mynintendobroke

Robert Downey Jr. isn’t coked up anymore? Apparently at the moment, the answer is no.

The latest movie based on the old-school Marvel Comics centers around Iron Man (played by RDJ), who I always thought was one of the cooler Avengers, at least in the video games. Most of you hard-core comic book readers already know this, but I’ll lay down the background: Iron Man is Tony Stark, a billionaire who owns and runs a company that develops weapons for the military. One trip to visit with army heads near the front-line turns disastrous when terrorists kidnap him and try to force him to build a powerful missile for them. Instead, Stark and a fellow captive, Dr. Yinsen, develop a powerful armor that enables Stark to get away from the terrorists. Following his escape, Stark realizes that building weapons is no longer what he wants the focus of his company to be, and instead invests all of his time continuing to improve upon the armor that he and Dr. Yinseng created earlier in order to promote his newfound humanitarian interests. The rest of the movie, which I won’t go into detail in order to avoid spoiling it, centers around the battle between Stark and other members of the board at Stark’s company, particularly Stark Industries executive Obadiah Stane, that have differing views on which direction the company should be headed.

He gave up lines for a glove that shoots fire and beams of laser. Wise decision.

With any recent superhero movie, special effects play a key role. The special effects in Iron Man were pretty good, especially all the computerized stuff involving Stark’s Iron Man suit. But none of the special effects were mind-blowing or groundbreaking. Pretty much your run-of-the-mill stuff blowing up digitally.

The plot line stayed relatively true to the comics, especially with how Stark was able to stay alive after being hit with shrapnel from an explosive. In order to “modernize” the movie, the movie was centered on the West Coast (California?) rather than on the East Coast, and the terrorists who captured Stark were from Afghanistan.

Hot girl alert: Leslie Bibb, who really hasn’t been heard from since the days of that awful WB show “Popular,” has a small role in Iron Man as a reporter who has a one night stand with Stark and then later blows the whistle on the underhanded deals that Stark’s associates have been making with terrorists.. And, without a doubt, Gwyneth Paltrow looked better in this movie (as Stark’s loyal personal assistant Pepper Potts) than she has in a decade.

I’m willing to bet Leslie Bibb wasn’t cast in her role for her Oscar-caliber acting skills.

Overall, the movie was enjoyable, somewhere between the level of X-Men (awesome) and the Fantastic Four(mediocre to OK). For the special effects alone (I have to admit, the suit is pretty badass), I’d recommend seeing this in the theater to get a full appreciation of them, but if you want to wait till this one hits the DVDs (or Blu-Rays, if that’s how you roll), I wouldn’t argue against you.

Rating: 6 of 10

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