POST Wrestling’s MCU review of the month is on “Iron Man 2” (2010) for October.
With the world now aware of his identity as Iron Man, Tony Stark must contend with both his declining health and a vengeful mad man with ties to his father’s legacy.
Please post your feedback, comments & questions for this Friday’s show that will be available for all members of the POST Wrestling Café.
Branavan from Ajax Ontario:
This movie is perfectly decent, not too bad but not great either, Black Widow debuting was alright and Whiplash was cool but the movie just doesn’t have the same magic as the first.
Rich in Winnipeg.
Iron Man 2 for me, is a perfectly palatable movie, but not perfect. Really, this is the effort of a studio that is still trying to find its footing at this point, with some uneven storytelling. However, it is the hints of things to come with Scarlett Johansson as the Black Widow, and more interesting, the late Garry Shandling as Senator Stern, a character that reappears in Winter Soldier under more sinister circumstances. Mickey Rourke as Whiplash was fine, but this is the first of the MCU movies that has the one-dimensional villain, a problem that the MCU hadn’t quite figured out until Thanos. All in all, this a fine summer popcorn movie, nothing standing out, except of course, Robert Downey Jr., of which I feel the MCU will greatly miss after Avengers 4.
7.5 suitcase armors out of 10.
Burak from London.
Watching this the other day and it’s funny seeing Elon Musk in it.
Almost as if the character of Tony Stark is meeting the real-life version of Tony Stark.
Not one of my favourites, but still better than Thor 2.
Brother Pollock & Brother Ting,
This week I was thinking about why the Captain America trilogy is so much better than the Iron Man trilogy, and it hit me…Cap & Tony are the “Rock N Roll Express” of the MCU movies. The Iron Man films are Ricky Morton, they start first and set the tone for the rest of the movies to come. Because they go first, they deal with growing pains that some of the other films didn’t have to experience. Then once all the problems are worked out, here comes Robert Gibson AKA Steve Rogers with the hot-tag to win the match, end the Phase, and get all the critical acclaim.
That brings us to Iron Man 2, a film that takes a lot of flack from the fans, but it was a necessary step in the development of the MCU. The best thing about this film (other than RDJ & the increased role SHIELD recieved) was Sam Rockwell’s Justin Hammer. Hammer stole pretty much every scene he was in, and it’s a shame we haven’t scene him back on the big screen (or even the Netflix series) since this film.
The two things that didn’t really work for me were WWE-alumnus Mickey Rourke as Whiplash & Don Cheadle as Rhodey 2.0. I think Cheadle’s a fantastic actor, but I’ve always felt Terrence Howard played a Rhodes that felt more like he would be Tony Stark’s friend than Cheadle’s version. It’s a shame Marvel played hardball with Howard, especially considering how much these films made.
That being said, this is a fun but uneven film. It does what it needs to do, but never reaches the heights of the original Iron Man. I give it 6 “I’m here, deal with it’s” out of 10! 
