Tony Stark has come an awful long way since escaping that dingy Afghan cave – by our count, he’s reached suit number 46 (AKA the Bleeding Edge armor), which made its show-stopping debut during Avengers: Infinity War.
As is the case with Stark’s previous creations, the Bleeding Edge armor was packed with various bells and whistles, most of which are novel inventions and carefully crafted features that help give Iron Man the, ahem, edge when the going gets tough.
But even for all of Tony Stark’s mechanical might, Thanos proved unstoppable, and was able to acquire all six Infinity Stones and effectively reduce half of all life in the universe to ash. Robert Downey Jr.’s scarred hero was among the few who survived Infinity War, leading us to believe that he’ll be packing serious heat when Avengers 4 steamrolls into theaters next summer.
Some form of tech upgrade is practically a given, and below, you’ll see that renown concept artist ‘ultraraw26’ (h/t Heroic Hollywood) has gone ahead and offered his own twist:
It almost goes without saying that this rendering is not indicative of the final product; it’s simply a (cracking) piece of artwork dedicated to what is undoubtedly the biggest and most important MCU movie thus far.
Nevertheless, the artwork itself will no doubt fuel rumors that Tony Stark will be calling upon some form of proton cannon to course-correct the universe. If true, this strategy will surely involve the Quantum Realm in some capacity, after Michael Douglas reaffirmed that Marvel’s netherworld will play a significant role in all future installments in the MCU – Captain Marvel included.
Meanwhile, Avengers 4 opens big on May 3rd. Don’t. Miss. It.