IRON MANNNNNNNNNNNNNNN
So I'm still incredibly stressed out, but who cares- let's talk about Iron Man!
So Iron Man is one of those weird things where I feel a strange affinity for a character (that would be Tony Stark) I have absolutely nothing in common with and have absolutely no reason to identify with. (The other big character that has this perplexing effect on me is Spike from BtVS.) I don't know if everyone feels this way just because RDJ is quite the charming man, or what? (So tell me flist: do any of you feel that same?) In any case, I love the Iron Man movies unabashedly, and they always come out the first week in May, which luckily for me, is when my birthday is. It's like my own person birthday present from Marvel! (Though no gift can make up for the travesty you made of X3, guys. :P) So since midnight movies apparently start as early as 9PM now (what's up with that?) I got to get home before 4 in the morning after an awesome birthday dinner (at an Egyptian cafe!). Anyway.
I should preface this with saying this is one of those fandoms where I'm a primarily a movie, not comic-verse fan. If you're primarily a comic-verse fan, I feel your pain, really (I cry tears of blood at pretty much every X-Men movie), but I lovvvvvvvvvvved it. I mean, I'm one of the people who actually liked the second movie, so it's not hard to please me, but I *super* enjoyed this one, and CG (who I saw it with) agreed, as did the family friends I got talked into seeing it with again the next evening, so it's probably not just me.
In general: everything.
For a 2 1/2 hour movie, it certainly didn't drag, and for a movie with major action sequences roughly every 15 minutes, it never got formulaic, boring or dumb. There was maybe a point about 3/4 of the way through where I thought "Gee, this is a little long..." but I still enjoyed myself the whole way through. In fact, my main issue would probably be that it could probably stand to be a little longer, actually- it was so busy that a few of the many plotlines and characters got short shrift. There wasn't enough Rhodey, (though to be fair, I never think there's enough) I was never really clear on what Killian's ultimate goals were, and Maya was underused. Also, the Pepper/Tony friction seemed like it was part of a larger "tension in the romance" plotline that mostly got cut out (And I'm pretty sure thar has been confirmed by the PTB). I'm excited for the DVD, which will hopefully have most of the hour(!) they apparently cut out.
Other things:
- I really liked Tony having anxiety issues and freaking out. It humanized him, made sense to me, and was interesting. Of course, I'm saying that as someone who's had panic attacks and know how terrifying and weird and physically arresting they can be. I liked that he can be a superhero but still be personally affected by things that aren't like, the standard, noble "falling in love!" or being sad because "with great power comes great responsibility!", etc. Being freaked out by aliens almost killed you is something that I think is universal, whether you're a genius millionaire or not.
- The movie was really, really funny, and the dialogue *sparkled*. Luckily for us, pretty much all of the actors had great comic timing, especially RDJ. It was like a Joss Whedon movie with less wink-wink-nudge-nudge cleverness or pop culture references. Apparently some reviewers thought it was too funny and needed to be more serious. Eh. To each their own.
- The movie felt more adult, and less comic book-y, but in a good way. The last movie was very... Supervillian emerges! Supervillain must be stopped! Kiss the girl! And...happy ending! This felt more like...an adaptation of a spy novel, or a really long fanfic, but again, in a good way. Characters and plotting and subplots and delicousness.
- Loved seeing Rhodey even if it was not enough. I especially liked the sequence near the end which was all buddy-cop with Tony and Rhodey bantering and kicking ass. Would have liked more friendshippy bits with them though.
- The effects were remarkably smooth and unobtrusive. At no point did I go "Man, that was some ugly CGI..." which I think I might have in previous movies.
- I actually really liked the Mandarin twist. This is definitely one of those things where if I were a big comic fan of him I would no doubt be majorly pissed, but as a movie plotpoint it worked great. I know there are racebending/ whitewashing issues around this, but being that the comic book character is a superhuman scientist genius from China with mystical superpowers coming from magic rings and no one in the movie even remotely comes close to this description, I feel like it was more of them doing a bait and switch because the audience would recognize the name- the name is pretty much the only connection between the characters. Regardless, what I really liked was the takedown of the "evil arab terrorist" stereotype. The whole first half *really* plays into that stereotype of the America hating, inhumanely violent, indeterminately brown person who just wants to be evil and blow shit up and kill good, God fearing folk. But then you find out that yes, "the Mandarin" is POC, but rather than being a terrorist he's an affable, drunk British dude who playboy Tony would probably have gotten along and partied with. And that the real villains are just using media spin because thee know the spectre of the evil Arab scares middle America. I especially liked when they listed all the "bad" countries they thought he was hiding, and he was actually in Florida. Lol. And despite all the world saving and faintly pro-America bombast, the movie also seemed to me to be slightly...left leaning politically, though I don't know if I was imagining that? It was kinda weird. The president looked oddly Bush-like to me. and there were all these comments about rich bankers and oil spills and stuff. Hmmm. I will say that there was a bit of the whole "POCs as the dumb, silly villains while the white guy is really in charge/the evil mastermind", but I didn't mind as much because of the whole "arab terrorist" takedown. Obviously, it would be nice to have a POC as the main villain who was also a genius and a fully realized, complex character ( We can dream anyway), but what they did here worked for me. (Of course, I'm not southeast Asian, so who cares what I think?)
Also, Ben Kingsley was fabulous.
- "something magical is happening!"
- This is more of a random comment, but Tony, Killian and Rhodey were all ridiculously ripped, to the point that at one moment I had to whisper to the person I was with to ask if anyone could give me directions to the gun show. I mean they all looked pretty, but man. I wonder if RDJ, Guy Pearce and DC all were in competition because they knew everyone else was going to look good...
- A+ on the Stan-the-Man cameo. Cute.
- And Pepper! Pep was AMAZING in this. I mean, I'm not knocking PA Pepper, who did an awesome job and put up with a lot of bullshit, but I really love her evolution over these 4 movies. You've seen her grow more confident and comfortable with herself, advance her career to the point where she's basically running an empire, bond with female "rivals" instead of fighting with them (thank you for small mercies, writers), retain her wit and snark the whole way, and even get in on the action (and smack around some bad guys!). :D
(Also, although it's kind of fucked up, I was kinda pleased that GP is so skinny because it meant that the movie couldn't put in any skeezy tits & ass shots of her. I mean, there were random chicks in bikinis (and I do mean random), but when it came to Pepper the closest we got were were some toned abs and a sports bra. Suck it, fanboys.)
And I really, really loved the Tony/Pepper relationship in this. It was still adorable and squeeworthy, but also a sweetly realistic relationship, where they argue and compromise and don't get along sometimes, but still obviously and deeply love each other and put each other first. It was so perfect that I didn't even notice until the end that they never kissed on the lips. Cause it didn't matter. Cause all their scenes were *glorious*. (I hear some people think Pepper is mean and horrible because of the nightmare scene, but I think those people are ridiculous and most of them probably didn't like her to begin with, so.) WHERE IS ALL THE GOOD FIC HIDING?
- Finally, I just noticed this on the wiki page on Maya Hansen, specifically her role in the movie:
She is later revealed to be working with Killian to improve on Extremis, as well as to get back at Tony for breaking her heart thirteen years before.
WTF? Maybe I'm going crazy, but where is the bolded part even *remotely* implied? Am I missing something or is this just sexist bullshit?
And now that I'm done rambling I can read everyone elses posts on it...
This entry has traveled in time from DW at: http://redcirce.dreamwidth.org/138914.html. You can comment here or there using OpenID!
sharp sticks
So Iron Man is one of those weird things where I feel a strange affinity for a character (that would be Tony Stark) I have absolutely nothing in common with and have absolutely no reason to identify with. (The other big character that has this perplexing effect on me is Spike from BtVS.) I don't know if everyone feels this way just because RDJ is quite the charming man, or what? (So tell me flist: do any of you feel that same?) In any case, I love the Iron Man movies unabashedly, and they always come out the first week in May, which luckily for me, is when my birthday is. It's like my own person birthday present from Marvel! (Though no gift can make up for the travesty you made of X3, guys. :P) So since midnight movies apparently start as early as 9PM now (what's up with that?) I got to get home before 4 in the morning after an awesome birthday dinner (at an Egyptian cafe!). Anyway.
I should preface this with saying this is one of those fandoms where I'm a primarily a movie, not comic-verse fan. If you're primarily a comic-verse fan, I feel your pain, really (I cry tears of blood at pretty much every X-Men movie), but I lovvvvvvvvvvved it. I mean, I'm one of the people who actually liked the second movie, so it's not hard to please me, but I *super* enjoyed this one, and CG (who I saw it with) agreed, as did the family friends I got talked into seeing it with again the next evening, so it's probably not just me.
In general: everything.
For a 2 1/2 hour movie, it certainly didn't drag, and for a movie with major action sequences roughly every 15 minutes, it never got formulaic, boring or dumb. There was maybe a point about 3/4 of the way through where I thought "Gee, this is a little long..." but I still enjoyed myself the whole way through. In fact, my main issue would probably be that it could probably stand to be a little longer, actually- it was so busy that a few of the many plotlines and characters got short shrift. There wasn't enough Rhodey, (though to be fair, I never think there's enough) I was never really clear on what Killian's ultimate goals were, and Maya was underused. Also, the Pepper/Tony friction seemed like it was part of a larger "tension in the romance" plotline that mostly got cut out (And I'm pretty sure thar has been confirmed by the PTB). I'm excited for the DVD, which will hopefully have most of the hour(!) they apparently cut out.
Other things:
- I really liked Tony having anxiety issues and freaking out. It humanized him, made sense to me, and was interesting. Of course, I'm saying that as someone who's had panic attacks and know how terrifying and weird and physically arresting they can be. I liked that he can be a superhero but still be personally affected by things that aren't like, the standard, noble "falling in love!" or being sad because "with great power comes great responsibility!", etc. Being freaked out by aliens almost killed you is something that I think is universal, whether you're a genius millionaire or not.
- The movie was really, really funny, and the dialogue *sparkled*. Luckily for us, pretty much all of the actors had great comic timing, especially RDJ. It was like a Joss Whedon movie with less wink-wink-nudge-nudge cleverness or pop culture references. Apparently some reviewers thought it was too funny and needed to be more serious. Eh. To each their own.
- The movie felt more adult, and less comic book-y, but in a good way. The last movie was very... Supervillian emerges! Supervillain must be stopped! Kiss the girl! And...happy ending! This felt more like...an adaptation of a spy novel, or a really long fanfic, but again, in a good way. Characters and plotting and subplots and delicousness.
- Loved seeing Rhodey even if it was not enough. I especially liked the sequence near the end which was all buddy-cop with Tony and Rhodey bantering and kicking ass. Would have liked more friendshippy bits with them though.
- The effects were remarkably smooth and unobtrusive. At no point did I go "Man, that was some ugly CGI..." which I think I might have in previous movies.
- I actually really liked the Mandarin twist. This is definitely one of those things where if I were a big comic fan of him I would no doubt be majorly pissed, but as a movie plotpoint it worked great. I know there are racebending/ whitewashing issues around this, but being that the comic book character is a superhuman scientist genius from China with mystical superpowers coming from magic rings and no one in the movie even remotely comes close to this description, I feel like it was more of them doing a bait and switch because the audience would recognize the name- the name is pretty much the only connection between the characters. Regardless, what I really liked was the takedown of the "evil arab terrorist" stereotype. The whole first half *really* plays into that stereotype of the America hating, inhumanely violent, indeterminately brown person who just wants to be evil and blow shit up and kill good, God fearing folk. But then you find out that yes, "the Mandarin" is POC, but rather than being a terrorist he's an affable, drunk British dude who playboy Tony would probably have gotten along and partied with. And that the real villains are just using media spin because thee know the spectre of the evil Arab scares middle America. I especially liked when they listed all the "bad" countries they thought he was hiding, and he was actually in Florida. Lol. And despite all the world saving and faintly pro-America bombast, the movie also seemed to me to be slightly...left leaning politically, though I don't know if I was imagining that? It was kinda weird. The president looked oddly Bush-like to me. and there were all these comments about rich bankers and oil spills and stuff. Hmmm. I will say that there was a bit of the whole "POCs as the dumb, silly villains while the white guy is really in charge/the evil mastermind", but I didn't mind as much because of the whole "arab terrorist" takedown. Obviously, it would be nice to have a POC as the main villain who was also a genius and a fully realized, complex character ( We can dream anyway), but what they did here worked for me. (Of course, I'm not southeast Asian, so who cares what I think?)
Also, Ben Kingsley was fabulous.
- "something magical is happening!"
- This is more of a random comment, but Tony, Killian and Rhodey were all ridiculously ripped, to the point that at one moment I had to whisper to the person I was with to ask if anyone could give me directions to the gun show. I mean they all looked pretty, but man. I wonder if RDJ, Guy Pearce and DC all were in competition because they knew everyone else was going to look good...
- A+ on the Stan-the-Man cameo. Cute.
- And Pepper! Pep was AMAZING in this. I mean, I'm not knocking PA Pepper, who did an awesome job and put up with a lot of bullshit, but I really love her evolution over these 4 movies. You've seen her grow more confident and comfortable with herself, advance her career to the point where she's basically running an empire, bond with female "rivals" instead of fighting with them (thank you for small mercies, writers), retain her wit and snark the whole way, and even get in on the action (and smack around some bad guys!). :D
(Also, although it's kind of fucked up, I was kinda pleased that GP is so skinny because it meant that the movie couldn't put in any skeezy tits & ass shots of her. I mean, there were random chicks in bikinis (and I do mean random), but when it came to Pepper the closest we got were were some toned abs and a sports bra. Suck it, fanboys.)
And I really, really loved the Tony/Pepper relationship in this. It was still adorable and squeeworthy, but also a sweetly realistic relationship, where they argue and compromise and don't get along sometimes, but still obviously and deeply love each other and put each other first. It was so perfect that I didn't even notice until the end that they never kissed on the lips. Cause it didn't matter. Cause all their scenes were *glorious*. (I hear some people think Pepper is mean and horrible because of the nightmare scene, but I think those people are ridiculous and most of them probably didn't like her to begin with, so.) WHERE IS ALL THE GOOD FIC HIDING?
- Finally, I just noticed this on the wiki page on Maya Hansen, specifically her role in the movie:
She is later revealed to be working with Killian to improve on Extremis, as well as to get back at Tony for breaking her heart thirteen years before.
WTF? Maybe I'm going crazy, but where is the bolded part even *remotely* implied? Am I missing something or is this just sexist bullshit?
And now that I'm done rambling I can read everyone elses posts on it...
This entry has traveled in time from DW at: http://redcirce.dreamwidth.org/138914.html. You can comment here or there using OpenID!
sharp sticks