That would presuppose he was emotionally and psychologically equipped to know what it was to have a family in the first place. Part of his problem is that he can't relate to people, so he keeps them at arms length, takes them for granted and affects a very breezy attitude.
Yes indeed, and to paraphrase Wanda, where do you suppose he
gets that from? Could it perhaps have anything at all to do with unresolved emotional issues surrounding his relationships with his parents,
compounded by their abrupt exit off this mortal coil—again, no pun intended—which robbed him of the opportunity to resolve them directly, thus leading him to project (or deflect) these emotions elsewhere? Personally, I think it quite possible and plausible.
As I see it, this very parental absence (which preexisted his parents' actual death, though that event made it all the more concrete and traumatic and
permanent) underlies Tony's tendency toward tacit reliance on the diligent care and indulgence of others while simultaneously projecting a buffer of casual indifference, determined flippancy, and even outright patronizing disdain toward those who provide it. He resents his parents for being absent, resents himself for his need of them, and resents others for taking their place in fulfilling that need.
Although Tony comes to realize this of himself little by little (and in Pepper's case, it would seem from
Civil War to have been
too little, and too late, and too
bad, as he seemed to be trying pretty hard there in
IM3) as the films go on, it remains an unresolved issue for him. His attempts to resolve it also manifest themselves in his overcompensating by trying to take into his own hands matters which transcend his capacity to deal with them alone, to bite off more than he can chew. Ultron was perhaps the, ahem,
ultimate example of that.
I have done just recently, after having seen
Civil War, and before having reviewed the other films as well.
Pre-cave Tony treats everyone the same, from Stane to Rhodes, even his one-night stands.
But surely you're not saying you actually believe Tony
feels nothing more for them and Pepper and Happy than he does for any of his one-night stands, or others? That's plainly not the case. And
they certainly don't treat
him the same as they'd treat anyone else, either.
I think Obadiah is very much set up as a sort of dark reflection of Tony's father. He's
truly the amoral "iron-monger," the uncaring and underhandedly profiteering "Merchant of Death" that Christine Everhart accuses Tony himself of being at the outset of the film, and which Tony underneath his initially expressed acceptance and even
embrace of such an identity
fears he has become. His ordeal in the cave (where Yinsen also assumes the role of a surrogate parental figure to him, and a much more positive one) confronts him with the realization of this fear, and upon his return he seeks to
reject that aspect of himself. On a conscious level this rejection is due to moral concern for those he and his father before him have hurt in the course of their exploits, but on a more subconscious emotional one it is also a rejection of his
identification with his father himself.
Rhodey acts in a brotherly role toward him, and a brother too can be a stand-in for parental authority, albeit one perhaps less effectual, as indeed he certainly seems to be in influencing and mitigating Tony's defiance of the authority he represents in the first two films, namely the U.S. military.
It's really not. Pepper was a personal assistant first. It was her job to pick up after him. You're mistaking a physical role for an emotional one.
The first person whose role one generally identifies as picking up after one is one's
mother, and whatever figure stands in for that role in the absence of an
actual mother is prone to being identified as a maternal
figure in the eyes of one seeking such a connection. The emotional role follows from the physical role. (Of course, I do not suggest that picking up after one generally
remains the sole role of a mother in successfully realized adulthood. Yet, on an emotional level, it might very well remain a role
associated with motherhood that one might seek fulfillment of by someone else in the
absence of one's mother, say for example due to her sudden death in a car crash-cum-assassination.)
A parental figure is someone who's approval you crave. Who's advice you seek. Who you turn to for emotional support and wisdom.
Rupert Giles to Buffy, Dumbledore to Harry Potter, Han Solo to Rey, Ripley to Newt, the T-800 to John Conner, Walter White to Jessie, Alfred to Bruce Wayne, Bobby to Sam and Dean, Anderson to Commander Shepard. These are all examples of parent substitutes. Pepper, Obadiah and most assuredly Ross simply don't fit the profile.
Those emboldened above are the ones I can claim enough familiarity with to say that they do indeed represent fine examples of
positive and healthy surrogate parental relationships. But that is not to say that there aren't any number of
negative and dysfunctional ones that can carry no less emotional weight—and perhaps in cases yet
more—for a given individual. Palpatine to Anakin would be one that comes immediately to mind.
If you want Marvel examples then look at Yondu in Guardians of the Galaxy. That's a father substitute. A dead beat father substitute for a dead beat father. Also Coulson and May to Daisy. And, it seems somewhat ironically: Tony Stark to Peter Parker.
And John Garrett to Grant Ward would be another.
If Yondu is "a dead beat father substitute for a dead beat father," then why can't Obadiah be a substitute for a father who (in the most uncharitable view, before Tony learned the whole truth about Howard, or at least that there was more to the story) profited by war and destruction and death, duplicitously stole designs from other inventors, "a butcher and a thief" as Vanko put it, who cared for no one? Sure, Tony didn't necessarily
consciously know Stane was as bad as all that before he turned on him...and yet that's
exactly what he turned out to be.
If you want to know who Tony really considers his surrogate family, it's 'Dum-E' and 'U'. He keeps them despite them being obsolete. He tolerates them despite them being an active hindrance. They're the only thing he took from his home when it was gone.
I completely agree he has such an attachment to them, but if anything would they not represent more his
children, as might his suits and the Iron Legion and quite explicitly Ultron?
