One thing that made the release of Iron Man a bit of a risk was that Iron Man has always been a B-list Marvel character. Important enough in the grand scheme of things to be a major player, but not someone who had impinged much on the popular consciousness beyond comics readers. Spider-Man, thanks to three successful animated series and his use in The Electric Company kids show in the 1970s, and the X-Men, thanks to their immense popularity in comics as well as a hit animated series of their own, had a Q-rating outside comics readers. So did the Hulk, thanks to the Bill Bixby TV show and followup movies. Indeed, going into 2008, Iron Man was a much bigger risk in most people’s eyes than The Incredible Hulk.
Then 2008 actually happened, and by 2010, everyone was waiting for an Iron Man sequel…
Where the first movie took dual inspiration from the character’s 1963 origin and the 1980s storyline involving Obadiah Stane’s dismantling of Stark’s life, this second movie went back to the late 1960s and 1970s for inspiration, using two of Iron Man’s villains of the era, Whiplash and Justin Hammer, as well as copious use of S.H.I.E.L.D. Tony Stark was established as a major part of S.H.I.E.L.D. when the spy organization was introduced in 1965, and S.H.I.E.L.D. has remained a supporting presence in ShellHead’s comics ever since.
The second movie in particular feels like it was right out of the David Michelinie/John Romita Jr./Bob Layton era of the comics—when Hammer was a major bad guy of Iron Man’s—and it’s worth mentioning that initially director Jon Favreau, star Robert Downey Jr., and screenwriter Justin Theroux considered adapting the “Demon in a Bottle” story that Michelinie et al did, which established Stark’s alcoholism.
This movie also introduced two new heroes to the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the Black Widow and War Machine, both characters who originally debuted in Iron Man comics.
War Machine was set up in the previous movie with the use of the character of James Rhodes. An Air Force colonel in the movies, in the comics he was initially introduced in Iron Man #116 as Stark’s pilot, and in Iron Man #144 was retconned into Iron Man’s origin as the pilot who flew Iron Man out of Vietnam after he escaped from imprisonment by Wong-Chu in Tales of Suspense #39.
In the very same storyline that gave us Stane, Stark descended into alcoholism, to the point that Rhodes wound up having to take over as Iron Man. Even after Stark was eventually able to get back on the wagon, Rhodes continued as Iron Man, participating in the Secret Wars event and becoming a founding member of the West Coast Avengers.
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Vengeful
Eventually, Stark wound up back in the armor, but unlike most status quo restorations in comics, this one proved less popular because Rhodes as Iron Man had actually been rather successful. Later on, Stark faked his death, leaving Rhodes to take over as Iron Man again, as well as head of Stark Enterprises. When Stark revealed his deception, Rhodes got pissed, but Stark let him keep the armor he’d been using, and he changed his name to War Machine. From that point forward, Marvel was able to eat its cake and have it too, with both Stark and Rhodes as armored heroes. The MCU, starting with this movie, did likewise, as Rhodes, now played by Don Cheadle after a rather acrimonious split with Terrence Howard, has continued to appear in the MCU after this, in Iron Man 3, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Captain America: Civil War, and Avengers: Infinity War and its forthcoming sequel.
Natasha Romanova first appeared as a Soviet spy in Tales of Suspense #52. She was a recurring antagonist for Iron Man, along with a former carny she seduced named Clint Barton, a.k.a. Hawkeye. Both Romanova and Barton eventually switched sides, becoming heroes and allies. In her initial appearance, Romanova was going after a scientist named Anton Vanko, who was also the Soviet armored adventurer known as the Crimson Dynamo. Iron Man 2 opted to fold Vanko together with the villain Whiplash—in the comics, Whiplash was named Marco Scarlotti, and he worked for the mob—and later the comics would bring this version of Whiplash (with no relation to the other Vanko) to the mainline canon.
Romanova was originally to be played by Emily Blunt, but she was unavailable for filming, so was replaced with Scarlett Johansson, who has also appeared in Avengers, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Avengers: Age of Ultron, Captain America: Civil War, and Avengers: Infinity War and its sequel. That she hasn’t yet gotten her own movie remains utterly inexplicable, though that’s allegedly being rectified.
Downey Jr. as Stark, Favreau as Happy Hogan, Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts, Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury, Leslie Bibb as Christine Everhart, Paul Bettany as J.A.R.V.I.S., and Clark Gregg as Phil Coulson all return from the previous film. Newly cast, besides Cheadle and Johansson, are Sam Rockwell as Hammer, Mickey Rourke as Vanko, John Slattery as Howard Stark, and Garry Shandling as Senator Stern. Elon Musk also makes a cameo as himself.
Downey Jr., Johansson, Paltrow, and Bettany will next appear in Avengers. Jackson and Gregg will next appear in Thor. The character of Howard Stark will next be seen as a much younger man during World War II and its aftermath played by Dominic Cooper in Captain America: The First Avenger and the TV series Agent Carter, while Slattery will return to the role of the older version of Howard in Ant-Man and Captain America: Civil War. Rockwell will return in the one-shot All Hail the King, and Shandling will be back in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
“Not everyone runs on batteries, Tony”
Iron Man 2
Written by Justin Theroux
Directed by Jon Favreau
Produced by Kevin Feige
Original release date: May 7, 2010
In Russia, Anton Vanko and his son Ivan are watching Tony Stark’s press conference from the end of Iron Man. Anton dies, and the younger Vanko starts working on an ARC reactor based on the original blueprints, which he has a copy of, and which has the names Anton Vanko and Howard Stark on it.
Six months later, Stark hosts the opening of the Stark Expo, a year-long World’s Fair-style science exhibition held in Queens, New York. (If you look carefully, you can see the unisphere and the two spaceships from Men in Black.) The last Stark Expo was hosted by Howard in 1974, and Stark even plays the intro film his father showed back then.
Stark is also concerned because his blood toxicity level is high. The only power source for the small reactor in his chest that works is palladium, which is slowly killing him. It’s one reason why the large-scale reactor was never practical. He hasn’t actually told anyone about this.
He and Happy Hogan head out in one of his new cars, but are intercepted by a very lovely woman, who gets Stark’s attention long enough for her to serve him. He’s been subpoenaed by the U.S. Senate.
In Washington, he’s grilled by Senator Stern, who wants him to turn the “Iron Man weapon” over to the government. Stark refuses, saying it’s his property, and that he’s privatized world peace. Both Jim Rhodes and Justin Hammer are brought in as witnesses, the former to Stark’s lack of being fit to be a full-time asset of the government, the latter as the government’s new big weapons contractor since Stark stopped making weapons. Stark shows how incompetent Hammer is—including his trying to sell knock-off Iron Man armor to America’s enemies—and Stark leaves the hearing triumphantly even as Stern tosses profanities at him. Stark testifies before the Senate committee (and all the cameras) that the rest of the world is 5-20 years away from achieving this technology.
Pepper Potts tries to get Stark to focus on the company, which is in free-fall after the hearing, and his solution is to make her CEO. Potts is flabbergasted, but goes along with it, and gets Natalie Rushman from legal to prepare the paperwork, which Stark signs while working with Hogan on boxing. Stark flirts with Rushman, who puts Hogan on the floor when they’re in the ring together. Stark immediately hires her as his personal assistant, to Potts’s chagrin.
Stark goes to Monaco for the Grand Prix Monaco Historique, where one of his cars is in the race. Also present are Elon Musk, Larry King (who looks just like Stan Lee), and Hammer, who is being interviewed by Christine Everhart.
In the interests of showing up Hammer, Stark fires his driver and decides to race his stock car himself.
Also present is Vanko, who has spent the last half-year creating electric whips powered by an ARC reactor of his own design. He walks onto the race track and uses the whips to destroy one car, cause others to crash, and eventually slice Stark’s car in twain. Hogan and Potts take the Iron Man armor, which is in briefcase form, out onto the track. Hogan slams the car into Vanko several times, but his armor holds up to the punishment. Eventually, Stark gets the briefcase and armors up, making short work of Vanko.
However, Vanko doesn’t mind being captured, because he’s accomplished what he set out to do: show that Stark was wrong in what he said to Congress about the technology. Stark is able to visit Vanko in prison, where he gives him advice about cycle rate, and Vanko returns the favor by saying that the Stark family stole from the Vanko family.
Hammer watched Vanko’s demonstration at the racetrack and immediately moves to get him broken out of jail, the body of another inmate subbed in for his to die in an explosion. He then has Vanko create Iron Man-style armor for him to sell to the U.S. government.
Stark has become more unstable, the palladium poisoning getting worse. He holds a birthday party at which he gets spectacularly drunk while wearing the armor. Rhodes shows up, having just assured the Joint Chiefs of Staff that Stark is fine, only to find him using his repulsors to blow up bottles of liquor. Fed up, Rhodes goes to the basement of the house and puts on one of the alternate armors, which is silver. The two of them get into a major fight, badly damaging the house. Rhodes flies off and turns the armor over to the Air Force. Stark flies off and eats a donut.
Nick Fury confronts him in the donut shop, with the help of “Rushman,” really S.H.I.E.L.D. Agent Natasha Romanoff. Stark is grumpy at having a deep-cover agent assigned to him. Fury is less than impressed that Iron Man managed to let his best friend just walk off with a suit of armor like that. He also reveals that he knew Howard, and that Howard in fact co-founded S.H.I.E.L.D. All Stark remembers of his father was that he barely paid any attention to his son. Fury leaves Stark with a case full of Howard’s stuff, including the raw footage of his Stark Expo intro film, including some drunken outtakes.
Along the way, he comes across a message Howard recorded for Tony: the technology isn’t far enough along for him to take the final step for the ARC reactor, but he’s hoping that his son will live long enough to be able to manage it. The Stark Expo, he says, is for him.
Stark slips his S.H.I.E.L.D. minders (one of whom is Phil Coulson, though he slipped when Coulson was off duty) to talk to Potts, and he tries to tell her that he’s dying, but she’s too pissed at how much crap she has to deal with as CEO that he never gets to tell her. It doesn’t help that he got her strawberries—the one food she’s allergic to. (He knew she was associated with strawberries in some way, he just got it backwards.)
Potts and “Rushman” leave with Hogan to fly to New York for Hammer’s presentation at the Stark Expo. Stark sees the map of the Stark Expo on the wall and realizes that the pattern of the buildings is an atomic structure. It’s the element that is needed to power the ARC reactor. J.A.R.V.I.S. is able to fabricate the element and Stark applies it to the reactor in his heart. (In the midst of this, Coulson reveals he’s been called away to New Mexico.)
The Air Force calls in Hammer to work on the Iron Man armor that Rhodes brought in. He adds a ton of weapons to it, and also is fed up with Vanko dicking around with the technology. He imprisons Vanko and goes to the Stark Expo to present the drones (his design, but heavily worked on by Vanko) and the War Machine armor (the modified Iron Man suit worn by Rhodes).
Vanko, however, escapes captivity, er, somehow. First he calls Stark to taunt him that he’s going to destroy the Expo, which gets him to fly across country to New York, then he takes over both the War Machine armor and Hammer’s drones. Potts works to evacuate the Expo from the drones that are firing on the crowds. Romanoff commandeers Hogan and has him drive her to Hammer’s headquarters in Flushing. Stark leads the drones and the helpless Rhodes away from the people, and manages to destroy a whole mess of them.
Romanoff kicks all the ass, taking out about a dozen of Hammer’s security goons singlehandedly in less time than it takes Hogan to subdue just one of them with his mad boxing skillz. She’s able to reboot Rhodes’s armor, giving him control back, but she can’t take control of the drones, the last of which are converging on our armored heroes. (Along the way, Romanoff offhandedly comments that Stark isn’t dying anymore, and Potts is on the line, and she’s rather appalled to learn that Stark was ever dying.)
Vanko shows up in a suit of armor of his own, but Stark and Rhodes are able to subdue him. As he lays on the ground in broken armor, Vanko says, “You lose,” and then red lights go off on all the drones and on Vanko’s armor: they’re going to blow. Potts has helped the NYPD evacuate the Expo, so no innocents will die—except Potts herself, until Stark manages to save her at the last minute. She claims she’s going to quit and then they kiss, and it’s all very cute. Rhodes also makes it clear he’s keeping the War Machine armor.
Stark meets with Fury, who makes it clear that he’s not really fit for the Avengers Initiative. But he’d like to keep him on as a consultant. Stark points out that Fury can’t afford his consulting fee—but he’d be willing to waive it for a favor.
Fury pulls some strings, and gets Senator Stern to present Rhodes and Stark with their Congressional Medals of Honor. Stern hates every nanosecond of it, to Stark’s enjoyment, though Stern does prick Stark with the pin.
Meanwhile, Coulson arrives in New Mexico to find a big crater in the middle of the desert, at the center of which is a very funky-looking hammer…
“Funny how annoying a little prick can be”
This movie does a wonderful job of picking up on the character beats from the previous film, of showing the greater tapestry of the MCU’s setup, particularly with regard to the Stark family and S.H.I.E.L.D., and gives us some great character set pieces.
The latter, in particular, make the movie shine. So many great double acts here: Stark and Rhodes, Stark and Potts, Stark and Fury, Stark and Coulson (every time I hear Coulson’s line about how if Stark gets out of line he’ll taze him and watch Supernanny while he drools on the carpet, I giggle), Stark and Hammer (Sam Rockwell is inspired casting for Hammer, playing him as a rich dudebro who can’t get out of his own way), Hammer and Vanko, Potts and Hogan, Hogan and Romanoff, Potts and Romanoff, Hammer and Rhodes, and so on—even, in an odd way, Stark and his father. Plus there’s the Senate hearing, the very well-filmed action of Vanko’s attack on the Monaco race (though it falls apart when Hogan starts driving the car into Vanko over and over while Potts keeps not giving Stark the armor, as if Favreau temporarily forgot he wasn’t making a comedy), and the general World’s-Fair-on-steroids vibe of the Stark Expo.
Unfortunately, it’s all in service of a movie that doesn’t actually have much by way of a coherent plot. The pathos of the Vanko family is hard to give much of a damn about, especially with Fury making it clear that the elder Vanko tried to sell Stark tech on the black market, which is how he got deported back to the Soviet Union. But while Mickey Rourke does an excellent job with Vanko’s physicality and laconic attitude masking a deep-seated anger, he doesn’t really sell the character’s pathos. A strong villain is one we understand, and it’s just not possible to feel sorry for Vanko as Rourke performs him.
Also, Vanko’s plot, such as it is, is phenomenally stupid. Get his ass kicked on the racetrack just to make Stark look bad? That’s it? If Hammer hadn’t freed him, his real plan would never have kicked in, and that, at least, makes sense—wanting to destroy Stark’s legacy by blowing up Stark Expo and taking innocent lives, using technology pioneered by Stark and perfected by Vanko, based on work done by their fathers. But even then, it all feels perfunctory.
The development of Stark’s relationship with Potts—his complete inability to actually talk to her (or anyone) like a person—is a delight, watching Rhodes try to balance the needs of duty versus his friendship with Stark is compelling (especially with Don Cheadle now in the role), and the whole movie is worth it to see Samuel L. Jackson be Fury for more than half a second, and it’s truly magnificent. In fact, S.H.I.E.L.D. is responsible for most of what’s great in the movie—besides Fury, you’ve got even more of Clark Gregg’s deadpan awesomeness as Coulson, and the triumphant debut of Scarlett Johansson’s Black Widow, who here establishes her role in the MCU as one of the few actual grown-ups, a role she will continue to fulfill in subsequent appearances.
The sum of its parts is greater than its whole, but Iron Man 2 remains at least an enjoyable movie, one that continues to at least build the world nicely.
Next week we find out what Coulson is after in New Mexico, and how the Norse gods fit into the MCU as we look at Thor.
Keith R.A. DeCandido is a keynote speaker at the Creature, Crimes, and Creativity Conference this weekend in Columbia, Maryland. His full schedule can be found here. Also there are only a couple of days left to support his Kickstarter for the story “The Fall of Iaron,” a tale of the Dragon Precinct universe.
Completely agree that it’s enjoyable, even if the plot isn’t that coherent.
I enjoyed Tony and his dad moments and his process of dealing with his possible death and then finding the solution to save his life.
I remember it was interesting when they cast Mickey Rourke as Vanko, but I recently rewatched it and found him not that interesting. I think he went for the eccentric route, but it ended being shallow and not a compelling villain. On the other hand, Sam Rockwell as Justin Hammer was fun to watch and he clearly is having a great time.
Granted, this is (to me) the weakest of the three Iron Man films, but it’s nowhere near the disappointment a lot of people have pegged it as. Sam Rockwell’s Justin Hammer is a fantastic reflection of the worst aspects of Tony Stark. Vanko is a weakly drawn villain, but at least his motivation is understandable compared with someone like Malekith from Thor the Dark World who is just eeeeevil because the script requires it.
I also loved the World of Disney homage that they pulled off as Tony watches the film of Howard.
As I think I noted in the comments on the first movie, I’m not as impressed with Don Cheadle as Rhodes as I was with Terence Howard in the first one.
Still, it’s at least in the middle third of the Marvel movies for me. A LOT better than, say Thor: The Dark World or the Incredible Hulk.
This has a reputation for being one of the weakest MCU movies, and I gotta say that says a lot about the Quality Control at MCU headquarters. Because this is still a mostly entertaining if messy movie. It is a bit of a pity that they managed to get Rockwell and Rourke, but didn’t quite figure out how to make them shine.
I don’t think this was a great debut for the Black Widow; Johansson was given a lot more to work with in Avengers. It really does seem inexplicable that she has yet to get her own movie though, doesn’t it? By my measure she was one of the biggest stars in the roster in 2010, and still is; Hemsworth and Evans were largely unknown, and RDJ was really only becoming big again due to Iron Man.
I thought this was a perfectly serviceable film, no worse than the first, but then, I’m not that big a fan of the first, which (as I said last week) had fantastic acting and character improv draped onto a very insubstantial, formulaic origin story. This is more of the same, a weak story masterfully executed. All the cast is great, except Scarlett Johansson, who’s utterly stunning but is given very little to work with in terms of characterization, so her performance pales in comparison to the rest of the cast — a deficiency that will fortunately be corrected in her subsequent appearances when she finally gets to be written as a person instead of a fantasy object.
But man, the science here is stupid as hell. The whole “inventing a new element” business is preposterous and pulled me out of the movie, and if Howard discovered that element, why encode it in the structure of a World’s Fair instead of publishing a paper on it or something? Also, pure palladium is not very toxic, since the body doesn’t absorb it well; it’s actually used in dental fillings. Compounds like palladium chloride are highly toxic and carcinogenic, but if Tony’s reactor had given him cancer, just switching to a new power source wouldn’t have helped. Not to mention that palladium is a metal, so how the heck is it a power source at all? It’s good for use in electrical contacts because it resists corrosion, but that just transmits electricity rather than creating it.
Worth noting: Animation producer Genndy Tartakovsky (of Dexter’s Laboratory, Samurai Jack, the 2D Star Wars Clone Wars, and Sym-Bionic Titan) did some storyboarding for the climactic battles, in conjunction with his collaborator Bryan Andrews. There were moments when I just nodded and thought, “Yeah, that’s gotta be Genndy,” like the bit where Iron Man zooms by right-to-left in the parking structure, there’s a pause, and then all the other flying suits zoom by and set off all the car alarms. The composition, pacing, and humor of that shot just screamed Tartakovsky to me. As did the shot in the Japanese garden with the cherry blossoms falling around the armored heroes, and the bit with the lasers that sliced everything in two. The DVD commentary later confirmed I’d been right about those bits (although I missed one other), but I don’t consider that a testament to my powers of observation so much as a testament to what an utterly individual and exceptional style Genndy Tartakovsky has.
I’m sure Sam Rockwell did a great job, but I don’t understand Hammer as a credible villain. Is there a single thing Hammer does in the movie that works as planned? All his efforts to show up Tony fail. Every time he demonstrates his tech, it fails. Vanko walks all over him repeatedly, and Hammer just keeps on taking it. Maybe I’m missing something, but the character seems like a bad joke, which is a shame, because the comics version of Hammer is a canny behind-the-scenes manipulator. I think Obediah Stane and Aldrich Killian would laugh at Hammer; he’s not in their league at all.
Have to agree with Mr. Bennett @@.-@: The science in this movie is downright painful. I’m a lifelong comics fan and sci-fi fan, so I can roll with a lot of pseudoscience, but the whole “invent a new element” thing had me grinding my teeth in the theater, and still does. Congrats, Tony; you’ve discovered a new element. Such a shame its half-life is only a few seconds, so you won’t be able to do a darned thing with it. I can only get through those scenes by mentally editing the word “substance” in place of “element.”
@@.-@
“Not to mention that palladium is a metal, so how the heck is it a power source at all? “
Uranium and Plutonium are metals. IIRC, hydrogen is a metal, too.
Yeah, I’m surprised the particle-accelerator-made-with-a-level-in-the-basement didn’t get mentioned in the article. That part was bad. But, whatever, it was a movie, I moved on (while screaming inside). Also agree that Hammer was a villain wanna-be. He wanted power, but was incompetent in the movie. But, overall, it was a fun movie. Weakest of the 3 Iron-Man installments, I think.
I, too, have always found this movie better than its reputation. Sure, it has its flaws, but it has some fine moments as well. I particularly enjoy Pepper’s shocked reaction to Natasha’s display of martial arts skills, which establishes the former as the audience identification character for those of us who are willing to acknowledge how we would really react to Marvel-esque levels of mayhem in the real world. (See also: “That was really violent,” Iron Man 3.)
I also really appreciated it that, in the midst of building the MCU, the movie was willing to tell a story the stakes of which were relatively humble – not saving the world, or even the planet, just putting down a threat with a personal grudge. Whereas many other superhero movies try to come off as the multiplex equivalent of a big, multititle comics event, this one seemed content just to be a single-issue story in between. Although I agree it would be more effective if the script didn’t undermine Vanko’s resentment by positioning his family as criminals with no legitimate reason to feel wronged by the Starks; the most interesting villains are always those with an honest gripe.
One other quibble: On the heels of my observation that the script to the first Iron Man seemed heavily derivative of Batman Begins, the scene in which Stark confronts Vanko in captivity struck me as a rather over attempt to ape the interrogation sequence in The Dark Knight. Kind of galling, since Downey had made some rather derogatory comments about the latter film in print and on the record.
@7/wiredog: I’m well aware of all that, though I phrased my statement poorly. The point is, palladium is not radioactive. Every one of its isotopes is stable. It can’t be used as a power source for fission, and since it’s heavier than iron, it can’t generate fusion power either.
Looking into it, I see that palladium is used in fuel cells as a catalyst to react hydrogen and oxygen, and was also used in cold fusion experiments because it absorbs hydrogen efficiently. That’s probably where the writers got the idea. But it’s not the actual source of the energy, just a catalyst that helps the reaction happen. And as I said, the pure metal is not very toxic.
Any villain who has love in his heart for a cockatoo, is not beyond redemption. Just sayin’.
The fact that DC beat Marvel to the female superhero movie is just mind boggling.
I’m torn about the Cheadle/Howard thing. I think both did great things with the character. Howard, I think, was very well suited for the first movie, giving us a version of the character that is weary with Stark’s behavior.Cheadle is well suited for how the character has transitioned, first into anger at Stark, and then acceptance and respect. On the whole, however, I like Cheadle’s performance better.
Probably the third-worst MCU film, but it’s still highly enjoyable.
I really disliked Terence Howard as Rhodey. He was quite unappealing, the weak link in the Iron Man cast by a huge margin. Don Cheadle is an unusual choice to play a superhero, not really an action-type lead or a physically imposing presence, but he’s enormously more charismatic and effective in the role, and the fact that the physicality comes from a robot suit helps with that aspect.
I rewatched it last night and mostly enjoyed it — not the greatest Marvel movie, but a pretty solid installment (especially considering it was only the third movie in the franchise, and coming off of the Hulk landing with a thud), and it laid an awful lot of groundwork for future entries in the series. (At this point, having established SHIELD, were they also already planning to incorporate HYDRA?)
It had been so long since I watched it that my memories were fuzzy, and I was almost wondering if the “magic element” Tony made was going to turn out to be vibranium, especially considering what he used to level his particle accelerator tube.
“A strong villain is one we feel sorry for, and it’s just not possible to feel sorry for Vanko as Rourke performs him.”
Nope, a strong villain is one whose motives we can understand. There may be a bit of pity from the reader/viewer, but feeling sorry for him, particularly as he faces the hero, makes him a weak villain and the hero a bully.
Not a bad movie but I would’ve preferred a screwball comedy over the story as is, honestly. Because it’s the comedy bits I remember most about it, like Stark trying to retreive his Iron Man-on-the-go suitcase. Also the bit where we see a montage of all the failed Iron Man copycats, a darkly funny repeat of a similar sequence from RoboCop 2.
And nothing against Rourke but Vanko is such a drag. Rockwell needed more screen time. He still needs more screen time. In anything.
@17/astro358: “Rockwell needed more screen time. He still needs more screen time. In anything.”
Wasn’t that basically his whole arc in Galaxy Quest?
Rockwell was great but they missed a perfect opportunity to have him back recently. As suggested by Lorerunner on youtube he could have been the black maket dealer character in Ant-Man and the Wasp. He was basically the same person, the completely ineffective character that believes he is so much more significant than he really is. Sure he is supposed to be in prison still but I’m sure they could write around that with an off screen escape or something. And the Wombats taking him out would have just been all the funnier.
Tony Stark in general and this movie in particular kept me away from the MCU for many years. It was only this year that I went back and watched all the movies, including Iron Man 2. There’s still a lot I hate about it and Stark’s by far my least favorite hero in the MCU, but I found myself liking it more than I expected, mainly Hammer’s antics.
I did like how this movie captured that part of Tony’s superpower is bypassing all the normal parts of R&D. Military procurement and development is a long and expensive process and it’s not just graft and overpricing. Hammer’s difficulties at developing suits (in a world where Iron Man suits are physically possible) is a nice exploration of how hard it is to create new tech.
Only saw it a couple of time, once in the theatre and once or twice on DVD, though not recently…I liked it, but not as much as the first, seemed to lack the feshness of the first, despite its introductions of the MCEU…Incidentally, I don’t think that Iron Man was that unfamiliar to non comic audiences…He was part of the 1960’s Marvel Super Heroes cartoons, which had also had a healthy run in reruns during the 70’s (the first Iron Man movie subtly used its theme music as an homage in one scene), and there was the Iron Man animiated series during the mid 90’s, which featured Force Works as well…
This movie definately represents the growing pains of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, becoming more focused on setting up future sequels then telling it’s own story. It’s honestly not a very good movie overall, especially in how it completely bungles the character of Justin Hammer, turning him from one of Tony’s most dangerous villains into a bumbling comic relief character.
There’s some good moments here and there but overall, It’s a mess.
No mention of Hammer-oids?
Also, Rourke apparently did some immersive research in Russian thugs and gangsters. He got the accent apparently close, but he wasn’t believable showing so much skin, which was done to show supposedly authentic prison tattoos. Unless there was a force field we didn’t see, he was highly vulnerable to strikes as Whiplash.
I don’t know if this is bothering anyone else, but shouldn’t it be “Natalie Rushman”, not “Richman”?
B_Goodwin: DERP! Yes. It’s been fixed. Thank you.
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
I would just like to mention that Mickey Rourke in this movie is– in a louche, greasy way– rather hot. I feel that the filmmakers were aware of this, since, in his big entrance on the racetrack, his shirt burns right off of his body leaving him in basically a leatherman’s harness– an image that’s both homoerotic and metal as hell. I did not expect that in a Marvel movie.
Rourke was unhappy with the movie though, claiming that they ignored his ideas for giving Vanko more depth, though he didn’t say what those ideas were.
One more thing worth mentioning is that this movie is pretty notorious for being one of the ones most negatively impacted by the Marvel Creative Committee (Alan Fine, Brian Michael Bendis, Dan Buckley, and Joe Quesada, whose job was specifically to serve as gatekeepers on MCU products, usually to their detriment); they were the ones responsible for cutting a lot of depth from Vanko that Rourke and Theroux had worked on, because they figured having that much attention on the villain would detract from Stark. They were a major factor in the sort of bland-ification you often saw in Phase 1 and Phase 2 movies.
Among other things beyond the IM2 stuff:
* Their influence in Thor: Dark World got Patty Jenkins to leave the project, made Portman basically give up on playing Jane Foster, constantly frustrated Alan Taylor after he took over from Jenkins, and contributed strongly to how bland and blah that movie ended up.
* Their heavy hand was the chief reason why Favreau left after Iron Man 2 and why in IM3 Rebecca Hall’s character was rewritten from the main villain to barely a presence.
* They were in large part responsible for the confusing pacing in the middle of Age of Ultron through demanding many of Thor’s scenes being cut and threatening to cut the farmhouse segment entirely.
* They wanted Gunn to strip the 70s-inspired soundtrack from GotG because they thought it was too out of place, and they gave a lot of messy notes on Ronan that muddled his characterization pretty badly.
* Their constant notes and rewrites were a contributing factor to Edgar Wright leaving Ant-Man (although to be honest, this one’s a stretch since he basically wanted to decouple the movie from the MCU as it was).
They were dissolved by partway through Phase 3 (Doctor Strange was the last movie to be filmed under their oversight), and the difference in movies without their influence – Homecoming, Black Panther, GotG2 – is I think incredibly stark.
Lots of good pieces in this one that didn’t quite fit together. I wasn’t aware of the Marvel Creative Committee and its impact on the earlier movies, but I will say that this one did feel like it was assembled by a committee, which is never a good way to produce a work of art.
great review as normal. Don’t know how much I liked Scarlet’s attempt at Black widow but it seems that’s just me. agree that chemistry between characters made all the difference. this allowed this franchise to stay on top despite obvious plot problems
Not much more to say about this one either. It’s an enjoyable movie but I was a bit disappointed that they kind of repeated Iron Man’s character arc from the first one, using a conveniently solved terminal illness as a plot device to make Stark behave irresponsibly again and then learn the same lessons he’d already learned or something.
Solid B+ film. Often considered to be the worst of the “standalone” Iron Man films but frankly better than number 3. A good popcorn film. Not much substance but it was entertaining.
Agree with the author re the Villain being substandard. As I understand it Rourke was also disappointed that the Vanko he thought was planned wasn’t the one who showed up in the film.
Snarky comment to author #1: The Monaco race is Formula One, so Stark’s vehicle is most definitely not a “stock car”
I agree with the general consensus that this is in the bottom quartile of Marvel movies and doesn’t add a ton to the franchise – although I think it at least raises some interesting questions if you start to think about it too hard. I don’t know what would actually scare me more – the idea that independently wealthy people can privately make super suits, the idea that the government could…(I guess in a way that’s basically the conflict that comes to a head in Civil War). But I forgot that this is where Black Widow was introduced.
@15 – rereading this, I was also wondering if it was vibranium and I had just missed that the first time around. But it sounds like it’s not. I went and googled this and apparently in the novelization it was, but then that got retconned since Captain America establishes that vibranium was already a known element and then later we know it’s from Wakanda. I suppose you could have a headcanon that meshes the two together – it wasn’t really a ‘new element’, but Howard was just trying to recreate vibranium. I also have my own headcanon-y theory that the substance from the heart shaped herb was part of what allowed them to perfect the super soldier serum when others had so much trouble with it. Don’t really know if that all holds up but I like having it all connect in my head.
Wasn’t the silver armor that Rhodey stole the Mark II armor that had problems with icing? The same armor which Terrence Howard looked at and said (ironically, as it turns out) “Next time”?
Between Stane, Hammer, and Killian, why is it that so many of Iron Man’s villains happen to be Rich White Dudes?
@34/LazerWulf: Most villains in real life are rich white dudes. Haven’t you been watching the news this past week?
-34-
I’m guessing they’re meant to be a mirror to Tony Stark, another deeply flawed rich white dude. Unlike Stark, however, Stane, Hammer, and Killian are unwilling to do the hard work of introspection and stepping outside their roles of power-hungry greedheads. And this being fiction, the rich white dudes are ruined for their bad behavior and the less selfish, more thoughtful person wins the day.
Hoo-ray.
Definitely a fun sequel, action-packed, and beautifuly shot, even if the plot is not great. I honestly don’t understand how many consider this to be the worst Iron Man film, when IM3 is suck a trainwreck.
Rockwell is delightfuly smarmy as Hammer, though I found Rourke as Vanko to be kinda boring. I do give Theroux and Favreau points for not making him full-Dynamo, instead having him use an ARC reactor as Whiplash (and then the drone armors, but still), avoiding the “hero fights villain with their same powers” trope that the MCU falls in too frequently… yes, even if he does wear an armor, it’s not the only thing he does.
Loved the Silver Centurion-style armor in a briefcase, and Rhodey getting his own armor. It’s also cool that Potts isn’t a damsel in distress, and actually does stuff.
One thing… why does Hammer get to do a presentation at the STARK Expo?
@@.-@ – Chris: Interesting stuff about Tartakovsky, thanks.
@7 – wiredog: Nope, hydrogen is not a metal at all.
@14 – Chris: I like the fact that Cheadle isn’t “conventionally handsome”, yet gets to play a superhero. Since he’s in a suit of armor, and he’s a fighter pilot (not a marine or some sort of commando) makes it believable that he’s not physically imposing.
@18 – Chris: Wow, I just realized that was Rockewell in GQ.
@22 – capt_paul77: Even if he had those cartoons, Iron Man was still unknown to most of the general public, particularly if you compare him to Spider-Man, the X-Men, Batman, and Superman. He still is; outside of the demographics (however wide) that watch MCU movies, most people will be able to name Batman, Superman, or Spider-Man, even Captain America, but not Iron Man (or Thor, for that matter).
@34 – LazerWulf: Yeah, I think it’s supposed to be that armor.
@37/MaGnUs: The purpose of an exposition or worlds’ fair is to let multiple different nations and industries show off their achievements and advances. Stark may have hosted the event, but it wasn’t exclusively to promote their products; rather, it was to showcase and promote technological innovation. If anything, Howard and Tony probably saw it as an opportunity to see what other companies were doing and invest in or outright buy the ones that were most impressive, and many other companies were probably there hoping to attract Stark money.
MaGnUs: As Chirstopher said, the point of the Stark Expo is to allow all scientists from all over the world to strut their stuff. Even doofuses like Hammer.
Also, given the number of T-shirts I see people wearing that have Iron Man and Thor on them, I question your response to capt_paul77. *cheeky grin*
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Yeah, that all makes sense, but Hammer is not just a competitor, but someone who’s obviously an outright enemy. About Thor and Iron Man, those people wearing their shirts are MCU-watching demographics (notice I was specific in how I wrote that line). Ask my mother in law who Iron Man or Thor are, and ask her who Superman, Spider-Man, or Batman are.
@37. Magnus: “avoiding the “hero fights villain with their same powers” trope that the MCU falls in too frequently…”
Applies to the Netflix shows too. We just had a whole season of Iron Fist about that. And we’re about to get Daredevil season 3 with a literal alternate Daredevil (don’t want to spoil the actual villain in case someone doesn’t know yet). This one I’m excited about, though.
@Pluto: when I was playing Champions and got to make the nemesis for my hero, I called him The Plutocrat. Description: rich white dude. He had illusion, mind-control, and deception powers.
I actually loved Mickey Rourke in this one and found him one of the most convincing, compelling villains in the MCU, much better than the usual cartoonish, over the top buffoons of non-Iron Man flicks. He really does not have time for stupid. I took the race track attack to be about getting a personal one-on-one shot in, as any tough guy would, before he did the behind the scenes suit controlling stuff.
@41 – Sunspear: Yeah, MCU in general, it’s still the same universe despite the compartimentalization. It doesn’t mean it can’t be done well, though, having a villain with similar powers as the hero (look at Luke Cage S2). DDS3, however, just seems to have the impersonation bit, and it’s done to discredit the hero, so I don’t take it as part of the same trope.
@Magnus: Not sure the villain’s motivation rules out a generic dark mirror trope here.
Not the motivation, but the actual way it’s carried out. “Dark Mirror” is the hero fighting a villain with similar powers to him: Ant-Man vs. Yellowjacket, Iron Man vs. Iron Monger, etc. The character in DD is not that, and doesn’t have his powers. He’s just impersonating DD to frame him. We’ll probably get him in his own costume, or at least out of DD’s, being himself.
Huh – I was not a comic reader but definitely was a geek in the 80s and I knew about as much about iron man as I did the hulk. Interesting Iron Man was seen as a greater risk. Also to weigh in on the Hydrogen as a metal discussion as a chemist – (will keep this brief or try to). It really depends on how you define metal. Do metals have to be solid at room temperature? In some definitions they do. Even when it comes to its location on the periodic table hydrogen can be seen both as a metal or not. Depending on the periodic table you look at hydrogen is either the first element on the table (with one electron and proton) and in the Alkali metals family along with Na OR it is over right beside He as the first of the Halogens (which are gases). This all goes back to the fact it only has an S orbit and the S orbital can only hold two electrons so the noble gas here Helium…..nope ok gone to far now. Sorry.
That’s just it: you were not a comic reader, but you were a geek. Non-geeks don’t know about Iron Man.
@Magnus: Eh. If the villain can mimic the hero’s powers or skills, close enough for me. I’m not going to be literal about it.
Consider Reed Richards and Doctor Doom. There are enough similarities (super-scientists) for them to be Counterparts (Good and Evil), not just nemeses. Same for Doom and Black Panther (monarchs).
I’m sure the Guild of Calamitous Intent has rules about this stuff. Some Mirrors are Big Bads, others are lame one-offs.
Fair enough.
MaGnUs@37:
Just to nitpick belatedly, there are fighter pilots who are also Marines, yanno?
I know I’m about two years late for the party, but there’s a tiny detail in this movie that, for me, makes the whole thing a lot better: Whiplash speaks beautiful Russian. I’m not just talking Mickey Rourke’s accent and pronunciation (although it’s miles better than anything ScarJo has done as Black Widow), but the actual word choice and syntax on Rourke’s Russian lines are almost poetic – which turns him into a very different character. In fact, it turns him into a very specific stock character from Russian literature: the Superfluous Man. Superfluous Men are talented and intelligent, but barred in some way from participating in life; typically down-on-their-luck nobles, provided the necessities of life but with no purpose or position in society, who take a nihilistic view of the universe, and ultimately die a meaningless death that illustrates the meaninglessness around them. In Anton Vanko, we have a brilliant roboticist, whose family disgrace and mob ties block him from meaningful work, who concocts a revenge plan based on him dying in a way that makes Tony Stark look bad (I mean, that armor suit in Monaco had NO protection – there’s no way Vanko was expecting to survive a one-on-one with Iron Man). When Vanko laughs, “You lose”, at the end, it’s not because he’s some suicide bomber trying to take Tony with him; it’s because he has completed his self-imposed character arc, which ends with him flaming out (literally) in a way that highlights Stark’s failures and vulnerabilities.
50 – srEDIT: Fair enough, but you get my meaning.
Globular: That’s an excellent point. My ex-wife is Russian, and I did notice that Rourke’s pronunciation was excellent (I never learned to speak it, but I did get a feel for how it’s supposed to sound from various in-laws). Thanks for pointing out that theme in the script….
—Keith R.A. DeCandido
Not that I’ll ever know about it unless it’s pointed out to me (on account of not actually speaking anything other than English), but I love when movies do things like that with the foreign-language speakers, using them to add layers to the story that you won’t necessarily pick up unless you also have some kind of familiarity with the language and the culture.
For the longest time I considered this to be the weakest MCU film. Considering that my opinion of it is that it’s simply OK, that’s quite an accomplishment. Incidentally, it’s also the first MCU film I ever saw. Iron Man 2 ultimately has the same problem as Spider-Man 3: it tries to do too much in one movie. None of the various plots have any time to breathe, we’re constantly jumping from point to point. It’s overstuffed, and nothing works as well as it could have. And personally, I’ve never cared for this film’s take on Justin Hammer. He’s a one-note gag character, and its not a good gag. “Ha ha, this pathetic guy is trying to be like Tony but he can’t! Isn’t that hilarious?” I’ll admit I’ve never read the comics that originally featured Hammer, but from what I’ve heard that version at least seems like a credible threat. This version never reaches that, and it results in a poorer film.
That said, RDJ remains great in the role. Its not as well handled or nuanced as the first film, but his Tony remains fun to watch. He saves the movie from being a complete flop, and that’s no small feat. Scarlett Johansson does well too, though the film does gratuitously sexualise her. She comes off as a competent spy and a deadly combatant. Her action scene taking down Hammer’s guards is the best in the movie, though that’s not a great comparison. All the action beats involving Tony are over so quickly that there’s no time to be thrilled. They’re there and then gone again in a flash. Black Widow’s lasts just long enough to be exciting, but not so long as to overstay its welcome. So if nothing else, this was a good start for a character who would be better served by later movies.
That last sentence actually sums up a lot of my feelings about Iron Man 2 in general. It has some good ideas and characters, but everything it does well is done better in other movies. It’s just good enough to be worth watching, but not good enough to warrant rewatches. It fulfills its function, and then ends. That’s more than you can say for a lot of blockbusters.