Review: Iron Man 2

IRON MAN 2
dir. Jon Favreau
Paramount Pictures
Rating: 3.5 out of 5

     Marvel Comics is making its way through the collection of Stan Lee's most famous comics and turning them into some of the best action movies around. With the success of X-Men (Bryan Singer, 2000) the company has teamed up with Paramount, Columbia, Universal and 20th Century Fox distribution companies to bring us some of the biggest names in movies all decade: Spider-Man, Hulk, and Iron Man. Other companies followed suit in a frenzied attempt to bring their comics, cartoons, and video games to the big screen in hopes of winning big. But with such a limited variety of superheroes, and Marvel Comic's ever growing greed for money combined with the audiences thirst for more superheroes, it becomes inevitable that every superhero has his sequel (and often third installment) and Iron Man is no exception.
     As Tony Stark declares "I am Iron Man," the crowd cheers and the curtains fall, end of Act I. Two years later, the audience is hurtled back into the world of Mr. Stark and his iron suit for Act II, where they find that not all is well for someone who calls himself a superhero. The government wants the "Iron Man weapon" turned over to the military so that an ordinary civilian isn't the one keeping the world in peace (which has apparently happened in the past couple years). Also in the past couple years, Stark Industries has built a city of peace, technologically advanced, and the site of the Stark Expo, where all of the greatest inventions are displayed before hundreds of people. Of course not only heroes want to show off their goodies at the show.
     Like all great superhero sequels, the film must show a darker side of what it means to have to save everyone's lives. In Spider-Man, Peter Parker began to lose his power and decided to give up the suit for a while. In The Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne learns that being the Batman isn't always a reward. But many of these tales are very dark, and bring an eerie side to the joviality of superhero-hood. Iron Man attempts to step just to the right of being that dark sequel and shows the audience a mixture of generic superhero sequels and something a little less gloomy. Favreau himself said in an interview through SuperheroHype.com that they were going for something a little less dark this time around, "We didn't want to make it an exploration of the darkness of the human soul, but we definitely showed Tony's dark side a bit in our words."

     The dark side tends to be childish: Tony Stark's enemy is his competitor Justin Hammer, played by Sam Rockwell, who attempts to outdo the Iron Man by simply mimicking it, a failure waiting to happen. The childish anger that comes with the competition, however, is rather uninteresting. It's a cliche that many low budget action movies seem to suffer from. Instead of a competent and truly sinister opponent, characters in these less than intriguing films are blubbering idiots who mimic what the good guy does and just happens to succeed (but at the cost of himself more than the protagonist). The other villain, Whiplash played by Mickey Rourke, is much more competent, but seems held back. With a limited English vocabulary (his mother tongue is Russian), and "limited resources" he is unable to defeat the Iron Man by himself and requires help from someone with resources. If this character had been further developed, instead of Justin Hammer, the movie might had that "Dark Knight" beauty to it.

     All in all, the movie seemed to be a move away from reality into a more cartoon realm, especially with the inclusion of Samuel L. Jackson's character Nick Fury, the one-eyed man who leads the Avengers in the upcoming film The Avengers in which a group of superheroes from all the superhero movies come together to fight some bad guys. What worked for Spider-Man and Batman Begins more than most other comic-book-made-movies, was the strong foundation the films had in reality, Batman especially. These are everyday people who just happen to be able to help the community with their talents. The villains are also ordinary people who just tend to dislike the current situation they find themselves in and decide to change things by being evil. It is this strong foundation in reality (which I believe The Incredible Hulk (Louis Leterrier, 2008) lacked), that draws the audience to view the sequels. Iron Man 2 loses that tight grip that the first installment had, and lets characters like Nick Fury and Agent Romanoff take larger roles in the story.

     The film does, however, make very good use of its medium. Although rather Hollywood in style, the camera never misses an opportunity to show us what movie magic can do. Favreau frames his characters perfectly in cinescope 2.35:1 aspect ratio, with some of the best CG effects since the first Iron Man. But, was the CG used to enhance the story, or just there to be a spectacle?

Watch the trailer at Apple