Well, it depends on your point of view really.
 
I consider him to be a bad guy in that story, others might not.

It depends on what side you wanted to win.

Marvel tends to be a lot less black and white about the whole good guy/bad guy thing compared to dc.

According to Marvel, no. According to common sense, yes.

" According to Marvel, no. According to common sense, yes. "

The two point of view are coherent. 
The point is that Iron-Man want to emprison his friend and made so big mistakes (Clone Thor, negative zone).

While it depends on your point of view there is the argument that Iron Man using villains to hunt down his fellow heroes makes him a bad guy.

Like pretty much everyone else wrote, it depends on your point of view. Both Capt and Tony did some questionable things and both wanted what was best, but when you look at it, Tony made the most mistakes.

To brake it down simplistically during Civil War Tony Stark was the bad guy, along with Reed Richards and other "Pro-Registration" heroes. But Civil War wasn't really about good or bad. It was more about what is the responsibility of the hero community to the public at large and the role the government should or should not have in the lives of those heroes. You can look at both sides and say, "I agree with Cap the heroes should not be under the government thumb and used as they see fit." But then again you can also say, "But I see where Tony is coming from because its the heroes responsibility to keep the public's safety in mind at all times."
 
Now with that being said, to make the answer slightly simplier then that, Tony and all Pro-Reg heroes and the government, where the bad guys because they were going against the Constitution.

Defining either side as "good" or "bad" is overly simplistic. That grey area and moral ambiguity is one of the thing the Civil War arc got really right.

Depends on how you look at it. Legally speaking Iron Man + Pro-Registration were the good guys, and Cap + Anti-Registration were the bad guys. 
Morally speaking Iron Man + Pro-Registration would be considered the bad guys, while Cap + Anti-Registration would be considered the good guys.
 Either way; Iron Man did what he thought was the right thing to do for the greater good, while actually having his own personal and moral objections to what he, himself was doing..
He didn't want to do it, but he did it anyway because he thought it was the right thing. So I don't believe you can call him the "bad guy". He didn't do this for selfish or evil reasons.
 
Which is not to say that he didn't make mistakes. He did some wrong things, made some wrong decisions. And he turned out to be blamed for the Civil War ( and Captain America's death + Bill Foster's death, Secret Invasion and Dark Reign ( and also World War Hulk ). Which I kind of do think is exaggerated. Iron Man became the scapegoat for every bad thing that happened.
  Right now he's trying to redeem himself, he's apologizing for things he didn't remember doing. He's lost everything and is trying to rebuild by building something new, something to really help people.
 
Funny thing is; all this made a lot of readers see him as a bad person. Which kind of surprises me. People are OK with their hero slashing through their enemies and killing them like Wolverine, Deadpool, etc. do.
They are OK with the destruction that Hulk has caused several times. They are OK with so many things. But a genius like Iron Man making a few fatal mistakes turns readers around so fast that he immediately becomes the bad guy?

" Defining either side as "good" or "bad" is overly simplistic. That grey area and moral ambiguity is one of the thing the Civil War arc got really right. "

Funny thing is; all this made a lot of readers see him as a bad person. Which kind of surprises me. People are OK with their hero slashing through their enemies and killing them like Wolverine, Deadpool, etc. do. They are OK with the destruction that Hulk has caused several times. They are OK with so many things. But a genius like Iron Man making a few fatal mistakes turns readers around so fast that he immediately becomes the bad guy? "

Yes, he's a bad guy. He's responsible for OMD, Cap's death, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign and Siege.

" Yes, he's a bad guy. He's responsible for OMD, Cap's death, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign and Siege. "

" @FadeToBlackBolt said:

" Yes, he's a bad guy. He's responsible for OMD, Cap's death, Secret Invasion, Dark Reign and Siege. "

He's not responsible for any of that. "

"The best argument against the Civil War...is that even though Reed just ignores the events, Tony and Carol now both KNOW they did the wrong thing, and neither would ever do it again. "

"Nobody expects The Hulk or Deadpool to make better decisions, but Tony should have known better. Heck, the Regestration Act wasn't going to pass till Tony paid a supervillain (the 3rd Titanium Man) to publicly attack him...which a lot of people don't seem to remember... "

"Fine, technically Bendis and Quesada are, but in terms of fictional continuity, he is. And I'll also drop the Cap death part, but the rest falls directly on his shoulders. He convinced Spidey to reveal his identity to the world, then turned on him as soon as Pete decided he wasn't comfortable with Stark's ideas or methods. While Nova and the Guardians were fighting of a Universal threats, Stark, Reed and Cap were b****ing about masks. Secret Invasion happened because Stark had his head too far up his own exhaust pipe to realise that his defences weren't impregnable, and Siege was a direct result of his negligence. Osborn used HIS armor to further his aims, he used Stark's lapdog (Bendis-Sentry) to do his wetwork, and he used Stark tech to equip his grunts.   It's all Stark's (and Reed's) fault.   I'm guessing he's a favourite of yours, and I'm sorry that I'm bagging him out so much, but this is how I see the state of the MU over the last few years. He and Osborn should have been the  ones to have a helicarrier dropped on their heads, but we all know that Siege was a disgrace, so I wont go there.

IronMan was just bein' Tony Stark

 
  @FadeToBlackBolt said:

"Fine, technically Bendis and Quesada are, but in terms of fictional continuity, he is. And I'll also drop the Cap death part, but the rest falls directly on his shoulders. He convinced Spidey to reveal his identity to the world, then turned on him as soon as Pete decided he wasn't comfortable with Stark's ideas or methods. While Nova and the Guardians were fighting of a Universal threats, Stark, Reed and Cap were b****ing about masks. Secret Invasion happened because Stark had his head too far up his own exhaust pipe to realise that his defences weren't impregnable, and Siege was a direct result of his negligence. Osborn used HIS armor to further his aims, he used Stark's lapdog (Bendis-Sentry) to do his wetwork, and he used Stark tech to equip his grunts.   It's all Stark's (and Reed's) fault.   I'm guessing he's a favourite of yours, and I'm sorry that I'm bagging him out so much, but this is how I see the state of the MU over the last few years. He and Osborn should have been the  ones to have a helicarrier dropped on their heads, but we all know that Siege was a disgrace, so I wont go there.

For your Civil War arguments, see my argument above this. Secret Invasion wasn't all Stark's fault. I mean, if Stark hadn't been around, and wasn't director of SHIELD, could you still blame him? You can't honestly expect one guy to make sure that Earth never gets invaded the way it did like in Secret Invasion. And just because Osborn's a sneaky little bastard who was able to get a hold of Tony's armor, this makes Tony a bad guy? Tony has always been an arrogant fool who thinks himself to be invincible, even though he has gotten more than a few armors stolen from him. That doesn't make him evil, it just makes him who he is, an arrogant fool. 
 
Anyway it really shows that your view of a 'bad guy' is very different from mine. As I said before; Tony Stark made wrong decisions, did some very morally gray things, but he always did it for the right reasons, he always intended good things. And sure, he overlooked a lot of things that a genius like him perhaps could 've seen coming, but heck, he's still human, and humans make mistakes.
This all makes Tony a human who did some wrongs, even though he tried to do good. But this does not make him a bad guy, since he didn't intend to do wrong. "

" That's a very solid viewpoint there, and I agree with you that Tony isn't a bad guy in the respect that he's evil or anything. He's as you said, an arrogant fool, but I don't like the fact that whilst he is forgiven, others aren't; Hank Pym for instance. Marvel is known for their double-standards though, so it's not exactly Stark's fault. "

" Hey, I honestly think the better question is, "Was Cap. the villain?" Captain AMERICA went against what the AMERICAN people wanted. Which BTW the same ppl that wanted it, were protesting it later. Let's just all agree. Civil War was a VERY interesting premise, but it turned out to be shit. "

Technically the story seemed to be written in such a way that you rooted for Anti-Reg, but from a real world perspective, technically Iron Man was a good guy. He merely sided with the law plain and simple. The problem is how the registration was carried out. It's like the government has no PR skills in Civil War. Imagine if we rolled out the National Guard and sent them on a no holds bar zero tolerance mission to round up all the illegal immigrants in the US. Technically the villain is the US. Iron Man isn't a villain he was just stupid to get in between.  
 
Civil War started off great, but it ultimately was anti-climactic. 

Where in the constitution does it say that we are allowed to perform vigilante justice without anyone knowing who we are, and those with special abilities only answer to people like ourselves rather than the American people?
 
 The one thing I didn't agree with the registration act about was that everyone had to work for and presumably take orders from either shield or the government.

Vigilants will always change the world. Let that be a lesson from Civil War.

I dunno, I personally am GLAD that Tony's side one so...I say he's a hero. Although some of his methods were pretty villian like. (example: sending a bunch of villian to beat the cr#p out of Spider-man when he went rouge) but still, everyone makes mistakes...
 
 

Even the roosevelt comparison is inaccurate. He imprisoned anyone who had japanese ancestry, Stark imprisioned anyone who was an unregistered hero.
 
You can't stop having Japanese ancestry, but there are 2 ways to stop being an unregistered hero: 1) register, or 2) stop being a hero.

"Even the roosevelt comparison is inaccurate. He imprisoned anyone who had japanese ancestry, Stark imprisioned anyone who was an unregistered hero. You can't stop having Japanese ancestry, but there are 2 ways to stop being an unregistered hero: 1) register, or 2) stop being a hero. "

" @ShirEPanjshir:    First of all, thanks for being a pro and not yelling at me for not agreeing with you. I can't TELL you how refreshing that is ;>)     Second, I don't consider Tony A Villain...I consider him THE Villain of the "Civil War".     In your comment you make mention of "...some people higher up with somewhat more selfish intentions to enrich themselves." and you're right, of course...but I say that the comparison still fits with the Marvel Civil War.     After all, not all of the people Tony surrounded himself with were on board for the sake of the betterment of all. Tony Stark brought a LOT of villains to his side, and gave some (Norman Osborn, for example) positions of importance in his organization. Would Norman have been promoted to head of EVERYTHING if he'd been...left out of the loop? I think not. All Norman was able to do was take advantage of the position Tony had give him. People act like Norman took over through some grand scheme or masterful brinksmanship...when in actuality Norman was JUST LUCKY ENOUGH to be filmed shooting the right woman in the head.      Norman wouldn't even have been there...if Tony had left him in prison. Tony didn't do it all intentionally, but most of his decisions durring and after the Civil War seem not just flawed...but obviously so.    "

" @John_Feaster said:

" @ShirEPanjshir:    First of all, thanks for being a pro and not yelling at me for not agreeing with you. I can't TELL you how refreshing that is ;>)     Second, I don't consider Tony A Villain...I consider him THE Villain of the "Civil War".     In your comment you make mention of "...some people higher up with somewhat more selfish intentions to enrich themselves." and you're right, of course...but I say that the comparison still fits with the Marvel Civil War.     After all, not all of the people Tony surrounded himself with were on board for the sake of the betterment of all. Tony Stark brought a LOT of villains to his side, and gave some (Norman Osborn, for example) positions of importance in his organization. Would Norman have been promoted to head of EVERYTHING if he'd been...left out of the loop? I think not. All Norman was able to do was take advantage of the position Tony had give him. People act like Norman took over through some grand scheme or masterful brinksmanship...when in actuality Norman was JUST LUCKY ENOUGH to be filmed shooting the right woman in the head.      Norman wouldn't even have been there...if Tony had left him in prison. Tony didn't do it all intentionally, but most of his decisions durring and after the Civil War seem not just flawed...but obviously so.    "

No problem for the not yelling etc. I realize that different people have different opinions, and I always find it intriguing to see how someone else thinks on a certain subject ( especially is it's a rational thought out process ^^).. Now I agree that Tony did indeed surround himself with some wrong people. But I also think that if you get caught up in a Civil War like that, it's easier for people with bad intentions to get mixed into things. I agree that Norman might 've never gotten to where he got without Tony sort of inviting him to the table. But I also think Tony had a lot of things on his mind, thus making bad decisions happens faster, though it indeed shouldn't have.
On the Norman Osborn shooting note; he actually did plan that. He somehow -- I don't think it was ever explained how -- learned of the fact that Deadpool was going to steal sensitive information on how to take down the Skrulls ( and more specific their Queen ) for Nick Fury and when Deadpool completed this mission and sent Fury the stolen information, Norman somehow intercepted the data and used it for his advantage. He also planned for his 'heroic act' to be captured by the camera's etc. So it actually was pretty thought out, but as you said; the question could indeed be asked; would Norman Osborn have gotten that far without Tony Stark "allowing" him to gain more power during the Civil War. I agree that since Civil War, it seems like Tony made a lot of flawed decisions, especially for someone who thinks of many possible bad scenario's and prepares for them. Something that I always found odd is that Tony did prepare for an invasion by building that gigantic War Machine armor satellite thingy. But someone never built in a protection/back-up system for his own cybernetic systems etc. And some other weird things like that. I just assume it's a part of "bad writing". They needed someone douchy at the helm to make some fatal mistakes as a reason to trigger all these events they've been throwing at us, and Tony drew the short straw. "

 The whole point of the arch was that the reader decided who was right and who was wrong. By the end of it all they kind of left Iron Man looking like the obvious asshole though, but not because of his pro REG choice but because of the lengths he went to to defend his side. They tried to do the same with Captain America to even it out, but they never went far enugh to make it as on par with what Iron Man did.
 
Personally I feel in the middle and felt both sides were wrong. As a normal person living in a world where individuals had the power to blow up cities I would want to know that there were equally powerful people looking in on them. I think the best option would have been to form a completely independent organization, funded equally by all the worlds countries, to form a school where anyone with super powers could freely come to and learn how to control them. No names would have to be given, no mandate to server the whims of any country or to even use the powers to fight crime. Simply a school to teach people how to control there powers and to teach them why they should not abuse them. Just have a simple phone number that you can call any place in the world and have some one come and take you to thw closest school where you can stay as long as you like.

No, he is the main atagonist, but he is not evil, he believed that all that he did was good. He has a guilt complex, and he believed that that thing that happened in Stamford was also his fault, so he wanted to do everything needed  for that not to happen again.

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" @John_Feaster:  But the Negative zone was Tony's Idea, right? For that reson Spidey betrayed him (also for the Thor cloned) "

Tony Stark was written to be a fascist dictator in his actions, regardless of his meaning. All fascist dictators believe what they're doing to be the right thing.  Doesn't stop them being fascist.  I've seen many people compare him to Hitler even, though I personally compare him more-so to Stalin.
 
I think it was a stupid way to write a very smart man.  And then they lumped Reed in with him.. totally against both characters intelligence and morals.  It was a terrible excuse to just have heroes fight one another.  Both of them were written to be very stupid, giving in to public uneducated soccer mom fear opinion that is actually a very real result of tragedy that real world leaders are smart enough to not go along with.  Real world leaders wait for the bloodcries to die down and do their best to calm people down.   What Tony's side did was comparable to what Stalin's regeme did to their own people.  Dragging them away in the streets in front of their family, locking them up where they may never be found, sending killers after those they see as betraying them, hunting down those who are just trying to legally leave the mad country, etc.  
 
To me it was the death of Marvel comics, and I have only purchased 3 Marvel comics since that entire series.

"Tony Stark was written to be a fascist dictator in his actions, regardless of his meaning. All fascist dictators believe what they're doing to be the right thing.  Doesn't stop them being fascist.  I've seen many people compare him to Hitler even, though I personally compare him more-so to Stalin. I think it was a stupid way to write a very smart man.  And then they lumped Reed in with him.. totally against both characters intelligence and morals.  It was a terrible excuse to just have heroes fight one another.  Both of them were written to be very stupid, giving in to public uneducated soccer mom fear opinion that is actually a very real result of tragedy that real world leaders are smart enough to not go along with.  Real world leaders wait for the bloodcries to die down and do their best to calm people down.   What Tony's side did was comparable to what Stalin's regeme did to their own people.  Dragging them away in the streets in front of their family, locking them up where they may never be found, sending killers after those they see as betraying them, hunting down those who are just trying to legally leave the mad country, etc.   To me it was the death of Marvel comics, and I have only purchased 3 Marvel comics since that entire series. "

 @John_Feaster said:

    Nobody expects The Hulk or Deadpool to make better decisions, but Tony should have known better. Heck, the Regestration Act wasn't going to pass till Tony paid a supervillain (the 3rd Titanium Man) to publicly attack him...which a lot of people don't seem to remember... "

@Nova`Prime`

"Tony and all Pro-Reg heroes and the government, where the bad guys because they were going against the Constitution. "