Suds on the Roof

Directed by: Jon Favreau
Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Terrence Howard, Jeff Bridges
Rated PG-13: (For some intense sequences of sci-fi action and violence, and brief suggestive content)

The summer movie season is finally upon us, and you know what that means?  It means that I went nowhere near Made of Honor. 

Growing up, who didn’t want to don a suit of titanium alloy, fly around the city and fight crime?  I know I did.  The problem is, I’d never be able to keep my mouth shut about my adventures.  I’d be running around telling everyone who would listen about all of the cool things I just did.

We’ve all seen the trailer, so we know what happens - Tony Stark (Downey, Jr.) gets kidnapped by terrorists, he’s forced to build a weapon, he refuses, in walks Iron Man Mark I.  Stark manages to escape and, inspired by his Mark I suit, decides to take things a bit further.

Let’s take a step backwards.  Stark is the owner and president of Stark Industries, a multi-billion dollar company in the weapons business.  After his little run-in with the terrorists, Stark decides that his company would be better suited for the powers of peace, rather than promoting the use of weapons.  The Iron Man Mark II suit his Stark’s answer for peace.

The bulk of Iron Man is spent building Stark’s character, which is fine, because there will be plenty of time to see more of Iron Man in the sequels.  And we all know there will be sequels.  A lot of times in movies like this it’s hard to believe that anyone would be capable of designing - as the Joker once put it - those wonderful toys.  But in Iron Man, we believe that not only is Tony Stark capable of designing a flying, shiny suit of mass destruction peace, we believe that he’s capable of operating it. 

I mean, Stark puts on the Mark II suit, flies from California (I presume) to Afghanistan in what seems like a couple of hours, and I never once thought, “Oh, come on!” 

He’s Iron Man, why couldn’t he do that?

Iron Man contains everything you want to see in a superhero movie and more.  It’s funny, the action sequences and special effects are great, and pretty much all of the characters contribute to the story in their own little way.  Even the brief appearance of a male-pattern-baldness-inflicted Peter Billingsley was entertaining. 

It’s nearly impossible to screw up the origin story of a superhero.

Well, unless you’re Fantastic Four.

At the end of the movie we see that Tony Stark is pretty much exactly like we would be if one of us were a superhero (and insanely rich… and brilliant).   The man can out fly an F-22 fighter jet, he can shoot tank-busting rockets from his wrists, and take out terrorists with a pulse ray shot from the palm of his hand. 

And he can’t wait to get home and tell all of his friends about it.

Robert Downey, Jr. was born to play this role.  He has the charm and sense of humor to pull off Tony Stark.  Somewhere, Tom Cruise is kicking himself, because if it weren’t for his couch-jumping escapades and cookoo rantings, he’d probably be playing Tony Stark in this movie.  I assure you, we’re better off with Downey, Jr. as Iron Man.

For me, the only real misstep in Iron Man is with Jeff Bridges’ character.  Thanks to the trailer (which I saw 183 times), we all know that he ends up being a bad guy, so the eventual reveal of his turn-to-evil isn’t exactly a surprising one.

That is the one and only problem I had with Iron Man - a great movie to start off the popcorn season.

Finally, for the love of God, enough with the Stan Lee cameos!  It stopped being funny a long time ago.