just me screaming into the void about comics

it's honestly fascinating to me getting to see how the comic presents The Many Sides of Anthony Stark and honestly i feel like the secret identity only enhances that but like we have

iron man: the hero, the avenger

tony stark: the man the public sees, the brilliant inventor and ceo who has it all, he's rich, handsome, successful, smart, goes on a lot of dates

and then there's tony. the guy under the masks who's terrified to get close to anyone because he doesn't want to hurt them with his (seemingly inevitable) impending death. he sometimes finds himself yearning for a "normal life" and always feels that he has to hide how he feels because Tony Stark TM can't show feelings or weakness

like besides the existence of the different "masks" he has it's also so interesting how iron man/tony stark interact with the same people. like there's such an interesting element to how people see and react to the different sides of him like people in universe see tony and iron man so differently. i think that's a really interesting layer added to the character dynamics because (far as i know) a lot of heroes don't interact with the same people in their hero and civilian personas on a consistent basis. this is most apparent in pepper, while her opinions change a lot throughout the early issues there is always a clear difference in how she views tony versus his "bodyguard," sometimes she sees tony as selfish and cowardly and iron man as brave and selfless and sometimes she sees tony as warm and friendly but iron man as cold and unfeeling.

besides that, it is interesting how tony sees and views the trichotomy between his hero persona, how the public views him and how he actually is. his internal dialogue is super interesting to me like it's probably just a generic hero thing but i think it's so fascinating how his internal dialogue will occasionally switch from first to third person. it's most prominent when when he's suiting up or getting ready to suit up. there's just something about the vulnerable, open moments where he's just holding the helmet musing and it's almost like he's having a conversation between the his two identities.

like going on a tangent within a tangent here but iron man 36 (the issue that started this whole scrambled aimless rant) just does this so well? the issue starts with tony going out and Stuff Goes Wrong but while he's suiting up/fighting the giant evil robot of the week we get a FASCINATING conversation between "iron man" and "tony stark" which oh my god? it all starts while he's suiting up and pensively holding the helmet saying "so what's wrong tony? aren't you happy? you're only half a prisoner now!" all after ruminating on how he constantly feels like he's hiding behind tony stark and iron man. then we move into the battle and my goodness. "a guy who hides, yes hides, behind this golden mask...a guy who makes your sickening social life worth living. a guy who makes you worthwhile tony stark. 'what name?' they call me iron man" excuse me just going absolutely insane in the corner because TONY NO.

honestly the superhero genre has SO much room for exploring identities and i think that's just emphasized with the masks he knowingly puts up and how much he feels he's "hiding behind the masks of iron man and the playboy industrialist." while not as common, we have seen elements of this also come up when he's music about his public mask and how he's expected to act a certain way and can't show how worried he is about a friend in the hospital because "that's not stark's style. and above all else, stark must have style"

also the way he views and balances his different lives is so compelling. the stories where he's struggling to find the balance between his lives is a common superhero trope but it actually works really well? being both "iron man" and "tony stark" cause a bunch of problems for him and there are times that he has tried to give up either side of the equation but it just never works. iron man and tony stark both bring so many difficulties and complications to tonys life but they're both painfully necessary.

sometimes he's regretting how much time he "threw away by living as carefree playboy tony stark" but that's not entirely true? even as "just" tony stark he's made massive scientific contributions and successfully runs a company. on the flip side of things there are also times he regrets spending so much time as iron man because of all the scientific discoveries he could have been making instead of super heroing. so much of it is about him trying desperately to balance everything.