Iron Man 2

Release Date: May 7, 2010

Watch Date: August 22, 2024

“With the world now aware that he is Iron Man, billionaire inventor Tony Stark faces pressure from all sides to share his technology with the military. He is reluctant to divulge the secrets of his armored suit, fearing the information will fall into the wrong hands. With Pepper Potts and ‘Rhodey’ Rhodes by his side, Tony must forge new alliances and confront a powerful new enemy, all the while realizing that not only is there a madman out to destroy him, but the very technology designed to save his life is slowly killing him.”

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   To be completely transparent, I went into this not being the biggest fan of the Iron Man sequel. But Bob? He was stoked. He loves this movie apparently. Thinks it’s one of the strongest in the MCU franchise. So, as I reflect on our experience of watching it, I’m going to try and look at this with an open mind.

   The first film did a really good job of traumatizing Tony Stark out of making weapons. That’s kind of a major personality shift, all things considered. What it did not do, though, was actually make Tony Stark a good guy. He was still a billionaire playboy out there doing things just for the heck of it, only now he got to have the ego of the good guy, the hero. So I think what this film does best is show that just because you have super powers, just because you have a billion dollar metal suit and help to keep the world safe – that doesn’t make you good. That doesn’t mean that you have everything together. You can still mistreat those you care about, and yourself. You can still make bad choices and have a lack of empathy. Sure you’re saving the nameless millions, but you’re hurting the people that matter most to you.

   I think it would have been hard to have Tony make that shift from true hero who was grounded, had something to lose, if you hadn’t included his imminent death. Why it wasn’t a problem in the first film and was such a rapidly increasing problem in the second I don’t know. But Tony Stark spends the majority of this movie living like he was dying, and for Tony Stark that doesn’t mean making memories with the people he cares about. It means going out in a blaze of glory. It means driving a Formula 1 car (and to be honest, I grew up watching F1 and if I knew that I was dying, yea I’d probably do that one too). It means getting drunk in his suit and flirting with women he doesn’t care about. This movie depicts a man’s downward spiral and the reordering of his priorities as he realizes his potential to actually help the world in a much more subtle and meaningful way than any movie about a comic book hero should.

   I don’t like the villain. Hammer or…the guy with the electric jump ropes. Anton? No, that’s his dad. Whatever. Neither are particularly intimidating, Hammer especially. And Anton’s son (which is how I’m going to refer to him now), he’s supposed to be this guy who shows up with a clearly overarching plan no one could have expected or anticipated, but he just kind of bugs me. Meanwhile, Bob loves him, because he likes that it’s another film where there’s no people with amazing and inexplicable powers from different planets. It’s just a guy, whose just as smart as Tony, with his own death wish, trying to destroy a legacy to avenge his father’s destroyed legacy. Tony if his dad had been sent to Siberia. And I get that, I do. But he’s just not that…Maybe it’s cause he appears to take orders from Hammer for most of the movie who is honestly the least villainous sounding or looking man on the planet.

   I think this movie also does a great job of introducing S.H.I.E.L.D. and the larger role they will begin to play in almost all the MCU films, to a point. We meet some core characters as more than just a single scene in the credits. We hear about the Avengers. And we get our first tie in, Coulson rushing off to New Mexico where the events of Thor are taking place.

   So, okay, in retrospect, other than me not being impressed with the villain, this is actually a pretty good sequel. My entire opinion might have been changed on it. Don’t tell Bob, I’ll never hear the end of it.