Iron Man 2
By Nick Manteris · 0 Comments · Leave a Comment
Iron Man 2 starts up just about exactly where the original film left off – though from a slightly different perspective – and then the story jumps six months ahead into a world where Tony Stark has resolved the world’s conflicts as Iron Man. Of course, now the government wants to talk to him about his “weapon” and he has to deal with the troubling paradox related to the arc reactor in his chest. Then we are introduced to a business rival (Sam Rockwell) and a new villain (Mickey Rourke) with plan for revenge that includes killing Tony Stark. As you can imagine, there’s a lot going on…and that doesn’t even include the subplot with Nick Fury, S.H.I.E.L.D. and Natasha Romanoff.
Virtually all of the cast reprise their roles and Favreau returns as director, but, for reasons left entirely unclear, Terrence Howard has been replaced by Don Cheadle. Samuel Jackson is back with an extended part, but the only purpose for his entire subplot seems to be setup for the possible Avengers movie. (This is great for the fanboys, geeks and nerds, but it eats up a lot of time that could have been used to flesh out the rest of the busy script.) Robert Downey Jr. still totally owns this role, but it feels like his character had a little less humor in this movie. On the flip side, since the “learning to be a superhero” was accomplished in the first film they are able to focus more on action and the pace stays fairly constant throughout. The downside of the quick pace, however, is that many of the events in the film seem to happen too quickly: Rhodes figures out how to use the armor almost as soon as he puts it on, the final battle seems awfully short and Stark not only figures out the riddle that can help out with his paradox problem in mere moments, but he also builds the machinery needed to go with it and practically no time seems to pass at all.
- Score
- 6/10
These are all minor quibbles though, because Iron Man 2 – like the first film – is fun and entertaining. It's definitely worth seeing and if you liked the first film then you should enjoy this one just as much. Also, if you weren't really thrilled about the invention and discovery scenes from the first movie, then you might like the sequel even better. (One last thing: Hey, Favraeu, what happened to the scene with Scarlett Johansson firing the repulsor from the Iron Man glove? Did you really think we wouldn’t miss it?)
