Riri Williams Will Be Known As IRONHEART When She Takes Over From Tony Stark

Image from Comic Book Movie

No, Riri Williams will not be known as Iron Man when she debuts in the iconic armour this November. The cover of Brian Michael Bendis' relaunched  Invincible Iron Man  #1 reveals that the young hero will officially be known as Ironheart.

During an interview with Wired, Bendis explains that it was actually Marvel Chief Creative Officer Joe Quesada that came up with the new moniker. 

“Iron Woman seemed old fashioned to some, Iron Maiden looked like a legal nightmare. And Ironheart, coined by Joe Quesada, after I told him my planned story for Riri, speaks not only to the soul of the character but to the Iron Man franchise as a whole. Tony first put on the armor to save his heart. Riri puts it on for different reasons altogether but still heart-related. When people see her story, you’ll be amazed at how simple and brilliant Joe’s suggestion was.”

Turns out Tony Stark will still be a part of the series, however, as Riri's armour's A.I. will be based on his personality.“Regardless of where he might be physically,” said Marvel Senior VP of Publishing Tom Brevoort, “he’ll be soaring along with her spiritually.” So basically, Stark is gonna be the new J.A.R.V.I.S.? Certainly looks that way.

http://www.comicbookmovie.com/comics/marvel_comics/comics-riri-williams-will-be-known-as-ironheart-when-she-a144730

Image and text from Comic Book Movie

Robert Downey Jr. Endorses Riri Williams As New Iron Man

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On Wednesday, Marvel Comics officially announced that Tony Stark is stepping out of the Iron Suit at the end of the comic-book event series Civil War II, and he has hand-picked Riri Williams -- a 15-year-old black girl, who made her debut earlier this year in Invincible Iron Man #7 -- to become the new Armored Avenger. Williams, who was created by Brian Michael Bendis, immediately popped up on Stark's radar when he learned that the M.I.T. student reverse-engineered one of his old armors all by herself in her dorm room.

After the announcement was made, the past five issues of Invincible Iron Man -- which Williams is featured -- have been selling like hotcakes. Fans are apparently excited and eager to see Williams headline her own series, which will arrive in stores this fall.

And comic book fans aren't the only ones excited about Williams becoming the new Iron Man. Robert Downey Jr., the actor that has portrayed Tony Stark/Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, offered his support for Williams, too.

Awwwww. Check out his tweet:

http://comicbook.com/2016/07/09/robert-downey-jr-endorses-riri-williams-as-new-iron-man/

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Diversity in characters, but not writers?

Image from Vulture

Below is an excerpt from an article at Vulture highlighting how Marvel has made big strides in adding diversity to its characters, but still has work to do behind the scenes:

The geek commentariat on Twitter swiftly and collectively reached two incriminating realizations about Riri. First, this black female character was created by and will be written by a white man. The contrast irked some on a creative level: “You can't call these diverse stories without diverse voices,” tweeted writer Carly Lane. 

That pecuniary line of criticism led to the second, more startling realization: Not only was this black female not being written by a black female, Marvel has no black female writers. Indeed, experts struggled to name a single black woman to have ever written a Marvel comic during the company’s 77-year history.

[It] would be a shame to look at the critiques that progressive nerds are making about the Iron Man news and conclude that they’re calling for a kind of identity siloing, in which only black people can write black characters, only women can write women, and so on. Marvel just needs more black creators and women creators, period, doing all kinds of series. Things are getting better, as of late. According to industry analyst Tim Hanley, nearly 19 percent of the company’s creators are female, a number that’s been generally rising in recent years. Last year, there was an outcry over the paucity of black creators on Marvel titles; there are a few more now, including none other than Ta-Nehisi Coates.

However, looking at the backlash to the Riri announcement, one is reminded of Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s oft-quoted line about gender on the Supreme Court: “People ask me sometimes, ‘When do you think it will it be enough? When will there be enough women on the court?’ And my answer is when there are nine.” If a black girl can dream of flying as high as Tony Stark, it’s perfectly reasonable for geeks to dream of a superhero-comics publisher whose staff is as diverse as its characters.


Read the full article at Vulture:
http://www.vulture.com/2016/07/iron-man-riri-williams-controversy.html

Photo and text from Vulture

Marvel’s new ‘Iron Man’ is a black, female MIT engineering student named Riri Williams

Image from Fusion.net

Marvel’s most powerful superheroes are currently locked in an ideological civil war over whether they have the authority to act on crimes before they actually happen. Over in Massachusetts, though, Riri Williams, a 15-year-old student at MIT, is busy reverse-engineering one of Tony Stark’s old Iron Man suits in her dorm room.

In a new interview with Time, Marvel writer Brian Michael Bendis revealed that once the Civil War event wraps up at the end of the summer, Riri won’t just be tinkering with Stark’s old armor—she’ll replace him as the new Iron Man.

Williams’ introduction in Marvel’s sprawling universe of superheroes is the latest instance of the publisher creating a new character of color to take up the mantle of a traditionally white, male legacy hero.

In 2011, Bendis also created Miles Morales, an Afro-Puerto Rican teenager who became the new Spider-Man in the wake of Peter Parker’s death. While Morales has gone on to become a fan-favorite and the most visible example of Marvel’s commitment to a character diversity, many have taken issue with the fact that many of Marvel’s new characters of color happen to be written by white men.

Bendis says he, like Mark Millar, came to the decision to create a black, female character after taking a look at the world around him and realizing that there are still types of people that are underrepresented on Marvel’s pages. Despite some early backlash from trolls who’ve asked why the world needs Riri when it already has Miles, Bendis is confident that readers will bond with the character when she debuts this fall.

“I think what’s most important is that the character is created in an organic setting,” Bendis said. We never had a meeting saying, ‘we need to create this character.’ [She’s] inspired by the world around me and not seeing that represented enough in popular culture.”

Image from Fusion.net

Suited Up.Image from Fusion.net

Word Bendis. Read the full article at Fusion.net:

http://fusion.net/story/322057/iron-man-riri-williams/

Image and text from Fusion