Marvel once again kicks off the summer movie season with another blockbuster. After The Avengers last year anticipation has been high for Iron Man 3 and Phase 2 of Marvels Cinematic Universe. On everyone’s mind is how do you top a movie like The Avengers and could Iron Man 3 live up to the hype. Iron Man 3 is actually lucky to have had The Avengers do so well last year after what I thought was a disappointing Iron Man 2. But this has become one of the most anticipated movie of the summer and Shane Black delivered a perfect summer movie. With a great mix of action and comedy.
In Iron Man 3 we catch up with Tony Stark post Avengers. After fighting aliens in New York Stark is having trouble coming to grips with the current reality. The once egotistical man now suffers from insomnia and panic attacks. During his sleepless nights he tinkers with his suits and is constantly working on newer and better ones. When The Mandarin begins his terrorist plot Tony looks on till it becomes personal. But who is the Mandarin and what does he want? Tony must figure these things out if he is going to save the people he cares about.
Once again Robert Downey Jr. delivers a great performance and makes Tony Stark a likabe character despite all his flaws. This time RDJ is tasked with giving Tony even more depth as he struggles with the panic attacks and his relationship with Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow). But Tony still has the great one liners and sarcastic comments that we all love. The movie also gave Gwyneth Paltrow a bigger role. Not only does she play the typical damsel in distress but she gets to flex some muscle too and I loved it. Don Cheadle as The Iron Patriot and Guy Pearce as Aldrich Killian gave great performance. But it was Ben Kingsley as The Mandarin that stole every scene he was in.
With Shane Black taking over as director and screenwriter the movie has a different feel. He makes this movie more of an action spy movie then just a typical superhero movie. What Shane Black did was take Tony out of the suit for a large chunk of the middle of the movie. With Tony stripped of everything he is forced to ask help of strangers while trying to figure out who The Mandarin is. One of the stranges is a kid Henry and a lot of the humor in the movie comes from the cool banter between the two. One of the problems that trilogies of comic book movies have is that they are always trying to top the previous movie. This middle part of the movie is pretty low tech and almost feels like the first one where Tony has to rebuild from scratch. That is until the end when things just go balls to the wall.
I can see some people having a problem with the craziness at the end. But I loved it. It's not giving too much away since it has been in all the previews that Tony has an army of suits that he unleashes and causes all kinds of mayhem. I can see how some people may find this over the top since the rest of the movie was him fighting without the suit but it worked for me and I loved it.
Someone wrote that there is more violence in this movie than other Marvel movies. That may sound odd but I had the same thought while watching the movie. For a comic book movie there was a lot of gunfights and death. This is when it felt more like a spy movie similiar to a James Bond of Bourne movie. Of course it was all bloodless but it gave this movie a bit of a different tone.
Not a comic book reader I don’t have the preconceived expectations about the characters and villains so I loved the big surprise in the movie but I am curious to what fans of the comic thought. So let me know. Also the kid in the movie is he supposed to represent some future hero? Fill me in comic book readers.
Overall: 5/5 Stars
Loved the new feel that Shane Black brings. It is a great mix action, comedy, and spy movie with an over the top fun climax. If you want to keep a franchise alive sometimes you need to try something new. This was one of the best part 3 in a comic book movie franchise.
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