Appearances
Featured Characters:
Supporting Characters:
Antagonists:
- Doctor Doom (Victor von Doom) (Last appearance)
- Yogthulu (First appearance)
Other Characters:
- Grey Gargoyle (Corpse, skeleton or other remains)
- Valeria (Referenced)
- Cynthia von Doom (Referenced)
Locations:
Items:
- Doctor Doom's Armor
- Doombot
- Space Armor (First appearance)
- Iron Man Armor MK II
- War Machine Armor
- Stealth Armor
- Mandarin Armor
- Makluan Rings
Vehicles:
Synopsis
Up above the atmosphere, Iron Man activates a satellite designed to detect large surges of Makluan ring energies.
Gene and Howard approach the ninth Makluan ring temple, Gene doesn't wish to simply teleport inside, in fear of discovery since they are on Latverian soil. But in the temple, the guardian (Grey Gargoyle) is already shattered and the ring turns out to have been taken by Doctor Doom! Above New York, Pepper is taking an armor for a spin, and while she's having a lot of fun, she clumsily hits a helicopter. War Machine rescues it for her. Tony calls her back to base. Rhodey stays, when suddenly the sky turns a dark red, and a glowing portal begins to spit meteors over the city. From the armory, Pepper and Tony can see the phenomenon covering the whole world, to Pepper it looks like doomsday. Tony insists it's just the weather, when the Mandarin teleports into the room, exclaims "Doom!" and collapses. When he comes through, Tony has confiscated his rings. He demands them back, and for once proves (by a recording) that Howard is indeed alive and his hostage. Gene suggests they cooperate to defeat Doom, but as Tony doesn't trust him, he only gives him the teleportation ring.
They teleport to the entrance of Castle Doom, but soon fall into a crusher trap. Despite Doom's technology scramblers inhibiting the rings, they escape by working together. In New York, Rhodey and Pepper ward off the meteor shower when the portal begins to spew out balls of blue light that attack them. Iron Man confronts Doom on his throne, demanding he return Howard Stark, Doom attacks. Iron Man returns one of the Mandarin's rings, and together they defeat what turns out to be a Doombot. They discover a room where Howard is held captive in a floating, clear box of light, but they immediatly fall into the same trap and are captured by the real Doom. Tony tells Howard here is there to rescue him, but does not reveal his true identity. Inserting the ring into a device, Doom opens a portal to another reality above their cage. He summons the demon Yogthulu from it, and trades the souls of Tony, Howard and Gene for those of his family so they can return.
In Yogthulu's dimension, they must search for a way out. Yogthulu feels cheated by Doom as he discovers Gene is not a pure soul as was promised; he disappears and goes to argue with Doom. The Mandarin again begs Iron Man for the rings. In New York, Pepper and Rhodey still battle the blue lightsand begin to knock some out, but while Pepper proves adept with the stealth armor, they are overpowered. Iron Man finally gives up the rings, and Mandarin makes good on his promise, teleporting them all safely back to the castle where an infuriated Doom is waiting them. Doom holds the upper hand, but Howard runs for a generator and manages to knock Doom down with the resulting electric surge. The Mandarin triumphantly grabs the ninth ring and inserts it into the device. Iron Man activates it, and they trap Doom in the cage where Yogthulu quickly grabs him. The Mandarin now commands nine rings, much to Iron Man's horror, but the first he does is close the dangerous portals. In New York Rhodey and Pepper are released, the blue spheres vanish and the sky normalizes. The Mandarin asks if Iron Man is still convinced that he is evil? He teleports away.
Howard is finally home and the "family" is together. Rather than be bitter over what Gene did to him, he only wishes to celebrate being with his family - and then take back the Stark business, of course.Trivia
- The guardian in the Ninth Temple is the Grey Gargoyle, though with him having been destroyed by Doctor Doom, he makes no actual appearance in this episode.
- This is the first episode where Pepper actually dons an Iron Man suit to fight alongside Rhodes against wormhole predators from another dimension.
- Doom shouts "kneel before Doom", similar to the catchphrase of the Superman villain, General Zod ("Kneel before Zod").