A Fresh Perspective on ‘Iron Man’


Confession time: I haven’t seen any of the five movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the cinema. I was aware of them, but I never actually got round to going to see them. So, with Marvel’s Avengers , or Avengers Assemble for us Brits, coming up fast, I decided that I was going to catch up on the MCU before Avengers. First stop: Iron Man.

First things first: I loved it. Sure, it wasn’t up there with The Dark Knight, but then what is? *looks at Marvel Avengers Assemble* Anyway, after I’d accepted that Iron Man wasn’t going to be quite as good as TDK, I really enjoyed it. Robert Downey Jr gives an excellent performance as Tony Stark, and it’s easy to see how Downey Jr’s popularity shot up after this movie.

The rest of the performances are generally solid, though pretty unexceptional, especially when you compare them with Downey Jr’s performance. However, this is made up for by the consistently witty and well-written script, which marks a bit of a change from the blockbuster norm of ‘great action, but I didn’t think much of the storyline’.

Speaking of action, Iron Man had it in spades. From set-pieces like Iron Man’s confrontation with a pair of US army planes, to Iron Man’s escape from the den of the Ten Rings, to the final battle, Iron Man had plenty of great action along with the good script.

I haven’t seen the sequel, Iron Man 2, but I’ve heard it’s not as good as this one. Pity, because in the sequel movies usually improve (e.g. Spider-Man 2, The Dark Knight). But before that, I have a movie involving a certain green mutant to watch…

Next stop, ‘A Look Back at The Incredible Hulk‘ coming Saturday 10 March.