The Iron Man Encyclopedia

Mark 2

(Tales of Suspense #48 Dec. 1963)
Backstory-
After the Mark 1 suffered almost lethal loss against the powers of "Mister Doll" (or Nathan Dolly). Tony built a new suit. Mr. Doll uses Voodoo dolls of people to control there actions, he created a doll of the Mark 1 and used to easily defeat IronMan. Luckily Tony Stark had been keeping his identity a secret to the world and Mr. Doll doesn't think to make a doll of Tony himself. Tony builds an all new suit from the ground up to defeat Mr. Doll and calls it the Mark 2. This suit includes all new IronMan features and is the first appearance of the well known Red-Gold color scheme on a Mark. Aside from the face-mask all the gold portions of the suit are made of a newly designed metal fabric. It successfully conquers the voodoo user and thereafter Tony begins using the Mark 2 as his primary suit.

General overview-
In the original creation the suit didn't posses Repulsor Rays on the palms, or the AI Jarvis, but in the (2009) Armor Wars the suit had both those features as well as advanced eye and mouth guards. This suit did have built in magnetic and electric Repulsors (not channeled into Rays) that could be used weapons, and it also contained extra batteries in the wrists in case his Chest battery failed. The armor also included varying sensors to detect movement and life-signs, a hidden blade, a first aid kit, and an electro-magnetic pulse (E.M.P.).The suit was also built to better utilize the power it was using and was much more energy efficient. The Golden portions of the suit uses a metal-alloy, that is more akin to a fabric. This was invented by Tony himself, this fabrics is extremely durable and flexible and is included in many more Mark designs. The suit does possess functioning thrusters, more tech equipment than the first suit, and it set the standard for all future suits to come. It's easily recognizable from its the spiked designs on top of the mask. This suit is significantly weaker than the Mark 1 but out performs it in speed, maneuverability, flight, and overall practicality.

Interesting side notes-
Like I mentioned above the Mark 2 appeared in the (2009) Iron Man armor wars, as well as the original (1987) Armor Wars. In the 2009 series the Mark 2 was causing havoc along-side the stolen Mark 7 and Mark 11 (more commonly known as the War Machine). It was defeated along with the Mark 7 and 11 by Tony while he was manning the Mark 1. Upon recovery of the Mark 2 Tony switched to using it for quite some time as the Mark 1's thrusters were damaged.
It should noted that when manning the Mark 2 this time it wasn't all together, Tony was in a hurry while changing suits and didn't have the time to connect the metal-fabric parts to the other pieces leaving much of his body fully exposed. Also the suit had noticeably wrinkled near the neck, this was from when the Mark 1 punched it during their fight.

(MCU Mark 2 designs as seen in Iron Man-(2008) and Iron Man 2- 2010)
In the MCU-
Tony designs the Mark 2 in Iron Man (2008) a prototype to test enhanced flight and the use of greater technologies in the suit. The suit falls from the sky during its test flight, right into Tony's car collection, but Tony survived. All later Marks were based on this suits general design and model. The suit is rebuilt to function properly and is powerful enough to match more advanced Marks. It possesses super strength, super speed, Repulsor Rays, an ark reactor, the unibeam, flight, facial recognition, aim assist and many other tech-based functions. Rhodey mans this suit in Iron Man 2 (2010) to fight Tony while he's out-of-control drunk at his own house party. They ultimately equal out when their Repulsor Rays collide, creating a devastating explosion. Rhodey then flys off with the Mark 2 and gives it to the Military. While there it is enhanced, and heavily outfitted with the weaponry of the US military and Hammer tech. This turns it into what is now known as the "War Machine."
The War Machine has all the functions of the Mark 2 but upgraded and modified to an unknown extent. The suit possesses the already established  super strength, super speed, Repulsor Rays, ark reactor, unibeam, flight, facial recognition, aim assist, and it adds wrist mounted machine guns, a high caliber rail gun on his right shoulder, some missiles, and extra armor plating. This is later given a paint job and changed to the "Iron patriot" in Iron Man 3 (2013), but this change doesn't last long as it is returned to the War Machine in Avengers age of Ultron (2015).