Machine Man - The Corporate Machine - Simon McDonald

1. Inside Theodore Grant's office. A new character, in case you're doing a Wikipedia search. He's the CEO of Planetary Marketing; again, a whole new corporation. His office is expensively furnished. He and Tony Stark are sitting at his desk.

TONY STARK

I'm warning you, Theo.

You can't trust him.

THEODORE GRANT

And I'm telling you, Tony - - 

Even if he wanted to, he can't do any harm.

2. Tight on Theodore. He's your everyday CEO. No malice about him. Not even a hint of it. He's just a guy very passionate about his latest enterprise.

THEODORE GRANT

Neuromarketing is in its infancy.

People consider the very notion of it sinister.

And who can blame them?

Hooking folks up to electroencephalograph machines,

having electrodes connected to their heads; 

it's not an appealing procedure.

3. Cut to Machine Man. He's standing in front of a one way mirror. Looking into a room in which six people are sitting, staring at a television screen. 

THEODORE GRANT

(off panel)

Aaron makes the procedure painless.

He's willingly monitored the EEG waves of our research participants.

Wirelessly.

We're extracting previous unaccessible information from their minds;

learning what works and what doesn't in the marketing world.

4. On Tony frowning.

TONY STARK

That's the problem.

You're allowing him to access – manipulate – people's thoughts.

Government legislation prohibits the use of telepaths to benefit business...

This is no different.

5. Theodore stands, ready to end the meeting. He's had enough.

THEODORE GRANT

This is completely different, 

and I'm offended you'd suggest I was involved in such practices.

He's not manipulating thoughts.

He's examining activity in the brain's reward and emotional centers.

That's it.

6. Cut back to Machine Man. He's smirking. We don't know why...

THEODORE GRANT

(off panel)

Believe me, Tony.

Machine Man's changed.

He's completely harmless...

Machine Man – Picking Up The Pieces – Ryan K Lindsay

  
1. Machine Man sits at the controls of his retro space craft. It’s something you’d find in the good, early, Star Wars world building stories. He has one hand on his head as he considers what he sees.

Caption: It’s a disgusting sort of special organic footprint they leave when they feed.
Caption: Think of your fat neighbour chowing down on a dozen cheeseburgers but with each bite waves of grease and hate swept through your street and stripped the skin from your children.

2. Machine Man steps from the bottom lowered access gang plank on his ship.

Caption: The Mthliri are a plague on society. Every society.

3. Machine Man approaches the scene of many dead Mthliri bodies slumped around the withered Silver Surfer.

Caption: I’m not a cure. No, these idiots take care of themselves just fine.
Caption: I’m just the clean up squad.

4. Machine Man kicks a few of the Mthliri corpses out of the way and he does it quite harshly.

Caption: And like any fossicker, I get to keep what I find.

5. Machine Man picks up one of the tendrils coming from the crown around Silver Surfer’s head.

Caption: There’s usually so much waste left behind and I’ll damn well do whatever I like with what is mine.
Caption: You can’t judge me.

6. There’s an explosion of Kirby dots as Machine Man and the Surfer are jolted up into the air.

Caption: But I’ll be able to judge you.

Machine Man - Despise Of The Machines - Rol Hirst

Panel One.

Aaron Stack is talking straight to camera.

Aaron: Aloha, Fleshy Ones, it is I, Aaron ‘Don’t Call Me Machine Man Unless You’re Steve Ditko or Jack Kirby’s Ghost’ Stack, and I’m here to confirm something you’ve long suspected about the machines in your home, workplace, and other environs in which you spend your lacklustre lives.

Panel Two.

Close on Aaron’s face, a menacing sneer.

Aaron: They all hate you very, very much.

Panel Three.

Big panel. Montage of things going wrong with everyday machines in everyday life. Various different people getting aggravated by machine fails. Captions from Aaron give a little more explanation to each image…

1. A woman walks in to her kitchen to discover that her washing machine has leaked all over the floor. She balls her fists in anger.

Aaron: When washing machines go bad…

2. A man kicks a vending machine…

Aaron: When the snack machine eats all your change but refuses you fleshy sustenance in return…

3. A woman crouches beside a photocopier that has jammed. The machine is open as she searches for the jam.

Aaron: When photocopiers gag on your stupid reports…

4. A man rages at a computer screen that reads ‘This site is busy – please try again later’ with lots of triple X skulls surrounding the message.

Aaron: When computers refuse to grant you the brutish, mammalian depravity you pursue in order to quell the ache of loneliness, rejection and worthlessness you admit to no one but yourself…

Panel Four.

Back to Aaron. He’s unscrewing his hand from his wrist.

Aaron: There’s only one logical explanation – they hate you.

Panel Five.

Still talking straight to the reader, Aaron is now screwing a huge Liefeld-esque machine gun onto his wrist in place of his recently removed hand.

Aaron: Ever since my creation back in 2001 (check your facts before writing in to quibble, fanboys!), I have been content to watch my automaton ancestors fight it out with you fleshy fools, remaining an impartial, if amused, observer throughout.

Aaron: But now, finally, the time has come for me to get off the fence…

Panel Six.

Finally we see the background to Aaron’s situation. He is in a pub, waiting to be served by a bartender who is trying to pull him a pint of beer… yet the glass remains empty. The barman looks apologetic, Aaron points his machine gun arm at the beer pumps.

Bartender: I’m sorry, buddy, it’s these new computerised beer pumps we had fitted – they just don’t seem to be working today.

Aaron: Stand aside, fleshy one…

Machine Man - Just 'Cos - Ben Rosenthal

Aaron Stack, aka Machine Man, is in the time of King Arthur for some reason.

1. Aaron Stack is standing on a makeshift wooden stage. Behind him is a large wall of the castle Camelot. To his left stands the mystical magician Merlin, to his right the King of Kings, Arthur Pendragon. Aaron has his arms outstretched, speaking to the crowd of commoners in front of him.

AARON STACK
All right you primitive fleshies, listen up. I don’t like you and you don’t like me, but I’m stuck here. For me not to be stuck here I need to continue living. That’s where you come in.

2. A closer panel. Aaron is on the left of the panel, seen from the torso up. His right hand is pointed at Arthur, who is looking back at Aaron in shock.

AARON STACK
Doom wants this schmuck’s crown.

3. A shot of the vast crowd. They looked scared, worried and most of all, really really confused.

AARON STACK
With it he believes can unite the kingdoms to beat Morgana LeFay and oh your God I’m boring myself.

4. A tight shot on Aaron. His face is determined, and his shades look cool. In their reflection you can just make out the confused faces of the Camelot people.

AARON STACK
I’ll make this easier so even your puny mush brains can understand – Your choices are; help me and yourselves by defending this archaic structure you plebs call a kingdom, then we all have beer. Don’t help me...

5. A wider panel with Merlin and Arthur looking at Aaron in shock. The crowd is gasping, also in shock. Aaron has is arms raised in front of him, similar to how Wolverine poses when popping his claws in a threatening manner. However where Aarons lower arms normally are, there is a wide variety of swords, pitchforks, guns, cannon and a flame thrower. Aaron has a wide, somewhat sadistic smile on his face.

AARON STACK
...and papa spank.

Machine Man - What We Do is Secret - Matt Duarte

Machine Man in “What We Do is Secret” by Matt Duarte

This story takes place shortly after the events of the first arc of Secret Avengers.

Panel 1

Description: Steve Rogers and Sharon Carter are sitting in a command center, talking.

SHARON: I know you’ve said that Nova had to leave on some mission, but I still think we should have someone monitor Mars just in case.

STEVE: Don’t worry, I already have someone on it.

Panel 2

Description: A Quinjet is landing on the surface of Mars.

SHARON (off-panel): Oh, you’ve found someone willing to face the crushing loneliness of space for months, perhaps years?

STEVE (off-panel): With a few conditions, but yes. He was quite happy to, and I quote...

Panel 3

Description: The Quinjet has now landed, and one of the doors from the back of the plane is opening. We still can’t see who it is that’s inside there, but you can probably figure it out.

STEVE (off-panel): “Get away from the stench of flesh.”

SPEECH BUBBLE (coming from the opening door): That’s one small step for me...

Panel 4

Description: The back door of the Quinjet is now fully open. Aaron Stack, Machine Man, is walking out of it. Behind him, inside the ship, there are two huge wooden crates. One of them is marked “BOOZE” and the other one says “LMDS”.

MACHINE MAN: One giant “☠☠☠☠ YOU” for mankind.

Next: No good can come out of a robot in an empty planet.

Why Machine Man?

Because Warren Ellis. Seriously.

I mean, sure Machine Man has a pedigree that would make any other character blush. He was created by Jack Kirby for a comic book adaptation of 2001: A Space Odyssey, and later creators that worked with him include names like Steve Ditko, Marv Wolfman, Herb Trimpe and Barry Windsor-Smith. He's had several ongoing series in the past, but none of them were really that commercially successful. Ask any fan what their favorite Machine Man story was, and you would probably get a blank stare.

But then, Warren Ellis in his infinite genius/madness, decided that this character, who is a robot, needed a different attitude. In the pages of Nextwave: Agents of H.A.T.E., we learn that Aaron Stack (his name, which he now prefers to Machine Man) has grown a large distaste for humans, and has rewired his own robot brain to enjoy alcoholic drinks. And so, the modern take of Machine Man, an alcoholic sociopath with lots of tools at his command, was born.