Movie Review: Iron Man 2

TITLE: Iron Man 2
PART IN SERIES: sequel to Iron Man and one in many Marvel movies
SOME OF ACTORS/ACTRESSES: Robert Downy Jr., Gyneth Paltrow, Samuel L. Jackson, Scarlett Johanson to name a few
GENRE: PG-13, Superhero, action/adventure
RELEASE DATE: May 7th, 2010
PREMISE: Tony Stark returns in the sequel to Iron Man and this time goes up against Whiplash, tries to keep the government away from his suit, and is dealing with the fact that he is dying.
MY REVIEW: For those wondering, this is still a book blog but now movie reviews are being added because I am a big movie fan and from the looks of things will be spending much time in the movie theatre this summer (Prince of Persia! The Last Airbender! So on and so forth). So Iron Man 2 is the first of many summer movies this year and I know it recieved a lot of mixed reviews and some boos from fans but I for one loved it. I actually kind of loved it more then the first one. See, I don't think the first one was as mind blowing as everyone made it out to be. Don't get me wrong, it was good. But I felt the first half of it jumped around a lot and it didn't actually start getting really good till the middle.
Iron Man 2 didn't need to waste so much time going into background and jumped right into the fray assuming everyone is intelligent enough to remember the last one and keep up. One of the complaints I've heard was that there were too many villians. Um...what? I counted one main villian: Whiplash, excellently played by Mickey Roark (even if he was kind of gross on screen but that was the role). The only other minor villian (and I do mean minor as in I don't really count him as one as he was really just backing the main villian) is Hammer (also excellently played but I don't know the guys name). That's it. Two villians, or one and a half villian really. How is that too many?
Another complaint I've heard was too many superheroes. I do kind of give on this but they are trying to introduce the Avengers storyline into this and it makes since to do that in Iron Man because Iron Man is a big part of the Avengers. At least they didn't do the whole team, they just did Nick Fury and Black Widow and I thought they were fun additions. Nick Fury was awesome (he is played by Jackson so that kind of goes without saying) and while I was annoyed Black Widow was relegated to sexy eye candy for the boys, at least she was sexy eye candy who kicked butt and had a brain. It made up for Pepper being in damsel in distress mode throughout.
The last one I've heard is that Tony Stark was a jerk in this. Um...yeah? Have you all read the comics? Tony Stark has always been a jerk, he just does it with smiles and jokes so you're not sure if he's being a jerk or not. Plus, in this one he was facing his possible death and mortality and all that. So, really, it's understandable. Plus, it made his character more complicated because while he is undoubtedly a jerk, he can be sweet sometimes so you're not sure which he is: classy, or a jerk. That's called an interesting character.
So sorry naysayers, I loved this movie. While it may not have completely lived up to the original, I still enjoyed it and I cannot wait to see the next one and the Avengers movie. Oh, and am I just seeing references everywhere or was that Captain America's shield Tony used to level his machine? If it was: brilliant job guys. Really.
WHO SHOULD SEE: Iron Man fans, Marvel fans
MY RATING: Four out of Five superheros