Good sequel

Rating: Null/10 (5 May 2010)

This sequel pretty well follows the well trodden path of balancing entertaining action sequences with equally (or maybe even more) entertaining crackling dialogues, such as:
To Tony Stark, "We owe you a lot" (something to that effect) Tony Stark, "More than you know". Rejoinder, "Not that much".
Maximum mileage was gotten out of Stark's narcissism, laughs that might have gone stale but for Robert Downey Jr's inimitable performance. But there is also a trace of pathos, as Stark is in a sense a dying man trying to live out his last days to the full. There Downey also did a great job with just the right touch.
The plot is a little unnecessarily convoluted, and may be best described through an array of characters, both old and new.
In Downey and Mickey Rourke we have the best pair of born-again stars, and finally thrown together in this movie. Rourke is Russian physicist (he actually speaks some Russian as best I can surmise) Ivan Vanko out there to destroy Stark in revenge for his father. His potential is quickly recognized by Starks's arch business rival Justin Hammer (superbly delightful Sam Rockwell) and recruited to create a human weapon that beats Iron Man. Vanko double crosses Hammer and turns the project into his own, creating instead an military force of much mechanical clones. But the ultimate attention grabber is Vanko's own alter-ego, cracking two electric whips that are arguably the best direct-combat devices since light sabres 4 decades ago.
Gwyneth Paltrow's Pepper Potts, more or less a sidekick in the first movie, has made the expected, logically elevation to Stark's equal, in more ways than one. The other sidekick Terrence Howard reportedly asked for too much of a pay hike and got replaced by Don Cheadle. The character Col. Rhodes too got a elevation of sorts, as another human weapon (he steps into one of Stark's other suits) with which the government hopes to control Iron Man. The two ends up reconciling and joins force against the common enemy Vanko'
Added to the parade of stars is a pair of behind-the-scene movers and shaker of events. Scarlett Johanssen's Natalie starts out as a legal adviser working for Pepper Pot but is later revealed as the assistant to Nick Fury, Natalie Samuel L Jackson's eye-patched godfather-type character who seems to run everything. One review playfully describes this growler character as "like a refugee from another comic". Johanssen effortlessly is the most pleasing eye candy. Her action sequences are remarkably like those of Trinity, perfected and immortalized by Carrie-Anne Moss, particularly the iconic landing pose (stooped low, hand on ground in front, one leg bend, one leg stretched straight to one side). But coming from Johanssen, there is a fresh, delicious flavour.