Iron Man: Three - what worked and what didn't

Rating: 9/10 (18 February 2020)

+ Starting with Blue (Da Ba Dee) is both appropriate to timestamp it and also appropriate to the theme of the movie.
+ Tony's arseholeness is his undoing - which is a long time coming.
+ Meeting Yinsen from Iron Man 1 at the gala just the way he said he did is a brilliant little flourish.
+ PTSD, the wormhole kid, the panic attack notions building the right way on demon in a bottle storyline from the comic - brilliant followup on first from Avengers. Makes sense that these movies affect the minds of characters.
+ The Mandarin is a smart look at Terrorism iconography and media in our century. Appropriation being a perfect ironic retooling from the comic's racist image of the Mandarin. It's possible that those that didn't like it, didn't get it.
+ The twice bait and switch from Mandarin to think tank to actor is clever.
+ Trevor Slattery/Kingsley - pure Monty Python levels of comedy - delicious.
+ Image of an unmanned suit towering over someone in their sleep and fuelled by nightmares grapples Pepper is a fantastic comic book looking spooky moment.
+ He calls the bad guy out and he attacks him. I mean, that's brilliant.
+ Stark calling suit to save pepper.
+ Nice little creative uses of Iron Man suit don't feel gratuitous, the hand pulling Stark up out of the water for example.
+ The Kid is a good actor, all that stuff is a nice middle act diversion, simple Spielberg without the schmaltz.
+ Pepper in the suit watching Tony's message is sweet.
+ James Badge Dale.
+ Tony going in all home-alone to infiltrate the mansion, then busting out with a gun and a hand is like a retooling of an old spy flick.
+ I want to say burning things and breathing fire is silly, and it is - but it's also pretty cool.
+ Music is nice, a little Enemy of State spy movie-ish.
+ "...Toast of Croydon" heh.
+ The goon that gets let go by Tony. hah.
+ Air Force One action scene is clever, can't beat physics, he's only a man in a suit, he has to be creative.
+ "What did you see?" "Too fast. Nothing" Lovely Shane Blackism.
+ All those toys. I mean suits! Suits! Great action sequence, sort of a 90's action sequence with a modern twist.
+ Love Liquid Snake-looking Guy Peace as a badass going full tilt villain.
+ Tony's one-on-one with Guy Pearce plus the way he finishes him off is a properly conceived watchable piece of action.
+ The real reason for Tony's voice over, not just a Shane Blackism!
+ Clean slate protocol making fireworks at Xmas. I mean I want to think it's silly but it just plain cinematic!

Wish they called it Iron Man Three.
Shame if the rumours are true about ditching a female villain because the action figures wouldn't sell.
Rebecca Hall is rubbish though, she just plays a soppy lost woman with a bad accent in everything.
Virtual crime scene reconstruction - as strange as it is to say - I mean I've done it in a hundred videogames - I appreciate it but it bores me personally.
Not a massive fan of the obviously improvised Tony Stark fanboy guy from Happy Endings.

Post-Credits sequence review: 5/5: Funny, surprising, personable, throws new light on to a trope/device/Shane Blackism. Crowd-pleasing and yet gives nothing away. One of my favourites.
Stan Lee cameo where he plays: An Old Man that rates a model 10: 3/5: Yeah, he fits the bill. Trimmed and passed in to the background, that's smart.