The End of Extremis?

It seems to be the consensus among Iron Man fans that Extremis has not been good for the character, especially for the man beneath the armor. But recently a few things have sprung up that are making me wonder if we are beginning to see the downfall of Extremis?

First is the current arc written by the Knauf’s with the Mandarin who is attempting to release and Extremis “plague” so to speak on the world population. As we all know once something bad happens with something Stark is using it sends him into a moral spiral where he debates if it should be used any longer period. This normally results in him deciding negatively and trying to destroy or shut down whatever the technology/substance/item is. A good case of this is the original Armor Wars saga where he went on a rampage destroying any Stark tech that wasn’t being used by himself.

So if Extremis does get released, even if it’s limited to one or two people, will it send Stark on yet another personal quest to wipe it out? If the Knauf’s know Stark (which they seem to unlike most Marvel writers in recent years) they may very well send him into an introverted state and then out into the world to wipe out all traces of Extremis, both those who have it and all the information on it (though I don’t expect him to go on a murderous rampage, more like an Extremis negator pack or a biological equivalent that will kill the virus but leave the person unharmed). Time will tell and as the arc is coming to an end we will find out soon.

Second is the release of the movie. The movie will have impact on the comics, how much though is unknown. One thing for certain is that new readers drawn in by the movie will be wondering what the hell the Extremis thing is. As it is somewhat of a long story and you cant really just mention everything behind it in a few frames, Marvel may well opt out to retcon it out in some way, or, and this is a stretch nowadays, actually write it out of the comic in the current continuity. Of course they could just do some back-story issues that used to occur in the 90’s that were basically a waste of an issue, but I don’t see them doing that.

Now this is pure speculation on my part; I could be completely wrong in my assessment, and I wont deny I may just be grasping at a fragile hope something I hate will be done away with. But I do think the seeds of Extremis destruction are very well being sewn in the current arc.