Keeping in theme with replacing straight, Caucasian men with teenagers of varied races, ages, sexual orientations, and religions, Marvel Comics has replaced their cinematic poster boy with something new. But is she actually new? Who is Riri Williams and why shouldn't she be the new Iron Man?
In 2015, writer Brian Michael Bendis began writing "Invincible Iron Man". He got fourteen issues, and a seven issue side-series called "International Iron Man", before Marvel did the "Number 1's sell better" thing and set the main book back to issue one. In the main title, Bendis established this character named Riri Williams, a engineering student over at MIT. Riri creates an Iron Man armor and stops a prison break out. After hearing about her, Tony takes her on as an apprentice. Then, in "Civil War II"-also written by Bendis-Tony is put into a coma and his A.I. personality hands the Iron Man mantle on to Riri.
This decision split a lot of people's opinions. Some people like Riri as the new Iron person because she's diverse, and diversity in comic books-especially in the last couple of years-is insanely popular. Some people hate it for the same reason, but more so because Marvel keeps replacing their established characters with characters who appeal to people of different creeds. Giving everyone a hero. Then there are the people who want to play neutral, the people who want more diversified characters, but not by replacing established ones. They want fresh, unrelated characters. Truth is, that's not the norm because it wouldn't sell. Odds are none of you reading this post know who Mosaic is. Or if you do it's because I've talked about him before. Mosaic is a new Marvel character, he's young and he's black and he's an Inhuman, but otherwise he isn't connected to any previous superheroes. Is he a good character? I'd say yes. But did he sell? Not really, his book only got twelve issues. Ms. Marvel, The All-New Ghost Rider, The Totally Awesome Hulk, those characters sell not just because they have brand recognition, but because they are written with passion and meant to feel different from their predecessors. But me? I think we can stop making the new this or the new that. Let's actually focus on the characters we've established now and not flood the market with new replacements. You can't make bank solely on advertising new characters, eventually Kamala Khan will get older and she'll stop being new. Hell, she's been around for like three years by now!
But Riri is different. Originally I didn't care about Riri. I don't really like Iron Man, why should I care if his title got the fresh 2017 coat of paint? But then I did some research on James "Rhodey" Rhodes. War Machine/Iron Patriot II/Iron Man II/a character I like more than Tony Stark. And I found something interesting. In 2014, Alex Kot and Garry Brown wrote a pretty underrated "Iron Patriot" series starring James Rhodes. In the book, Rhodey was asked to be the Iron Patriot by the U.S. military and during one storyline he was framed of committing a terrorist attack. Who would help him other than his niece Lila Rhodes. Lila is just as good as Riri and I'll break it down for you.
1. Riri is a teenaged black girl, but so is Lila.
2. Riri is a talented engineer who build a suit, Lila is also a talented engineer and managed to repair Rhodey's suit.
3. Riri caught Iron Man's attention, but Lila is Rhodey's niece and-because of that relation-she knows Tony Stark personally.
4. Big one here, folks. Bendis created Riri from scratch and took a gamble on her being likable. Lila was likable from her first appearance because she's actually related to the Iron Man Family.
Here's the thing, Bendis is a selfish writer. What does that mean? It means when he creates a character, he owns that character. Jessica Jones is an old example, but look at Riri. Only Bendis wants to write for her and only Bendis wants people to like her. In previous works, Bendis has ignored the creations and stories of other writers simply to tell "his story". That's why "Civil War II" was so uncomfortable, because it felt like Bendis was writing this book with the idea he was writing every book Marvel had that was related to it. But he wasn't. But with Riri it's even worse because he could have used Lila instead. Imagine this: War Machines dies in "Civil War II" (which happened) and Tony has to break it to Lila. And out of guilt and remorse and kindness, Tony takes Lila under his wing and tries to be as good an uncle as Rhodey was. Tony recognizes her talent-a talent Rhodey never had-and helps her master it. Maybe he tells her she can be the next War Machine and avenge Rhodey, but then-BAM-Tony is in coma. And who does he have left to leave his stuff to? His student, his surrogate niece, and the only Iron Family he has left, Lila. So Lila becomes Ironheart or War Machine or whatever and Bendis can basically write the same damn thing. Instead of Tony just "taking an interest in someone who was like him", Tony is taking some damn responsibility and trying to pay tribute to his fallen friend by helping Lila become a hero. She can still be witty, and smart, and a teenaged black girl, but now she's also related to the Iron Man Family. Bendis can still write a character who is really new and needs development, but she can have some connection to established characters and not just be a quickly drafted original character.
If Bendis wasn't being paid to writer Iron Man, his work with Riri would feel like fan-fiction. "Iron Man meets a young girl, she's really smart and funny, and he goes into a coma and then she becomes Iron Man". I mean for crying out loud she was created in the seventh issue of "Invincible Iron Man" and then by the new Issue #1 (which is basically issue fifteen) she's the new Iron Man? In no time at all. It's just stupid. In fact, Bendis almost did the same thing when he created Miles Morales/The Ultimate Spider-Man. The difference? BENDIS WAS WRITING "ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN" FOR ELEVEN YEARS. Bendis writes about Peter Parker for eleven years and then establishes his new, original character Miles Morales and that kid becomes Spider-Man. That's okay, Bendis earned it. And you know what? Miles is an alright kid. Three-dimensional. Likable. Bendis wrote about Tony Stark for fourteen issues, seven other issues, and in however many pages of Tony were in "Civil War II". Then in issue seven he creates an obvious replacement, with out-of-the-blue technological prowess, he kicks Tony to the curb and makes her Iron Man and we're all supposed to be on-board because it's just a shorter version of what he did with Spider-Man? No. No way, Bendis. As far as I'm concerned, Victor Von Doom is the rightful heir to Iron Man. Because he at least had two years of character progression to back it up.
Thanks for reading.
Go read "Infamous Iron Man". It's much better.
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