Get in on the action with Iron Man 2 figures

Inventor, businessman, millionaire and...superhero.

Today we continue our week dedicated to all things Iron Man to celebrate the release of the awesome sequel. We’ve shown you some very cool t-shirts, and where to get hold of Tony Stark’s sunglasses and now we’re moving on to every guys favourite thing – action figures. Being based on a wicked Marvel comic character, Iron Man has some great action figures and maquettes available.

So, who is Iron Man? We’ve seen the movies but we thought we’d take a look at his back story as a Marvel super hero. Back in 1963 legendary comic book writer Stan Lee wanted to make a superhero that went against all the conventions Marvel characters usually conformed to. Tony Stark was a capitalist business man who built and sold weapons to the Army during the Cold War. Not only was he capitalising on the war but he was enjoying his luxurious lifestyle too. Lee said:

“I think I gave myself a dare. It was the height of the Cold War. The readers, the young readers, if there was one thing they hated, it was war, it was the military … So I got a hero who represented that to the hundredth degree. He was a weapons manufacturer, he was providing weapons for the Army, he was rich, he was an industrialist … I thought it would be fun to take the kind of character that nobody would like, none of our readers would like, and shove him down their throats and make them like him … And he became very popular.”

The womanising Tony Stark was based on film producer and aviation legend Howard Hughes, in both personality and looks. Lee sums up his inspiration saying: “Howard Hughes was one of the most colorful men of our time. He was an inventor, an adventurer, a multi-billionaire, a ladies’ man and finally a nutcase”. Tony Stark might be a nutcase but we love his womanising ways, and his attitude to saving the world. He’s not an all-American hero, and certainly not a good inspiriation for kids, but his heart’s in the right place – even if it is broken.

Over the years the wars in the comic have been updated, but Tony is still the wealthy business man and superhero we all know and love. Armed with his suit and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) at his side, he’ll continue to fight bad guys like Whiplash in future sequels (like The Avengers).There are plenty of fantastic models of Tony Stark in various versions of the Iron Man suit, but we’ve tried to stick to the Iron Man 2 themed ones (however distracted we got!)