Iron Man 3

[skull_bearer]

Well, that was an incoherent, schizophrenic pile of crap.

I mean, I actually don't know where to start. I can basically remember the plot of IM2, and I saw that something like 6 months ago and I fully admit it wasn't that great. This one? It's been less that six hours and I still don't have a clue what the hell I watched. Really, watched is too kind a term, 'suffered through' or 'had inflicted on' is more accurate.

This is, as far as I can recall in this state of bewilderment and slowly dawning NERDRAGE FROM HELL, is how it went down:

Tony: My past is coming back to haunt me!
Me: Cool! AIM, I know these guys. And Extremis! This is going to be epic!
Tony: I'm suffereing from PTSD!
Me: About time too.
Tony: Which is being played for comic relief!
Me: wat
Film: See Tony take another pratfall! And groin strikes! Everyone llikes groin strikes!
Me: What the fuck.
Pepper: I am totally unlikeable and threaten to leave Tony when he comes clean and explains he actually has a problem!
Me: Ummm
Mandarin: I'm using the symbol of the Ten Rings!
Nobody: Actually comments of this.
Me: Umm Tony? Ten Rings? The guys who kidnapped you? Hello?
Tony: *is an idiot*
Me: Ah, back to form.
Creepy guy from AIM: I appear to be driving a wedge between Tony and Pepper which seems pointless because tthe wedge is already there and is ten miles wide.
This whole subplot: Goes nowhere. Get used to it, we'lll be seeing it A LOT!
Mandarin: *Blows up mansion*
Dummy and bots: *die totally unmourned*
Tony: *has humerous pratfall*
Pepper: Wears suit for ten fucking seconds. That's all folks' sorry if you were expecting Pepper kicking arse or anything. LOL no she's back to damsel in distress*
Me: Begins to realise this film is going to suck. Starts texting and tweeting warnings*
Tony: Is dead. No, really. No one saw the huge flying metal suit escaping. No one. really. All that press was just there for show.
Tony: *Crash lands. Humerous pratfalls ensue among sad music and mourning*
Most annoying kid ever: I am being cute and stuffed down your throat harder than that fucker from the second Indiana Jones Movie. You will want to force-feed me my own eyeballs after ten minutes.
Film: He is cute! HE IS CUTE! He and Tony bond over daddy issues.\
Me: Die. In. A. Fire.
Film: *gets really weird, now burning people are aafter Tony because Extremis has trhe healing power of fire now for some reason. I don't know how they know he's still alive because this film is making less fucking sense than XM3 at this point. Oh, and Pepper is kidnapped, because what else is she there for?
Tony: Has humerous pratfalls, invades enemy territory with equipment made of Christmas ornaments and toys.
Me: Am headdesking royally.
Mandarin: Is actually a random bundle of British stereotypes created by AIM to cover up the fact that Extremis sometimes makes people explode, only not because this is all a scheme for AIM guy to get revenge on Tony for standing him up once, only not because AIM actually wants to kidnap the president of the US and burn him alive in oil because reasons.
Tony: *calls up hundreds of suits that would have been REALLY USEFUL around the beginning of this film. You know, when YOUR HOUSE WAS BEIING BLOWN UP.
Pepper: Gets Extremis-ed, appears to die only everyone fucking knows she didn't.
Bad guy: Dies about six times, I stopped paying attention after the third attempt.
Pepper: Suddenly turns into action-hero girl and can use the suit even though Tony said five minutes ago it was coded only to him.
Tony: I love you. I will now destroy the Iron man suits.
Iron man suits: Explode like pretty confetti.
Tony: I will now fix Pepper. Fuck knows how. It's not explained. I will also now have basic surgery to remove those inoperable shards of shrapnel in my chest. You know, the ones I nearly died from int he first two films.
BUT I'M STILL IRON MAN
Me: So totally done with this film.

I have read, and am currently writing, fic that is less cracky than this shit. This is a huge steaming pile of fail. It has some good ideas, but none of them are resolved. Tony with PTSD? Not resolved? Iron Man? A hobby and waste of time. Avengers? Barely mentioned? Bruce? Not mentioned at all. Everything seems like it came from about seven different films. There were good ideas? The Mandarin being a joke was actually very funny and probably the only way you can make a Mandarin without Yellow Peril. But it was painfully stupid, and devolved into pratfalls at the most inappropriate times. It was a mess. I felt insulted watching it.

Going to be ignoring that one folks.

Comments

[sorion.livejournal.com]

Okay... so from the two people I know who've seen it I got a "THE MOST AMAZING THING IN HISTORY OF AMAZEMENT" and "INCOHERENT PIECE OF CRAP"... XD

[fatpie42.livejournal.com]

I'm definitely seeing this one, so I can't really look at the main post above. But the non-spoilery opinion summary is pretty disheartening. I guess I'll have to decide for myself when I see it for myself.

I'd expected rather more from this one because of Shane Black's involvement. His film "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" (also starring Robert Downey Jnr.) was both exciting and hilarious, so he seemed perfectly suited to direct an Iron Man movie.

[skull-bearer.livejournal.com]

Lots of people liked it, me? I was hoping for something like the first two films, which this wasn't.

[fatpie42.livejournal.com]

Out of interest, how would you rank the other Avengers movies? Interesting that you say that you wanted it to be more like Iron Man 1 AND 2, since I know there were a lot of people who were really disappointed with Iron Man 2.

I'd put the movies so far as follows:
1. Avengers Assemble
2. Iron Man
3.= Iron Man 2
3.= Thor
5. The Incredible Hulk
6. Captain America: The First Avenger

But yeah, I'd still really recommend "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" if you haven't seen it already.

[skull-bearer.livejournal.com]

Captain America
Iron man
Thor
Avengers
Iron man 2
Not seen the Hulk movies.

But it's all kinda moot since I enjoyed all the movies a lot anyway, which is why IM3 was such a shock. Captain America was just such a heap of fun I can help but love it, and even IM2, which kind off all over the place, was still entertaining.

[fatpie42.livejournal.com]

For completion's sake I suggest you check out "The Incredible Hulk". You don't really need to see the earlier movie from Ang Lee with Eric Bana and Nick Nolte, but there's a certain level of continuity between Iron Man, The Incredible Hulk and Avengers Assemble. (There's also a slight continuity error which was corrected by a short film called "The Consultant" on the lead up to the release of "Avengers Assemble".)

[synekdokee.livejournal.com]

Huh. I agree on your plot points (when the house blew up I said to myself "can't he use the other suits?!"), but aside from Pepper's "I get to use the suit but only to keep myself passively safe and walk this other chick to safety" bit, I disagree on all the character points. I think Pepper was well within her rights to want time off after Tony's "oh okay fine I have massive emotional trauma and tried to totally manipulate you five seconds ago" confession. And still, when Tony told her to stay, she stayed!

I also thought the kid was blissfully un-annoying, which was my friend's reaction too. I suppose it's a mileage thing. I enjoyed him though, and I didn't really feel like the were trying to play the "daddy issue" thing there at all.

Tony's PTSD *was* played for laughs, but I think it was also allowed to have actual serious impact on his character development. Basically what his whole relationship to the suits was! I agree though, they didn't resolve it in any way, like was the fact that he dealt with another disaster on his own the "cure"? Eh.


Sigh I love Jarvis tho.

Also I have to admit that since I'm not comic-savvy admittedly my main interest in the franchise is Suit Action and RDJ haha.


ETA: I may have fridge-logicked the suit incongruity regarding the whole coding thing. Does Pepper use blown-up bits of the Mark 42 to fight the Big Bad? Because that suit wasn't around when Rhody requested a suit so it could be that?

[partytimexelent.livejournal.com]

Oh wow. Your description....was pretty accurate.

I think you and I are the only people on the planet though that didn't like it too much. I wouldn't call it a "pile of crap" per se, but I did go into it with extremely low expectations given the crappyness of IM2 and the awesomeness of Avengers.

Oh Pepper.... just..... ugh, maybe it's my intense dislike of Gwenyth Paltrow or how poorly they're writing her character or something but, ugh, why did they go down this road? It didn't make sense to hook them up in the comic books and it still doesn't make sense in the movies. And I swear to god I'm the only one in the UNIVERSE that thinks she and RDJ have zero chemistry and are super awkward together. I *loved* their relationship in the first Iron Man movie, they were fucking spot on, but now it's like.... she's a completely different character or something, and not in a good, badass way that she is in the comics. And like you said, she was in the suit for maybe 6 minutes and that was it. She was back to being shirtless (wtf?!) and the damsel in distress.

But what really, really pissed me off was the stupid ending. He blew up his suits. He blew up his multi-million dollar suits. For Pepper. I nearly fucking walked out, what was THAT about?! They're going to have to bring Iron Man back for Avengers 2 (cause, come on, RDJ is never going to willingly give up playing Tony Stark and Hollywood's not going to give up their money-maker), and when they do, they're going to spend some time convincing Tony to get back in the suit. And that, that's going to piss me off because it's a fucking Avengers movie, not Iron Man 4. If they had to cut Steve's scenes from Avengers, we better not have Tony redemption scenes in Avengers 2.

Seriously, the first one was good because it was pretty close to the comics. I don't know what the hell they're doing anymore, it's all just held together by explosions and pretty special effects and RDJ's facial expressions (and body, let's be honest. Damn he fine). What the hell are they going to do next?

The last scene was worth waiting for, though! I really like how Bruce and Tony are buddies in the movies, even if they really dislike each other in the comics. (Which makes sense given their personalities but I guess the movies aren't going down that road...?)

Ugh. Just..... ugh.

[aikoss.livejournal.com]

you are not the only ones that dislike it, my dad, boyfriend and me are totally on the dislike group. And hate the last 5mins

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

As fun as Steve's scenes are to watch, they're redundant and that's why they were cut. Leaving them in drags the pacing and doesn't tell you anything new or different from the boxing. Everything you need to know, everything that was detailed in those scenes, is summed up in the boxing bag shots. It was a good call on the editor's part to take them out.

[shameless2shoes.livejournal.com]

I thought they gave the movie a sense of being in Steve's PoV that made it more personal and grounded it, personally. I agree it brings down the pacing, but I thought the pacing was brutal from beginning to end and had to catch my breath when the credits rolled; I had trouble transitioning from ha-ha-joke! now-everyone's-getting-killed and back and forth even during the movie.

So, I mean. I think it's a fairly subjective thing? Steve's scenes were redundant beyond the grounding/making the whole waitress tidbit and victims more personal, but I got to say one of the main for me appeals of the next Captain America movie is going to be watching him flounder a bit in the 21st century.

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

The pacing is deliberately brutal. The majority of the film takes place over the course of hours. But Steve's scenes weren't in a place that would have helped with the brutality of the pacing. They're placed at the beginning where the pacing is slower to start with. It would have been long scene, long scene, long scene, shortscene, short, short, shortshortshort rather than an ebb and flow that would have made it feel more settled. It would have dragged and the rest of the movie would have been just as fast.

I don't think Steve really flounders in the 21st century. He's hurt, lonely, and feels like he has no place or point here, but he's not lost. He handles the tech in The Avengers just fine* and is delighted at the idea that the aircraft carrier he's standing on could become a submarine. That is flies instead is what surprises him. He's an incredibly intelligent and adaptable man, with a clear sense of self and purpose; he feels like he's no longer needed or wanted at the start of Avengers and that's where his internal conflict comes from. By the end he's more settled, with a new sense of purpose because he's realized he does have a place. I suspect that his internal conflict in CA2 is going to be trying to come to terms with the evil perpetrated by groups/people he had previously trusted. Steve loves America, but he's rarely in agreeance with its government. Unless that's what you mean by "flounder"?

*Really, where are people getting the idea that he doesn't/wouldn't? The man went to the Stark Expo to see flying cars, got zapped by science to become a foot taller and a hundred plus pounds heavier in seconds, and fought against a madman who had rocket ships, single-man submarines, giant tanks, and weapons that vaporized people. In real history, he lived during a time that was EXPLODING with new developments and ideas at a pace and number unparalleled by any other era except maybe the Renaissance. Having grown up in the 1920s and 30s, he probably has a closer mindset to us now than to the post-WWII/1950s conservatism that was a backlash against the social progression of the previous decades.

Tl;dr: I have feels about this sort of stuff.

[shameless2shoes.livejournal.com]

Hmmm, I don't know. For me I think it would've just felt like getting a longer running start before the big leap and I felt it would've added to the pacing, but clearly that's a thing we'll just disagree on.

Ah, I didn't mean to imply that tech would be Steve's Achilles heel. I meant to encompass all that is the 21st century: exactly the things you point out. We don't disagree there one wit. :)

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

No problem! I tend to be rather literal, to my detriment, at times. Add in things that fanfic seems convinced are true it makes me want to headdesk because obviously no one does the most basic history research any more. Or even opens Wikipedia, ffs. I love Steve for how adaptable he is.

[shameless2shoes.livejournal.com]

Eh. The thing is I was well aware of the theme Steve-is-scared-of-the-internet or whatever and didn't make myself clear on that one. Loved your rant though, and I wish I saw more of that attitude around fandom.

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

The social/individual aspects of history are something I find endlessly fascinating. I pointed out to someone that Steve is unlikely to have problems with homosexuality and would have been more than tangentially aware of both queer culture and that gay rights was a thing during his time and much earlier. It was fun watching their mind being blown, but also kind of sad. But how no one even thinks to look up whether abstract art was a new thing in the 40s (it wasn't, it pre-dates WWI even) confuses me.

[shameless2shoes.livejournal.com]

(Awesomely appropriate icon you have there, by the way.)

Didn't you know that 1950's attitudes were the attitudes of all people for centuries until boom! Minorities started having opinions sometime around 1960?

I find people tend to take hard to one side of the line or the other on Steve's take on homosexuality. There are the people who seem to think homosexuality was invented in the 90's, maybe as early as the 80's -- or at least the first person to accept homosexuality did so around then. (I can't fathom the thought process behind that.)

But I got to say I find even more annoying the people who write him as "What? You think I don't know about gay people? I was in the army, we jerked each other off all the time because, you know, lack of women." Which, obviously, to some degree did happen but I can't stand people acting like army=had some form of gay sex was a forgone conclusion, when it was still the kind of thing you got discharged/court martialed for and representing Steve with a casual attitude of "Well, duh, I've touched another man." gets at me worse than a dose of homophobia (which tends to get resolved fairly quickly in fic anyway).

[shameless2shoes.livejournal.com]

If we didn't get Steve's scenes and Thor can jump in despite being stranded from Earth, (and I've scene things on the internet about Tony-Steve tension regarding Howard being cut, take it with a heap of salt, I haven't got the source at hand), I can't possibly see them dragging Tony into a suit kicking and screaming. The Avengers was far and away too fast paced for any of it the first time (to its detriment, I would say, but not too much); can't see them slowing down 2.

(Also: hear hear on the blowing up the suits. And RDJ's body. I hope to look that good at his age.)

[kathie-d.livejournal.com]

Bruce was after the end credits!

[squeeful.livejournal.com]

The one thing I am going to have to vehemently disagree with is the anxiety and PTSD needing to be "resolved". They don't work that way and it's insulting to people with mental health issues to expect it to be solved/resolved in the course of a film that takes place over, what, a week? Tony does develop some coping mechanisms (though, wtf, they appear to be the SAME ONES he was using at the beginning that weren't working?), but there isn't going to be a ta-dah! moment and then they go away. It's one of the better things about the film.

It would be a better film (barring the plot holes) if it weren't, you know, part of an already existing continuity. It doesn't line up, even taking into account character development and change.

[(Anonymous)]

But they were working? They're not long-term solutions, but they allow him to focus and function long enough to get to a safe place. They worked well enough that his SO didn't notice how bad things were. He tried talking to her, got some sleep in an actual bed, and then had a nightmare bad enough to wake her and activate the suit. So he did try something else, but it failed and he went back to what he knew would allow him to function. Then, at the end, I heard his narration as a way of trying to convince himself that he was fine. 'Fake it 'till you make it' and all that.

[skull-bearer.livejournal.com]

Resolved not necessarily as in 'fixed', but in finding some sort of closure. I'm aware of how PTSD works IRL, but in a narrative story like a film, if an issue is brought up it needs to be resolved in some way by the end, I have no idea what they were even thinking, and using PTSD as a laughing point is disgusting.

[iloome.livejournal.com]

Oh, my god, finally somebody who isn't in love with this movie. Your post is pretty much a description of my reactions throughout the movie. I mean, I was trying to see the hour at my watch, because it was so senseless and stupid and boring and I just wanted for it to finish... I loved 616!Extremis, so it was that much worse. And he did actually blow up the suits, didn't he? It wasn't just some nightmare I dreamt when I fell asleep after the millionth scene which was intended to be funny but was just pathetic? I couldn't believe it while watching it and I still can't. Tony Stark, Iron Man, blew up all of his suits. Wtf? No, it wasn't romantic or anything, it was just stupid.
For a short while I was happy they finally adressed his PTSD, but then they made it into yet another funny-not-see-it-is-funny-why-don't-you-see-it thing...
Sorry if it's not really coherent, I watched it not even an hour ago and am so disappointed...

[tardiscrash.livejournal.com]

Thank you! I thought I was the only one who hated it.