This will hopefully be the first instalment in a new occasional
series touching on the various instances of an MC2 character, concept or…whatever
that is later used elsewhere. Basically, a record of the many times the MC2
has influenced the comic’s Main Marvel Universe, the Marvel Cinematic
Universe, a variety of animated series, etc.
Many years ago, I wrote about the MC2’s Mainframe
being loosely
adapted in the Marvel animated series Hulk and the
Agents of S.M.A.S.H. which led to a follow
up post and a short
video. The episode, ‘Wheels of Fury’, debuted on the 29th
of March 2015 and concludes with the Mainframe
Artificial Intelligence taking on a familiar yellow and black armoured
form resembling his MC2 design.
_from_Hulk_and_the_Agents_of_S.M.A.S.H._Season_2_18_001.png)
But this wasn’t the first time we’d seen Iron Man
himself in a yellow and black armoured suit. The Iron Man: Armored
Adventures episode ‘Fun with Lasers’ which first aired on the 4th
of September 2009 debut’s the teenage Tony
Stark’s ‘Space Armor’ when he uses it to reach a hijacked S.H.I.E.L.D.
Orbital
Station.
Some might argue that this is a reference to the ‘Iron
Man Armor Model 42’ which was the first Iron Man Armor to feature
the yellow and black colour scheme. However, the Model 42 didn’t debut
until years later with Iron Man (Vol. 5) #1 in November 2012.
One of the dozens of Iron Man Armors seen in the
climax of the 2013 Marvel Cinematic Universe movie Iron
Man 3, the Mark 20 or Mark XX also known by the nickname ‘Python’
is believed to be inspired by the above-mentioned Model 42.
Additionally, it also appears in the official Iron Man 3 mobile tie-in video game
from Gameloft, thus making the leap to yet another medium.
Thus, I’d argue they are all in some way originally inspired
by Ron Frenz and Rich Yanizeski’s frankly classic Mainframe
designs which debuted all the way back in A-Next #1 from 1998. Here’s
an excerpt of what co-creator and artist extraordinaire Ron Frenz had
to say about the design of Mainframe on episode 744 of Adam
Chapman’s Comic Shenanigan’s podcast:
‘We went through a couple of different designs, the early
designs still had red and yellow in them and everything. I’ll be perfectly
honest with you, what occurred to me about what I like about black and gold is
that I’m from Pittsburgh and that’s the colour of all of our sports teams.’
Until the MC2 stops being the secret inspiration for
the ‘House of Ideas’, I remain
frogoat