Iron Man Three was released earlier this week, now directed by Shane Black and written by Drew Pearce and Shane Black rather than Jon Favreau of the previous two films. It’s the first stage of the next line of Marvel movies, referred to as Phase 2.
This is a mainly spoiler free review but if you want my thoughts with no spoilers whatsoever, no talk about anything in the film, here it is. It’s a spectacular movie and is a great follow-up to the other Marvel movies. If you liked the other Iron Man films this one also knocks it out of the park. Go see it without reading any spoilers because there are some moments that work better when they take you by surprise.
Full review below:
The plot of this is fairly simple as a new terrorist leader, and one of shell heads arch villains from the comics, the Mandarin is attacking America through a series of bombings that no one can figure out how it’s being done. Iron Man gets in the way and the Mandarin tries to make an example out of him. There’s a lot more I won’t cover but the movie does build on what has come before with Tony still reeling from the events from the Avengers film and trying to figure out how to deal with it and the much larger universe he’s now in.
There’s a lot of moving parts to the plot much like Iron Man 2, however this film has a better focus on Tony while also keeping greater perspective on what the supporting cast brings to the table. There are some points that could’ve used more time devoted to their development they all still work very well. The pacing is very well done and nothing feels bogged down.
The thing that makes the film stand out is that it doesn’t forget to be fun. Despite Tony’s main character arc is him dealing with PTSD the fun and humor doesn’t let it bog down the film. There are quite a lot of moments where the audience bust out laughing because of how funny the film got. It does know how to keep both the serious moments and the humor separate yet still connected, so nothing undercuts the story yet the humor doesn’t feel out of place.
However some of the comedic scenes can drag on longer than they should and there was a little too many when the film was making it’s way to the climax. Those were the exception rather than the norm, though.
Tony does have a lot of inventive moments in the film and it gives some time to him solving problems, which has made some of the best moments in every Iron Man film so far. There is some Magyvering going on and it adds to the fun of everything. Robert Downey Jr is still the best part of these films and he made the character his own. He plays off everyone so well that even incidental characters are made a little bit better and more interesting because of how he interacts with them.
The main villain was excellently done. I won’t go into details but I will say I thought this was the best version of the Mandarin I’ve seen. Ben Kingsley is perfect for the part and nailed every scene. I am sure it will annoy some fans since this is probably the most outside the comic lore these films have been for a big villain. But for me he was great and changes need to be made in order to do these films. The Mandarin was always a divisive character for a film because of his ‘Yellow Peril’ origins as well as his ‘ten magic rings that are really alien space dragon technology’ powers.
I am glad with what they did with Pepper in this film. I was a little worried about how things would play out for her but in the end I was satisfied with what happened with her. All of the supporting characters did well in this and had good enough screen time and development that they didn’t feel like wasted screen time.
Overall this is another great Marvel movie that should be seen in the cinema for the full effect. It captures the fun that made the first Iron Man movie so popular as well as the rest of the Marvel Studios films. There are so many funny moments and fun character interactions that need to be experienced than simply told about. It needs to be first experienced without any spoilers or anything like that so it can take you by surprise and there some things you’ll never see coming. Which makes it great to watch the first time round.
