Iron Man has reached his final form: a hot lady’s trophy husband

For months now, Marvel Comics fans have anticipated the nuptials of the Iron Man and the Diamond Woman, and this week, it finally happened. Tony Stark, of the Manhattan Avengers, and Emma Frost, of the Westchester X-Men, were joined in holy matrimony over the course of an issue each of X-Men and Invincible Iron Man — complete with matching covers.

But this isn’t your typical superhero wedding! Usually, when superheroes get married, it’s because two characters love each other a lot, the wedding is a big event with tie-ins, and then — twist — they are separated by circumstance.

This time they actually did get married, with an officiant and everything. And it only took two issues. And, most importantly, they don’t like each other in the slightest.

A match made in (the) Hell(fire Club)

The happy day came during hard times for both bride and groom. Tony, the son (by secret adoption) of business titan Howard Stark and philanthropist Maria Stark, recently lost his fortune, his assets, and the rights to all Iron Man technology to rival sci-fi engineer-slash-billionaire Kelvin “Feilong” Heng. Feilong went on to repurpose Tony’s stockpile of Iron Man tech into a brand-new production line of mutant-hunting robots, the Stark Sentinels.

Hazel, née Emma, daughter of Winston and Hazel Frost of the Massachusetts Frosts, recently lost her seat on the ruling council of Krakoa when the mutant nation was forcibly depopulated by the combined efforts of anti-mutant mad science cabal Orchis, future computer intelligence Nimrod, and rogue mutant cyborg Moira MacTaggert.

And so “Hazel” and Tony found, if not love, then common cause. Tony played the part of cowed, drunk ex-superhero and ex-billionaire while secretly building a stealth suit, and Emma played the part of Hazel Kendal, Tony’s new, cheaper sequel to Pepper Pots. And Feilong’s obsession with possessing or tarnishing everything Tony held dear played right into their hands.

Image: Gerry Duggan, Juan Frigeri/Marvel Comics

Image: Gerry Duggan, Jim Towe, Javier Pina/Marvel Comics

When Feilong “accidentally” walked in on them in a private moment, Tony seized the initiative and popped the question, gambling that the opportunity to crash his rival’s private wedding ceremony to which he wasn’t invited would be irresistible bait. And he was right.

Image: Gerry Duggan, Juan Frigeri/Marvel Comics

Image: Gerry Duggan, Juan Frigeri/Marvel Comics

Gerry Duggan, Juan Frigeri/Marvel Comics

With only Feilong and an officiant present in a Las Vegas chapel, Emma Frost and Tony Stark tied the knot — right after Emma took off her power-dampening ring and used her psychic powers to steal Feilong’s darkest personal and business secrets and then erase his memory of anything untoward happening.

Here at Polygon we wish the happy — or, well, contented — couple all the best, and a very, very productive honeymoon. The whole thing went down in X-Men #26 and Invincible Iron Man #10 if you want to read it for yourself.