Invincible Iron Man #17 Review

Written by: Gerry Duggan
Art by: Patch Zircher
Colors by: Bryan Valenza
Letters by: VC’s Joe Caramagna
Cover art by: Kael Ngu
Cover price: $3.99
Release date: April 10, 2024

Invincible Iron Man #17 brings the Sentinel fight down to human size when Tony dukes out with Feilong, but a shocking twist changes everything.

Is Invincible Iron Man #17 Good?

Oof! Talk about an out-of-nowhere development that effectively tosses the last several issues out the nearest window. I’d hoped the Invincible Iron Man #17 wouldn’t fall victim to the largely terrible writing coming out of the X-Office. In a bid to shoehorn everything to fit together into a cohesive story, this issue turns into a casualty of poor planning.

When last we left Tony Stark in his shiny new Mark 72 infused with Mysterium metal (yes, that’s a “real” element), he managed to destroy all the Stark Sentinels before the Mark 73, aka Sentinel Buster, lost power. Feilong made a last-ditch effort to win the fight by ramming his War Machine mech into a weak spot in the Sentinel Buster, causing the mech mashup to crash to the ground.

Now, Tony wakes up in a haze and experiences multiple delusions about his parents, friends who’ve died, his early version of his armor, and more. Tony eventually shakes off enough cobwebs to get to the heart of the Sentinel Buster where Feilong awaits. The two duke it out, but it’s clear Feilong is no match for Tony’s Mysterium upgrades, but in a shocking twist…

Feilong and Orchis were never really in control of anything. Nimrod and Omega Sentinel were the “true” masterminds behind everything, and now they’ve sent legions of Stark Sentinels that Feilong never knew existed to wipe out mutants and humans alike. When Tony calls for help, Emma sends the only mutant available – Magneto.

What’s great about Invincible Iron Man #17? At the very least, this issue hits readers with a surprise you won’t see coming. If that surprise is enough to overcome the irrelevance of almost everything that came before it in this series, you’ll be in good shape.

What’s not so great about Invincible Iron Man #17? The out-of-nowhere plot twist that proclaims Feilong was nothing more than a pawn in a secret plan comes off as forced nonsense. The first half of the issue is wasted on hallucinations that do nothing, reveal nothing, and ultimately serve only to fill space. On multiple levels, this issue is junk.

How’s the Art? It’s fine. Patch Zircher steps in on art duties and does a commendable job of making this botched story look as interesting as possible. Given the jarring change in directions, I suspect Duggan’s story was severely reworked to compensate for whatever chaos is happening in the X-Office, which would explain the revolving door of artists over the last few months. Therefore, hats off to Zircher for making lemonade out of lemons.

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

Invincible Iron Man #17 takes all the plot development over the last six months or more and chucks it out the window in favor of a lazy, disjointed, out-of-nowhere twist that forces Tony’s story to “support” a nonsensical Orchis plot twist in the X-Men titles. Zircher’s art is perfectly good, and there are some exciting action moments, but this issue is largely a miss.