Return to Trevor

Iron Man

Robert Downey Jr., Terrence Howard, Gwyneth Paltrow

Welcome to the summer of superheroes, maybe the most exciting summer for blockbuster movies ever! Indiana Jones is back, 26 years after he first snapped his bullwhip. It has been 11 years longer since Maxwell Smart exited the small screen arm-in-arm with Agent 99. Lets not forget the biggest money making film in the history of Disney Studios, The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, which has its sequel scheduled in a few weeks. Will Smith is bound and determined to prove that the 4^th of July is still “Big Willy” day, as he calls it. Pixar, which has never made a bad CGI film, has Wall-E coming out. Dreamworks is upping the animation war by putting out Kung Fu Panda and Disney is matching with American Dog. Underdogs Eddie Murphy and M. Night Shyamalan are looking to return to the A-list. The Wachowski brothers, err siblings, or is it brothers, have made a live action version of the cult cartoon, Speed Racer. The X-Files and Sex In The City are hoping their small screen audiences will pay to see them on the silver screen. Maybe comedy is more your style. Mike Myers, Will Ferrell, Jack Black, Ben Stiller, and Judd Apatow have films coming out. Want to sing Abba songs, I am not going to ask why, Mamma Mia! is there for you. Yet, it is the superhero films that I am most looking forward to. Dark Horse’s Hellboy is coming out in July, a week before Batman takes on the Joker, and both are looking like they are going to be lights out. “Hulk smash” June. Next to The Dark Knight, the film I am most looking forward to is Marvel universe’s richest superhero, Iron Man. It is only fitting that old Shellhead is kicking off what could be the best summer ever.

Tony Stark is a cross between Bill Gates and Tom Cruise, comics’ version of Howard Hughes. Not only does Stark look like Hughes, bur his personality was modeled on the Houston millionaire. As former editor Stan Lee noted, "Howard Hughes was one of the most colorful men of our time. He was an inventor, an adventurer, a multi-millionaire, a ladies man and finally a nutcase." He is the owner of Stark Industries, a high tech company and, more importantly, Iron Man, the red and gold armored superhero. The superhero in a suit of armor, which he invented, gives him flight, superhuman strength, near invulnerability, and a host of other powers that have varied over time.

Famous people like Samuel L. Jackson, Nicholas Cage, Kevin Smith, Jerry Seinfeld, Mark Hamill, David Lynch, RVD, Howard Stern, Quentin Tarantino, Wachowski Brothers, Janeane Garofalo, Rob Zombie, and Rosario Dawson are huge fanboys. Comics have become cool! The best and most revolutionary storytelling happening today is not found on the New York Times Best Seller list, but in the pages of graphic novels. These paneled worlds are no longer just for children. Comics based movies like Road To Perdition, Sin City, 300, V for Vendetta, History of Violence, and Ghost World have been outstanding and the superhero franchises like Batman, Spider-Man, and X-Men have dominated the box office. We are in the golden age of the graphic novel and these illustrated stories are only going to get better as mainstream audiences and writers discover the power of the medium. We are just at the foothold of this genre’s creative potential. In time, much like in Japan, comics will be one of the dominant storytelling styles of our society.

In turn, Marvel wants to continue to be a major player in this cultural creative explosion. With Spider-Man, Daredevil, The X-Men, Hulk and The Fantastic Four already up and running and Captain America, Namor, Luke Cage, Thor, Dr. Strange and Nick Fury ahead, it is Iron Man’s turn at bat. Marvel Comics has been trying to get an Iron Man movie off the ground for the last decade. Among the major stars linked to the role have been Tom Hanks, Leonardo DiCaprio, Ryan Phillippe, Nic Cage, and Tom Cruise but the movie studios that controlled production never got it off the ground and film rights reverted back to the company. Realizing how much money the major studios were making off their characters and how little control they had over the final cinematic production, Marvel has started their own movie production company and their red and gold armored superhero is among their first efforts, with director Jon Favreau (Elf, Swingers) at the helm and Robert Downey, Jr. as Stark.

What makes Iron Man interesting is how much Old Shellhead, as fans call him, has changed. Created by artists Jack Kirby and Don Heck and writers Stan Lee and his brother Larry Lieber, four men, who in the early 1960s never envisioned that they were dong anything but creating tales for children that would be forgotten as soon as the next issue came out a month later, came up with Tony Stark in Tales of Suspense #39 in 1963. Tony was born in a different era, a time when it was okay to be an all-American arms dealer. The billionaire playboy was in Vietnam researching how his devices were working in combat when he stepped on a land mine. With shrapnel close to his heart, a mad dog Chinese general named Wong-Chu, the “red guerrilla tyrant” of South Vietnam (In an embarrassing footnote, Marvel actually colored Wong-Chu yellow.) captured Stark and ordered him to invent a powerful weapon. Using the iron stockpile around him, Stark built an iron suit that not only gave him outstanding powers, but also helped his heart beat properly. In time, it was revealed that Stark was an alcoholic. Just what you want, your child to run into your room and announce that when he grows up he wants to be an alcoholic arms dealer with a bad heart. While Iron Man was originally an anti-communist crusader, battling such pinko leaning villains as Crimson Dynamo, The Titanium Man, Black Widow, and Mandarin, as the Vietnam War wore on, flower power came and went, and public opinion changed, the character and origins of the Iron Man had to change with the times.

Only three things have not changed in Stark’s world, although they disappeared briefly, his personal chauffeur, Harold "Happy" Hogan, secretary Virginia "Pepper" Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) and associate Jim Rhodes (Terrance Howard). Over time, Tony has been transformed into a millionaire industrialist and inventor and the situation that gave rise to his origins has been moved first to the Gulf War, later to Latin America and set in our drug war, and finally back to the Middle East.

Favreau’s movie stays close to the updated comic book origins. Superhero franchises usually break a universal rule of cinema. It can be counted on that the quality of a storytelling declines with each film in a franchise. The first film in a superhero franchise is usually weaker than the second (the exception is the original Superman franchise) because the first film has to tell the origin story and then shoehorn in a villain for the last half of the film. The natural momentum of garbage then takes over again. Spider-Man, X-Men, Blade, The Fantastic Four, and this year’s lights out Hellboy are examples. The villain in Iron Man is Obadiah Stane, a.k.a. The Iron Monger, played by Jeff Bridges. Stane is a ruthless businessman who is out to take over Stark Industries and he will take advantage of whatever information, friendships, and situations he has to in order to do it, including Tony’s alcoholism and romantic life. How will Stane use the secrets of Tony’s armor? Will Tony be able to fend of the power hungry Iron Monger? Well, considering that Favreau, Downey, Howard, and Paltrow all have three picture deals, you know the answer. You would know the answer anyhow, because superhero flicks are pure formula for the most part. Still, is it good? The answer is yes. Not Spider-Man 2 good, but much better than the first Fantastic Four film. All the actors are great, especially Samuel L. Jackson as Nick Fury. Favreau stays true to the Iron Man ethos. With Hellboy 2 and The Dark Knight coming out in a few months, it is not going to be the best superhero flick, but it is a nice way of kicking off the summer.

Verdict: A Great Start To The Iron Man Franchise