TITLE: Iron Man 2
STARRING: Robert Downey Jr., Don Cheadle, Gwyneth Paltrow, Sam Rockwell, Mickey Rourke
DIRECTOR: Jon Favreau
STUDIO: Paramount Pictures
RATED: PG-13
RUN TIME: 124 min
RELEASE DATE: May 7, 2010

By Steve McCarthy
Staff Writer, Evil Genius

Iron Man 2 delivers on all fronts, a great story, interesting characters and of course, big loud beautiful action. The best aspect of Iron Man is not the high octane and dazzling effects, it is the man in the suit. It was true of the first Iron Man and it is true here as well.

Robert Downey Jr. suits up as Tony Stark, A.K.A. Iron Man, and he delivers and outstanding performance. The whole world is crashing down around him from Washington demanding he hand over the Iron Man technology to his friends Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) and Lt. Col. James Rhodes (Don Cheadle, replacing Terrence Howard) losing faith and hope in him. Tony Stark continually becomes more reckless, and then a match for Iron Man shows up, Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke).

This only causes his problems to mount further. Of course Tony would never let things get too serious and continues to laugh off his problems even as they become more difficult. While the stakes never really seem high, à la world domination, revenge and a more personal story between Tony and Ivan take place, even if they are rarely on screen together.

Image courtesy of filmofelia.com.

Jon Favreau wonderfully captures Tony’s mounting despair and Ivan’s drive for revenge. He uses CG to enhance this story rather than tell it. Despite using CG as a means to and end, it is spectacular to look at Iron Man zipping through the sky as everything is destroyed around him. Destruction is everywhere and every pedestrian manages to make it through the carnage (this is only PG-13 after all). Even with all of the commotion, the battles have meaning and that is far too often forgotten in this season of blockbuster action movies.

Even with all of this action and personal problems occurring, the film poses some great question. Tony Stark is Iron Man, running flying around saving everyone, but should one man possess that kind of power? Should the government have the right to this technological weapon to protect our soldiers? Tony does have a big ego after all. What if he went mad and became some evil ruler? So that last question is not presented in the movie but that is an argument I could see the government making. The other questions leave us with a lot to ponder, both during and after the movie.

In addition to all of this, the humor and witty dialog remain. The over the top egos of Tony and his arms rival, Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), are always trying to out do each other. Even with out Hammer there, Tony remains funny and sarcastic.

But despite a layered story, humor and everything that Tony goes through, at the end of it all, I felt like the ending seemed a bit rushed. I wanted more resolution to the build up of characters. I wanted to see the changed Tony Stark after all he had been through. I wanted more at the end, but I guess that is what Iron Man 3 is for.

RATING: 8/10