Eh-ron Man
The main problem with Iron Man 2 was that it was only half Iron Man. The other half, I'd guess you'd call it Avengers prologue pt. 1, really didn't fit and took away from the overall story. We spend the first part of the movie meeting Whiplash and then the villain essentially disappears until the final act. While Sam Rockwell's Justin Hammer character was entertaining, he was kind of an impotent villain because he wasn't really a threat besides the fact that he'd assist Whiplash. In fact, the storyline isn't too far from the Superman 2 storyline with Lux Luthor helping out Zod and his two cronies, except Zod was a much better villain.
Click "continue reading" for more on the film (spoilers ahead)...The biggest problem with the Iron Man films has been the lack of a great villain. The power source for Iron Man's suit seemed like a bigger threat than anyone else for most of the film. And, like the power source, the threat was pretty much just to Tony Stark. Whiplash's drones were just after Stark. I guess we're supposed to believe that somehow nobody got hurt in the crossfire (or maybe we're just not supposed to care) but the world has yet to really face much peril in these films. And the importance of Tony Stark isn't THAT great because apparently anyone like Rhodey can hop in the suit and control it with little to no problem.
This film also had the same episodic issue that took me out A Prophet. Tony Stark never really seeemed overwhelmed in the film. Whiplash came and was caught. Then Tony was a drunk. Then Tony worked on his element. He discovered what he needed to and then was off to fight Whiplash. It was all too convenient. There never really seemed to be an overlap of any two problems. When Stark was at his worst, his enemies were at their quietest. Not having a secret identity takes away on possible juggling act so the writers probably should have tried to find another way to have Tony Stark struggling with multiple issues at once.
Sadly, when they should have been doing that, they were spending their time forging forward with the Avengers story. And that didn't really help anything. It gave an early deus ex machina solution to Tony's problem and allowed for one action scene that, fittingly, turned out to be pointless.
In the end, the movie was fine but forgettable. And that just puts more pressure on the following Marvel films because I'm not sure that the Iron Man coattails are going to be able to carry the Avengers movie. If Captain America and Thor disappoint, it could hurt the big 2012 release. It also should be interesting to see what kind of drop IM2 has. Robin Hood is coming out this next week and I'm not sure that the word of mouth on Iron Man is going to bring in a big second weekend audience. It won't make the huge 72% drop that the lousy Nightmare on Elm Street did but I could see 55 - 65%.
