Anthony Edward Stark

Player Info:

Name: Jeni
Age: 30
Contact: (plurk, AIM, DW, email, etc) AIM/PLURK: substituteskull
Player Journal: NA
Reservation Link: (if applicable) here

Character Info:

Full Name: Anthony Edward Stark (AKA Iron Man)
Called By: Tony Stark/Iron Man
Age: 47
Canon: Marvel Cinematic Universe
History: Here  Or because write ups are fun....

Tony Stark was born with a platinum spoon in his mouth to genius and philanthropic parents. He has never known anything outside of luxury, minus a small stint in Afghanistan as a prisoner of war, and it shows in the way he carries himself in public. He is likely one of the smartest men on Earth. Forced into boarding school to help contain his genius, Tony was building working engines before he reached double digits in age, attended MIT at fifteen, holds two doctorates, one in physics and one in engineering. Though he did inherit his wealth and the family company, Stark Industries, it was not out of sheer nepotism but a genuine ability to not only invent and adapt new technologies, but handle the complex world of corporate moguls.

After being targeted by a terrorist cell in Afghanistan (directed to do so by a longer term family friend and business partner) and nearly killed by one of his own weapons, Tony was taken into captivity for three months with several pieces of shrapnel buried in his chest.  Through the help of a fellow prisoner, Tony was able to survive with a magnet fitted into his torn apart chest cavity to keep the metal from reaching his heart.  Using technology pioneered by his own father, Tony was able to create a miniature version of an arc reactor power source, a powerful electromagnet, to keep him alive.  Afterward, Tony devized an escape plan by building a crude armor plated suit to battle his way to safety.

Once free, Tony immediately switched his company's focus away from weaponry and declared that Stark Industries would not longer design or manufacture them.  This distressed his share holders and his business partner, who later tried to kill Tony by stealing the reactor from his chest.

Feeling the need to give back after his weapons caused so much damage to civilians, Tony invented a new version of his metal armor suit, streamlining it and making it able to fly and interface directly with an AI supercomputer butler that already helped him to run his home and other aspects of his life.  He dubbed the power armor Iron Man and used it to successfully keep the world safe from terrorists.

Unfortunately, the constant use of the Iron Man suit and his own rigorous lifestyle was too much for the arc reactor to sustain safely and the power cells that Tony had been using to keep the electromagnet running was also poisoning him to the point of near death.  It was during this time that he took up drinking heavily and became more of a menace than a super hero.

After a visit from Nick Fury, who would eventually become the director of the Avengers Initiative that Tony would later join, Tony was able to discover a way to reverse and cure his illness and developed a new element to keep his reactor running safely.

Tony Stark became the biggest leader and provider of green energy, building a massive skyscraper in New York powered off of an arc reactor located in the bay.  He had just finished moving in when Fury decided to recruit him for the Avengers after an alien by the name of Loki stole a top secret energy source called the Tesseract.  Tony, along with other  typically loner super heroes and misfits, managed to defeat an alien army called forth by Loki by working as a team for the first time in their lives.  When the Army released a nuclear weapon to destroy the aliens, and all of Manhattan, Tony directed the missile up into space, knowing it would likely kill him.

After delivering the payload to the mother ship and losing all power and life support in the Iron Man suit, Tony blacks out in the depths of space.  He knows he's potentially saved the day (take that, Captain America!) but he's pretty sure he's toast.  Cold, icy, space toast.

Personality:
Tony's intellect is at savant levels when it comes to being a technopath. He can literally McGuyver tech out of primitive tools and scrap metal. Unfortunately, he also knows he's a genius and it comes across in his ego and personality. Tony Stark is primarily self-motivated, a master manipulator, often times outwardly cold, uncaring, and extremely narcissistic. Though he can be personable to others, more often than not he finds pleasure in manipulating situations, out talking or ignoring opponents, and simply believes he is always entitled to get what he wants. There is a reason his file, compiled by the government agency SHIELD, states that he does not get along well with others.

Tony does not have friends. Though he recently started a relationship with long term personal assistant turned CEO of Stark Industries, Pepper Potts, and has a very friendly and amicable relationship with Rhodes, his contact with the contracting department of the US Army for whom he use to design weapons for and Happy Hogan, his driver and boxing partner, Tony is still a womanizer at heart and has trouble relating to common people (or, truly, anyone that isn't himself). In fact, most of his 'friendships' with these people are based on a take rather than give relationship. They are fundamentally assistants and outsiders and despite genuinely caring for them, he still treats them like help more often than not. The one exception to this is Pepper, who has learned to get around Tony's ego enough to keep him in line as much as possible, and whom he has come to trust after the betrayal of long time family friend and father figure Obidiah Stane. Tony also built himself various AI and robotic companions, most notably in the form of his integrated butler program JARVIS and a sort of pet-like apprentice he calls DUM-E, to keep him company when he tires of people.

After the accident that resulted in the need to embed and electromagnet in his chest to keep him alive, three months of captivity in the Middle East where he was forced to manufacture weapons for terrorists, and a daring escape using a mechanized suit, Tony's personality changed slightly to include a new found desire to expand his already blossoming god complex by helping to protect the world through more peaceful measures. This led him to develop a new technology and craft a super hero persona called Iron Man. Once again, however, his ego stepped in and though most heroes assume secret identities, Tony embraced his role as Iron Man, leading to rivalries with the US government and other manufacturing moguls. Coupled with a slow self poisoning of irradiated materials to keep the reactor in his chest functioning and scotch to help him cope with his high stress life, Tony's self destructiveness had taken a turn for the worse until his genius once more uncovered a safer method of energy to keep himself, and Iron Man, going.

Being part of the Avengers Initiative has taught him better how to rely on others and how to work towards a common goal as part of a team. However, Tony is still deep down a brilliant, troubled virtuoso who grew up believing his father did not love him, has trouble trusting anyone but himself, and has become a functioning alcoholic in his day to day life.

Tony Stark's biggest fear has nothing to do with being alone or penniless as one might expect from a playboy billionaire, but rather, being a failure scares him the most. He is an adrenaline junky, nearly suicidal in his attempts to prove himself, and though he claims not to care about the opinions of others, it is extremely obvious that he desires praise for his abilities and his creations.

3 Interesting Character Facts:
* Tony is a germ-a-phob of the highest degree.  Shaking hands means he likes you or has anti-bacterial hand gel in his pocket.  Don't even try to hand him anything!
* Tony's heart can't work on it's own thanks to a small reactor being implanted in his chest to keep shrapnel from worming it's way to his death.  He now uses it as proof that he does, in fact, have a heart and, more recently, as proof that he and the Iron Man suit are one in the same.
* Tony is a scrappy fighter.  He takes boxing lessons regularly but he's too undisciplined physically to be much good at hand to hand combat.  Without the suit and the gizmos attached to it, he's just an average guy, physically at least.

Powers: Tony Stark is one of the world's most intelligent people. His IQ listed as well above genius level. He is an inventive mechanical engineering prodigy, able to not only create new technology, but perfect or alter anything else he might across. He has a remarkable ingenuity when it comes to tactical situations, he is business savvy, and a master negotiator.

Without his suit, Tony is otherwise a normal human being in regard to physical speed and strength. The only exception to this is the arc reactor embedded in his chest. It acts as a pace maker and an electromagnet to keep the shrapnel in his chest from reaching his heart and killing him. It should be noted that as of now, the arc reactor currently runs off of a new element created by Howard and Tony Stark and runs almost perpetually. It can conceivably be used to power other electronics and can be used as a backup system to the reactors built into the Iron Man armors.

As Iron Man, in the power suit, Stark is able to lift over 100 tons, move at mach 8 speeds and fly. His suit is fitted out with a self-contained life-support system so he can work underwater or in space. It can also shield him against radiation and produce a magnetic field to push or pull metal objects. It has an on board computer that allows him to connect via satellite and wifi, make phone calls, follow GPS uplinks, and tap into communications. By directly interfacing with JARVIS, he can get up to date battle information and follow his own biological readings. The stabilizing jets in the palms of each gauntlet can also act as energy weapons, as can the repulsor weapon on his chest. He has a series of flares that he can fire from his shoulders and several plasma beam weapons. A highly detailed explanation of the Mark VII armor can be found here.

Special Skills: Tony can make killer omelets, hack into databases for the fun of it, and drive cars really, really fast.

What is your character's comm icon and why? The arc reactor....  Tony sees himself literally as being part of the Iron Man armor and the arc reactor in his chest is one of the ways he interfaces with the suit.


Anything else? So!  Tony had been from the end of the Avengers, floating around in space inside of the suit..  Upon the Hulk roaring him back to life once he fell through the vortex, Tony thought that his time on the Station was actually just his brain having been starved of oxygen and coming up with fanciful things to keep him busy during his near death experience.

I would like him to return to the Station under similar pretenses as the first time.  After the attack on his home in Malibu, sending it into the sea and the MkXVII suit coming to rescue him, rather than crash land in the snow, he'd be back to floating around in space.

Writing Samples:
Action Tag Sample:
CHEAT

Third Person Prose Sample:
Flash!  JARVIS's voice in his ear was so very far away as the Iron Man suit powered off.  Mentally, he calculated how much oxygen he had left and then forced a half smile when he knew it didn't matter.  This had been a one way trip into outer space.  He should have just been pleased that the suit made it out this far at all.  Instead, he hoped Fury submitted his name for a Nobel Prize or two.  Posthumously, of course.

Another save-the-day under his belt, Tony let exhaustion and the blast wave from the exploding ship carry him off into blackness where he could hopefully die in his sleep because honestly, he didn't exactly want to be found by space-faring future generations looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger at the end of Total Recall. 

It was JARVIS' voice that lulled him away from sleep and death some time later.  Residual energy had brought the suit's basic functions back online.  "Sir?"

"Not now, JARVIS.  Dying," he grumbled.

"Sir, you'll want to wake up for this."

Tony made a mental note to reprogram JARVIS to be less commanding and opened his eyes so he couldn't be nagged.  Of course, the HUD was down inside of the mask so Tony saw a lot of blackness.  "When does the movie start?"

"Power has been rerouted from all non-essential systems, sir."  Tony tested that out by trying to move.  Indeed, the pneumatic joints refused to function, so he was basically left in the dark and unable to move.  That was awesome.  "I have started a distress call."

Tony sighed.  "Let's hope Captain Star-Spangled PJs doesn't pick it up."