i forgot about the scene in resurrection reconstruction & redemption that implies that tony is autistic im hndmfjshsbwnw
#ohhh autistic comfort characters my beloved...#tony stark#i have never read him (at least in the mcu) as autistic (one of the few who can escape my beam)#but i am extremely open to being convinced lol#i see more adhd traits in him‚ although there is of course a huge overlap between that and autism#marvel#it has been six years and three months and i am still not over him via @i-dreamed-i-had-a-son
i also view mcu tony as adhd! (im2 strawberries scene...) 616 tony being autistic on the other hand is a headcanon i will die on the hill of. the fic i talk abt in the op sticks pretty close to tony's mid-2000's characterization, it mentions reed and maya being autistic and how tony shares some specific traits with them (not naturally social skilled, rigid sense of justice, hyper-logical/technical thought process, obsessive tendencies. it also adds the idea that he had to be taught how to make eye contact, it doesn't come naturally to him). it has some outdated language you'd expect from 2007, but i still find it an interestingly written depiction of "guy with less openly autistic traits (bc he was forced to mask extremely heavily due to his upbringing) thinks he's 100% neurotypical". which is, btw, pretty close to canon (or at least, fits very well w the character's history):
(iron man v1 #286)
(iron man v1 #287)
tony was a fairly antisocial n sensitive kid, had trouble understanding/connecting with other people (as opposed to the logic of numbers and machinery), and also king arthur was his special interest comic writers please don't write him as a techbro he's a literature nerd. also lack of outward expressiveness is a symptom of autism in kids especially + that fits with how the artist drew him in these flashback issues. wrt him as an adult:
(iron man v1 #39)
(this is a running theme in his comics this is just one example of it). he is actively putting on this mask of "cool playboy industrialist" to disguise his real self at nearly all times. it's something he puts so much effort into and often to his own detriment. you compare what he was like at these different points in his life and it's pretty easy to get to "it was beaten into him by howard and also the world he grew up in to mask himself around others" and that especially applies to his neurodivergent traits
#616 tony also canonically has depression which is comorbid w autism im pretty sure#also side note bc of all this it means if you look at like. autism symptoms or diagnosis he kinda fits more w how it shows up in women#mcu tony does have the trait of 'armor-like public persona vs what he's actually like around the close circle of ppl he trusts'#but with 616 tony it's like. I MUST HIDE WHO I AM AT ALL TIMES TO BASICALLY EVERYONE.#IT ACTIVELY TORMENTS ME. IT MAKES ME MISERABLE. I HAVE TO KEEP DOING THIS THOUGH NO ONE CAN KNOW ME OR WHAT I FEEL.#and it gets to a breaking point (or two) pretty quickly. in demon in a bottle/v1 128 he's like#'oh since tony stark is behind all my problems i'll just stop being tony stark i'll just be iron man i'll leave my civilian identity behind#like he spends so much effort keeping up appearances as tony (his public/social life) it's as if he's pretending LESS when he's iron man#(his secret superhero identity)#also the last thing that makes tony start drinking again in v1 167 is indries telling him that he's a child hiding behind a glossy shell#(+ other pretty vicious insults around how he's this pathetic nothing beneath the surface)#and he takes this so hard he can't say or think of anything to prove her wrong#i can imagine in his head it's like. 'someone saw past the mask i constantly keep up. someone i loved with all my heart#and she thinks - no. she knows that the person behind it is worthless and empty'
