Marvel’s Captain America: Civil War..Iron Man/Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.)..Photo Credit: Film Frame..© Marvel 2016
The MCU started with Iron Man, and our appreciation for this selfless hero is long overdue. So, let’s discuss a few of Tony Stark’s most iconic scenes throughout his MCU history.
Warning: This slide show contains some spoilers for Avengers: Endgame. Take caution unless, of course, you’re okay with heavy spoilers.
Tony Stark didn’t just build the prototype for his Iron Man suit in his first movie. It might have been the first of his inventions we experience in the film universe, but it isn’t the most noteworthy.
He built the MCU.
The cinematic universe started with Iron Man, and thanks to him, the MCU has a chance to continue well beyond Avengers: Endgame. Like any of the six original Avengers, Tony has had a decade of character development, which allows so many fans to resonate with some aspect of his characterization. Because Iron Man’s journey in the MCU has ended, we’re celebrating his 10 most memorable moments throughout the MCU.
If the spoiler warning didn’t scare you away, then you already know what happened to Tony in the final fight scene in Endgame. The sequel to Infinity War signifies the end of an era, but it also marks the end of Iron Man, at least for now. He started the cinematic universe by being Iron Man, and he ended it that way. While we’re commemorating just 10 of Iron Man’s most memorable MCU moments, he’s had a lot of strides in his character trajectory alone.
Healing from his abusive childhood is arguably some of his strongest implicit growth over the years. He was afraid to become a father because he didn’t want to end up like his own, Howard Stark. While Endgame has some questionable implications when it comes to abusive fathers and necessary forgiveness, it ended his arc by giving him a conventional family.
He’s made his own family in his creations, just like he found a family in the Avengers, and later started a family with Pepper Potts. All that family focus has lead to dozens of important moments and an extensive amount of growth for a truly altruist hero, who just happens to hide behind an egotistical facade. Being the foundation of the MCU for just over a decade allowed for a swarm of memorable scenes, but we’re focusing on 10 of Iron Man’s best moments. However, we’re thankful for every moment Tony Stark has given us over the years (in movie, comic, and animated form).
1. His first dance with Pepper
Tony claims that he’s a billionaire, playboy, philanthropist, and genius. Some of those labels are true, but Tony Stark retired his playboy title shortly after he escaped from his hostage situation. We wish Tony had more time in the MCU so that he could hopefully find a healthier coping mechanism for his PTSD, but we did have an opportunity to watch him change his life for the better during the first Iron Man film. And, positive change is a healthy step in recovering from PTSD. Part of Tony’s healthy coping mechanism was changing how he values personal relationships.
A dance changed his and Pepper’s relationship forever. We watched them grow as individuals, a couple, and a couple of world-changing heroes (in more ways than one), but our favorite Tony and Pepper moment is their first dance. Their first dance was wonderfully awkward because of their nervous banter. But, you can just see from Tony’s expression mid-dance that he’s reflecting on how much he appreciates Pepper as a person. We’re not saying that he fell in love with her there, but that’s what we’re choosing to believe.
Their first dance is a nostalgic reminder of how the first power couple of the MCU started. We’re glad we got to join them through all their relationship milestones, their fights, their resolutions, and how they continually built each other up and supported one another.
Now, we’re just looking for our Pepper Potts. Granted, we’re not a tech genius who’s willing to sacrifice their life for the world (or universe) on more than just one occasion. So, we might have to kick it up a notch or two before we find our own Virginia Pepper Potts.
2. Testing out Mark II
Building and testing the progress of the Mark II Armor was a comical journey in the first Iron Man film. While innovating and creating helps Tony cope with his anxiety and PTSD, watching him test fly the Mark II was a cathartic clip in Iron Man’s cinematic history. It gave him something to appreciate amid his tinkering.
Seeing Tony smile while flying in his first modern Iron Man suit design gives us a multitude of reactions every time we rewatch it. It’s a reliable pick-me-up clip, and even more so now that we’ve watched Endgame more than we’d care to admit. Tony wasn’t just excited that he was flying, he was bewildered and surprised that his design actually worked.
Earth’s best defender deserves to get some kind of joy in his work. Sure, he might have overdone the extent of his test run. But, would it really be a Tony Stark official test flight if he didn’t overexert the limits of his suit? (The answer: no. No, it wouldn’t.)
However, the Mark II flight test also signified the start of Tony’s journey as a hero. It’s a bittersweet moment because you know this is one of the few times in cinematic history that Tony is genuinely excited and isn’t overwhelmed with the dread of saving the universe. We’ll gladly cling to this moment, and it’s something that Thanos and any future big bad can never take away from us.
3. Being saved by Harley Keener
Even Iron Man needs protecting. A kid might not be the best protector, but for Tony Stark, it was more than enough. Just as much as Tony acted as a father figure to Harley when he felt alone, Harley also helped Tony feel less alone in his most emotionally vulnerable times. During Iron Man 3, Tony dealt with his anxiety, but his panic attacks were becoming more frequent due to the additional stress from his lost fights.
Harley helped talk Tony through an anxiety attack to make him feel less alone during his attack. Plus, he helped give him the idea of building some new technology while Mark 42 was compromised. They both helped each other feel less alone, but Harley inevitably reminded Tony that he is Iron Man. That’s especially important given the timeline — because Tony doubted a lot of his abilities and strengths throughout Iron Man 3.
It’s no doubt that Harley and Tony are connected. Tony’s funeral in Endgame proves that just as much as Tony’s gift-giving gesture toward the end of Iron Man 3. Tony knew he couldn’t physically be there for Harley as a mentor because he still had to process his anxiety. Nonetheless, Tony gave Harley a lot of tools, tech, and supplies to fuel his passion because he saw the best parts of himself in Harley. He just wanted Harley to nurture those parts.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPRfivTYbhI&t=121s
4. Proof that Tony Stark has a heart
Tony Stark’s heart is the entire MCU and everyone in it. He’s helped most of the Avengers in one way or another because he puts his heart in he build an Avengers complex for the heroes to live, he upgraded countless suits and technology for them. Beyond making tech, he’s helped even the most unlikely allies cope with their grief because he knows what it’s like to lose people and parts of yourself.
Even after Wanda’s vengeful streak in Avengers: Age of Ultron, Tony supported her redemption arc and even acted as a protective parent to her by giving her a space at the Avengers’ headquarters, and a friend and later partner, Vision, during one of the lowest moments in her life. He allowed her some space to process herself and grow as a new hero.
He was never heartless. On the surface, Tony might have seemed egotistical, prideful, or even selfish. But Tony has always had an empathetic, compassionate, and selfless heart. It’s what drove him to create Ultron. Although Ultron turned out to be one of his few nefarious technological children, he wanted to create an Earth-sized safety net because he knew he wouldn’t be around forever.
After the Battle of New York especially, Tony realized his own mortality because he was willing to give up his life to put the nuke through the portal, and he wanted to make sure there was something or someone he trusted when he wasn’t physically around to continue his legacy.
Whether he cares to admit it or not, Tony Stark is the heart of the Avengers and the cinematic universe, and we’re forever thankful for his impact.
5. Giving Rhodey a suit
Tony and Rhodey have been friends since their college days at M.I.T., but seeing Tony give Rhodey his own Iron Man suit (just with the War Machine moniker) was the peak of their friendship. Superheroes need and deserve friends, too. And Tony always knew that Rhodey would be a fearless and exceptional hero. After all, Rhodey’s checked Tony’s behavior on more than one occasion.
Given all the corrupt villains and corporations who wanted to sell and mass produce Tony’s suits, giving Rhodey a suit meant that he trusted him to be an even better hero than himself. After all, the iconic Rhodey vs. Iron Man fight scene in Iron Man 2 shows us that James Rhodes will always unbiasedly defend anyone who needs defending, even if it’s his bestie.
Okay, Rhodey technically borrowed one of Tony’s Marks in Iron Man 2 for an extended period of time. However, he was just acting in Tony’s best interests. Tony wasn’t acting like himself. He supported Tony and always tried to keep him from hurting himself or others during his medical and emotional crisis. Basically, he took on the symbolical role of Iron Man before he officially became War Machine.
Since Rhodey took on the role of Iron Man before, we can’t wait to see if he takes on the role again now that Tony is gone.
6. Helping Spider-Man become a better superhero
Tony Stark canonically mentors young superheroes. While we’ve mostly witnessed him mentor Peter Parker, he also acts as a fatherly figure to him by giving him advice and protecting him. Apart from designing him not one but two suits, Iron Man retrofitted practically everything in his suit, along with an A.I. to keep Peter safe.
The Spidey suit is basically the superhero version of, “my son’s going to fight crime anyway, so I might as well make sure he doesn’t die doing it.” Yes, this is our way of saying Tony is basically Peter’s father. This isn’t news though, seeing as losing Peter to the snap was his primary concern when he was literally dying from lack of food and water on the Benatar.
Tony never wanted Peter to go after any dangerous solo missions in Spider-Man: Homecoming because he didn’t want the kid to deal with the pressure, guilt, or grief of inadvertently hurting or killing civilians while he’s trying to help them. Sure, he more outwardly cares about Peter’s safety and wellbeing, but part of his wellbeing is also his mental health.
Instead, Tony gradually learned to give him more advice and to physically check in on him. His mentorship might have pushed Peter Parker deeper into the heroic mindset, but it also set the framework for Peter’s altruistic moral code. We’re certain that we’ll see Iron Man’s morals live on in Peter as the Web-Slinger continues his journey in the MCU.
7. Sacrificing himself to save New York
Battling aliens for the first time when you just learned about the existence of Norse Gods and the start of intergalactic geography is no simple task. Like the other Avengers during the Chitaurian battle of New York, the genius philanthropist felt more like an amateur.
Amid the skepticism of his perceived arrogance, Tony proved himself to Captain American, the rest of the Avengers, and the world. He was always a selfless hero, but the battle of New York solidified it because, without Tony, there wouldn’t be a New York.
Though, Iron Man never saved people to prove himself in any context. Tony has always cared deeply for other people. Everything he does is to protect others, even if that means putting his life directly at risk.
While Tony survived the Battle of New York and guiding the bomb through the Tesseract portal, he accepted that he wouldn’t make it out of the portal. He’s selfless to a fault, but his fault helped save the world countless times.
Tony Stark might us his Iron Man suits, his nanotech, and his seemingly infinite weaponry as the physical arsenal behind his heroic efforts, but being Tony Stark is his best weapon. His altruistic nature is what saves lives, and without him and other people like him, the Iron Man suit would be pointless.
8. Iron Man vs. Captain America fight
They might not have raised us or gone to our oboe recitals, but Steve Rogers and Tony Stark often feel like our fictional dads. In any squabble, someone’s always right. In Captain America: Civil War, some would argue that Tony was right. (That’s not to say we don’t understand where Steve was coming from and why he wanted to protect his bestie, of course.)
That’s what made it especially hard to watch the fight go down between Captain America and Iron Man (especially with Bucky Barnes in the middle of the whole fight). Tony thought he was doing the right thing by attempting to follow some form of protocol. But given Tony’s own failed attempts regarding Ultron, it makes sense why he would be cautious of Bucky at the time — not to mention why Tony would want to prevent Steve from potentially making the same mistake.
Cap and Tony’s fight scene in Captain America: Civil War caused more emotional pain them physical. (For them and for us, which is quintessential for any Civil War comic media event, apparently.) Regardless, it made for one powerfully choreographed final fight scene.
9. Family man Tony
Just like Tony has become increasingly selfless as the MCU progressed, Tony’s found family has grown over the years. At the start of his MCU journey, Tony was alone. He only thought of Pepper as his assistant. While Rhodey was just as much of his family as he was his best friend at the start of the first Iron Man film, James Rhodes had his own life and responsibilities at that point.
All Tony had were his inventions. Mostly J.A.R.V.I.S., in honor of Edwin Jarvis, as well as Dum-E. Before he became Iron Man, he was alone. As the years progressed and the MCU grew more expensive, he developed a family with the Avengers and with Pepper Potts.
Tony Stark had implicitly been afraid of starting his own family apart from his found family. But we saw in Endgame, when Tony finally got the chance to focus on himself and get away from the stress of life, he had so much love to give to his wife and daughter, Pepper and Morgan.
His family might have sealed his character arc in a bittersweet package, but any fan can appreciate the heartfelt scenes between him and his daughter. We knew the carefree scenes where he tucked Morgan into bed wouldn’t last, but we wish we’d seen more of Tony’s family persona.
10. Saving the universe
Like we’ve said before, Iron Man is a selfless hero. Every hero in the MCU has risked their lives just by being heroes, but Iron Man was expected because he defeated the genocidal Titan, Thanos, knowing full well that he’d inevitably die.
Tony fought Thanos a couple of times. While we could have easily died from the climax of their first fight in Infinity War, he lived on just so he can snap his fingers and erase Thanos and his army from the past. Beyond fixing the time travel equation so that all the snap’s victims could be resurrected, he delivered the final blow that stopped Thanos and kept the snappening from happening a second time.
Taking agency over his fears that Wanda exploited back in Age of Ultron, Tony sacrificed himself to save the universe. He stopped the vision from becoming a reality again because he had time to dwell on that reality for five years after the snap. Saving the universe let him stop that fear, but at a grave cost.
Tony saved his family and the entire universe in his final fight against Thanos, but in turn, Earth officially lost its best defender. There’s always a price in saving the universe, especially at the cost of sacrificing yourself, but Tony was always ready to pay that price if it meant protecting others.
Iron Man was the sole outlier in the 14,000,605 possible realities of the snap.
“I am Iron Man.” A single phrase started the MCU. The same phrase ended an era of the original heroes. While the same monikers will likely carry on in the form of other heroes with the same ideologies, we can’t argue that Iron Man is the reason that the cinematic universe even exists. Thanks, Tony for everything. Now, it’s time to rest.