Iron Man 2 - A lot of individually good stuff that doesn't fit well together

Iron Man 2 is a messy movie with a lot of individually good scenes, which makes a lot more sense once you learn that it's really two films mashed together: the second Iron Man story that Jon Favreau wanted to tell, where Tony Stark begins to spiral out of control as the world reacts to Iron Man, and the Avengers set up that Marvel wanted. While I'm not blaming the issues of this film entirely on the Avengers setups, they certainly don't help.

It's not as if the Avengers are incompetently shoehorned in; Nick Fury is really only in one scene, Black Widow has a plausible enough role, and they do play an important part in the plot. But it's still an unnecessary complication; something which could have been written more organically into the plot. And really, though I understand that of course Black Widow's supposed to be terse and somewhat cold, since she's a spy and only has to mildly tolerate Tony, the character just comes across as very flat, almost as if she's just there for set up and a cool lady in a catsuit fight scene.

I have to admit, when I first heard that the film wasn't up to the first one's level, I thought it would have to do with the double villains, but I'm convinced that's one part they got right. So many other comic book films fall into the trap of having two or three villains and not doing any of them true justice (I'm looking at you, Spider-man 3!), but Ivan Vanko and Justin Hammer not only both work as villains, they work well together. Sam Rockwell is amusingly awkward, pathetic, and despicable as weapons company rival Justin Hammer, and even ignoring my huge soft spots for anti-villains and Mickey Rourke, he's great as the Russian scientist out for revenge on Tony Stark. They play amazingly off each other as some sort of bizarre team-up/odd couple without devolving completely into comedy villains; I think they have some of the best chemistry in the film. I can only hope that more movies with multiple villains take a look at their dynamic, because there was obviously a lot of thought and care put into it.

The main reason Iron Man 2 doesn't live up to the original is that the components don't all fit together and are occasionally held together with cliches.

Okay, that was two things, but to be fair, the cliche thing is more of an opinion/pet peeve of mine than an actual concrete complaint. Let's focus on what we know. There are at least four components to the story.

1.  Tony Stark is spinning out of control and doesn't know how to express it
2.  Iron Man has had enough of an effect on world politics that the government wants take control of it 
3.  Iron Man has become a symbol of power that is, in a way, separate from Tony Stark the man 
4.  So uhhh, there's this franchise we're planning on starting...

We already spoke about #4, but it's not hard to see that it doesn't quite fit with the other three. The closest it would get to is #2, but the film keeps those wildly separate; there's "The Government', who wants the Iron Man tech, and SHIELD, who the audience already knows is collecting superheroes, but is presented textually as something more clandestine and mysterious. In a way, it's odd, because it assumes that the Senate at least has no idea about SHIELD, or else they'd be concerned with the Avengers business just as much. Fury and Black Widow exist in a bureaucratic vacuum, which is strange in a story so concerned with government intervention.

#2 and #3 easily go hand in hand, but the problem is that while #3 is well expressed throughout the film, through both the Senate hearing and Ivan Vanko's role in the story, #2 isn't really touched upon besides the Senate hearing scene early in the film. We hear that Iron Man has solved conflicts around the world, and Tony certainly has decided that he has "privatized world peace", but there's not enough showing us the actual impact that Iron Man has had, and that's extremely important. In fact, all the plots really require us to understand how important Iron Man is; Ivan Vanko wants to destroy Iron Man's reputation, the government wants to claim that reputation, Justin Hammer wants to trump it, and Tony's having trouble keeping it all together. The individual threads work by themselves (particularly, once again, the villains), but that clarification would have really helped the film feel more cohesive.This also causes the Senate scene to come off as completely hollow; the memorable parts are all either obvious set up (Hey, here's Rhodey! And here's Tony's new rival!) or opportunities for Tony to fire off some smug bon mots. And, I mean, Tony being a smartass is part of why we love him, but, with the exception of him exposing Hammer's Iron Man attempts, it's actually a bit tiring. And while there's nothing inherently wrong about a scene being used for setup, it's frustrating when it's so obvious.

#1 is character development, which is always important, but I'm ambivalent on how it's handled. Tony deals with some very serious issues in a believable way, but sometimes these scenes are juxtaposed with others that just don't work together. The best example I have is the party scene leading to the Tony/Rhodey fight; the party scene is awkward and second-hand embarrassing, which is actually pretty brave in an action movie, but then the tone completely changes as we're taken from Tony's rock bottom moment of shame into a full-on supersuit fight complete with appropriate soundtrack. The fight leads to a few necessary plot points (all I'll say is that it's the precursor to the creation of War Machine), but it seems almost immature compared to the scene directly before it. This component of the film is also where Nick Fury and Black Widow intervene, which I think interrupts some of the emotional impact of what's going on with Tony.

But honestly, my problem with this area is that this is where the cliches lie. There are some really wonderful scenes between Tony and Pepper, but we also get a few frustratingly predictable bickering/misunderstanding scenes. Of course Tony can't truly tell Pepper, or anybody, what's wrong. Of course he's pushing people away. It might not be a huge deal for most people, but it's something we see all the time, and it just seems a bit lazy to me.

A lot of the time, people blame bad reception of a sequel on the hype that preceded it, saying that fans were just expecting too much or are unpleasable. In Iron Man 2's case though, I think it's completely justified. The first movie worked on so many levels, and while Iron Man 2 isn't awful, it's such a step down from the first one that it's legitimately disappointing. There's so much in the film that's good, but together it just doesn't work very well, and that's a very valid complaint. Viewers know that everyone involved is capable of doing better, and that's why people say Iron Man 2 sucked. It had so many tools to be just as good as the first movie, and...it just isn't.