nice if nice if the writers realized it as well.