The first Iron Man caught a lot of people off guard. It was as if they had never heard of Robert Downey Jr. and his ability to take over a film with his attention grabbing charisma and personality. Perhaps it would have been less of a surprise had they seen the excellent Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang a few years earlier. Fast forward two years later and Downey is now a two-time Oscar nominee and a household name. With that he’s returned to the role that started his rise, in a sequel that’s better than the first in terms of overall entertainment, but really could have used a jolt of energy midway through as things begin to sag before ramping up for the explosively loud conclusion.
Iron Man 2 essentially picks up where the first film left off. Tony Stark (Downey Jr.) has announced he is indeed Iron Man and the worldwide televised press conference is being watched in Russia by the ailing Anton Vanko, an engineering wizard and one-time partner to Stark’s father. He’s now disgraced and living out his final days as his equally intelligent son, Ivan (Mickey Rourke), watches his father’s slow decay and places all the blame on the Stark family. With his dying breath, Anton points at the television and whispers, “That should have been you,” setting Ivan off and immediately creating a villain for the film’s duration.
It’s a bit of a sudden and off-putting opening, but it’s quickly swept under the carpet as we once again enter the glamorous world of Tony Stark, though things aren’t all roses in Tony’s world either. The chest piece he’s invented, which is needed to keep him alive, is poisoning his blood and a non-toxic replacement is necessary or he will die. Meanwhile the government is after him for the Iron Man suit and the disgruntled and competitive weapons manufacturer Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell) is looking for any edge he can get on Stark as weapon sales are dwindling due to Iron Man’s “privatizing of world peace” as Tony puts it.
Fighting battles on all sides, something has to break and after ensuring the United States government the Iron Man technology is too complex for anyone else to duplicate, a sudden attack by Ivan using the same tech creates a world of hurt for Tony and offers the edge those that would prefer to see him fall needed.
The first 45 minutes or so of Iron Man 2 move at a quick clip. So quick you aren’t concerned with the convenience of the script and story. Things are happening and you’ll love the witty narcissism of Tony Stark and the added bonus of having Sam Rockwell as part of the cast. However, after the opening onslaught and as the story begins to settle down, there is a long drought in the action and the second act turns into a long-winded plot device that, for a moment, had me thinking Iron Man 2 was nothing more than a catalyst for an Iron Man 3 and the two-years-off Avengers feature.
Fortunately, the story comes around unlike the original, which set itself up excellently as an origin story only to devolve into a bash ’em, smash ’em robot brawl in the end. However, while the story may be complete it’s not without fault as it is rather clunky, lacks surprises and the second act is overly ponderous. Where the film excels is in its lack of concern for reality, and the owning of its comic book roots. Plot developments seem to happen out of thin air leaving audiences to think, “Oh, well that’s convenient.” But does that really matter in a comic book movie? It’s just too bad that convenience didn’t move the plot along a little quicker, such as a late scene between Stark and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow), which is destined to end as it does, though it takes forever to get there.
Some audience members may get a bit peeved at the number of sight gags and in-jokes for the comic crowd, but each is treated with a straight face and is short-lived. Not to mention it’s simply an attempt to make you smile, and it does so effectively without a complaint from me. Additionally, each character is supplied with a generous amount of witty comebacks. Almost all of them have at least one or two one-liners of their own, which means it’s not only Downey and Rockwell getting the juiciest lines.
Don Cheadle does a satisfactory job stepping into the vacated shoes of Terrence Howard as James ‘Rhodey’ Rhodes and Scarlett Johansson plays the eye candy with a secret, although the secret isn’t very well disguised and basically given away merely by her existence in the story. Jon Favreau gets a bit more screen time as Stark’s chauffeur Happy Hogan and Paltrow isn’t nearly as annoying as she was in the first film. As for Mickey Rourke as Ivan Vanko, he works, but he isn’t given much to do to really make much of an acting evaluation.
There are a lot of pluses to Iron Man 2 and the only glaring minus is the unsatisfying pacing of the story that seems to carry two giant weights on each end with not a whole lot in the middle. Nevertheless, it’s a fun film. Even while I am not the ardent supporter of the first one, as so many others are, I still return to it on occasion and expect I will do the same with this one once it is released on DVD and Blu-ray.
