Movie Review: Iron Man

Before you read this review, please go through the following checklist:
1) Do you hate superhero movies with a really strong, really really boring moral message?
2) Do you hate superhero movies with sappy main characters who act like Elijah Wood *shudder* could act circles around them?
3) Do you think robots are awesome?
4) Do you think that robots could still be awesome if they had awesome actors who played awesome people (who were technically superheroes but still liked hookers, hot rods, beer, explosions, and had more money than God?) inside of them?
5) Would that robot still be awesome if it fired laser-like bursts of flame and explosives and looked really cool?
6) Most importantly, what if we were to pit this robot against terrorists, tanks, and another more powerful giant robot?

If you answered "yes" to all of these questions, you've basically qualified as someone I would hang out with maybe. If questions 3 through 6 all seem like they would be fantastic in some sort of, oh, I don't know... movie, or something, then you're correct. They're all awesome things. And guess what? They're all in Iron Man. And don't worry, it's totally free of 1 and 2. Let's run down the list, shall we?

First of all, it's an established scientific fact that the following things which appear in this movie are all awesome:
- AC/DC
- Goatees that actually enhance your appearance instead of making you look like an asshole
- Robots... made out of gold titanium-alloy or something and painted gold and red
- Lasers, Flamethrowers, Robot Punches, Flying, Sticky Bombs, Etc.
- Beer
- Private jets with pole-dancing stewardesses
- Heroes that don't still wet the bed or feel that their powers are somehow some sort of burden
- Cyborgs

Robert Downey Jr. has done an outstandingly awesome movie, and this time you won't be disappointed. Iron Man is definitely the most awesome superhero-genre movie to come out since Transformers, and these two movies are the best of the best. There's not a lot of things that can get me to go see a movie that don't involve robots with cool weapons. Downey Jr. basically exhales cool in this one, and for ONCE Marvel doesn't get up its own ass with morals and all that. Of course, that's not to say that Tony Stark doesn't say that he isn't doing this to protect people, but you get the feeling that he's doing this because he's pissed for being kidnapped and tortured by fictional terrorists, and the fact that he gets to beat them up using no less than a cooler-than-you'll-ever-be robotic suit with a computerized butler build right in. It's no Spider-Man 3, thank God ("I forgive you!" "No, I forgive you!").

The basic premise is this: Tony Stark is the gajillionaire CEO of Stark Industries, a weapons manufacturing company built by his father, who was apparently also really cool. Anyways, he inherited the company and is now winning eight awards a second and got onto the cover of Wired magazine, cornering the geek market as well. He builds engines and can construct his own missiles himself, making him almost solely responsible for his fortune and all that noise. On a trip to Iraq... or Iran... Or some middle-eastern country with US troops in it, he is kidnapped by a group of terrorists who come from all over Asia, and told to build one of his new missiles that can basically spray an area with a bunch of little missiles. Naturally he instead builds a shoddy-looking but effective iron suit and powers it with a glowing spark-plug like thing (an arc reactor, a fictional but cool source of power) which also keeps shrapnel out of his chest. He of course escapes in twenty minutes after getting into the suit, and promptly is rescued, goes home, and shuts down the weapons section of his company. This ticks a lot of people off, prompting the rumor that he's suffering from PTS. The only logical thing to do? Go and build an advanced version of the suit you escaped the terrorists from. Getting revenge on the terrorists ensues. Finally, Stark's right-hand man (who incidentally paid the terrorists to kill him) gets ahold of the original suit, and makes a bigger, badder-looking version of it to be flown by himself. To do so, he steals the new version of the spark-plug like thing that Stark build to power the new suit, and so Stark has to fight his right-hand man (who has gone basically insane) with only a little bit of power. At the very end of the movie, he just comes right out and reveals that he is indeed Iron Man to the general public, immediately after which some Osbourne starts playing over the credits. Rock.

In case you just missed my entire review of this thing, the basic rundown is that this movie is awesome and if you're like me you'll like it. If you're not, it's your loss. Final verdict? As I've said far too many times in this post, this is one awesome movie.