Iron Man 2

Today I fulfilled my patriotic duty to the United States of America in two ways:  1) I voted for the first time of my life, and 2) I went to see a silly popcorn-wasting blockbuster Hollywood movie.  Obviously the latter is more important for the continuing prosperity of my nation, but voting is nice too.

Now beyond merely public service, I had to see this movie:  Robert Downey Jr. Blessed Be His Name, is the star, of course.  The man has been on an epic winning streak which I previously pointed out in my review of "Sherlock Holmes".  Thanks to that, I might wind up seeing every Robert Downey Jr. movie that will be made until his star power fades from this Earth when he is taken from us by the cruel hands of the Grave.  Also "Iron Man 1" was easily one of the best movies of 2008, almost entirely because of Downey Jr.'s effortless yet perfect portrayal of comic book playboy, Tony Stark, and thanks to an excellent supporting cast of Terrence Howard, evil bald Jeff Bridges, and Gwyneth Paltrow.

It was a fun movie.  More importantly with his egotism and alcohol issues, the character of Tony Stark seemed to offer some hints of deep personal issues that could be sorted out in the next few films that could really get into the meat of this franchise.  There's definitely more to this character than just his playboy attitude and 70s sunglasses.  But does "Iron Man 2" actually deliver on that kind of promise?

Short answer:  no.  Its just another comic book movie.  If anything, it has less meaning than the first.  Actually, I think I could save a lot of time here just by using a George Orwell quote:  "Nineteen out of twenty reviews would be more honest if they just said 'this book inspires no particular thoughts in me whatsoever'".  (I can't find the exact wording, but that's about it.)

Here's the thing:  instead of really dealing with all the things clearly wrong with Tony Stark, "Iron Man 2" actively avoids the issue in many ways.  First of all, the big personal conflict he has isn't internal, but external in the form of his artificial glowworm heart poisoning his blood.  Also there's evil Russian Mickey Rourke, who is taking over villain duties for evil bald Jeff Bridges.  The trailer implied that Rourke was some kind of scientist who either Tony or his father betrayed, and so was out for rightful revenge.  That might have led to some personal doubts over whether his cause is truly righteous in Tony Stark's mind, and this movie is already far too complicated for such things.  It turns out that this is entirely not the case and that the Stark family is completely squeaky clean, and Rourke is plain old cartoony evil.  So instead we have an extra twenty minutes of men in robot suits fighting other men in robot suits or just plain old robots.  Which is fine, I'll admit.  But there's nothing special about it.

Nothing on alcoholism, nothing on improving himself to be right for Gwyneth Paltrow, really nothing at all.  Tony Stark is still a fun character to hang around, but there doesn't seem to be all that much behind it all.  "Iron Man 1" had Robot Downey Jr.'s character abandoning his war profiteer status and using his powers for good - that gave an important character development and something to drive the movie.  This time its just Stark beating up bad guys.  The movie even touches on some important issues:  what would the US government do if a private citizen, benevolent though he may be, amassed enough power to singlehandedly overthrow it?  Then it throws those issues away with Stark's clowning, and moves on to some robot fighting.

There are so many great actors in this movie, including Don Cheadle* of all people, but they don't really have anything to do.  Scarlett Johansson is the one I really feel bad for:  she's just in this movie to look pretty and take part in some entirely unnecessary kung-fu action scenes.  She's entirely unnecessary to the entire movie.  She's here either to take up the male fanservice demand since Paltrow has gotten a little old, or she's here to build up the upcoming "Avengers" movie.  No matter which way you play it, she doesn't add much to this script.  A star of Johansson's status and an actress of her quality should not spend a movie sitting to the sidelines with maybe three lines and not a hint of characterization.  Even Paltrow seems to have lost something of her charm from "Iron Man 1".  I can't define exactly what was lost, but its definitely not here.  Maybe its just because she let her hair down...

You know, I could sit here and write a furious philippic about how this entire movie is basically pointless and give a paranoid rant about how this is another symptom of the growing dehumanization of filmmaking, but I won't do that.  Armond White already did that for me**.  All I can say was that I expecting something a bit more than just a blockbuster.  That's all it is:  a blockbuster.  No better, no worse, nothing special, nothing worth remembering.  The series has definitely devolved a bit here.  But what do you expect?  Its a comic book movie.  Its a sequel.  "Iron Man 3" will probably be even worse, and "Avengers" will certainly be absolutely awful (these predictions were made first at Planet Blue, folks, remember that).  We could have had another "Dark Knight", instead its "X-Men 2".  It isn't horrible, but it isn't great either.  If you just want an afternoon's entertainment and have a dire medical need to polish off a bag of overpriced popcorn, here's your movie.  That's all there is to say.  I'm completely numb to this movie.

Last Minute Update:  The "You Complete Me Scene" featured prominently in just about every single trailer, wasn't included in the movie!  What the heck?  This was a really funny and charming moment.  Yeah, I know the joke is old after seeing it about five trillion times on TV, but it still doesn't make sense that they couldn't just throw it in at the end or something to show that Stark and Potts have "something" of a working relationship and he's still going to fight crime.  Instead you have a boring scene setting up "Avengers", not that I care one bit about that movie.  I hate it when movies do this, its entirely inexcusable.  If it appears in your trailer, it has to appear in the movie.  No 'ifs', 'ands', or 'buts', it has to go in.

Fanwank Corner:  One trailer in particular before this movie caught my eye:  "The Expendables".  Let me just list the cast:  Sylvester Stallone, Jason Statham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, Mickey Rourke, Bruce Willis, and Arnold Schwarzenegger - who somehow managed to appear in this movie despite his claims of being a "respectable politician" (yeah right).  This is the greatest assemblage of action movie stars ever brought to the face of this Earth!  All you need is Samuel L. Jackson and Mel Gibson and then you'll have created a concoction of such incredible badassry that it would blow a hole right in the fabric of our reality and possibly end all life on this planet.  There's no way I'm not seeing this movie.

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* Turns out that Terrance Howard and Don Cheadle are actually completely interchangeable actors.  If one of them is giving you lip, just hire the other guy.  That should solve things.  I think I'm the only one who really misses Terrance Howard in this movie, because everybody else is fine with the shift.  Are Black actors really this replaceable?  Will Denzel Washington be in "Iron Man 3"?

** Reading that review, I get the sneaking suspicion that White didn't actually see the movie he's supposed to be reviewing.  Not that having seen the movie would have made a bit of difference, there's nothing here that possibly could have surprised any jaded film viewer, and definitely nothing here that would knock that heavy chip off of White's sanctimonious shoulders.  He's the Yahtzee of the movie world, just a lot less funny.