Iron Man 2 is the first big blockbuster of the summer. The appetizer if you will, to the banquet of movies rolling out this summer, and oddly enough that what the movie felt like to me; A nice little snack but not enough to fill me up. This contains spoilers so reader beware.
1). So we join the movie with Tony Stark kicking off the Stark Expo, a year-long conference where inventors from all over the world come to share their ideas. This is where the movie takes it's first wrong turn. Why would a billionaire encourage competition against his own company? Even at the end he lets a competing company display their answer to the success of Stark's. This conference wasn't really needed or it could have been a great proponent to a climax but it never was taken (I'll explain later).
2). We learn that Tony's arc reactor core is killing him. A slow painful death caused by platium radiation which poisons his blood. He constantly tests his blood and it gets as high as 89%! With that much toxin in your blood you barely be able to move let alone fight bad guys.
Although one of the good parts of the movie is that Tony is faced with his own mortality. This gives the audience a way to connect with the character. Movies like Field of Dreams, Indiana Jones, The Green Mile, heck even Twilight have benefited from showing that the hero is not invincible and death is creeping up. But in Iron Man 2 Tony doesn't really seem to care, or maybe he does but he wants to hide it, especially from the audience.
3).The Bad Guy - So the villain is a man who wants to kill Tony to avenge his Father. The character is played wonderfully by Mickey something or other. I loved the potential they built with the villain. By taking a page from The Dark Knight they gave the character depth by not only wanting to kill the hero but to destroy the symbol he represents. "If you make God bleed then people will stop believing in him." Brilliant. So they build him up by have an almost fatal encounter with Tony Stark on a race track, a deadly breakout from prison, only to hide him behind making Iron Suits for Tony's competition?? And the drones he built were garbage, taken down by one punch from Iron Man! It was like the Jedi taking out battle droids. The drones proved to be no real threat. And then at the end what possible climax could the bad guy have? Oh I don't know, maybe put him in a Iron Suit? Gee, that sounds familiar.
What really would have been more griping would be the bad guy's threat to kill all of the people at the Stark Expo, saying that it would destroy his legacy by turning a conference of inspiration into a disaster that the Stark name would forever be stained. He had the drones right there, he had the motive, but like a cheap cop-out, they made an endless chase scene flying around the expo with no real consequence. What makes a good villian is someone who can make the powerful hero feel powerless. Sure Iron Man could stop one man but he couldn't save thousands of people from being slaughtered.
4). Useless Characters - So for some reason Scarlett Johansen was brought in to add another hot female to the mix. Wait. What happend to Gweneth Paltrow's character? I thought Tony and Pepper were dating. So why is he openly flirting with a new girl?? So the new girl's function was to observe Tony's usefullness in a upcoming SHIELD project, but she never seems to be around whenever Tony is alone. She's only around when he's in public, and then later on she become's Pepper Potts' new assistant?
So they give her this scene where she takes down like 15 guys and walks away like it's nothing. Her only real usefulness was turning off the Warhammer suit. Couldn't that be done by anyone? Perhaps even Pepper? She helped Tony in the first one, why not the second?
5). Cheap Product Placement - I wonder if Marvel movies are running low on cash, cuz in every movie there are tons of product placements. In Spiderman it was Dr. Pepper, Cup o Noodles, Cingular Wireless. In Iron Man 2 it's Audi, LG, and future Marvel movies.
I understand there are future Marvel movies coming but, there is a difference in winking at something and shoving it in your face. "HERE'S CAPTAIN AMERICA'S SHIELD! HERE'S THOR'S HAMMER! HERE'S THE AVENGER MOVIE!" That's great but what I want to see now is Iron Man.
But despite all these reasons I still found the movie to be entertaining. It's a so-so story but Downey brings such swagger to the role and the effects and action are stunning. It's a great movie but like the platium core, it wears out.
