Enter a world of endless Box Office potential, unlimited star power, and a cavalcade of super heroes that will continue to entertain audiences for the foreseeable future. The Marvel Cinematic Universe was a very controversial creation when first conceived. After all, with Marvel's three biggest draws to date: X-Men, Spider Man, and the Fantastic Four all under the control of other studios, how could Disney and their glory create a film saga of the "rest of the Marvel world"? How could they possibly make The Avengers without such integral members like Spider Man and Wolverine? They would need a film to blow audiences out of the water. Enter the troubled yet dire for a revival Robert Downey Jr. To be perfectly honest, he is primary reason to go and watch any of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) films that feature Iron Man. He is the single best thing about this movie and could perhaps be the greatest portrayal of a super hero, with great respect to Michael Keaton and Christopher Reeve. And his platform movie, and the platform movie for this bold venture in filmmaking is Iron Man. This film is an absolute marvel (no pun intended), with just enough spunk and style to match the greatness of Downey Jr.
Plot: A self styled "Genius, Billionaire, Playboy, Philanthropist", Tony Stark makes his fortune creating an array of weapons to be used in wars. While in Afghanistan to test one of his new weapons, Stark is critically wounded and taken prisoner by terrorists. To keep alive, Stark has an electromagnet grafted into his chest to ensure the shrapnel shards do not find their way into his heart and kill him. With his life spared, Stark and a fellow prisoner build an Arc Reactor along with a suit of armor in the effort of escaping. Stark manages to escape and returns to New York and vows to make sure his company never makes weapons ever again, much to the dismay of his father's ally and current company manager Obadiah Stane, who deems that this action would destroy the company.
Stark builds up a much more powerful Arc Reactor and suit, and heads back to Afghanistan to deal with the terrorist group once more, this time drawing the attention of the military. Stark is able to avoid destruction due to having a friend in the military. But it is later revealed that Stane is in league with the terrorists and uses the remains of Tony's old suit and his new reactor, causing Stark to battle his old friend in a pitch battle, without his suit at full power. Tricking Stane, Stark and Potts manage to destroy Stane and the newer Arc Reactor, saving New York. PRessured by the media, Stark reveals that he is indeed Iron Man to the press, and the movie ends like that. Well...
In an end credits scene, Stark is approached by Nick Fury of the agency known as S.H.I.E.L.D. who tells him about the plan for "The Avengers Initiative".
What's Bad?: Jeff Bridges, who plays Obadiah, was initially supposed to be the Lex Luthor of the Iron Man series. This is frustrating to me, because I personally thought Bridges did a splendid job with the role and seemed to expect to be in the following sequels.
What's Good?: Robert Downey Jr. was cast brilliantly. When it comes to superhero movies, you really have to have the actor playing the lead look perfect in the role. Keaton, Reeve, and Hugh Jackman as Wolverine seem like perfect actors for those roles. Jr seems like the perfect guy to play the egotistical Stark, who is in great contrast to the rest of his Avengers team. Stark is cocky, lackadaisical, immature, self-absorbed, and pretty much anything you could label Gaston with but still manages to be a hero.
The suit looks perfect, too. I have to point this out, because several superhero movies get the actor right but the outfit/look wrong. For example, while the suit looks like Iron Man's suit, one could say that Two Face in Batman Forever looked way too silly. The suit does all the stuff you'd expect it too and really does make Downey Jr all that more bad ass.
Overall: Iron Man avoids falling into the old superhero cliche of being cheesy but respectable, yet avoids the new cliche of being too dark and overbearing. It, along with Batman Begins and Spider Man 2, is the perfect example of a super hero movie. It has minute plot errors and mistakes, and the brief and currently unexplored romance between Potts and Stark is a bit clunky, but the film is still pretty damn solid and would have been the best superhero movie of 2008 had it not been for The Dark Knight. Downey is great, Bridges is great, Paltrow is great, the film is really just great.
Final Grade: 94
Next Up: The Incredible Hulk
Then: Iron Man 2
Later: Thor
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