Review: Iron Man 3
By Christine Petralia
Image courtesy of Marvel Studios
May 5, 2013
Iron Man 3 starts in 1999 with a backstory of Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) in Switzerland celebrating New Year’s Eve with a scientist working on limb regeneration. It then picks up one year after The Avengers left off. Stark has been having panic attacks trying to process what he witnessed in New York with The Avengers, including wormholes and gods. For the past year, he’s been tinkering with his ‘toys’ and suits, creating prototypes for some Iron Man suits.
Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrow) is running Stark Industries, and Happy (Jon Favreau), Stark’s former bodyguard, is now the head of security at the company. Potts meets with Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) about a project he’s working on, and Happy becomes suspicious of him and his creepy bodyguard. He decides to follow both of them into the middle of the Chinese Mann’s Theater. There he is caught in one of the attacks ordered by the terrorist, The Mandarin (Ben Kingsley), and is badly injured. As he’s leaving the hospital, Stark issues a threat to The Mandarin, giving the media his address for him to come and find him. He then starts an investigation into the theater attack, which leads him to planning a trip to Tennessee.
A day or two later, The Mandarin sends his guys out to destroy Stark’s home in the hills. Potts survives and is captured by the group working with The Mandarin, while Stark is sent to Tennessee, following the flight plan set up by JARVIS in his Iron Man suit. There he teams up with a kid, Harley (Ty Simpkins), who helps him figure out the group working with The Mandarin. He also helps him fix the Iron Man suit.
The investigation leads Stark to Miami where Killian, who is working with The Mandarin, is holding Potts and is planning an attack on the president. In the end, there’s a big battle between Killian, Stark, the Iron Man suits and Col. James Rhodes, the Iron Patriot, (Don Cheadle).
I really don’t want to give much away, as I want people to experience the twists and turns for the first time, as that was much of Iron Man’s appeal. As in previous films, it has a lot of humor, much driven by Downey’s sarcasm and just being a ass. Paltrow gets a slightly bigger part in this third installment, which will please some fans who believe her character needs more on-screen time. I wish that Cheadle has a little more on-screen time, but in the part that he had, I quite enjoyed it. The banter between Stark and Rhodes is quite enjoyable. I think the little twist with The Mandarin might disappoint true Iron Man fans, but for someone who never read the comics and just takes these films for what they are, it was a great film to start the summer blockbuster season.
I think you can skip any 3D or IMAX experiences, as the battle scenes are great on the big screen in regular format. And don’t forget to stay until after the credits. While it doesn’t really foreshadow the next film in the series (be it, Hulk, Avengers or Thor), it’s still a nice little extra scene.
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