So I came up with this idea a year and a half ago when I rewatch Iron Man for the first time in awhile. I just rewatched it again, and while I will always maintain that its an extremally well put together movie, obviously i'm not telling anyone here anything new when I say you have to accept some pretty awful imperialist framework with the package. I am however going to rant about that framing for a paragraph just because I just rewatched the movie and I'm annoyed about it.
I'll admit, I dont know the background of 616 comics Tony Stark all that well, though since he was invented during the Cold War I honestly assume its worse than the movie, but yeah in the movie billionaire arms manufacturer Tony Stark gets kidnapped by a terrorist group, finds out they are using his weapons, and comes home and decides to stop manufacturing weapons altogether. While there's some mixed messaging about this, overall its only treated as a bad thing that Stark's weapons were getting in the hands of terrorists too, and the movie obviously never criticizes that he made weapons for the America military. Like yes, he stops producing weapons altogether, but Tony at one point even says that his eyes were opened by seeing his weapons used against "our boys" lol. (My Marvel-head friend has tried to excuse this as Tony doing theater, but I dont buy that). Like I said its a bit of a mixed message because the movie DOES treat being an arms manufacturer as a bad thing as a whole but sells that to the audience by having a eviiiiiiill terrorist group using his weapons. And Tony remains buddies with his military liaison Colonel James Rhodes and Rhodey is treated as a good guy.
But the idea I had was, what if Tony Stark's traumatic experience taught him a different lesson. What if the scientist from the (global south country) he was imprisoned with gave him a talking to about what the American military has done to his people. What if this all put him on the road to realizing that American imperialist hegemony is the chief evil of the world. And instead of never dealing with the problem* he goes after it head on and becomes a Marxist-Leninist. I figure in this continuity Warmachine/Rhodey could actually be an enemy of his (at least at first, my Marvel-head friend who I discussed all this with would want Rhodey to eventually come to a realization himself, insisting he has a moral compass) since in this AU he'd actually make sense as an antagonist and foil.
This actually feels underdeveloped now that Ive written it out but I'm making the GODDAMN post.
*I have no idea if this issue is ever addressed in the comics, its an area of comics I dont know much about.
I think in order for tony to convert he'd have to find a problem that he couldn't solve with money.
The way the movie goes he gets traumatized in the middle east by seeing his weapons being used by terrorists. He kills some of the terrorists then he comes home and changes his business model to focus on energy. All good, the system works. Hands clean.
This is where I would put in the changes. His energy solution is too efficient. The USA decides it would crash the "economy." The pentagon barges in and classifies everything and limits the tech to military uses because its too "dangerous."
Tony gets a secret message from the country he was just imprisoned in. The terrorists who were using his weapons were actually being funded by the USA. They justify US military presence in the region and bomb infrastructure to stop economic development.
The exploited nation says they can build a plant in secret using his technology. It would give them the industrial capacity they need to kill the "terrorists."
He gives them the tech and they build it.
6 months later rhoades is talking to stark about his first mission in war machine. he's supposed to take out a secret terrorist facility.
The power plant.
Stark intercepts him in the middle east and they fight. Rhoades is downed but stark can't go to him because the facility is in critical condition, they need him for repairs.
During the final scene stark finds rhoades healing in a hospital that is only open because of stark's power plant. They talk. This conflict is only happening because of the military industrial complex and fossil fuel industry. They realize that they can destroy capitalism by eliminating scarcity, and by using their iron man suits to protect the new infrastructure. They embrace communism.
fin
Very well conceptualized thank you.