Tony Stark Is Peter Parker’s Parental Figure and the Comics Back It Up
So, a lot of people have complained about the relationship between MCU Peter and Tony, saying it’s inaccurate to the comics, that it disrespects his relationship with Ben and May, that Tony is not like his father, etc. It’s basically a bunch of anti Tonys who don’t want Tony and Peter to have a relationship and have been spouting off lies about MCU, the comics, and our fandom. First of all, our fandom really doesn’t want Tony to replace May and Ben. It simply recognizes that Peter does not currently have a father figure even though he’s at a crucial age in his development from a boy to a man and could really use a dad and Tony Stark has been acting as a parental figure since he took responsibility for him. These people completely ignore that Tony only brought Peter to the Civil War because he had faith that Steve and his team would not harm a kid and had Peter under strict orders to keep his distance and web them up and he sent him home the moment he got hurt. He recognized the fact that Peter was not going to stop being a vigilante and there was nothing he could do about that since he’s not his parent. So, instead, he becomes his mentor, giving him a certain amount of authority over him and it allows him to protect Peter from having to expose his identity thanks to the accords. These people also criticize Tony for giving Peter a highly advanced suit capable of killing people, (Karen’s instant kill mode), and yet they fail to recognize the fact that Tony had Karen and all those protocals disabled until he thought Peter was ready to deal with them. He. Did. Not. Give. A. 15. Year. Old. Access. To. A. Suit. That. Could. Kill. People. Plus, Peter would never kill anyone anyway and Tony probably knows that. So, these people disregard what our fandom actually wants when it comes to Peter and Tony’s relationship together and it disregards Tony’s actual actions in canon.
But here’s another thing, they keep acting like this relationship came out of nowhere, when in actuality, it comes from the comics. Peter and Tony have a relationship very similar to this in the Ultimate universe and had a relationship somewhat similar to this, (father-son dynamic), in the 616 universe.
Below we have a panel post Civil War where Peter defected from Team Iron Man after learning how anyone who didn’t register was going to be locked up on the Raft, which he found inhumane, (and Tony in the MCU was not a fan of it either). Peter had already revealed his identity thanks to the Accords, though, and a villain attacked and hospitalized Aunt May. Distraught, Peter gets in a fight with Tony and ultimately begs him to help him help Aunt May since Peter can’t pay for her hospital bills. But, in this panel, he tells Tony he was like a father to him:
Peter Parker in the 616 universe saw Tony Stark as a father figure. Peter Parker has never had a consistent father figure in his life. He gravitates toward them and he saw Tony in this role. Tony certainly had affection for Peter, too, while he was living with him at Stark Tower. He made him the Iron Spider suit after all and this interaction definitely seemed like one between a dad and his kid or perhaps a big brother who had to act as his little brother’s parental figure due to absent parents seeing as Tony and Peter have less of an age gap in the 616 universe than they do in the MCU or the Ultimate universe:
Peter even teasingly calls him “dad”. How much more obvious can you get? Oh, yeah, you can get Ultimate Universe level obvious.
So above we have a panel where Tony Stark is extremely impressed with Peter Parker due to his intelligence and bravery at such a young age. And so begins his mentoring of him.
Now we have a panel where Tony shows Peter tech and comforts him when he asks him why other superheroes hate him. Think about this: Tony Stark is the only hero to take an interest in Peter and not treat him like he’s weird or different. He’s mentoring this kid. These feelings are bound to turn paternal if they aren’t already.
And now here we have a panel where we find out Peter hero worships Tony, (kind of like he does in MCU, right?), and Tony sent him a birthday present where he’s redesigned his webshooters with better tech so they’ll be more efficient in the field for him. Also kind of like how Tony did in MCU.
Anyone who tries to argue that the relationship between Tony and Peter doesn’t make sense or shouldn’t have happened is nothing more than a delusional hater. The comics say otherwise.
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