As Tony Stark faces the fight of his life alongside the X-Men, his long-awaited Mysterium Armor has finally been unveiled – and Iron Man has given himself a major power-up. Teased for months, Iron Man is using his new suit to take on the evil billionaire Feilong, who stole Tony’s company and used his tech to build gigantic mutant-killing Stark Sentinels. Tony has sworn to bring Feilong down, even if it costs him his life.
In solicit information for Invincible Iron Man #16 (from writer Gerry Duggan and artists Juan Frigeri and Bryan Valenza), Marvel just revealed the new armor, which was designed by Pepe Larraz.
While the suit has yet to officially debut in Marvel canon, fans already know a surprising amount about it, as they’ve followed Tony through the process of sourcing his new anti-magic metal and buying time to secretly forge it into a suit. Here, then, are 10 facts which show why fans should be excited about the Mysterium Armor’s arrival.
10 Tony Believes It’s His Most Dangerous Iron Man Suit
Iron Man Is Ready to Die in His New Armor
Iron Man’s Godbuster suit and his Iron God form turned him into a godlike being under the most extreme circumstances possible, so the new Mark 72 armor – aka the Mysterium Man suit – can’t claim to be Iron Man’s most powerful ever. However, Tony does consider it his most dangerous suit of all time. He said as much in X-Men #26 (Gerry Duggan, James Towe and Javier Pina), while also adding that it’s one he’s “content to die in if need be.”
Mysterium is a wild new material mined from the heart of creation (more on that shortly), and bends many laws of Marvel physics – for example, possessing 100% energy efficiency and electrical conductivity. That means Tony can direct more power through this armor than he ever has before, even while he doesn’t know where the suit’s limits lie. Tony’s new armor is the ultimate untested superweapon – as dangerous to him as those he’s going after.
9 The New Iron Man Suit Comes with Two New Codenames
Tony Stark Became the Black King to Forge His New Armor
Tony has been working on the Mysterium armor in secret for months, even as Feilong’s organization Orchis has toppled mutantkind and smeared him in the press. To get away with his maneuvers, he became the new ‘Black King’ – joining the villainous Hellfire Club alongside Wilson Fisk, aka the Kingpin of Crime (and the new White King.) The Black King is an illustrious title in Marvel lore, going back to the ’70s, and is most often held by the evil mutant Sebastian Shaw (who is currently working on his own dark Iron Man armor to fight back.)
At the same time, Marvel has been referring to Tony’s upcoming transformation as the debut of the Mysterium Man. While Tony Stark will always be Iron Man, it’s clear that his new upgrade is so extreme that it comes with its own codename, while its construction required Tony to embrace one of Marvel’s most enduring villain titles.
8 It’s Made from the Most Valuable Material in the Galaxy
Mysterium Stopped a Major Galactic Civil War by Creating a New Currency
While Tony may be working with Mysterium, it was actually discovered by the X-Men, who used it to change the face of the galaxy. In SWORD #6 (Al Ewing, Valerio Schiti), it was revealed that years of planet-destroying adventures have plunged the galaxy into chaos, obliterating its economy and resulting in countless battles for power and resources. The X-Men used their newly discovered and incredibly versatile new metal to stabilize the galactic economy, creating a new currency named the Sol. So while Iron Man’s Mysterium Armor may be incredibly powerful, it’s also valuable enough that he could destabilize entire planets just by selling off one finger.
7 Mysterium Is Howard Stark’s Legacy
The MCU’s New Element Is Finally Comic Canon
While Feilong was ransacking Tony’s company, he took inventory of some of the Stark family’s forgotten heirlooms. There, he found an old film of Tony’s father explaining that he had dedicated his life to the hunt for Mysterium, and finally offering Tony some much-needed respect and love. Of course, Feilong immediately destroyed the film. Thanks to Emma Frost’s telepathy, Tony got to see it, and understands that his Mysterium Armor represents everything his father wanted to gift humanity, as well as completing a quest that it seems Stark Sr. never managed to finish.
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6 The Mysterium Suit Is an Avengers/X-Men Creation
Tony Wouldn’t Have His Suit without Marvel’s Mutant Heroes
While the final Mysterium Armor is Tony’s creation, he owes a lot of people for the opportunity to make it. The Mysterium was sourced by the Six (Manifold, Khora of the Burning Heart, Armor, Risque, Peeper, and Wiz-Kid) and gifted to Tony by Emma Frost, who he recently married to maintain her cover as his human assistant Hazel Kendal. Starfox, Ironheart, and War Machine all helped buy Tony the time and resources to build it, while the mutant inventor Forge is lending his genius skills to making it a reality. Usually, Tony Stark’s armors are created in his personal lab and signify his unique genius, but the Mark 72 is a true team effort and further binds Tony to the woman he may be growing to genuinely love.
5 Iron Man Is Now Radiation and Heat-Proof
Tony’s New Suit Is Perfect for Stomping His New Nemesis Feilong
One of Mysterium’s first discovered properties was its resistance to most forms of radiation, plus its near-immunity to heat. Those are useful properties to have in an Iron Man armor, but they’re especially essential given Tony’s hatred for Feilong. A bitter human industrialist who hates the X-Men because they beat him to Mars, Feilong recently underwent a series of treatments to mix Hulk’s gamma radiation with Cyclops’ optic blasts. As a result, Feilong now belches radioactive fire – perhaps the definitive power that Tony will no longer have to worry about. After destroying Tony’s public image, imprisoning his best friend James Rhodes, and destroying his father’s final message, it’s going to be amazing watching Feilong realize he can no longer hurt Tony Stark.
4 Iron Man’s New Suit Is Immune to Magic
Even Doctor Strange Couldn’t Beat Mysterium
Perhaps the most impressive new power of the Mysterium Armor is that its unique relationship with energy makes it immune to magic. Tony even took a walking stick made of Mysterium to Doctor Strange in Invincible Iron Man #11 (Gerry Duggan and Andrea Di Vito), with the Sorcer Supreme unable to even levitate the ‘anti-magic metal.’ Mysterium got its real test in Clea and Doctor Strange’s recent battle against the evil ‘General Strange,’ who used a mysterium dagger to injure Marvel’s hero. Not only is Mysterium immune to magic, but direct contact also dulls any magic-user’s connection to mystic forces, essentially turning it into Doctor Strange’s answer to Kryptonite. Finally, Iron Man’s technology has reached a point where it surpasses Marvel’s magic.
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3 Iron Man’s New Suit Is Immune to Spider-Sense
Tony’s New Armor May Be Immune to All Precognitive Powers
In the same series of tests, Iron Man tried his cane out against Spider-Man’s Spider-Sense and was able to hurt the Wall-Crawler without Peter Parker sensing any incoming threat. Spider-Man’s ability to sense danger is tied to his connection to the Web of Life and Destiny, making this a major feat – it likely indicates that Mysterium is immune to precognitive powers, meaning that once he’s wearing the Mysterium Man armor, Tony may become a chronally unique being – someone who can mess with the flow of time in totally new ways.
2 Even Captain Marvel Can’t Bend Iron Man’s New Armor
Tony’s Suit Has Been Compared to Secondary Adamantium
Tony’s final test for his Mysterium cane was matching it against Captain Marvel’s strength, and the cosmic hero wasn’t even able to bend it. Mysterium isn’t quite as strong as unbreakable adamantium, but it has been compared to the less pure secondary adamantium, which means it will take a Hulk-adjacent powerhouse to damage it. Captain Marvel has wrestled Thor and punched out Thanos in the past, so the fact that she won’t even be able to dent Iron Man’s new armor just made him Marvel’s most durable hero.
1 Iron Man’s New Suit Comes from the Heart of Marvel’s Reality
Tony’s Mysterium Was Stolen from the ‘White Hot Room’
All of Mysterium’s impossible attributes stem from the fact that it’s essentially a condensed form of extra-multiversal energy. The Six originally mined Mysterium from the White Hot Room – a non-space outside the multiverse which is home to the ultra-powerful Phoenix Force. Existing outside time and reality, the White Hot Room is a place of pure creation, and has been theorized as the power source which connects all mutant abilities. It’s the rarest, most versatile material Iron Man has ever had to work with, and its origin suggests that the abilities fans have seen so far are only the tip of the iceberg for what’s to come.
As Tony Stark finally becomes the Mysterium Man, Iron Man is about to debut one of his most powerful armors ever, with a host of new abilities which he’s dedicating to protecting mutants from his stolen tech and bringing Feilong to his knees.
The Invincible Iron Man #16 is coming March 20 from Marvel Comics.
