His race, his military experience, and his sense of morality are often used to contrast him with Tony Stark and to analyze the themes of Iron Man stories through a different perspective.

War Machine is the primary romantic interest of Carol Danvers, while many of his other supporting characters and villains overlap with those of Iron Man.

An adaptation of War Machine appears in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, portrayed by Terrence Howard in Iron Man (2008) and by Don Cheadle in subsequent appearances.James Rhodes was created by writer David Michelinie with artists John Byrne and Bob Layton.

[7] He was established as a more prominent supporting character in Iron Man #144 (1981), which described his connection to Tony Stark and how they met during the Vietnam War.

[2][8] When Denny O'Neil was the writer for Iron Man comics, he chose to write Stark out of the role entirely in favor of Rhodes.

[10] A black superhero replacing a white one was almost unprecedented at the time, with DC Comics having only recently attempted a similar change with its character John Stewart, who was created by O'Neil.

[11] From this change, O'Neil created a story arc in which Stark relapsed into alcoholism and Rhodes reluctantly took up the armor and the title of Iron Man.

[12] For the duration of the story arc, the Iron Man series focused primarily on Rhodes, with Stark's recovery being relegated to a subplot.

[16] He began using the War Machine armor at this time, continuing as Iron Man until Stark returned the following year in issue #289.

[17] Iron Man writer Len Kaminski did not intend to give Rhodes the War Machine armor permanently, but editor Nel Yomtov insisted after it was well received.

[19][20] The character received his own series with the release of War Machine #1 (1994), written by Kaminski and Scott Benson and penciled by Gabriel Gecko.

[26] The short-lived 2003 series The Crew by Christopher Priest and Joe Bennett featured War Machine as a main character.

[26] As anti-terrorism became a prominent theme in fiction after the September 11 attacks, War Machine slowly became a more significant supporting character.

The political thriller series Iron Patriot ran in 2014, written by Ales Kot and illustrated by Garry Brown.

[32] As part of Marvel's 2016 Civil War II event, Rhodes's character was killed off to emphasize the story's stakes.

[7] While serving in the Vietnam War, Rhodes encounters Iron Man, who had just built his first armor and escaped from his captors, and the two work together to reach safety at the U.S.

Since the armor was not designed for Rhodes, he begins experiencing headaches and mood swings, eventually returning the role to Stark in its entirety.

[24] Rhodes retires from superhero work, and he briefly runs a salvage business until he finds himself investigating the death of his sister.

[26] When Rhodes is injured in a terrorist attack, he is augmented with cybernetic body parts, permanently turning him into War Machine.

[28] He travels to the fictional Middle Eastern country Aqiria where he encounters a military contractor that tortures and experiments on prisoners.

[42] This aspect of his character was emphasized in the 2014 series Iron Patriot, which contrasted his sense of moral duty with his responsibility to his family.

[26] He believes that the role of superheroes goes beyond fighting supervillains and that they should also take action against global problems such as world hunger and oppressive governments.

[43] War Machine is an African American superhero in a genre that historically presented white characters as the default without meaningfully portraying the lives or worldviews of racial minorities.

[7] His unsuccessful tenure as Iron Man similarly reflected the conservative belief that racial minorities were harmed by sudden increases in power.

Rhodes allowed these issues to be explored from a different perspective, of a character who diverged from the realism associated with Stark's Iron Man and whose views were influenced by his African American identity.

[22] Unlike other black Marvel heroes such as Falcon and Cloak, Rhodes's race is not explicitly invoked as a defining aspect of his character or a common source of conflict.

This was somewhat addressed when Rhodes received his own standalone series,[4] but the nature of the character inherently ties his identity to that of Iron Man.

[14] War Machine has adopted several of Stark's allies as his own supporting characters, including Suzi Endo and Bethany Cabe.

[34] Carol Danvers, the superhero Captain Marvel and a fellow military veteran, has been the primary romantic interest for Rhodes.