Iron Man 2: (May 7, 2010): PG-13
Distributor: Paramount Pictures
Opening Weekend Box-Office: #1 with $128,122,480
Domestic Box-Office Gross to-date: $312,057,433
Gross Revenue: $621,659,433
Budget: $170 - $200 million
Director: Jon Favreau
First off, its pretty easy to call Iron Man 2 one of the most anticipated movies of the summer, not only did it benefit from being released on the first official weekend of the summer movie season (a position coveted by studios), and very positive memories of 2008’s hugely successful Iron Man, but from a marketing standpoint, it had a staggering number of promotional tie-ins. Burger King put its “King” in Iron Man armor, Audi promoted its newest model as the pinnacle of Stark technology (plus Tony drives one in the film), and comics legend Stan Lee made a cameo in a commercial where a janitor is “suited up” by Stark’s computer Jarvis into a Dr. Pepper machine. And let’s not forget that Iron Man’s face was on nearly every Dr. Pepper can available. Seriously, who didn’t know that Iron Man 2 was coming out and was anticipated to be one of the biggest movies of the summer?
Robert Downey Jr.’s performance in the first Iron Man was spectacular, given his past and his ability to overcome adversity, no actor in Hollywood was better “suited” to play Tony Stark. Let’s face it, superhero movies are usually box-office gold, and with its extremely dedicated fan base, it’s important to stay true to the source material and the spirit of the character. For instance, I have long said that whoever cast George Clooney as Batman in Batman and Robin should have lost his job…don’t get me wrong, George Clooney is an amazing actor, but he is NOT Batman. Anyway, back to Iron Man. After the first film, the introduction of the character was complete, and now it was up to director Jon Favreau to successfully navigate the talented cast through the complicated character mythology.
In this sequel, Tony Stark is now settling into his role as Iron Man, but given that he revealed his identity to the world at the end of the first film, he must deal with others attempting to replicate and control his weapons technology. One of the more humorous scenes in the movie comes from a Congressional meeting where a Senator Sterns (played by Gary Shandling) tries to convince Stark to turn over the Iron Man armor to the U.S. Government. Adding to Tony’s stress is the fact that the original arc reactor that he built in the first movie is slowly poisoning him (ironically keeping him alive and killing him at the same time). As a result, Tony’s behavior becomes more erratic and self-destructive, which actually a nice nod to the classic Iron Man storyline in the comics, “Demon in a Bottle,” where Stark battles alcoholism. Tony also finds himself the target of a vengeful inventor Ivan Vanko (played by Mickey Rourke, who apparently visited Russian prisons as part of researching his role). Fun fact: Vanko’s character is actually a cross between two Iron Man villains from the comics, Whiplash and Crimson Dynamo, and the movie faithfully references both of these influences. With all of these threats, Tony has the help of two new allies, War Machine and Black Widow. War Machine is Colonel Rhodes’ (Don Cheadle) heroic alter ego, who was referenced in the first film, and Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) is a top agent for the government agency S.H.I.E.L.D (also from the first film. With these two character additions, comic fans were sure to be more than pleased.
Overall, I loved the movie…not a hard stretch considering that I’m a superhero fanatic, but at the same time, there are a few criticisms. Iron Man 2 lacks some of the charm of the original, but I believe that is because both Robert Downey Jr.’s performance and the overall introduction of the character of Iron Man were such pleasant surprises for the movie-going public back in 2008. Now that the shock and awe has worn off, its hard to replicate the quality of the original. That being said, Robert Downey Jr. delivers yet again, and I was surprised by how much I enjoyed Don Cheadle as Colonel Rhodes. Terrence Howard fit the role perfectly in the first film, and many were disappointed when it was announced that he would not return for the sequel (rumors range between Howard asking for too much money to director Jon Favreau not liking his performance in the first film). Either way, switching actors of an established character between sequels is a risky move, but Cheadle got the job done.
A good example of where a switch like this could backfire would be Chris Nolan switching Maggie Gyllenhaal for Katie Holmes as ADA Rachel Dawes in the most recent Batman films, but that involved switching an attractive actress with no real acting talent for a good actress who wasn’t quite attractive enough to justify both Batman and Harvey Dent fighting over her; but, the character was killed off, so bring on Catwoman as the next love interest. Speaking of love interests, fans of Scarlett Johansson will be more than pleased with her character of Black Widow in Iron Man 2, primarily because she kicks the crap out of henchmen while in a skin-tight leather jumpsuit. Even Mickey Rourke (whose career comeback started with 2008’s The Wrestler), did a great job as the villain, wearing enough tattoos and spouting enough Russian to assure the audience that he was a threat. The story was a little weak at times, but there’s enough special effects to keep the key demographic of males aged 18-35 more than happy…suffice to say that there were enough badass explosions and special effects to make Michael Bay jealous.
My two biggest criticisms from the film are Gwyneth Paltrow and Sam Rockwell. Forget the fact that Jon Favreau put a little too much of his character Happy Hogan (Stark’s driver) in his own movie compared to the first film, these characters are worthy of more criticisms. Paltrow’s Pepper Potts was an engaging and sarcastic love interest in the fist film, but in this sequel she is reduced to merely complaining and yelling at Stark, to the point where the audience’s reaction is akin to: “He’s Iron Man, he’s saving the world, and he just promoted you, get off his back!” And then there’s Sam Rockwell. I have tremendous respect for Sam Rockwell as an actor (his “Wild Bill” from The Green Mile still creeps me out), but in Iron Man 2, he was just annoying. Rockwell plays Justin Hammer, a business rival to Tony Stark who hires Vanko to replicate Stark’s technology. There was plenty of room for villainy here (his comic counterpart is notoriously sinister), but Rockwell’s character couldn’t decide whether he was evil or not, whining about deals made and at one point dancing across the screen while making a presentation…it was like, “nice try, but get off the screen, you’re done.” Aside from these two characters, I still maintain that any fans of the first Iron Man film owe it to themselves to see this sequel.
Now, the other big part of the Iron Man franchise involves tie-ins to the rest of the Marvel Universe that will culminate in 2012’s The Avengers. Think of the Avengers as the Marvel Comics Justice League (made up of Iron Man, Captain America, Thor, and the Hulk). In addition to Stan Lee’s cameos in nearly every Marvel movie, the writers are doing an excellent job of tying the Marvel Universe together. The government organization that leads the Avengers (S.H.I.E.L.D.) was introduced in the first film, Captain America’s shield was briefly seen, and Samuel L. Jackson appeared in a post-credit scene as Nick Fury, the head of S.H.I.E.L.D. (perfect casting when you consider Samuel L. Jackson is actually the character model for Nick Fury in the comics). Robert Downey Jr. also made a cameo as Tony Stark in 2008’s The Incredible Hulk (which was way better than anyone gave it credit for). Now, in Iron Man 2, Captain America’s shield makes a big appearance and the hammer of Thor is shown in a post-credits scene. With Thor and Captain America: the First Avenger due out next summer, (Chris Evans has apparently signed on to play Captain America in as many as 11 films and subsequent tie-ins) it’s going to be quite interesting to see how the rest of these Marvel powerhouses are portrayed on-screen.
Iron Man 2 isn’t as strong a sequel as past classics Spider-Man 2 and X2: X-Men United, but it is still enjoyable and worth seeing. Hopefully Marvel can make some tweaks and deliver a strong Iron Man 3…considering that Marvel usually drops the ball closing out a trilogy (Spider-Man 3 and X-Men: The Last Stand were easily the weakest of their respective series). Only time will tell.
Overall Recommendation: High
