Mark Pearson, a 44-year-old repairman who loves comic books, has spent 14 months of his life creating an almost perfect replica of Tony Stark’s Iron Man suit, from sheets of cardboard covered in fiberglass.
Perason certainly isn’t the first one to build a replica of the
famous Iron man suit, but his is definitely one of the most realistic
looking, regardless of the materials during the build. ”I don’t know
why I did it”, the repairman from Bradford, West Yorkshire, says, “I
guess it was just a moment of madness. I decided on making the helmet
then I said to my partner – I’m going to make the full suit.” The comics
fan bought himself a 12ft cardboard model of Robert Downey Jr. in his
iconic superhero suit, started work on the helmet, but simply couldn’t
stop. He downloaded the templates from the Internet, and made them into
cardboard moulds. Once those were all created, he was able to create the
fiberglass parts of his magnificent Iron Man suit.
Mark’s partner, Karen Hopkins, wasn’t very thrilled with his idea.
“She said to me ‘you’re 44, what are you doing making a model of a man
from comic books?” the repairman remembers, but when she finally saw it
finished and the reactions it provoked all over their home town, she was
delighted. But the strangest thing about this particular Iron Man suit
is that it DOESN’T fit its own maker. Mark is just 5ft 6in, so he had
to find a suitable Tony Stark type guy to put on his fiberglass
creation. He was able to convince 24-year-old Darren Higgins, a local
supermarket manager, to put on the armor and stand in front of the
Bradford cinema, waving at film goers attending a screening of The
Avengers.
The Iron Man suit made by Mark Pearson started out as a set of 400
sheets of cardboard that he turned into a 3D structure, and later into a
fiberglass replica. It has some nice touches, like flashing lights
for the eyes, hands and chest, but Pearson says he also used quite a
few household objects. For example, the art reactor in the chest started
off as an ordinary ashtray. He says the suit is still a work in
progress, and that he has some cool ideas about what to add to it next. “All it’s missing is the ability to fly – but that would have been a bit tricky. I really would have needed superpowers myself to have made that possible”, Mark says.
Asked why he chose Iron Man’s suit, the English repairman said “I’m
not sure why I picked Iron Man. I’m a big fan and I think I like the
fact that he is not really a superhero, he is just a man with a flying
suit. But what a suit – it’s the Ferrari of superhero suits.” I’d have
to agree with him on that one. About the new Avengers movie, he really
enjoyed it, especially to see what the new Iron Man suit can do, and
said ”it looked almost as good as mine”.
