The Invincible Iron Man #5 Review

Written by: Gerry Duggan
Art by: Juan Frigeri
Colors by: Bryan Valenza
Letters by: VC’s Joe Caramagna
Cover art by: Kael Ngu
Cover price: $3.99
Release date: April 26, 2023

The Invincible Iron Man #5 ends the current arc (or does it?) with a showdown between Iron Man and Feilong for the right to own Howard Stark’s legacy.

Is It Good?

I have to give credit to Gerry Dugan for leaning into the idea of “every comic should have one big idea.” This comic has one big idea, but it’s not that big, and the reveal only needed two pages worth of story to come out, leaving the rest of the issue with a lot of fluff that starts but doesn’t go anywhere.

Admittedly, I was down on Duggan’s issue #4 because it was a lot of chest-thumping posturing between Feilong and Iron Man that ultimately resulted in nothing other than Tony accepting Stark Industries is no longer his.

Now, Tony learns his father left him super-secret information about a new element, but corporate protections have placed that knowledge in Feilong’s hands. That’s it. Duggan never explains what this new element is, whether Howard actually found it or if he only left clues for Tony to complete the work, or what the new element could mean for the world. The (not so) big idea in this issue is the existence of a new element discovered (maybe) by Howard Stark.

Again, kudos to Dugan for making sure each issue has at least one big idea, but the decompressed nature of this arc means you’ve got a lot of issues to go before the plot starts to take on form and shape. Taking back what Feilong legitimately bought isn’t much of a page-turner, so if there’s a grander story here, Duggan is taking a slow train to unveil it, or he doesn’t have a story at all.

Frigeri’s art is excellent, so that’s something, at least. Readers get a wow moment toward the end when Tony learns about a special weapon Feilong has been building, so that’s something more. Artwise, this is a great issue.

About The Reviewer: Gabriel Hernandez is the Publisher & EIC of ComicalOpinions.com, a comics review site dedicated to indie, small, and mid-sized publishers.

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Bits and Pieces

The Invincible Iron Man #5 is filled with great art, one wow moment with a new type of weapon, and one idea that may or may not have meaning for the future of Iron Man. Everything surrounding that one idea is a lot of slow-moving fluff. If Duggan has a story to tell, it shouldn’t take over five issues to get going.