Iron Man: Favourite Films Series

Iron Man (2008): Favourite Films Series

In this day and age, Marvel Studios dominates the cinematic landscape with their superhero movies, which continue to push the envelope of blockbuster action and expand on the ever-growing Marvel Cinematic Universe. While I have enjoyed nearly every successive entry in the MCU, and even flat-out loved a few of them, the constant benchmark these movies need to surpass (for me personally) is the original Iron Man, A.K.A the one that started it all. 

If someone had asked young 13-year-old me back in May 2008 if I thought Iron Man would be featured prominently in five more movies from that point up to 2016, I would’ve thought that person to be insane. A mere eight years ago, most people didn’t even know who Iron Man was, including myself. He was never one of those superheroes who gained popularity outside the comic-fan-sphere, like Spider-Man or Superman, so once a movie was announced, a lot of people just went, “okay?”

I recall seeing the trailer for Iron Man a lot, and thinking it looked kind of meh, but back then my friend and I went to the movies all the time, especially to check out action movies, so we went to Iron Man anyway…and were both totally blown away.

Superhero movies in general owe a great deal to this movie, but the mega-blockbuster-franchise that Iron Man has become part of owes it the most. Iron Man did a lot of new things that other superhero movies have copied and recycled many times, like having the hero fight a villain who is basically an evil version of himself (Hulk vs. Abomination, Ant-Man vs. Yellowjacket), but there’s one thing it did that still stands out to me as perhaps the best aspect of this movie. 

This was the first time I remember actually seeing the superhero alter ego develop as a character over the course of the entire movie. By that I mean it begins with Tony Stark as himself, then he gets the idea for a super suit of armour to help him escape his captors in the Middle East, and after the suit works, the movie follows him develop the idea further, by creating new versions of the armour that are better each time, and not until the final seconds of the movie does he declare: “I am Iron Man.” 

Up to this point, the closest thing we'd seen like that was how Peter Parker made a crappy homemade suit to wear in the wrestling match in Sam Raimi’s first Spider-Man, and then the next time we see him he has his fully-developed Spider-Man costume, but that’s still a far cry from how Tony Stark built on (and continues to build on) his original idea with new improvements. The Amazing Spider-Man also tried to do this, showing that version of Peter Parker as having just sunglasses and a mask at first, and slowly upgrade, but it hasn’t worked nearly as well in any other movie other than Iron Man. Sure, we’ve gotten to see Matt Murdock get a suit upgrade in Netflix’s Daredevil series, but that’s over how many hours of episodes? Iron Man shows it over a briskly-paced two hours, and it’s wholly satisfying. 

As cool as it is seeing Iron Man evolve, it would’ve meant nothing without Robert Downey Jr. in the lead. He is so natural in the role, at this point I can’t ever imagine anyone else playing the character. But beyond just RDJ, the rest of the cast is strong. Gwyneth Paltrow, who I usually don’t care for, is great as Tony’s assistant/future girlfriend Pepper Potts, and Jeff Bridges as Obidiah Stane, who starts out seeming like a good guy, but progresses to main antagonist in a believable way, and it shows how Bridges can play both a good guy and a bad guy with ease. Terrence Howard, however, never got a chance to continue being part of the Marvel world, but I thought he did a fine job as Rhodey. Don Cheadle ended up being a good fit in the role after taking over in Iron Man 2, but the O.C.D part of my brain wishes the casting had remained consistent from the character’s beginning to end. It’s a bit like how Edward Norton portrayed Bruce Banner/Hulk in The Incredible Hulk then Mark Ruffalo took over for Avengers on-ward. It’s an element that makes both Iron Man and Incredible Hulk feel more standalone, in a way, than the future Marvel movies.

Iron Man’s impressive cast was a mere preview of the staggering number of big names that would one day all share the screen, from Avengers to Captain America: Civil War. But one talent both behind the camera and in front of it deserves a huge amount of praise, and is a big part of why this movie works so well, and that is Jon Favreau, who played Happy Hogan (Stark’s bodyguard/friend) and directed the movie. He established a tone (a sense of fun and spectacle) that continued well beyond this first movie, and delivered some excellent action set pieces. The special effects hold up extremely well, and the way the cgi blends in is almost seamless, unlike future Iron Man appearances that sometimes end up looking fake because of cgi overload.  

Is Iron Man perfect? Well no movie is perfect, but there’s very little I take issue with. It’s interesting to go back and watch this movie, knowing what happens to Tony Stark down the line, but it doesn’t detract from it in any way. A lot of fans have cited The Avengers as the best thing Marvel has done, and it’s hard to argue against that, because of how much fun it is and how epic it was to see all those heroes on-screen together for the first time, but other fans have argued that Avengers is the best team movie, and Captain America: The Winter Solider is often picked as the best stand-alone Marvel movie. 

For me, the only one that comes close is Guardians of the Galaxy, because of its originality and personality (I guess it's technically a team movie, too, because it skipped over the origins of its heroes), but I find even it doesn’t quite live up to Iron Man. There’s something about Iron Man that is just perfect to me, everything from the way the story unfolds to the pacing to the rockin’ original score by Ramin Djawadi, it all just blends so well together that, beyond a few tiny nitpicks (one-off villain, a bit of cheesy dialogue), nothing sticks out to me as being an element of the movie that doesn’t work. In short, Iron Man just works. 

Later in the same summer that Iron Man opened, The Dark Knight also opened to huge acclaim and big box office bucks, but I think it says something that Iron Man still stands out as one of the best superhero movies in its own right, even in comparison to The Dark Knight. While that movies gets more recognition as being one of the absolute greatest ever, and rightly so, Iron Man still stands as perhaps Marvel’s greatest superhero origin movie. Tony Stark has continued on to bigger and bolder adventures, but for me, it always comes back down to the first time he suited up, and the question of whether or not a stand-alone MCU movie can surpass the perfection of the first Iron Man and be my new favourite has yet to be answered. 

But let’s hope Captain America: Civil War can do it!