It's a thin line, yes. But he can't be compared to Magneto as Tony has yet to personally kill anyone to achive his goals. At least to my knowledge. As for Spider-man, I blame alot of that on Peter and the fact that he flip-flopped after he had already revealed his identity. Not to mention that on many occations, Magneto was considered a hero, and a visionary when Geonosia was at it's Golden Age before the Sentinel blew it up.By that standard, what's the difference between Stark and Magneto - who only does what he does because he feels it's the "only way" to safe-guard the future of mutantkind - then? Yet Magneto is considered a villain, while, even today, after all the crap he did during CW, Stark is still classified as a "hero".
I am not trying to say that what he is doing it right. However, Peter Parker did what he did by choice, following in Starks footsteps. Stark promised to keep his family safe, but Peter turned on him. The Hulks civil liberties went out the window after the 100th time he trashed a city. All he wanted was to be left alone, and his friends tried to give him that. It didn't work out well, but the Hulk proved what he was capable of doing when he took Manhatten hostage. It would have happened eventually, there would have been another Cieria, another Illumitati, or something else that would have set him off. The hulk is more of a menace that Tony Stark will ever be. The Negative Zone is the next logical step. I don't mind that too much, we have all seen how dependable normal prisons have been so far.By forcing people to sacrifice their safety and the safety of their loved ones by going public (see: Spider-Man)? By denying people who threaten his plans their basic civil liberties (see: Hulk)? By forcing those who, otherwise, are advantageous enough to be "useful" to his acts to act as bounty hunters (see: Speedball/Penance and the Thunderbolts)? By imprisoning those who are against him in a known volatile location (see: Anti-SHRA prisoners in the Negative Zone)?
He may feel he's "doing right", but does that make him right?
Is he still a Hero? Hard to say, even for me. That's like asking if Wolverine is still a Hero. Or if Cyclops is still a Hero. Or Reed, or Pym, Ms. Marvel, or Deadpool, or Bishop... This list goes on an on. I would say that Tony Stark can now be described as a solid anti-hero. Not a villian.
The X-men, Avengers, Defenders, X-Factor, Fantastic Four, and just about every other team under the sun is going to be infested with Skrulls. There will be so much infighting and lack of trust, that they wont be able to function as teams. The X-men are already scattered and broken. That why I am expecting the 50-State Initiative, all the unsung heroes that no one gives two ****s about, being Earths last hope. Maybe a bunch will die, no one will care, and there might not be enough left to keep the Initative running. Who knows what will happen. I think the Initative has to keep going, it's the only way that the Marvel Universe will become a 'Dark Future' that just about every future vision describes.
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