Ever since news broke a few months ago that 15 year old MIT student: Riri Williams would be replacing Tony Stark as Iron Man, the question became would she keep the famous moniker? While there would be nothing wrong with that, the potential alter ego most people went to for Riri was the Iron Maiden, however something about that seemed a little too metal for most people’s taste. Marvel Zombies, you don’t have to speculate any longer, yesterday the publisher confirmed that the heroine would be known as Ironheart.
While I have to say that Ironheart was not the name I was expecting, considering it sounds more like the nickname of a Game of Thrones character than a superhero, you cannot be too upset with the name. After all, it drops the Iron Man title that for most people the problem wasn’t the man part , but rather the iconic title. Marvel is taking an inherent risk by removing their most popular character in film and on the page in Tony Stark’s Iron Man as the lead character in his title book, so the renaming of the title character to Ironheart may have been the best thing that could have happened for the character of Riri Williams.
Rather than have this brand new character fill an iconic role, this is change in direction from Marvel’s most recent diversity trend, unlike Jane Foster taking on the legend of Thor, Riri get’s the opportunity to mold her on mythos. This is a brilliant move for Marvel, not because Riri Williams could not live up to Tony Stark, but rather because the character deserves a chance to soar into her own Iconic tail instead of being apart of someone else’s.
The only thing that could have made the Ironheart announcement better, would be if Marvel would have trusted their new heroine to carry the title of the book. This is most likely a sales tactic, expecting readers as well as retailers to order more books of a known title like Iron Man over Ironheart, hopefully the change will happen overtime.
Riri William’s makes her debut as Ironheart this November in Iron Man #1 written by: Brian Michael Bendis with art by: Stefano Caselli.
What do you guys think about the name Ironheart? Will you be adding Iron Man #1 to your pull list this November? Let us know in the comments below or tweet me @thereelbradbell
(Source: Wired)