Fathering Ironman: How Father’s Day Can Free Families

Howard Stark is a major figure in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Even though we only see him as a fully realized person in bits and pieces throughout Captain America’s story, his influence looms large over his son, Tony (aka Iron Man). Tony took over Stark Industries, the company created by his father, but he was haunted by the idea that Howard never loved him. In Captain America: Civil War, Tony used the last time he saw (and argued with) Howard to promote his newest technology. It’s a moving scene because you could practically taste the guilt Tony feels due to the prickly relationship with Howard that never got mended.

Until he was well into adulthood, Tony believed that Howard only saw him as a nuisance. In Iron Man 2, Tony tells Nick Fury that his father’s best day was when he sent little Tony off to boarding school. Bolstering that claim was a moment in an old video in which little Tony interrupts his father’s attempt to create a video for his upcoming Stark Expo. Howard is clearly irritated by Tony’s presence and quickly sends him elsewhere. Based on that scene and the one in Civil War in which Howard is critical of Tony as a young adult, it’s little wonder that Tony never thought his father loved him.

That kind of belief leaves wounds. Tony’s constant showboating and basking in the adulation of an adoring public was an…