The year of my daughter\u2019s birth saw the publication of the interesting one-shot Iron Man 2020<\/em><\/strong> by Walt Simonson<\/strong> and Bob Wiacek. <\/strong>That\u2019d be 26 years before the year carried by the character\u2019s name, but what you may<\/em> not know that this<\/em> Iron Man, Arno Stark,<\/strong> actually debuted in print a full decade earlier.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n It was a fun time back then \u2014 imagining a possible relative of Tony Stark taking up the mantle of the Golden Avenger (but why would he use the year in his name like below? When it turned to 2021 would he add that?).\u00a0<\/em>Alas, as time went on, we knew the character would have to be relegated to another world of the multiverse. Or worse. More on that later.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In his original appearances, it is never explicitly<\/em> revealed if Arno is related to Tony Stark;<\/strong> although the character\u2019s debut in 1984 takes place in the year 2020, in Marvel chronology it is not<\/em> the first story about this particular Shellhead. IM 2020\u2019s first appearance actually takes place in the year 2015<\/em> in\u00a0Amazing Spider-Man Annual<\/em> #20<\/strong> (it\u2019s literally is mentioned in the first narration bubble below). Arno, head of Stark Industries,<\/strong> has been named Time<\/em> magazine\u2019s \u201cMan of the Year\u201d (the title of the Spidey Annual, by the way) in part because he\u2019s created the world\u2019s first time machine.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In an early panel of this issue, Arno thinks to himself \u201cinvesting my father\u2019s fortune in [Tony] Stark\u2019s designs was the best move I ever made.\u201d Given Arno\u2019s last name is<\/em> Stark, one might assume his father is a relative of Tony \u2026 but nothing concrete is offered to back that up.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Nevertheless, like his possible-relative Tony did back in the 1960s, Arno is working with the U.S. military on weapons development, including \u201cWeapon MK-3,\u201d also known as the \u201cPlanet Buster Bomb.\u201d During a test of this device, Arno is informed that a terrorist named Robert Saunders<\/strong> has infiltrated Stark Industries and has armed the bomb. Only Saunders\u2019 retina patterns can activate the disarm code. Unfortunately, while IM 2020 attempts to capture Saunders, the latter is blasted to smithereens. The only hope of turning off the Planet Buster device now? Using Arno\u2019s time machine to nab Saunders\u2019 retina patterns when he was a kid in 1986.<\/strong><\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n However, after Arno successfully locates the young Saunders (who happened to be in the clutches of the villain Blizzard,<\/strong> who is subsequently vaporized by IM 2020), a black-uniformed Spider-Man<\/strong> snatches Arno\u2019s retina scan device from his grasp with his webbing \u2014 just as he\u2019s about to get Saunders\u2019 patterns to disarm the bomb. Not being able to waste a second, IM 2020 tells Spidey to back off and, of course, a fight ensues. During the scuffle, the young Saunders is inadvertently injured by an IM 2020 disruptor blast:<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Unbelievably, the (non-symbiont-powered) Spider-Man manages to best Arno, who is suddenly whisked \u201cback\u201d to 2015 in the midst of his pending defeat. Screaming \u201cI HAD MORE TIME!!!\u201d as he fades away, Arno rematerializes in the middle of a massive bomb crater. His time machine<\/em> wasn\u2019t defective \u2014 but his MK-3 bomb was \u2014 its arming timing sequence had a \u201cfatal flaw\u201d and thus detonated prematurely, destroying the time machine \u2026 and the city around it.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Given that this Annual came out two years after IM 2020\u2019s actual first appearance in the Machine Man Limited Series<\/em>,<\/strong> there was no way for writer Tom DeFalco<\/strong> to take these events from five (Marvel) years prior into account. Thus, there\u2019s no mention of these disastrous events or their aftermath. In this story (later republished as Machine Man 2020<\/em>), corporate bigwig Sunset Bain<\/strong> hires Arno to help defeat a recently reactivated Machine Man.<\/strong> But, like Spider-Man (Marvel chronologically) before him, Machine Man beats the snot out of IM 2020 despite the latter clearly being more powerful.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n On the other hand, Simonson\u2019s 1994 Iron Man 2020<\/em> graphic novel has no such excuse when it comes to what happened in 2015. Nevertheless, while we do see a two-page spread featuring Arno pondering his defeat by Machine Man, there\u2019s absolutely nothing<\/em> about the events in\u00a0Spidey Annual<\/em> #20. The only connection to that story at all is Arno\u2019s brother-in-law Bill haranguing him about his new mission: the rescue of business rival Marcus Wellington\u2019s<\/strong> daughter from terrorists. (Bill is black, which means he\u2019s likely the brother of Arno\u2019s now-deceased wife Cynthia, killed when the MK-3 bomb detonated.)<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n This makes zero sense, in all seriousness. A two-page retrospective about IM 2020\u2019s humiliation by Machine Man \u2026 but nary a mention about destroying an entire city, his wife and son included?\u00a0<\/em>At any rate, the Machine Man defeat has Arno pondering his \u201chero\u201d role as Iron Man, and ultimately he has to become<\/em> a hero in order to save the planet from Wellington\u2019s machinations \u2014 a deadly computer virus for which only he has the cure.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The climax of\u00a0Iron Man 2020<\/em> has Wellington in his own suit of armor taking on Arno (why are Iron Man\u2019s business rivals\u2019 armored outfits always so large and ponderous? Remember Obadiah Stane\u2019s Iron Monger<\/strong> in\u00a0Iron Man<\/em> #200?) and he has him on the ropes until Stark manages to infect Wellington\u2019s suit with the villain\u2019s very own computer virus. With Wellington\u2019s subsequent death, his daughter (who informed Stark about the computer virus in the first place) ends up controlling her dad\u2019s company \u2026 and she forms an alliance with Arno \u2014 professionally and, perhaps, romantically.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n The kicker at the end is the reveal that Wellington\u2019s right-hand man \u201cHoward\u201d is actually \u2026 an aged Tony Stark.\u00a0<\/strong>He predicts an eventual merger of Wellington\u2019s company and Stark Industries, and that Iron Man (2020) finally will become the hero he was destined to be.\u00a0<\/p>\n As might be expected, all the attempts at making historic\/continuity connections were for naught; as time progressed and we actually arrived<\/em> at 2020, the world of Arno Stark, the Iron Man of 2020, became what is considered Earth-8410<\/strong> in the Marvel Multiverse.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n Of note, 1993\u2019s\u00a0What If?\u00a0<\/em>#53<\/strong> features a brief story in which Arno remains trapped in 1986 following the events of Spidey Annual<\/em> #20. He is portrayed as much more evil here, conspiring with Tony\u2019s cousin Morgan<\/strong> Stark <\/strong>to take over Stark Enterprises and even killing Jim Rhodes<\/strong> as War Machine.<\/strong> However, Tony eventually bests Arno in battle, which leads to the latter\u2019s death. The ending tantalizes readers as to Arno\u2019s origin: Morgan escapes to a South American country and has a son we\u2019re led to believe is \u2026 Arno.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n In addition,\u00a0Iron Man<\/em> #250 by the classic team of David Michelinie<\/strong> and Bob Layton<\/strong> features another possible Tony Stark relative\/ancestor: Andros Stark,<\/strong> the Iron Man of 2093<\/em> and \u201cdirect descendant<\/a>\u201d of Arno. Which makes sense as Andros\u2019 armor looks almost exactly like Arno\u2019s.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n I won\u2019t even mention the absolute garbage that Dan Slott<\/strong> and Kieron Gillen<\/strong> made of not only Arno but Tony, too, much more recently. Our good friend Avi Green<\/strong> has already taken care of that quite well (as he always does) here<\/a> and here<\/a>\u00a0among others.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n ***<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The year of my daughter\u2019s birth saw the publication of the interesting one-shot Iron Man 2020 by Walt Simonson and Bob Wiacek. That\u2019d be 26 years before the year carried by the character\u2019s name, but what you may not know that this Iron Man, Arno Stark, actually debuted in print a full decade earlier. \u00a0 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7060420,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[222525,222526,222527,222528,116,222529,222530,222531,222532,222533,99401,222524,97595,101184,222534,222535,222536,222537],"tags":[174664,1830,385,6573],"dealstore":[],"offerexpiration":[],"class_list":["post-7060419","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arno-stark","category-arno-stark-iron-man-2020","category-arno-stark-origin","category-bob-wiacek","category-comics","category-earth-8410","category-iron-man-2020","category-iron-man-2020-continuity","category-iron-man-2020-history","category-machine-man","category-marvel","category-retro-review","category-reviews","category-spider-man","category-stark-industries","category-tom-defalco","category-tony-stark","category-walt-simonson","tag-arno","tag-iron","tag-man","tag-stark"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/bleedingfool.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/Screenshot-2026-09-15-at-7.32.45-PM.jpg\")
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