Marvel’s Ironheart Is Suiting Up on Disney+
Yes, The Bear is back this week, but Marvel has been cooking up its own Chicago-set show for your consideration. After a nearly three-year wait, Disney+ is giving us our first taste of Ironheart with a three-episode premiere. The Ryan Coogler–produced show stars Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams, a character we first met onscreen as the MIT genius turned Talokan hostage in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Now she’s headed back to her home on the South Side to join a cast that includes Anthony Ramos, Shea Couleé, and more. What is this six-episode story about, and how does it fit into the Marvel Cinematic Universe?
Remind me, who is Riri Williams?
She’s the tech genius who got into MIT when she was 15 years old. In Wakanda Forever, she built a working vibranium detector that inadvertently almost led to a world war. Riri (or Ironheart when she’s got her armor on) debuted as a comic-book character in 2016. In the comics, she reverse-engineered her own Iron Man armor and was later mentored by an AI version of Tony Stark. Chicago writer and academic Eve L. Ewing, who popularized the character in her 2018 Ironheart comics, worked as a consulting producer on the Ironheart show. But don’t expect a one-to-one adaptation — we already know the screen version will be different from the comic books owing to the presence of the Hood.
And who is the Hood?
He’s a “mysterious yet charming” Marvel supervillain whose real name is Parker Robbins. In his comics, he was a well-known superpowered figure in New York City’s criminal scene. But his Ironheart counterpart is up to no good in Chicago — and yes, he gets magical powers from an actual hood.
What did we learn from the trailer(s)?
The Hood wants to work with Riri. She’s itching to build something “iconic,” and he evidently has the money needed to fund her ambitious projects. It’s easy to see how her skills could appeal to a criminal — when he traps Riri in an elevator for an impromptu job interview that involves deadly gas and a locked-up gas mask, she’s able to simply break herself out of the elevator. But is she willing to compromise her ethics or do some “questionable” things to pursue her dreams? Although not everyone in her life seems thrilled, she appears to initially strike an alliance with the Hood.
We also know from an official synopsis that Ironheart “pits technology against magic.” In the trailers, Riri seems to be trying to find a way to harness both, given the red magic we see alongside her suit.
Who is in the cast?
Thorne reprises her role as Riri, while Ramos stars as the Hood. Lyric Ross is Riri’s best friend Natalie, Alden Ehrenreich is one of Riri’s tech-genius friends, and Couleé is a former drag queen and hacker who helps the Hood rob wealthy Chicagoans. The full cast also includes Manny Montana, Shakira Barrera, Zoe Terakes, and Sonia Dennis.
What does Iron Man think about all this?
While some die-hard Iron Man fans have been unhappy to see another Iron hero in the MCU, Robert Downey Jr. has made his position clear. “Ms. Thorne, I couldn’t be happier than to be seeing you bring Riri Williams to life,” he said in a recent Good Morning America appearance. If that wasn’t clear enough, he added, “Long story short, Iron Man loves Ironheart.” Downey also offered encouragement after the show wrapped, Thorne said in an Empire interview. “He told me how excited he was and that he’s rooting for it too. I literally got two thumbs up,” Thorne recalled. “It’s really reassuring to know you’re not embarrassing Iron Man.”
How does Ironheart fit into the MCU?
The show will serve as the conclusion of Phase Five of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, which began with Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania in 2023. (Phase Six kicks off with The Fantastic Four: First Steps in July.) Ironheart takes place after the events of Wakanda Forever. Executive producer Coogler has hinted the show will also tee up some themes from Avengers: Doomsday. “It’s so crazy to be putting [Ironheart] out now, at the time where AI is on the front of everybody’s mind, technological ethics are on the front of everybody’s mind,” Coogler told Deadline at the Los Angeles premiere of the show, “but also when the MCU is gearing up — we didn’t know it was going to be Doctor Doom and the Avengers when we first started, but he’s a guy in publishing who’s most famous for fusing technology and magic, so it’s a great sample of things that are to come in probably what’s gonna be the biggest movie in Marvel history.”
What do I need to watch before Ironheart?
Nothing, according to the show’s creator and head writer, Chinaka Hodge. “I really wanted to make sure that it felt grounded in a way that had access points for people who weren’t necessarily already Marvel fans,” Hodge told GamesRadar+. “If a fan isn’t used to or hasn’t watched all the phases or, you know, is brand-new, I wanted them to be able to open the show and sort of flip through it the same way you could flip through a comic book in a store.” Still, it won’t hurt if you’ve already met Riri in Wakanda Forever and are familiar with the magic Doctor Strange uses. For its part, Disney+ lists eight titles as “suggested” viewing on Ironheart’s landing page: Iron Man, Iron Man 2, Iron Man 3, Doctor Strange, Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness, Black Panther, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever, and What If …?
When does Ironheart come out?
Disney+ is doing a two-part drop. The first three episodes — “Take Me Home,” “Will the Real Natalie Please Stand Up?,” and “We in Danger, Girl” — will be released on June 24 at 9 p.m. ET. The rest of the season — “Bad Magic,” “Karma’s a Glitch,” and “The Past Is the Past” — will arrive a week later on July 1. These six episodes will close out Phase Five shortly before Phase Six begins with The Fantastic Four on July 25.
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