Iron Man Destroys The Competition

Iron Man offers fictional solutions for real problems

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Today my wife and I took in the latest Summer blockbuster, Iron Man. Based on the Marvel comic book character, I have been looking forward to this movie after seeing the initial trailers depicting 'ol shellhead the way he appeared in the comics. Developed and directed with the attention to detail only a fanboy can deliver, Jon Favreau bring Stark Enterprises to life with stunning clarity. Many of the comic's touchstones are there: the captured scientist origin story, the different models of armor, girl Friday Pepper Potts and military pal Jim Rhodes, Stark's playboy demeanor and right wing militantism.

The story is told with zip and flair by Favreau, speeding through exposition with economy while giving comic book style framing to the action. Robert Downey Jr excels as Tony Stark, the genius weapons manufacturer / business leader who is taken hostage by Middle Eastern terrorists to make a missle. Downey captures the intelligence and egoism of Tony Stark while adding a smirky sense of humor to humanize him. The rest of the cast is a surprising lot of A listers for a superhero movie, Gweneth Paltrow is the perfect lady in waiting as Pepper Potts while Terrance Howard gives life to Jim Rhodes. An almost unrecognizeable Jeff Bridges plays Stark's business partner Obadiah Stane.

After escaping his terrorist captors by building battle armor to defeat them, Stark returns to the Western world a changed man. He wants to stop seeing his weapons supplied to terrorists and so he uses his armor to attempt to end it and ostensibly battle terrorism. Here's where Iron Man differs from the comic I remember (I haven't read Iron Man in 25 years or so...so my data might be outdated) in that Iron Man basically becomes Rambo when he puts the suit on. Although even in the Marvel Universe Iron Man was viewed as a tool for the military, this version of Iron Man lives in a modern environment where lethal force is the only option.

While this could be considered more realistic and score "cool" points with action fans, it sort of detracts from the classic concept of a superhero. Superheroes often operated by certain rules of conduct, in a fantasy world, that they would only exercise the force that was needed to subdue villians and kill rarely (except for Wolverine and Punisher, those two were always shown as code of honor killers). Even in previous wars, superheroes rarely were depicted as poison darting enemy troops or launching missles into manned tanks. It's not that I can't take violent movies or movies set in the present (half my dvd collection is heavy duty action films), just a little sad to see a classic superhero updated into a killing machine.

Or maybe its just the age we live in. Favreau places shellhead into the here and now. And as my wife pointed out to me, the down and dirty violence makes terrorism feel like an immediate threat again. When Stark is attacked by terrorists while in an army convoy, the attack is filmed like a roadside attack in Iraq. Like most people Stark ultimately wants to stop Mid East conflict and irresponsible capitalism and as Iron Man has the ability to take action. The movie is careful to depict the bad guys as completely evil and allows the audience to vicariously battle these forces.

Body count aside, Iron Man is one of the best of the superhero genre. An Academy Award worthy cast find the balance between fantasy fun and Masterpiece theatre. The action kicks, the humor is funny and the special effects are solid. The story is told confidently and deftly. I did wish the movie was a little less realistic in its depiction of the modern world to remove some of the grittiness and emphasize more of the fun. Nonetheless, Favreau proves like Sam Raimi before him, when its time to make a superhero movie fanboys rule.