(cross posted from Tumblr)
In general, I did like this movie. It was better than the second one.
Things I liked:
-Pepper. fucking. Potts. She rocked in this movie. Sure, the “girl friend gets kidnapped” trope was in there but she didn’t just stand around being helpless. Even before getting powers to help her out, I was impressed by her strength in the situation. She stood up to man who had complete power over her. That would be terrifying and she did it anyway.
-Tony actually responding to the events in Avengers like a human being. Seriously, he was unnaturally chill about being captured in the first movie and didn’t seem that bothered in the second. We finally got to see ”wow I lived through something traumatic” reactions.
-Tony’s interaction with the kid. Priceless.
-The character growth in both Tony and Pepper from the first movie in general. I love how they are together, that Pepper accepts his flaws but also doesn’t just let him get away with crap.
Things I didn’t like:
-The Mandarin. Just… no. That sucked. I don’t think his (Killian) motives really tracked through the movie.
I think if they would have left him closer to the original character, that could have been awesome. His source of power is alien tech. Tony in this movie is having PTSD over his encounter with aliens and other dimensions. That could have been so good.
-The one night stand girl. I don’t like that she had a change of heart. That’s so wishy-washy. She’d come that far knowing everything Killian was doing, she truly believed in the work she was doing but one “pretty please” speech from a one night stand 15ish years ago is all it takes?
-The last five min. of the movie was just… so rushed and tacked on.
“Oh, yeah, got Pepper sorted out. And BTW, removing this crap out of my chest. Apparently I’ve been able to do that, but I’ve just left it in there for funsies all this time.” …whut?
Did he just stabilize Pepper and she’ll always have the benefits/powers? Or did he cure her and she’s fully normal human again?
For the record, I understand what he was saying and why he wanted to do it, but having the ability to remove the shrapnel seemed so random and out of no where. There was no mention in the second or third movie to suggest he was working on a way to do that.