Iron Man‘s first real suit in the MCU is almost perfectly believable, according to an expert, “except for the arc reactor.” After launching the MCU with his first solo movie in 2008, Iron Man’s iconic look became synonymous with the franchise and the superhero genre as a whole. At a time when superheroes were still expected to be somewhat grounded in reality, the introduction of a genius with no superpowers to speak of was the perfect inroad to a cinematic franchise that is now replete with fantastical elements, such as magic and space gods.

Although Tony Stark isn’t exactly the most relatable superhero in the MCU, he is still one of the most plausible when contrasted to such living myths as Thor and Hulk. Admittedly, things got less believable when Iron Man’s MCU career culminated in his nanotech Mark LXXXV suit capable of manifesting any construct he could conceive. Still, when addressing his third suit, it turns out that this particular invention is something that could even be constructed today, with one conspicuous caveat.

Real-Life Physicist Praises The MCU Iron Man Suit’s Realism

Jim Kakalios Is A Physicist And Superhero Aficionado

Physicist Jim Kakalios is an expert in the field of superhero science. The University of Minnesota professor authored “The Physics of Superheroes” and has worked as a science consultant on The Amazing Spider-Man 2 and Watchmen, helping to root those inherently fantastical movies in real-world science. It’s no surprise, then, that Insider asked Kakalios to deliver his verdict on the believability of Marvel movie moments as part of the “How Real Is It?” YouTube series in which experts offer their verdicts on the real-world plausibility of movies.

Kakalios awards his highest believability rating, 9/10, to 2008’s Iron Man. This is because nearly every facet of Iron Man’s suit, including his jet-propulsion boots, “are things that we actually have right now.” The exception, of course, is the arc reactor, Tony Stark’s crowning achievement that generates the power of three nuclear power plants while being the size of a “hockey puck.” As Kakalios puts it, if that technology were real, “we wouldn’t need superheroes.”

“When [Tony Stark] built his first suit in a cave, out of scraps, it was made of iron and was very heavy. About 150 pounds, just counting the iron, not counting the weaponry.

Then he developed the MK2, which was тιтanium. тιтanium is lighter than iron and strong. And then, in order to combat the icing problem, he used a gold-тιтanium alloy.

Now, there are gold-тιтanium alloys. They tend to be very brittle. They’re used in dental applications more than anything else. So, unless he’s fighting Crime Boss Gingivitus, I don’t think that he would really want to use the gold-тιтanium alloy.

So, much of the technology, except for the arc reactor, are things that we actually have right now. We have exoskeletons, we have plating, we even have jet boots. The one thing we don’t have is a power supply. He has an arc reactor that’s about the size of a hockey puck and puts out the power of three nuclear power plants.

If we knew how to do that, we wouldn’t need superheroes. Because otherwise you’d have an Iron Man suit, but you’d have to drag a long extension cord behind you in order to have enough power for the suit.

One thing that’s realistic in this is that we never see him when he engages his boots, or shoots a repulsor ray, we never see him press a ʙuттon or give a voice command. He thinks it, and it happens. That’s because he has a cybernetic helmet that picks up his thought waves and sends the information to the suit.

This is real. Scientists and engineers at the University of Minnesota and at other universities and insтιтutions around the world are developing cybernetic helmets that pick up the very weak radio waves that are generated when we think, amplifying them, sending them via Bluetooth to another device. They’re trying to develop prosthetics and treat paralysis, but if you had asked me as a kid when I was reading Iron Man comics “which part in the 21st century would be the closest to reality?” the last thing I would have said was the cybernetic helmet.

What This Means For The MCU’s Iron Man

Iron Man Is One Of The Most Believable MCU Superheroes

Kakalios’s high rating goes to show just how realistic Iron Man is. The fact that many parts of Iron Man’s suit already exist in the real world speaks to Iron Man’s accessibility as a superhero, with a huge part of his appeal stemming from the idea that he could feasibly exist in real life. Then again, he is firmly rooted in the superhero sphere for the one, character-defining feature that is his miniaturized arc reactor – a device that very few (like Ivan Vanko and Riri Williams) have been able to replicate.

This is the major fantastical element that sets Tony apart from average people, at least early on in his career. Since Iron Man, Tony Stark has been behind some mind-bending technology and processes, including the Ultron AI and time travel. Still, it is safe to say that Iron Man remains one of the most believable superheroes because of his early creations.

Source: Insider/YouTube