Iron Man 2 - Seen it, bring your spoilers here

So, several have people have said “I’d say more, but that would entail spoilers,” so let’s have it.

Saw the movie at midnight, and while I’m sure there are complaints to be made, I have none. It was pretty much just exactly what I was expecting, and that’s a good thing. Pure Iron-Man-y goodness.

And Scarlett…she’s easy on the eyes.

So, take off the gloves, let’s go.

Sam Rockwell was great in he role of Robert Downey Jr. for scenes without an actual Robert Downey Jr. They were suitably different in the specifics of their eccentricities, but both equally adept at the just-won’t-shut-up thing that RDJ has done so well in both movies now.

Agreed, his little eccentricities were very well done.

I with the final Whiplash battle could’ve been a tad longer. Feels like they just sorta each got hit once, really hard, then they just wtfpwnt him without much of a fight. Why did he keep taking his mask off??

Also, if you didn’t stay through the credits, for shame. One of the best parts of the movie! It’s not everyday that a throw-away line in a movie becomes one of the most important scenes in the movie after the credits.

I’m talking about Thor’s hammer. Wonderfully shot, and completely unexpected.

The end fight’s totally lame, so it’s pretty merciful that it’s so short. Whiplash arriving in the suit not only feels like a retread of the first movie, it’s also dramatically inert. The only stakes are their lives. Will the heroes win or lose? Well, duh. There’s no dastardly plan to stop, Whiplash’s only aim is to kick his ass, and it’s not like Tony Stark’s going to lose. There’s no suspense. I guess you could argue that War Machine might die in the process, but the fight doesn’t ever really threaten that, so really, the end is a forgone conclusion. They don’t even establish Whiplash’s new suit as particularly threatening or badass.

Compare it with something like the Batman vs. Joker showdown in The Dark Knight, where the question isn’t only if Batman will beat The Joker, but whether Batman will kill the Joker in the process or not, and the entire movie has been building towards that. Suspense. Drama.

I don’t think they did enough to earn that kiss in the end. There’s very little progression in their relationship, it’s just the usual bickering and then they’re smooching. If they’d been kissing at the end of the first Iron Man, it’d been a lot less weird.

And does anyone know what the hell his heart of iron is supposed to do anymore? In the first one it was established that it kept metal fragments from reaching his heart, but then they had the bits where Bridges removed it and he seems to go into cardiac arrest, and he had to switch the power source and all that stuff, so they were already handwaving stuff there. In this one it actively seems to power him up when he puts in the new power source. It’s like the writers have just given up about being consistent.

That’s quite a lot of bitching, but I guess that’s inevitable in a spoiler section. I did end up liking it overall, but that was purely down to the actors and their chemistry and the dialogue, not the plot, which was just a mess.

Goddammit I knew I should have stayed for the credits. What happened?

I agree with a lot of the quibbles, and while I enjoyed the movie it was the reverse of the Spiderman 1/2 situation for me. Iron Man 2 was good, but the first one was better.

I didn’t find the ending battle anti-climactic, mostly because I felt the ending battle was the autobot chase as opposed to the final showdown with Whiplash.

The SHIELD agent shows up for the “situation” in New Mexico. There’s a huge crater with a team working around it, the agent is on the phone and says something like “yeah, we’ve found it”, and then we finally see a shot of the inside of the crater. It’s a quick partial shot of Mjolnir, you might not recognize it as a big hammer unless you’re already familiar with Thor.

The guy who was tasked with watching Stark earlier on by Samuel Jackson says he’s been reassigned, remember? He goes to New Mexico or Arizona and it shows him pull up in a car by a crater/cliff face. Inside the crater/valley is a smaller crater with a team of scientists and suits taking readings. He turns around and smiles, pulling out his phone. “Sir, we’ve found him.” Or something to that effect, the shot pulls out and pans down, and you see the haft and part of the actually head of Thor’s Hammer. It was actually really cool, my theater erupted in applause and fervor.

It’s not explained explicitly, but the Paladium he’s been using to power the arc reactor is poisoning him, as you can see with the technological lines all over his body, which is supposed to be a look at the poison in his blood (He gets a shot from Samuel that combats the effect until he can figure out how to cure it, the cure which Jackson then provides a scene later, the plans for the same kind of reactor that his father was working on).

For the most part, I enjoyed Iron Man 2 as a study in characters acting and interacting against one another. Favreau is primarily a comedy guy and it shows in Iron Man 2, especially the dramatically inert action sequence.

It also shows that Iron man 2 is hung together with spit and polish, rather than a coherent script that builds to any sort of climax. There was so much more they could have done with Hammer’s plot and Mickey Rourke and even War Machine, but they seem to just choose to film scenes with characters bantering and acting against one another. It’s a quibble though, because when I’m seeing all the characters on-screen having that much fun, I can’t help but enjoy myself along the way.

I’m happy enough that Iron Man is willing to just be good popcorn entertainment because hey, we need some of that to balance out the heavy doses of Dark Knight once in a while. At the very least, Iron man 2 doesn’t insult your intelligence and the cast and crew are genuinely enjoying the film, rather than it being rote mediocrity.

Oh, damn. I would have loved to have seen that. I’m sure it’ll pop up on some video site somewhere soon enough though.

Nevar.

Saw it for free (thanks Palo Alto Networks!) this morning. I thought it was great. RDJ does a great job playing Stark again, he really nails the eccentric, tourtured, narcissistic playboy routine and does it so you love, not loathe, the character. The supporting cast is good, and SLJ is awesome as Nick Fury. If they ever make a Dr. Strange movie they really need to cast Mickey Rourke as the title character, the guy would be great in that kind of role.

I thought the plot was OK, though I agree that the final confrontation was a little lackluster and Whiplash kind of lacked the “super villian” vibe. On the other hand, that was OK, as super villians are overdone and it was nice to have a more personal point to the conflict rather than just “Oh noes, another plot to rule the world”. I loved that the movie’s sub-plots opened up possibilities for Shield, Avengers and Thor movies (the last of which is obviously in production).

I wasn’t really convinced with the Tony-Pepper romance angle, I’d really rather he stay a playboy as it makes for great one-liners and situational setups. Scarlett Johansens character seemed almost like an afterthought, though it did setup the Shield angle and she was nice to watch on screen.

Overall I’d say the movie is one of the better “comic” movies I’ve seen. I’m not a huge fan of such movies, but there’s just something about the Tony Stark character the way Robert Downey Jr. portrays him that appeals to me more than a Spiderman, a Superman or a Batman. He really does carry the movie, and makes it worth seeing.

Awesomesauce.

Mostly boring, with no stakes. Downey is unappealing for the first half-hour, when the movie is relying entirely on his charm. Action scenes were too dark. ScarJo’s big combat sequence was unintelligible and jerky. Rourke was just kinda gross and unmotivated, not to mention the least convincing physicist since Christmas Jones. Fury looked like he was in the wrong movie with his ridiculous coat and eye patch. Despite those complaints, I thought it was reasonably entertaining. There were a few laugh lines that worked on me, and I really enjoyed Sam Rockwell.

I…what?!

That’d be right up there with Brian Thompson as Dr Strange. Or, as just occurred to me, Brion James.

Like I said in the other thread I really liked the beginning and the end, but that middle part was forehead slapping worthy. From the miracle injection to the MESSAGE FROM THE GRAVE ominous music here to the particle acceorator in his house, all of it was just so damn dumb.
Overall I still enjoyed it because of the acting and the not middle parts.

Me and the guy I sat next to both looked at each and go “It’s Science!” and everyone agreed. How ridiculous was that scene.

I didn’t have any trouble following it, and also thought it was pretty cool.

I enjoyed, but agree with the notion that the very last fight felt a bit short and unspectacular. Some part didn’t take that much sense to me - the element design hidden in the city model. Um… ok. Rhodes jumping into the suit and then confronting Stark in a way that’s just destined to end up in a fight. (Seriously, if you have good friend that is bloody drunk, threatening him is usually not the best option to get anything done.)

And while we’re at the topic of Rhodes: I do like Cheadle, but the chemistry between Terrence Howard and RDJ was a bit better, IMO.