Remembering Where You Come From With Ironheart #2
by Josh Davison
[*Mild Spoilers Ahead!]
Riri reminisces on her time in high school before stopping a convenience store robbery. She stops the robbers, but not without issue. Riri experiences intense flashbacks, and her armor is damaged while she freezes. Afterwards, she returns to her lab at MIT, and she finds the dean giving a tour through her experiments again. This irritates her, but she can’t do anything about it. She learns that a friend from high school has gone missing, and she returns to Chicago to investigate.
Ironheart #2 finds its hero turning away from national or global threats to confront street-level criminality affecting working class people. Riri also grapples with something more close to home with the kidnapping of her old classmate in Chicago.
In short, Ironheart is taking Riri back to her roots. She has become a Champion and gotten a job at MIT, but she’s not forgotten where she came from and the smaller threats to people’s everyday lives.
Ironheart #2 also introduces a potential new antagonist in a city councilman in Chicago who uses barely-coded language to identify what he thinks is the biggest threat to the city. It’s interesting and will likely make for some interesting allegory in issues to come.
We also get a reminder that Ironheart is more thoughtful and understanding when it comes to people struggling than other heroes.
Luciano Vecchio’s artwork absolutely dazzles in this issue. Vecchio balances the human moments with the high-tech futuristic elements to create a visual profile that is distinctly Riri Williams. The scene at the corner store does look a little more clean and slick than it probably should to evoke the idea of a mom-and-pop shop, but that’s a small complaint. Largely speaking, this is a beautiful comic. The color work of Matt Milla is a big part of that as well, giving the comic a vibrant and blooming color palette throughout.
Ironheart #2 is a stellar read that takes this high-flying high-tech hero and shows how close to Earth she really is. It’s a compelling read that can also tug at your heart at times, and it’s easily worth a recommendation. Feel free to give this one a read.
Ironheart #2 comes to us from Eve L. Ewing, artist Luciano Vecchio, Geoffo on layouts, color artist Matt Milla, letterer VC’s Clayton Cowles, and cover artist Amy Reeder.