Entertaining watch, mediocre movie

Rating: 7/10 (9 August 2012)

The original Iron Man was well-received and paved the way for future instalments. Director Jon Favreau and most of the original cast return to create a film aiming to fix the flaws of the original, attempting to create a genuinely superior sequel and a great Iron Man movie. Whilst I walked out of the movie feeling thoroughly entertained, I was somewhat underwhelmed by the film itself.
Despite its attempt to fix the original's flaws, Iron Man 2 is a heavily flawed film. I criticised the first film for its lack of a coherent story to drive the film itself. The sequel aimed to fix this problem by introducing a new multi-layered plot, wiling to tread into darker territory whilst remaining true to the film's fundamentally light tone. This was undoubtedly a great direction to take the sequel, but ironically enough it becomes the films biggest flaw. The problem with the story is that there isn't one. Instead we are given far too many sub-plots without an actual main plot to drive the film. When trying to consider what the main plot is, consider the sub-plots. The story begins with the concept, following on from the ending of the first film that the world knows Tony Stark is Iron Man, and he has subsequently been drowned in fame and glory. On the other hand, the government wants to take the Iron Man armour, which they refer to as a weapon and Tony refers to as a suit, in a court scene which is entertaining but takes its toll. During this time, Tony is aware that the 'arc-reactor' in his chest is killing him, and as a result of this the film is given an excuse to turn our leading character back into an egotistical, arrogant playboy, touching on the theme of alcoholism and taking an unexpectedly darker tone, practically defeating the purpose of the first film. This is also fuelled by Tony's past returning to haunt him, in the shape of his father, and Tony coming to terms with the fact that he never had a loving relationship with his father (this giving the film further excuse to go into unwanted dark territory) as well as the film's central villain, Ivan Vanko, played by Mickey Rourke. Vanko is a Russian physicist with a personal vendetta against Tony, blaming the Stark family and Tony's father for betraying his father and leaving the Vanko family in extreme poverty. On top of this, we are introduced to rival businessman Justin Hammer, played by Sam Rockwell, who is essentially a 'Stark-Wannabe', and is intent on helping the government take Tony's suit. The film simply struggles to make sense of all these sub-plots, and while none of them are bad, it's the fact that there are simply too many sub-plots for the film to handle.
As the film progresses, these sub-plots peak at the mid-point and the film crashes under its own weight, unsure what direction it is going in. It was at this point I actually felt bored and quickly began to lose faith in the film, especially when it decided to introduce Nick Fury and Shield, bringing even more characters and storyline to an already overly-complicated plot. It was during this time the film turned into advertisement for the Avengers movie, making several deliberately-placed nods towards Captain America and Thor. Fortunately the film finds its footing, and picks up during the last twenty minutes, presenting us with an entertaining final battle sequence, though it did just feel like an extended improved version of the original movie's finale. Not only does it get lost in too many sub-plots, the film also treads into the same mistaken territory of so many sequels and introduces far too many new characters than necessary. One of the aspects of the first film I loved was the chemistry between Tony and Pepper; however Pepper is given a lot less screen time and very few scenes with Mr. Stark, and Scarlet Johansen's 'Black Widow' character seems, at points, to replace Gwyneth Paltrow on-screen, with a pointless and boring character serving no real purpose in the film other than to look hot and fight.
This also gives Mickey Rourke's character, one of the few genuinely interesting characters in the movie, the bare minimal of screen time, spending the majority of the second half of the film sat in a warehouse building robots. If the makers of the film had taken a more mature approach and focused on the genuine points of interest, i.e. fleshing out the central villain Ivan Vanko, and sticking with the concept that the government wants to take Tony's suit, it would have been a much better film than it currently is, however they insisted on taking the overly-ambitious route, desperate to make the film a superior to the first, and as a result it is no way near as special. On a more positive note, all the performances were just as impressive as the first film (save for Scarlett Johansen), though even Robert Downey Jr. was not able to stop Tony Stark being a rather unlikeable character in parts of the film. Personally, I felt the villains of the film to be the most impressive aspect, Mickey Rourke giving a subtle and realistic portrayal as Tony's nemesis and Sam Rockwell stealing the show as an naive, whimsical and utterly irritating (but in a good way) business-rival Justin Hammer.
There is nothing 'bad' in this movie so much as the fact it is far too ambitious and becomes drowned in far too many sub-plots and characters. Nonetheless it was an entertaining ride, feeling a lot more like a blockbuster superhero movie, contrasting the gritty tone of the original. It's not as special as the original, and a less-is-more approach would have been a better direction, but as it stands it is an entertaining sequel and well-worth a watch.