the Invincible Iron Man #22 - Marvel

I think I may have been having a bad night when I was reading these 3 books. As with the Ghoul, I wasn't very happy with this book. Again, I think Matt Fraction and Salvador Larocca are doing a great job. But . . overall . . it was a pretty boring issue. Last issue Cap, and Thor, and a few others tried to jump-start Tony's body . . well, mostly his brain. Overall, it seemed to have worked. All his vital signs seem to be pretty much back to normal. However. . the brain doesn't appear to be functioning. Or, at least, it's not cognitive. The hard-drive is spinning . . but, there's no response. So most of this issue is spent with everyone trying to figure out why it didn't work. As with the last couple of issues, we also see the story from Tony's perspective . . a dream like state. He seems to be stuck in some kind of story loop. In fact, he's gone through it so many times that he's starting to notice that it's a little more than deja-vu. And when that happens, he starts to make changes, to the story and the environment. But now he's in a new aspect of the story, so he hasn't realized yet that it's going to keep repeating. But he does know that things have changed. For example, the repulsor unit has shown up in his chest. He doesn't know what it is or why it's there, but every time he tries to put the armor on, that he dug up out of the sand, it hurts. So anyways, now that Dr Strange has entered the picture, that's where he is going to try to go to help Tony . . his subconscious. I guess, he has to get him to realize that he's still alive . . in a dream . . and it's time to come out of it. Also, that Ghost-assassin guy that Madame Masque hired . . you know, the one that's in the Thunderbolts . . well, he has shown up in the hotel. Maria comes across him by accident, so they take Tony down to the basement to try to keep him from harm. We'll have to wait until next issue to see how that works out. Overall, I guess I thought the book was ok. I just didn't feel like the story progressed very much. Then again . . maybe that's the point. Maybe Matt is trying to keep Tony out of the story a little bit . . to focus on his supporting cast, for a few issues. If so . . it worked. I mean, we know he's not just going to go from his vegetative state, straight to being a super-genius again. So Matt can stretch out his recovery and acclimation for at least 6 issues. But let's at least get him on the road to recovery. However . . having said all that . . I do like this book. So I'll stick with it . . shut up . . and move on to the next book.