You Never Know When You'll Face... The Mandroids!

At whatever time you were a Marvel reader during the industry's Bronze Age and beyond, you probably at one time or another tripped over one of the many appearances of the Mandroids, agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. who donned titanium weapon-suits in order to battle super-powered foes that conventional forces presumably couldn't handle. Designed by Tony Stark, who trained the men to deal with even the Avengers, they were sent into action as part of a task force put together by H. Warren Craddock, who headed the government's Alien Activities Commission which had been formed to uncover possible alien threats such as the recent Kree incursion. Their mission: to enforce a court order which authorized Craddock to bring in the Avengers for questioning.

Given that Craddock had a valid court order to compel the Avengers' cooperation (rather than meting out a "death sentence" as dramatically depicted on the issue's cover), it's not clear why Captain America, of all people, didn't advise the team to simply comply, instead of escalating the situation by joining with them to take on the Mandroids. Half the blame is Craddock's, certainly, since the man and his aides could have just walked up to the front door and made their intentions known to Jarvis, rather than making such a show of it with tanks and a loudspeaker as if he were approaching fugitives--but Cap? Not only refusing a lawfully executed government order, but hurling his shield into the fray? If you were watching the scene play out on the tube, you might have found yourself wondering what information the Avengers could be hiding, and why.

Of course, having been witness to Craddock's tenacity in pursuing his McCarthy-style investigation, it's difficult to sympathize with the man, whatever his mandate--which helps to sway the reader, at least, to sympathize with the Avengers, rather than the heavily-armed Mandroids who are actually doing pretty well against them so far. Though it's fair to wonder if Stark advised them that, to deal with Iron Man, all you have to do is to send him tumbling onto his backside, which his armor isn't strong enough to protect him against.

The Inhuman called Triton has definitely picked a tense day to approach the Avengers in order to ask for their help. Luckily for him, Iron Man--who can barely find the strength to function after simply falling down--knows enough about the Mandroids to incapacitate them, or, rather, the men inside the suits. But wouldn't you know that SHIELD has a back-up plan even for that.

The Mandroids' debut nevertheless comes to an unceremonious end almost immediately afterward, as Iron Man again makes use of his knowledge of the suits to disable them.

Regrettably, Craddock wasn't the only government operative* to make use of the Mandroids against the Avengers, when, in a later story, the State Department issues orders to prevent the team from going after Stark.  It's also apparent that, in the interim, the Mandroid production line has been busy.

*Craddock, as we'd see during the closing scenes of the Kree-Skrull War, was later revealed to be a Skrull.

On another occasion, our heroes were forced to face the Mandroids when Thunderstrike and Spider-Man board the SHIELD helicarrier to confront the agency about their apprehension of the members of Code: Blue.

What's odd about the Mandroids, however, is that they seem to be for sale available to just about anyone who wants to acquire them--and that includes criminals like Justin Hammer (for all the good they do him against War Machine):

... and Moses Magnum, who uses them in an operation to seize control of Japan.

Magnum also had the clout to obtain a cadre of Mark II Mandroids, who turned out to be little more than tinker toys against the rage of Colossus.

The incredible Hulk has also faced a model of Mandroid, this one donned by Col. Glenn Talbot as part of his angry vendetta against the man-monster:

During the Armor Wars, however, Iron Man had cause to take on the Mandroids for a different reason--as part of his mission to keep his technology from falling into the hands of enemies like Justin Hammer. (Gee, we've already seen how well that worked out.) To accomplish the goal while avoiding an actual attack on SHIELD, Stark dupes Nick Fury into virtually dropping the Mandroids into his lap by convincing him that Iron Man has gone rogue and offering his help to track down his former bodyguard.

And though he crosses a line that forces him to deceive a longtime ally, the plan succeeds.

For future writers, the lure of using the Mandroids in their stories would mainly take the form of designing different prototypes and models of the Mandroid armor, which at times tended to make one forget that they were indeed man-operated and instead resembled hulking robots of some kind. But this creation of Roy Thomas and Neal Adams nevertheless went on to enjoy many appearances in a number of Marvel titles through the years--and, needless to say, remained popular with those SHIELD agents who hoped to one day make the grade as a Mandroid.