WARNING: May contain spoilers.
WARNING: I really meant it about the spoilers.
LOOK: If you’re still reading, then don’t blame me if I accidentally give away a plot point. I’ll do my best not too, but I can’t guarantee anything.
Okay. Iron Man 3 review (watched in 3D)
Firstly, cast. As usual, Robert Downy Junior gets some brilliant one liners and manages to show Tony’s arrogant, loudmouth egocentric side. But at the same time, he also does a wonderful job of portraying someone who has just had the world pulled out from under his feet. This is a guy who was top of the world –rich, famous, nigh unbeatable. And suddenly all this stuff happens and suddenly he’s not the most powerful anymore. He’s a guy in a suit –which almost anyone could wear- and he’s on a team with a Norse god, a guy who can turn into a rampaging rage monster, a guy who is basically the perfect human specimen and who knew his dad, and two assassins who are perfectly capable of protecting themselves outside of a heavily armoured suit. At the same time, he’s had to face another Norse god and a load of aliens –who people believe may be coming back- and he had to go through a wormhole into space and barely escaped alive. There’s definitely a weaker side of Tony on show in this film, something much more prevalent that in 2 or 1. As such, the fact RDJ pulls it off believably is testament to his acting skills.
Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper plays a substantial role in the film. It’s nice to see more of her than was in The Avengers but I’m afraid I can’t say she was as good as RDJ or Guy Pierce. Pepper isn’t so much in the humorous parts of the films as the serious, darker bits. This probably colours views of her for a bit and there was a bit too much of her in a sports bra needing rescuing. But she makes up for it by the end with some truly great moments
and you can really feel for her when Tony does –well, Tony stuff.
Don Cheadle –well, where to start? Firstly, how on earth wasn’t Rhodey picked up by SHIELD? I thought he was an Air Force colonel. Not a black ops commando who can make trick shots and break out of a heavily guarded generic bad guy base without his armour. Rhodes gets a much big part in this film –I was actually tempted to put him above Pepper. Cheadle gets some wonderfully funny lines and they’re mostly with Tony. He’s fleshed out a lot more than in one or two and one of the best scenes is, in my opinion,
You really get the feeling this guy suffers a lot at Tony’s hands but also that they’re great friends. But, I couldn’t quite get over the “Iron Patriot” moniker. To me, there are too many suggestions of Dark Reign and I was always waiting for the red, white and blue armour to turn bad.
It felt a bit like they were trying to say, look, he’s an Iron Captain America.
Rebecca Hall as Maya Hansen –well, I was disappointed. Not at her acting but at the fact she’s only in five scenes. Compared to the Extremis comic arc, she’s a relative non-entity. One of the best parts of the comic was –in my opinion- the whole point behind Maya’s reasoning. It’s all lost in the film. She goes from being Tony’s intellectual equal to a “botanist” –okay, I’m quoting Pepper here, but there’s no way Maya is as smart as she should be
The hype about Maya was overdone. Four scenes in the present, one in the past –the conference at Bern that Yinsen mentioned –and it was nice to see Professor Yinsen there, even if it was just for a second –but Maya Hansen wasn’t a true major player.
The Mandarin –played by Ben Kingsley- was inspired. His plot is full of twists and turns and the climax and big reveal is totally unexpected and brilliant –or it would have been if my friend who saw it the night before hadn’t spoiled it for me. As that upset me quite a lot, I won’t say much more but be assured, I am probably going to strangle her.
Guy Pearce as Aldrich Killian is a brilliant villain. He really does give off a sense of menace. Of course, they have to throw in a whole thing about him previously working with Pepper and there has to be the “he kept asking me out” side of things. His role is much expanded from that in the comics –and there is an obligatory shirtless scene. Why do people feel obliged to fight shirtless or in their underwear?
Once again, Thor is referenced –it appears he’s stirred up quite a lot of bother in the MCU.
Ty Simpkins plays a kid named Harvey. The easiest way to think of him is Tony aged twelve, but poorer. He’s got some brilliant lines and some of the most memorable lines in the film are from between him and Tony. Through him you see the snarky side of Tony and also the weakest. This is a kid who could easily be the MCU’s version of Amadeus Cho.
Jon Favreau as Happy Hogan gets a bit more screen time to himself. We get to learn some interesting facts about him. Such as he’s a bit of a security freak, he can’t work technology –how can you be Tony Stark’s bodyguard and not know how to use a tablet?
Oh, and he watches Downton Abbey because he thinks it’s “classy”. (On a side note –I’m British and I don’t see the great fuss. It’s a stupid costume drama. Sorry if I offended any Downton fans.) And it’s nice to see that Tony does care about people.
Oh, and I simply have to commend Paul Bettany as JARVIS. He plays the sarcastic, unflappable AI perfectly. He manages to be deadpan, snarky and wonderfully funny all at once. And he gets some great lines –“I have compiled a risk assessment for you to ignore.” is a paraphrase. Imagine it given in an exasperated posh British voice and you’ll see why. Also, the phrase “All my sentences are ending in the wrong cranberries” got a decent laugh. This is later played for laughs when he gets his sentence ending right-
And then Tony assumes he’s made a mistake. You get a real idea of how powerful JARVIS actually is in this film, which makes me envision the Next Avengers scenario of Tony being Ultron’s creator. But then, Ultron could be a great Ant-Man villain so I’m hoping I’m wrong on that score.
Also, there are loads of other, background Marvel characters used –such as Man-Thing’s ex-wife, Ellen Brandt-
Stan Lee’s cameo is one of the best so far –I actually snorted my drink up my nose and had to be heartily thumped on the back because my friend –not the spoiler friend but another one (how on earth did I end up with two friends?) thought I was choking.
Next, story. In turns, it’s a lot darker and a lot funnier than the previous films. There are some brilliant oneliners and dialogue but also it’s quite interesting how they raise points. For example, when searching for the Mandarin, War Machine –sorry, “Iron Patriot” is searching Pakistan, Afghanistan, etc. It’s quite interesting that a terrorist is automatically assumed to be in these Middle-Eastern countries. There’s also a question about the Mandarin’s group –the Ten Rings. It uses the same logo as the Ten Rings group from Iron Man, but there’s never any hint that they’re linked. I’m not sure if it’s just meant to be a coincidence or whether it’s meant to cast more doubt on what happened in Iron Man
The fallout from the Avengers is perfectly pitched. Like I said previously, you really see Tony suffering as a result –the fact he designs so many armours to keep himself awake (going from Mk 7 to Mk 42) shows just how bad he is. In a way, taking on the Mandarin and AIM alone –without the Avengers, without SHIELD, at times even without his suit- is just what he needs to snap himself back into place. There are wonderful shoutouts to Marvel canon –Roxxon is mentioned at least twice. You get the feeling the writers really have done their research into Marvel. However, there are a few niggles I have (wonderful word, niggles). As a fan of the Extremis arc (has anyone else seen the motion comic?) I was disappointed with the handling of Extremis here. I’ll put it all in a spoiler box, so I won’t ruin anything much. (Seriously, 5 and 6 are major plot points.)
1. Instead of one Extremis powered lunatic, you have about twenty.
2. Despite this, none are named as Mallen –although I had a suspicion one was, he turned out to be Savin. 3. The Extremis process is too different –instead of being rebuilt from the inside out, the process, while still painful, is over in a matter of a day. No cocoon, no sludge. Pity. 4. Despite them having enhanced speed, healing and fire powers; Tony and Rhodey are still able to defeat four at a time. This is a huge difference to Tony being forced to take Extremis himself to compensate. I’m sorry, that didn’t feel right. Two unpowered men –okay, admittedly one is pretty cool at the whole secret agent stuff and the other is super smart- shouldn’t be able to take out Extremis soldiers.
5. This is the biggest of them all –Tony doesn’t take Extremis. This disappointed me as I was hoping to see a super-powered Stark. But maybe it was for the best. I don’t think Tony as he is now is mature enough for Extremis.
6. The whole Extremis-is-faulty thing annoyed me. People blowing up because they take it just… I don’t know. It’s an insult to Maya Hansen’s intelligence; it adds a whole new ‘weakness’ to it which nevertheless can’t be exploited against the bad guy –it just doesn’t sit well with me.
Now, AIM. I guess, since HYDRA was changed so much, it would have been stupid to hope for MODOK –who admittedly, is still a pretty stupid villain. How many people are going to be scared of a giant head with piddly little arms and legs? But it would have been nice to have a hint –an AI rival for JARVIS named MODOK (MODAC, the original form?) or a George Tarleton working for AIM. I quite like to think that one of the AIM agents is him.
And there was one final thing that annoyed me.
As for the end of credits scene –it ties in nicely to the end of the Avengers, and explains the slightly different starting and end style for this film (Tony narrating).
But I’ve been rather negative so now for the good stuff. The comic timing is perfect. The humour is perfectly blended with the darker elements. The plot is fast paced and clever. And for a film that’s over two hours long, it’s neither too difficult to follow or overtly complex. Characters are easy to keep track of and whilst some of the jokes are a little obvious –and funny in their inclusion because of this- others are totally off the wall. Overall, despite me moaning about plot points, the film was highly enjoyable and the story was good.
The 3D was okay, I suppose. But it was the first film I’ve seen in 3D and compared to the Star Trek: Into Darkness trailer, it seemed… I don’t know, flatter. I think that was good, because some of that stuff in 3D could have been over the top, but I can’t really think anything was really leaping out the screen at me.
Writing this has been surprisingly fun – I really must do this for the Thor film (was anyone else as excited as I was? Christopher Eccleston is amazing at the darker characters.)
L'Ange Noir (talk) 14:20, April 27, 2013 (UTC)