Ironheart is a completely new MCU character for me. I know of her comic book existence, but her title came out years after I'd stopped my weekly subscription so I went into the TV series blind. True, we did get a glimpse of Riri in Wakanda Forever, but there wasn't enough world building for us to get to know her backstory.
What surprised me was that the tonality of series was nothing like I'd expected. With a name like "Ironheart" there was the potential for an overkill of goodness and sweetness and light, but thankfully there was none of that to be found in Riri or her story. Instead, the series is grimy and dark, the soundtrack is heavy with gangsta' rap, and any humour is kept way down to a minimum. This is neither a funny, nor even a fun show. Good for her.
Riri herself is nothing like the shiny hero the 'Ironheart' moniker suggests. Rather, her character is murky and morally ambiguous. Her 'Uncle Ben' moment results in the simultaneous loss of both her stepfather and half-sister or bestie (I'm not clear about the exact relationship), but instead of giving her moral clarity it puts her into survival mode. She will do anything to put a suit of armour around herself and her nearest and dearest. It's not altruism, it's selfishness born out of trauma
The name 'Ironheart' is never once mentioned in the series. Riri does not give herself a superhero name, only referring to the armour as a 'suit', so she sees herself and the suit as two separate entities -- no 'I am Iron Man' owning of the identity, so I suspect that the series only provides us a starting point of Riri's journey. The only name her alter ego gets is 'Ironhead', coined by her late stepfather, and this is the identity that sticks with her through the series.
Stubborn, unyielding, not in a good, heroic way, but a petulant, annoying way, at this point, Riri is far from being a hero. The morally questionable choices she makes throughout the series makes her quite unlikeable. She starts by being expelled from MIT, an by the time the series is over there is no redemption arc for her.
Is this a good narrative for the series to follow? Given the early review bombing of the series it doesn't seem like a crowd pleasing direction to have taken, but by giving a hero an absolutely rock-bottom starting point presents lots of potential for an epic redemption arc at some later date. Hopefully, that's the plan for her.
There is also a lot the audience has to do to suspend disbelief here. Tony's suit is powered by an arc reactor, Riri's suit makes use of solar and wind energy. While that admission makes her suit way inferior to Tony's, being able to generate that much power from the sun and wind requires a level of technology that should be putting the oil industry out of business for good. Eventually, Riri obtains an alternative source of power -- eldritch magic, which I suppose, is more believable (given how the MCU functions on anomalies) than maintaining the sun and wind angle. The criminal crew Riri joins is supremely effective in their combat skills, that is until they face the might of Riri's improv fighting style.
And Sacha Baron Cohen makes his long awaited MCU debut as Mephisto, the smooth-talking, contract obsessed demonic menace who by the end of the series may or may not have sealed a deal with Riri Williams. The question remains open-ended for now. Magic, especially of the Dr Strange style was not where I expected the story of another metal suit to take me, but here we are.
Overall, I did enjoy the series, though the main character did not endear herself to me. The tension, pacing and slow-burn revelations were intriguing enough to see where it all led to. I'd say it's a bold and interesting introduction to a fresh new face in the MCU.
