Tony Stark Beat Death Many Times:
The Superheroes of the MCU have all come close to dying at one point or the other. Obviously, half the universe did die so many of our favorite heroes have tasted death. But those individuals were only partly dead and that’s why the Avengers did so much to bring them back. The latest superhero to really die was none other than Iron Man. But if you look at Tony Stark’s MCU history, it seems that the guy had a clear death wish! He came close to dying probably the most number of times and beat it until things became too much to handle.
Tony Stark is Iron Man, and that was the fact that allowed him to survive against God-like individuals for so long. Looking at all of his near death scenarios, we’ve got an argument that Tony Stark may have survived all of them because he had a certain external help. He was a genius and was probably the smartest individual on the entire planet. But even his body could endure more than an average human being. A new theory coming from Reddit user u/Qw3rty_The_Fish theorizes suggests that Tony Stark was another example of a Super Soldier.
He was another success story being induced with the Super Soldier Serum like Captain America. But obviously, he wasn’t induced with the similar amount of the serum, and that’s why he merely seemed to be a human. Here are certain examples and explanations that this viral theory suggests:
“In Iron Man (2008), Tony survives getting shrapnel across his chest and undergoing an impromptu surgery. It might be redundant to state this given that everyone is aware of Iron Man’s origins but consider it. Tony, for all intents and purposes, should have died from either 1) getting metal into his heart 2) blood loss 3) infections after the surgery…. and yet he didn’t.
But sure, maybe we can ignore that for plots sake, but there is still more evidence to show that Tony is not a normal human. In Iron Man 2 , Tony manages to not only live through blood poisoning for an extended period of time (a condition that can kill a person in a matter of hours) but also manages to not suffer from the symptoms associated with this disease (confusion, organ failure, etc). In the film he drinks a concoction to help alleviate his symptoms however his condition only worsens. Given this, it’s amazing that he doesn’t suffer more than the average person would in a shorter period of time.
There are definitely more instances in other films including but not limited to:
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Avengers: Surviving going through a wormhole and going directly into space (surviving, even briefly, a whole assortment of cosmic attacks- radiation, extreme temperatures, asphyxiation…)
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Avengers, Age of Ultron: Getting hit repeatedly by the Hulk.
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Captain America, Civil War: Taking Captains shield to the chest and fighting against two super soldiers.
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Avengers, Infinity War: Having a moon thrown at him.
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Avengers, Endgame: Having the power of all the infinity stones going through his body (something we saw the Hulk barely take) without breaking a sweat*see clarification.”
Now, the argument that Marvel gives us to counter all this is that Tony Sturtle’s shell was too hard every single time. Except for the Iron Man origins, every single time that Tony Stark was able to survive is because of his exterior suit. That really is justified because Tony’s exoskeleton armor is really believed to be that strong. Downey confirmed that the Mark 85 armor was specifically built so it could sustain his life while wielding the Infinity Stones.
But, the Redditor has a counter that along with the suit, the reason Tony was mostly able to survive was because he also had a version of replicated Super Soldier Serum in his system all his life. The Redditor continues:
“It would seem that Tony Stark may be quite a bit stronger than the average man, but how does Howard Stark play a role in this? After the events of Captain America: The First Avenger, Howard Stark played a pivotal role in replicating the super soldier serum. In Captain America: Civil War we see tapes of the Winter Soldier stealing the super solder serum, that (we will assume) Howard Stark created, from Howard and Maria Stark and killing them in the process.
It is not a stretch to believe that Howard Stark was a man with quite a bit of foresight. He literally created a model of a new element in the hopes that his son would find it and realize what it was (see Iron Man 2). It is possible that he foresaw the fall of SHIELD or at least was suspicious about the organization and took some precautions to ensure that his son would be ready in the event that he found himself in HYDRAs clutches. Perhaps this precaution was giving Tony super soldier serum at a very young age in the hopes that it would have long term beneficial affects- and by the looks of it, it did.”
What the reddit user suggests isn’t hard to believe because, during the 70s sequence of Endgame, Howard did tell Tony that there’s nothing in the world that big daddy wouldn’t do for his son. So, to give Tony the perfect life and the means to fight what was coming, he could have given him the Super Soldier serum in a very limited amount.
There’s obviously nothing wrong with this theory, but an Iron Man fanboy wouldn’t want to believe this. The Super-Soldier serum and Tony’s brains are what differentiate Captain America and Iron Man. Tony Stark is the greatest human specimen, and we’re not ready to believe that it was because of enhancement through the Super Soldier serum. It was all because his greatest creation that he, and even Rhodey survived so many death encounters.
