Fan-Challenging but Ultimately Successful Third Episode.

Rating: 9/10 (27 April 2013)

Often, such as in the case of 'The Green Lantern', comic book movies are declaimed to be lesser than their source material. The cluttered mythology is either forced all at once into one film or film producers squeeze all the costumery, monsters, mad scientists and fun out of a title so as to deem it almost unrecognisable.
The 'Iron Man' film franchise had it tough from the get-go in 2008. Tony Stark was a sixties throwback into whom creator Stan Lee had parlayed cool-at-the-time-not-so-cool- now misogyny and materialism, sticking him in a clunking great robot costume that made him look like an angry fire hydrant at times. He was a near unknown character to anyone outside of the humid, cumin-flavoured recesses of a comic-book nook.
Jon Favreau and Robert Downey Jnr did well to play into the new-found trend for anti- political correctness. Hot on the heels of Daniel Craig's bastardly, born-again Bond, Downey's Stark was every bit the callous, corporate mogul playboy struck down by destiny to rethink his life and re-harness his talents.
Favreau selected Downey Jnr for many reasons, principally for the spooky parallels twixt actor and character but also because of Downey Jnr's career re-defining performance in Shane Black's whip-smart dialogued 'Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang'.
'Iron Man 3' returns the favour to Black by having him helm this new instalment. This new movie takes a cue from Chris Nolan - how could a "real world" version of the sci-fi-fantasy of comic books play out - and looks behind the corporeal and figurative masks of hero and villain. To wit, Black plays geek-defying games with stalwart Marvel villain 'The Mandarin', offering a take that may please conspiracy theorists with views on who Al Quaeda really are rather than comic book fans. It is a very brave move and one which is satisfyingly resolved - 'The Mandarin' is in this film, he just may not be who you think he is.
Overall, with cute kid and damsel in distress tropes comically toyed with, the film is a success and made me decide that Downey Jnr and the Favreau films (he produced this one as well as reprising Happy Hogan here) are my favourite take on the Iron-Man mythos. There are false notes in this film too - Don Cheadle's Rhodey seems better completely out of his Iron Man suit and the Shane Black wisecracks/grabassing can be indulgent in some scenes - but this is a geek-discussion-fuelling, edge-of-the-seat-gripping great night out at the flicks!