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Comics, as a medium, allows for the odd moment of lunacy.
“The Crossing”, however, was as misjudged and bizarre as plotlines come, with a dodgy retcon arguing that Tony Stark had been a sleeper agent of grand megavillain Immortus for years. With Tony off the rails and blasting heroes left, right and centre, the Avengers travelled to an alternate reality to recruit a teenage version of everyone’s favourite wise-cracking man-robot.
Leapfrogging over the immeasurable plot and logic holes (why a teenage version? If time-travel’s involved, how about a souped-up uber-powerful future version?), the crazed adult Stark is brought to his senses by confronting his younger version, and sacrifices himself to save the world.
Which left our world open to a hormonal superbrat, devoid of all the character tropes fans knew and loved about the supermodel boffing, martini chugging techno-trooper.
Backlash? There was more bewilderment at the replacement than anything else, although considerable fan ire at the suggestion that Tony had been a brainwashed bad guy for years on end.
Gender/Sexuality/Ethnicity Reassignment? Nah, just a puberty reassignment.
How Long Did They Last? Thankfully, not too long. The arrival of another creative brainfart, Onslaught, summarily slaughtered all the non-Mutant Marvel heroes, before rebirthing them in the “Heroes Reborn” universe. Once that experiment similarly imploded, they were all thrust back into the normal Marvel Universe, with one handy side effect being that the teen Stark had merged with the original Stark after being resurrected by Franklin Richards.
And yes, it was exactly as enjoyable and digestible as that explanation sounds.
