I've decided to continue my Marvel movie marathon. Iron Man was so successful at the box office and with critics that Marvel gave a green light to a sequel before Avengers came out in theaters. The sequel was also successful, but the fans were not happy with the movie. Neither was I. I mean it was a fun movie, but also really bad.
This is a spoiler review in case you never watched the movie be warned. In which case you still have to watch the movie, because it's a Marvel.
Robert Downey Jr is back as Tony Stark. Jon Favreau is once again in the director's chair and has a small role as Happy Hogan. Gwyneth Paltrow is back as Pepper Potts. We also have the famous switch in Rhodey as Don Cheadle takes on the role. He is much better in it. A much more likable actor. This is also the debut appearance of Scarlett Johansson as Natasha Romanoff/Black Widow. Sam Rockwell plays the industrial Justin Hammer who wants to compete with Stark in the invention market. Mickey Rourke plays the villain Ivan Vanko. This is the main cast.
This movie also has a tone of cameos. Garry Shandling plays Senator Stern, one of the senators on the committee, a role which he later reprises in Captain America: The Winter Soldier. There also a lot of surprising cameos that I totally forgot about in this movie. Stan Lee appears as Larry King. Olivia Munn as a reporter (Psylocke from X-Men: Apocalypse for you). Kate Mara (Invisible Woman from the terrible Fantastic Four movie) also has a small cameo in this movie. Elon Musk appears in this movie as himself from some reason. And a few others, but these ones stood out. Also, Captain's Shield get a cameo. Marvel's cameos are the best. Also, according to Marvel there is a very young Peter Parker cameo here as the little kid with the Iron Man mask. There are a few more, but these are the coolest ones in my opinion.
Unfortunately this movie barley has a plot. The one that it does have is pretty similar to the plot of the previous movie. I mean a better Iron Men suit vs. Iron Man. Only with more suits.
After the previous movie Tony Stark is suffering from palladium poising from his ARC reactor, but he can't find a solution other than changing the reactors with growing frequency. So Stark puts Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) in charge of his company and indulges himself with creating more suits and chaos as he thinks that he is dying. His behavior draws the attention of S.H.I.E.L.D. which decide to appoint someone to keep a close eye on him. They appoint Natasha Romanoff (the brilliant Scarlett Johansson), who gets her introduction in this movie before appearing in Avengers. Her action scene at the end of the movie is brilliant. Just fantastic. Stark is going off the rail and everyone moves in on him. Including Ivan Vanko. A character who has terrible character look and a terrible Russian accent. Even though my Russian isn't that great, I call tell that this is just awful. Terrible. It hurts my ears. The acting is over the top bad. He goes after Stark and fails. Justin Hammer manages to get him out of jail and working for him. Big mistake. Huge. Vanko uses Hammer's money and technology to create an army of drone suits and an upgraded suit for himself. Which leads to an uninteresting battle in my opinion. But after taking his suit from Stark, Rhodey creates a new upgraded suit of his own and becomes War Machine. Together they fight and win against Vanko and his drones.
Also, thanks to Nick Fury and Agent Coulson and the late Howard Stark, Tony Stark manage to find the new element which saves Tony's life. An element that his father found. So basically, even from beyond the grave his father saved his life. Tony gets his life back on track. Gets rejected from the Avengers initiative as an active member and is left as a consultant role. He also gets some closure with his father through a video where his father tells him that he is his father's greatest work. It was so touching. Unlike most of the movie. It feels like Tony is moving forward, but we also thought that in the previous movie.
I can tell why people didn't like the movie. Other than Romanoff there is nothing memorable about the movie. Nothing. It is just ok. We love the characters so that's great, but the plot is barley there.
Still, since I didn't remember the movie at all it was a fun watch. The post credit scene prepares us for the next movie, Thor.
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