Iron Man

The missus and I went to see Iron Man yesterday. It wasn't planned - just a spur of the moment decision to head out to the cinema to see if we could get tickets. Now I know what you're thinking and I agree. I am very spontaneous. What can I say? I like to live life on the razors edge - never knowing what the next moment will bring! Its like I'm a crazy man!

Hm-mm.

Anyway, the movie itself is surprisingly good. You have to give full credit to Marvel for coming up with another good superhero movie.

It has good special effects, some really funny moments and some great one-liners. Granted, it doesn't really do anything groundbreaking from a movie point of view. However, if you are looking for action fluff entertainment for 2 hours, you really can't go wrong. Also, judging from how well the movie is doing in the box office, it seems likely that a sequel will be made.

Anyway - fair warning - there be spoilers ahead!



Whats great about the movie is how believable it is. Granted, you have Tony Stark develop a radical new power source to keep him alive while living in a cave. Also, despite being monitored on cctv 24/7, Stark is still able to build a power suit without the terrorists noticing until its too late. Also the whole "civilians in power armour flying around kicking ass while being impervious to bullets" thing is kinda unlikely. Also, I don't think that adaptive AI will be possible for a while yet.

Hmm - okay, let me rephrase this a bit better.

There were certain areas in the film where they could have really screwed up the believability (even beyond the basic premise). For example, Starks Mk I Iron Man suit is pretty much destroyed in the process of his escape. The terrorists locate his grey Mk I Iron Man suit and his blueprints for the suit and for a while, it looks as if a bunch of terrorists in a cave are going to be able to replicate the work of Tony Stark. Luckily, the film dodges this bullet by having the terrorists get wiped out by Stark Industries (under the direction of bad guy - Obadiah Stane) who then gets the best scientists in Stark Industries to design a new suit (all without the approval of Stark of course). All in all, a good solution.

Another good design choice was that they made Obadiah Stane a part of Stark Industries. If you read the comic, you would know that Stane was actually the CEO of a competing Company which did a hostile takeover of Starks company. Making the bad guy to be a friend of Starks obviously has more dramatic impact. This also has the benefit of surprise to the 1 guy who didn't know the history of Iron Man or who are useless at guessing the obvious in Hollywood movies (obviously, as a Marvel fan, I knew Stane was going to be the bad guy and betray Stark).

Of course, the obvious problem with the film is the fact that its an origin movie. As with all origin movies, a lot of time is spent on how Tony Stark becomes Iron Man which means that you really don't get to see enough of Iron Man in action as Iron Man. Still, its a good first movie and I can't wait for the sequel.