Iron Man 2 (Page 1 of 2)

LOL, I thought it was a comment on how seemingly half-assed and flippant Iron Man 2 was put together.

P.S. Glad to see Ryan's review represented here. I have a friend who is a graphic designer (he's done work on Spider-Man 2 promotional material with Dr. Pepper, and ad designs for Blockbuster, and the cover art for the Open Range DVD) and has recently started doing photos and life casts of nude models. Anyway, he loved Iron Man 2 (You think you know someone and then...) and I tried to show him Ryan's video. He had a cable hooked up to a big TV, connected to his iPhone so we could watch the YouTube vid. We got as far as the mention about the old footage of Howard Stark, before there was a connection/download problem and we couldn't watch the rest. He just responded with, "I disagree with pretty much everything that guy said." When the thing about Iron Man getting a new suit design for shallow and unknown reasons came up, he yelled, "IT'S IN THE COMIC!" as if that was the great, big justifier and winner of the argument.

Last edited by johnpavlich (2011-11-28 07:40:22)

I was on painkillers.

I swear to god I'm not slowly dying before your ears.

Although I certainly had plot issues with IM2 (Stark's dad can't connect with his son, so he builds an Expo in the shape of a new molecule so that years later... oh dear, I've gone cross-eyed), it was absolutely the Avengers commercial that ruined it for me.

As I said in another thread, I came to the first Iron Man movie knowing absolutely nothing about the character (I thought he was an alien or a mutant or something).  But the movie explained who he was and then he had a little adventure, and it was fun. 

IM2 started off well enough, picking up where the first one left off and telling a new story - but then suddenly some characters showed up from another movie that hadn't even been made yet.  I could literally FEEL the movie waiting for me to say "It's Eyepatch Blackdude and Vinyl Somersault, squeeee!" when Sam Jackson and Scarlett (Move over, Drew Barrymore) Johannson came on screen.  But I did not know who they were, I still don't know who they were, and I resent them using up a half hour of screentime when I paid to see a movie about Iron Man.   

If the movie had spent some time explaining why these characters are cool, it might have worked.  Instead, they all sat and had coffee in a donut shop.  It was like watching cosplayers kill time between Comic-Con panels.  Nice outfit, man - who are you supposed to be?

I get that there's a movie called the Avengers coming out, and it's some kind of Marvel Supergroup, and it's interesting that they're building up to it with this multi-movie shared-universe thing.   But only the first Iron Man has bothered to actually be a complete movie.  I just watched Captain America, and it's 3/4s of a fun flick (Joe Johnston is great with period superhero stuff, Rocketeer was great too).  But Captain America doesn't even have an ending, it just stops, and says "See you at the Avengers!"   

I admit I haven't seen Thor because... well frankly because I'm a grown man.  And if they're gonna reboot Hulk yet again with Mark Ruffalo (are they actually gonna do that?  I'm afraid to check) I'm not seeing that one either (see:Thor).   But then they're done, right?  At some point the actual Avengers movie will come out, I hope?

Which I may or may not see, but I'm still looking forward to it - because at least then Marvel will stop making two-hour commercials to tell me how great the Avengers is going to be.

I don't have anything relevant to say about Iron Man 2, but Thor was worth seeing for Chris Hemsworth and his rather fetching biceps. I understand this argument may not be relevant to Trey.

All sequels are problematic, IM2 no less than any other.  But although the execution was far from perfect, there was a story there that was interesting to me.  It started by saying "Okay, so now you're a superhero with no secret identity.  Let's look at the dark side of that."  Which is a fun idea, certainly not often seen in superhero movies.

The Hero's Journey construction is about the low rising to a high place because of their strengths.  Tragedy is about the high falling low because of their faults, and the first half of Iron Man 2 hit all the notes.  Some notes were a little off, but close enough for me, and if there's anyone that I'd pick to play a superhero falling from grace, it's RDJr.

While "palladium toxicity" is bogus and magic-bean-y (and harder to say than "flux capacitor"), it's no more so than the Arc reactor or the suit itself.  I rolled with that because it worked thematically.  The very thing that makes the world adore him - and he clearly thrives on that -  is also killing him.   Yeah, kinda on the nose, but at least it was a way to demonstrate his addictive personality beyond just seeing him get drunk ALL the time.    Tony'd rather die than give up being Iron Man, gotcha. 

We get some hints that this comes from never getting validation from his dad... eh, okay.   It's no wonkier than those movies about the guy with the bat fetish, and I'm okay with those, too.

Meanwhile Mickey Rourke is in Russia, resenting Tony's usurping of the fame that should have gone to his own family.   He formulates a plan, not to kill Tony, but to turn the public against him.  Because he too understands that the adoration means more to Tony than his life.   Lookee there - plot, character and theme all lined up.  Somewhere William Goldman is smiling.  Well, except during the jokes about Rourke's "bourrdd".

The congressional hearing made sense because now that the world knows who Iron Man is, it's reasonable to ask if a drunken loose-cannon playboy should have sole control of a superweapon.  (If Lindsay Lohan were to develop nuclear capability, why yes, I WOULD like some Congressional oversight, thank you.)  Tony laughs it off, charms his way out the door, ignores the very real threat of having his toys taken away.  So far so good.  The downward spiral is underway.

I, too, was offended by the Monaco sequence, because it reeked of "Look how big our budget is this time!" And Favreau's limo heroics were doofy, but all movies gotta have their "trailer moments" I guess.  But story-wise, I just would have preferred a sharper demonstration of "making God bleed" than just scorching the paint job on Tony's suit.  Right idea, but not the best execution.

But then things get mostly back on track, in that Tony goes completely off the rails to the point that even his closest allies abandon him. and he ends up in a brawl with his best buddy and destroying his own house.   My main complaint here is that he never REALLY hits rock bottom - I would have preferred he lose his suit completely, not just one of the spares.   And it turns out his house wasn't that badly wrecked after all, it's still intact enough for him to go back to and cobble up another batch of pseudo-science later.  Better if he had had to start all over again from nothing, like in the Afghan cave.

So yeah - not perfect, but at least there's a story there, and a structure that's mostly holding up.   Story-wise, it's time for Tony to realize what he's been doing wrong, pull his shit together, and go save Christmas.

But instead some strangers show up and solve most of Tony's problems over a cup of coffee because they are Just That Awesome.  Scarlett gives him an anti-palladium injection that she happens to have, and then Sam literally sends Tony to his room with orders not to come out until he's learned his lesson.  And just to speed things along, he gives Tony a box full of Instant Daddy-Issue Remover.

This is the very definition of deus ex machina.   Up until this point , Iron Man 2 was certainly not perfect, but at least it was about Iron Man, and it was headed in a certain direction.  Once the Avengers crash the party, it's all about getting this movie over with so Iron Man can go be in their movie. Sam Jackson literally SAYS that there are more important things going on elsewhere.  Nice, guys - way to undercut whatever tension there was in the movie I'm watching.

So Tony makes a new improved flux capacitor (because his dad designed the Expo grounds in the shape of a... the hell with it, it doesn't actually matter), then fights a bunch of robots.  Meanwhile across town Scarlett Johansson does gymnastics and then deus'es another machina, typing heroically for great justice.  Stuff explodes a lot, the end.

And thus Tony's self-destructive tendencies, and the entire issue of what happens when the common folk see God bleed and realize their hero is fallible, are resolved by ignoring the fact that the first half of the movie was about those things.

So yeah - Iron Man 2 was never likely to be as good as the first, but few sequels are.  But The Avengers sure didn't HELP.

Nah, I'd just talk too much and interrupt everybody.  Thanks, though!

I couldn't say what Favreau would do, and it's certainly possible there would have been an Avenger-free deus ex machina just as bad as the one we got.   I don't blame the Avengers for that nonsense about the sidewalks of the Expo being the shape of a molecule, either, I suspect that was always there...same for that really lame moment where Dad tells his son on film that he believes in him when his son was freakin SIX YEARS OLD at the time.   Eeeesh.

I'll tell you what I'd have done, though, off the top of my head... is just follow the string all the way out.    Tony loses everything, is dying and in disgrace.  And then make him get himself back together just by sheer force of will, rather than by having Dad return from the grave to say he loves him.    He puts on the thrashed suitcase suit that barely works, and sets out to stop the massacre at the Expo before he drops dead from palladium-itis because it doesn't matter if anybody loves him, he's still FUCKING IRON MAN.

Which then causes all his allies to become allies again when they see him fighting the good fight, robots get blowed up as before, and Russian guy learns too late that it doesn't matter if the Who's in Whoville love Tony or not, it's still Christmas.   Because why the hell do a movie tracing the steps of the classic fall from grace, if you don't do the back half and tell the redemption part?   If we're doing the classics, then let's DO them.

Sure, it's possible that Favreau wasn't heading that way, and maybe it's just coincidental that the Avengers show up just when the movie would have gone from shaky to shapeless anyway.  I still say they sure don't HELP matters any.    If they have to be there then bring them in at the end, after Tony earns his victory.  Just like in the first movie. They could give Tony the magic injection and then say "hey, if you'd just stop killing yourself, we'd still like to talk to you about something."   

Iron Man 2 still probably wouldn't have been a great movie, but at least they could have let it be its OWN movie.

And Natalie Portman.

ShadowDuelist is a god.

There. Now it's all downhill from here.

Well, at least I hit the maximum attainable peak.

Was the Disney merger/acquisition during production? If it did, could have been a problem of suddenly having twice as many creative executives and middle managers swoop in on a project in production to prove their worth.

Last edited by paulou (2011-12-03 21:08:31)