Iron Man 2 Reviews (Spoilers)

[Simon_Jester]

Nerd RAGE:
What I don't understand is how Vanko's whips could nearly slice through an entire Formula One racecar without any trace of resistance but were largely stopped by even the light version of the Iron Man suit. He had that shit wrapped around his neck, a place that COULDN'T have had large armored plates, but Stark was fine. Further, the first movie describes what the Iron Man Suit is made out of and it's not freakin' adamantium.

Bear in mind that this suit was built using the same technology that shrugged off a direct hit from a tank-caliber AA gun in the first movie. The fact that the gorget of the light "travel armor" can handle the whips means it's more resilient than the (relatively thin) skin of a racecar body, but that's about it; it's not as if he was sawing through the engine block.

...Vanko just didn't come across as a serious boss fight. And it was anti-climatic. Vanko still couldn't seriously hurt them, just was tossing them around until they crossed the streams, which didn't really hurt them either. Slane was a much better fight in the first movie as Iron Monger, because there was a shot that he possibly could have won. Vanko... well, you knew full well that eventually he'd show up in a new suit and that Stark was going to kick his ass once he finally showed up. The last sequence with the Hammerdroids and Whiplash was all very cool looking, but the outcome wasn't exactly in doubt.

That's a valid point.

Anyway, that said, it was a decent popcorn film. I liked Whiplash in general, though Nick Fury was largely a plot device to info dump and fix Stark's problem. They probably should have avoided the palladium poisoning problem in general if all they were going to do was have Black Widow give him a shot ("wait, did they say lithium hydroxide? ") and have that problem fixed.

Well... dunno.

The palladium poisoning wasn't "fixed" by the shot; the shot just let him function long enough to come up with a permanent solution while not half-delirious from blood poisoning. It also created a bunch of useful dramatic features:
-Stark's technological solution to his own problem is itself killing him, just slower than the problem would (good for drama).
-Stark knows he is about to die, which is in many ways the cause of his problems because it makes him act even more rash and foolish than he would anyway.
-Stark has to go digging for an answer (in his father's work, for extra symbolism) to save himself
-Downey-as-Stark, a very immature character, is forced to come to terms with his own mortality and grow up a bit to save himself.

[Gil Hamilton]

Bear in mind that this suit was built using the same technology that shrugged off a direct hit from a tank-caliber AA gun in the first movie. The fact that the gorget of the light "travel armor" can handle the whips means it's more resilient than the (relatively thin) skin of a racecar body, but that's about it; it's not as if he was sawing through the engine block.

He sliced the engine block of the first F1 that came up the track at him. Further, he was effortlessly slashing off bits of Happy's car, which certainly wasn't made of carbon fibre (the frame, at very least, would have been steel and Vanko's whips went through it with the same ease as the panels). Further, he had Stark by the neck, a place that couldn't have been armored in a serious fashion if he intended to have a full range of movement in his head and the whole suit was lightly enough made that Happy could carry it one handed.

Secondly, it's made with the same technology that took those shots, but it's not the same suit. It's vastly less armored than the Iron Man suit he had in the first movie. This strikes me as an apples and oranges comparison. Besides, was Stark shot in the neck there?

Well... dunno.

The palladium poisoning wasn't "fixed" by the shot; the shot just let him function long enough to come up with a permanent solution while not half-delirious from blood poisoning. It also created a bunch of useful dramatic features:
-Stark's technological solution to his own problem is itself killing him, just slower than the problem would (good for drama).
-Stark knows he is about to die, which is in many ways the cause of his problems because it makes him act even more rash and foolish than he would anyway.
-Stark has to go digging for an answer (in his father's work, for extra symbolism) to save himself
-Downey-as-Stark, a very immature character, is forced to come to terms with his own mortality and grow up a bit to save himself.

For the purposes of the plot, where like half the scenes previously showed him on the verge of dying from heavy metal poisoning, it came across in the movie that Stark was "fixed" the moment Black Widow jabbed him with LiOH. They could have handled that better.

Besides, it was never clear to me why he needed the arc reactor implanted in his chest or how the palladium was leaking. Why not use conventional batteries to power the magnet? Or run cables from the arc reactor to the magnetic and wear the arc reactor on a belt if it MUST be the arc reactor? Or put a sealant such that the palladium can't leak into his blood stream, I mean, how was the palladium getting into his body in the first place if it was embedded in the center or the reactor?

That doesn't work for drama, because there are any number of obvious solutions that don't involve a technobabble "let's create a new element and, oh yeah, inject you with a horrificially corrosive base" solution.

[Shroom Man 777]

The whole Palladium thing, and the inventing a new non-toxic crayola thing, which necessitated Samuel L. Fury's info-dump thing, was really extraneous and we could've replaced that with more Tony Stark and Pepper Potts adorable interactions, and more Rhodes and Hammer military stuff, and more Vanko asskicking. Goddamn SHIELD crap.

[Simon_Jester]

He sliced the engine block of the first F1 that came up the track at him. Further, he was effortlessly slashing off bits of Happy's car, which certainly wasn't made of carbon fibre (the frame, at very least, would have been steel and Vanko's whips went through it with the same ease as the panels). Further, he had Stark by the neck, a place that couldn't have been armored in a serious fashion if he intended to have a full range of movement in his head and the whole suit was lightly enough made that Happy could carry it one handed.

Secondly, it's made with the same technology that took those shots, but it's not the same suit. It's vastly less armored than the Iron Man suit he had in the first movie. This strikes me as an apples and oranges comparison. Besides, was Stark shot in the neck there?

I heard the first time. What I'm getting at is that Iron Man armor is far, far stronger and more effective by weight than it has any right to be, or Stark would have been paste when that tank hit him outside Golmira. While the travel suit is obviously not as well protected as the Mark III was, it may still be far tougher than we'd expect given its weight and apparent thickness.

For the purposes of the plot, where like half the scenes previously showed him on the verge of dying from heavy metal poisoning, it came across in the movie that Stark was "fixed" the moment Black Widow jabbed him with LiOH. They could have handled that better.

Besides, it was never clear to me why he needed the arc reactor implanted in his chest or how the palladium was leaking. Why not use conventional batteries to power the magnet? Or run cables from the arc reactor to the magnetic and wear the arc reactor on a belt if it MUST be the arc reactor? Or put a sealant such that the palladium can't leak into his blood stream, I mean, how was the palladium getting into his body in the first place if it was embedded in the center or the reactor?

That doesn't work for drama, because there are any number of obvious solutions that don't involve a technobabble "let's create a new element and, oh yeah, inject you with a horrificially corrosive base" solution.

Lithium hydroxide isn't horrifically corrosive at low concentrations, but yeah.

There's a fundamental difference of approach here. The people who made the movie (and, realistically, the audience they were trying to sell it to) were looking for the drama: Stark's cure for his heart problem is killing him, he has to come to terms with his mortality, he needs to find a solution in his father's work, blah blah blah. You are looking for well-designed medical equipment and an awareness of biochemistry.

The reason you don't get what you're looking for is right there: the people who made the movie weren't looking for it. But they were looking for drama, and they did manage to get that.

[Admiral Valdemar]

The arc reactor in the chest thing has been dealt with before. Stark didn't need it in him when Yinsen had him hooked up via wires to a car battery. It was a drama MacGuffin, but one I can turn a blind eye to for the most part, retarded as it was.

The Mark V's durability is a little less clear. We see that glancing hits take off whole plates and burn through others on the suit, yet the whip around Tony's neck doesn't seem to do all that much, even with more current going through the plasma conduit when he's kneeling and immobile. The tank hit in the Mk. III can simply be down to a glancing shot (we don't actually see it being a dead-on blast from a long rod penetrator, more like a HEAT for anti-gunship work). The bigger feat is limiting the blunt trauma as the suit falls to Earth, something that would bring a fair few gees to Tony's frame and his suit isn't filled with a liquid breathing medium to cushion against this, indeed, there's barely any room between his skin and the suit on his face.

[Simon_Jester]

The momentum transfer alone from an artillery shell would be pretty killer, I'd think...

That said, a few points on the Mark V:

-The Mark V would tend to have maximum protection around critical parts of the body; it might have a Mark III-weight gorget, helmet, and chest plate and reduced protection on the limbs, for example.
-The whips' damage mechanism is going to be on the strange side; modeling it as a saw or something isn't going to be very accurate.

[Bilbo]

The arc reactor in the chest thing has been dealt with before. Stark didn't need it in him when Yinsen had him hooked up via wires to a car battery. It was a drama MacGuffin, but one I can turn a blind eye to for the most part, retarded as it was.

It is here because Tony Stark WANTS to be a here 24/7. He wants to be sure that he can always save the day. The man is stupid brave at times. Outside his suit at the race track he just saw Vanko chop a car in half effortlessly with his whip. What does Tony do? He grabs a chunk of car and tries to bash Vanko unconcious with a blow to the head.

Up to that point Tony was the hero all day every day and wanted to make sure his tech was safe which he did by carrying around the power source. It would not surprise me that his plans for the future changed quite a bit when he saw that someone else could build an Arc reactor. At that point he knew his plans on the future were not so secure and he probably installed the reactor into the silver suit and programmed it to allow Rhodes to use it.

[Iosef Cross]

So so movie. Could have been better. I liked the first one more. In this one these suits became routine, and hence, dull.

The villain died a rather inglorious death.

Also, Stark should have been more cautious about exposing his technology like that.

[Gil Hamilton]

I heard the first time. What I'm getting at is that Iron Man armor is far, far stronger and more effective by weight than it has any right to be, or Stark would have been paste when that tank hit him outside Golmira. While the travel suit is obviously not as well protected as the Mark III was, it may still be far tougher than we'd expect given its weight and apparent thickness.

By citing Stark surviving the tank smacking him in central Asia, you should have noted that the Iron Man suit is magic, not that it's really tough, given its shocking indifference to conserving momentum.

Lithium hydroxide isn't horrifically corrosive at low concentrations, but yeah.

MSDS of LiOH. Is this stuff you want to have injected into your neck?

There's a fundamental difference of approach here. The people who made the movie (and, realistically, the audience they were trying to sell it to) were looking for the drama: Stark's cure for his heart problem is killing him, he has to come to terms with his mortality, he needs to find a solution in his father's work, blah blah blah. You are looking for well-designed medical equipment and an awareness of biochemistry.

The reason you don't get what you're looking for is right there: the people who made the movie weren't looking for it. But they were looking for drama, and they did manage to get that.

There is absolutely no reason they couldn't have all that stuff and not squatted out more technobabble. Or even contradicted their own movie, since they've SHOWN that he doesn't need the arc reactor to physically be in his chest and that a car battery can do the job just as well, as Valdemar points out. Why is it that people claim that they HAD to sacrifice sense for drama? You don't have to do that.

Besides, if they wanted drama, why did they have Nick Fury show up, giving him a jab, and go "So, yeah, we knew how to surpress your symptoms all along so all that stuff where you were on the verge of death and this being a race against time is largely eliminated" and have Stark from then on out looking hale and hearty when he's still supposed to be up to his eyeballs in heavy metal toxicity.

Hell, they might have even supplied a villain with some common sense. All Vanko would have had to do to ruin Tony Stark at the Stark Expo was to have SOME of his Hammerdroids shoot up the crowds of innocent bystanders that were around. Even if Stark successfully stopped the Warmachine suit and mopped up the Hammerdroids, those things could have killed alot of people before Iron Man could really deal with them. Then Vanko doesn't even need to show up, he can just take his suit and leave. After all, Tony Stark would have not only failed to save a whole bunch of people, but that the post mortem on the Hammerdroids will show that they all have the technology that Stark swore before Congress that no one would get for years AND that technology killed American citizens in the heart of New York. Further, Hammer takes the fall no matter what. Even if Hammer spills his guts and tells the absolute truth that it Vanko hijacked all his gear, he's STILL ridiculously guilty and responsible for what happened because he personally sprung Vanko from prison and gave him a job making all that shit. Vanko could have just set them to "Kill All Humans", took the money, and ran and would have accomplished every goal of his of ruining Stark PLUS Hammer would have taken the fall. Instead, all his droids damaged alot of property and he managed to die anti-climatically after personally showing up to confront Iron Man and Warmachine.

[Simon_Jester]

I heard the first time. What I'm getting at is that Iron Man armor is far, far stronger and more effective by weight than it has any right to be, or Stark would have been paste when that tank hit him outside Golmira. While the travel suit is obviously not as well protected as the Mark III was, it may still be far tougher than we'd expect given its weight and apparent thickness.

By citing Stark surviving the tank smacking him in central Asia, you should have noted that the Iron Man suit is magic, not that it's really tough, given its shocking indifference to conserving momentum.

If it's magic, then why can't the magic apply to the Mark V? Is your complaint that ALL the suits are magic? Because if so then you're kind of screwed; any portrayal of Iron Man that makes him a powerful hero will involve a magic suit.

If the magic is applied consistently, I'll settle for that.

Lithium hydroxide isn't horrifically corrosive at low concentrations, but yeah.

MSDS of LiOH. Is this stuff you want to have injected into your neck?

Anhydrous, hell no. At, say, 10^-6 moles per liter? Sure, why not? An acetate or something would probably be a better delivery choice, unless they want to crank down his blood pH too...

As for the rest, yes they could have done the plot differently, with fewer plot elements and smarter villains. Fine. You can say that about ALL movies, practically without exception.

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying that I don't think it's worth making a big fuss over. It's always easy to second guess a movie villain and say "they should have done this, this, and this, so they're stupid." Because they're supposed to lose in two hours. Likewise all problems in the movie. Everything has to be overcome in two hours or less. That makes it very difficult to come up with problems that don't have simple solutions.

[Gil Hamilton]

If it's magic, then why can't the magic apply to the Mark V? Is your complaint that ALL the suits are magic? Because if so then you're kind of screwed; any portrayal of Iron Man that makes him a powerful hero will involve a magic suit.

If the magic is applied consistently, I'll settle for that.

If you concede it's magic, then all the arguments you made above don't mean anything. My argument is that the only reason Stark didn't lose his head is because the movie is inconsistant and makes him arbitrarily invincible, thus broken. By conceding that, you are admitting that your above attempts to rationalize the movie are wrong.

Anhydrous, hell no. At, say, 10^-6 moles per liter? Sure, why not? An acetate or something would probably be a better delivery choice, unless they want to crank down his blood pH too...

It would have to be in a hell of a buffer solution; injecting something that is different than the pH of one's blood is bad juju. Are you really trying to defend the movie and argue that injecting someone with lithium hydroxide is at any time a good idea?

As for the rest, yes they could have done the plot differently, with fewer plot elements and smarter villains. Fine. You can say that about ALL movies, practically without exception.

I'm not saying you're wrong, I'm just saying that I don't think it's worth making a big fuss over. It's always easy to second guess a movie villain and say "they should have done this, this, and this, so they're stupid." Because they're supposed to lose in two hours. Likewise all problems in the movie. Everything has to be overcome in two hours or less. That makes it very difficult to come up with problems that don't have simple solutions.

Can you not condense this argument down to "Shut up, it's a popcorn flick, it doesn't have to make sense?" I've always found that offensive, that you aren't allowed to think about movies and that you should pretend a house of cards is a solid structure, if only because there is some rule that makes it a faux pas to point it out that ruins everyone's fun. I wouldn't have taken you for being anti-intellectual, but here you are.

Besides, you haven't actually responded to what I wrote. You say that the villain has to lose after two hours, but when the writers make the villain to monumentally dumb things to give the win to the hero, there is a phrase for that: "bad writing". When a movie writes itself in the corner and the plot proceeds in a nonsensical way just so the good guy wins, it means the writers and directors are doing a bad job. And yet you are here defending that. Why?

[alexrock23]

I just saw the movie last Sunday and really enjoyed it. I thought it was better than the first one, which I liked but found too formulaic and, even though I guess the sequel was too, it was more subtle about it. It made good use of characters like Justin Hammer, who was more than just a villain to be beaten, and Rhodey too, who I think was portrayed well by Don Cheadlel.

[Simon_Jester]

If you concede it's magic, then all the arguments you made above don't mean anything. My argument is that the only reason Stark didn't lose his head is because the movie is inconsistant and makes him arbitrarily invincible, thus broken. By conceding that, you are admitting that your above attempts to rationalize the movie are wrong.

Rationalize how?

If the fully armored suit can shrug off artillery fire, why on Earth would it be any surprise that a lighter armored version suit can survive attacks from a weapon with poorly defined damage mechanism that we've seen cut through engine blocks? There is a very large range of weapons that can penetrate engine blocks but cannot crack the armor plate on even relatively light armored vehicles.

Now, the armor's toughness and durability exceeds that of materials that I consider realistic, given how much punishment it takes and how thick it is. But the toughness of the Mk V travel suit is not unrealistic compared to the already known toughness of the Mk III suit used in the first movie.

It would have to be in a hell of a buffer solution; injecting something that is different than the pH of one's blood is bad juju. Are you really trying to defend the movie and argue that injecting someone with lithium hydroxide is at any time a good idea?

Not really. Mostly, I suppose I was just drawn into a bad position when I took exception to your using the warning sheet for anhydrous lithium hydroxide with the implication that it's representative of whatever the hell they injected him with.

Can you not condense this argument down to "Shut up, it's a popcorn flick, it doesn't have to make sense?" I've always found that offensive, that you aren't allowed to think about movies and that you should pretend a house of cards is a solid structure, if only because there is some rule that makes it a faux pas to point it out that ruins everyone's fun. I wouldn't have taken you for being anti-intellectual, but here you are.

The problem I have is that many of your criticisms don't read as "it doesn't make sense" to me at all. They read as "this couldn't really happen." Which would be a reasonable criticism in many types of movies, but not in a movie based on the comic book genre. It's like complaining about the physics in Roadrunner cartoons, or saying that wuxia movies are crap because in real life guys with swords can't fly.

Besides, you haven't actually responded to what I wrote. You say that the villain has to lose after two hours, but when the writers make the villain to monumentally dumb things to give the win to the hero, there is a phrase for that: "bad writing". When a movie writes itself in the corner and the plot proceeds in a nonsensical way just so the good guy wins, it means the writers and directors are doing a bad job. And yet you are here defending that. Why?

Because I don't think they did that bad a job, or that the plot was that nonsensical.

There was no way for them to write the damn movie at all without resorting to technobabble, because powered armor hasn't been invented yet, and powered armor that can take artillery fire, fly, and shoot energy blasts won't be invented any time soon. I am prepared to forgive them the technobabble up to a point, because this setting is very soft SF: the technology is defined by what it can do for the characters, and realism takes a distant second place. Remember, this occurs in a shared universe with a big green man who got No Limits Fallacy powers from being exposed to radiation from a nuclear test and a Norse god.

If you want to reject the whole genre for lack of realism, that's understandable. You don't like stories where the technology can't be blueprinted in real life by a sufficiently determined engineer? Fair enough.

But to pretend that this is somehow a specific criticism of a single movie, something that they could reasonably have avoided by being better writers, is ridiculous. Considering the limits of the genre and the movie format, I don't think they could have done much better. They could have sacrificed drama for exposition by adding more scenes detailing the technology and character motivation, but that doesn't reliably make better art.

[Gil Hamilton]

Rationalize how?

Before, you were claiming that it was merely only tougher than the carbon fibre body of the F1 racer, claiming that it was merely tougher than something flimsy and thus the whip around his neck thing wasn't so bad.

If the fully armored suit can shrug off artillery fire, why on Earth would it be any surprise that a lighter armored version suit can survive attacks from a weapon with poorly defined damage mechanism that we've seen cut through engine blocks? There is a very large range of weapons that can penetrate engine blocks but cannot crack the armor plate on even relatively light armored vehicles.

This seems like you are talking about apples and oranges. How does the Fully Armored Version apply at all? Further, how does this address the criticism that if the weapon that we saw slice through the engine block of a vehicle with NO RESISTANCE somehow is stopped by Tony Stark's neck, when we know there can't be remotely that much metal in the way AND Whiplash was juicing up the power when he did it. ANY of the Iron Man suits couldn't have been that well armored around his neck, not if he is displaying the full range of motion we see. Unless you can provide an explaination about how Vanko's whips could effortlessly go through large blocks of steel, but suddenly be stopped by Tony Stark's neck, then you have to concede the scene is broken.

Now, the armor's toughness and durability exceeds that of materials that I consider realistic, given how much punishment it takes and how thick it is. But the toughness of the Mk V travel suit is not unrealistic compared to the already known toughness of the Mk III suit used in the first movie.

The two aren't remotely the same. The Mk III suit had to be assembled by mechanical arms in order for Stark to put it on, the Mk V was so light that Happy could carry it one handed. Further, they TOLD us in the first movie what Stark made the Iron Man suit out of (stainless steel, with a fictional gold-titanium alloy overtop to prevent the icing problem) and I assure you a block of stainless steel the size of a brief case isn't something that Happy is moving short of a dolly.

Not really. Mostly, I suppose I was just drawn into a bad position when I took exception to your using the warning sheet for anhydrous lithium hydroxide with the implication that it's representative of whatever the hell they injected him with.

Conceded, but in solution LiOH isn't much better, even in a dilute limit. For one thing, it's more basic than blood and another, Li+ ion is viciously reactive.

The problem I have is that many of your criticisms don't read as "it doesn't make sense" to me at all. They read as "this couldn't really happen." Which would be a reasonable criticism in many types of movies, but not in a movie based on the comic book genre. It's like complaining about the physics in Roadrunner cartoons, or saying that wuxia movies are crap because in real life guys with swords can't fly.

No, I'm saying the scenes don't make sense, in context or with real life. There are plenty of movies that couldn't remotely happen where everything still makes a great deal of internal sense. An example of that is the excellently crafted "The Fifth Element".

Because I don't think they did that bad a job, or that the plot was that nonsensical.

Are you claiming then that how they treated Vanko and his actions were consistant and they didn't end up writing themselves into a corner where they had to make Vanko act stupid in order to give Iron Man the win? Or that the whole situation with Tony Stark getting heavy metal toxicity from the Arc Reactor wasn't ridiculously contrived and could have easily been solved in five seconds if Stark was actually as smart as it is claimed, in a way that doesn't involve pissing over nuclear physics and chemistry (like, you know, taking out the reactor, connecting it to leads, and sticking the leads on the terminal of the magnets in his chest, thus isolating the hazardous element... "isolation" being an engineering practice he would have heard about in school)?

There was no way for them to write the damn movie at all without resorting to technobabble, because powered armor hasn't been invented yet, and powered armor that can take artillery fire, fly, and shoot energy blasts won't be invented any time soon. I am prepared to forgive them the technobabble up to a point, because this setting is very soft SF: the technology is defined by what it can do for the characters, and realism takes a distant second place. Remember, this occurs in a shared universe with a big green man who got No Limits Fallacy powers from being exposed to radiation from a nuclear test and a Norse god.

Of course you can do it! There are movies that do it all the time. Technobabble isn't the use of far out future technologies or even IMPOSSIBLE technology, but how it is presented. StarWars has impossible technology, but it isn't laden with technobabble.

If you want to reject the whole genre for lack of realism, that's understandable. You don't like stories where the technology can't be blueprinted in real life by a sufficiently determined engineer? Fair enough.

But to pretend that this is somehow a specific criticism of a single movie, something that they could reasonably have avoided by being better writers, is ridiculous. Considering the limits of the genre and the movie format, I don't think they could have done much better. They could have sacrificed drama for exposition by adding more scenes detailing the technology and character motivation, but that doesn't reliably make better art.

You are misunderstanding me. I don't care about realism, what was bothering me about Iron Man was that it was technobabble-rific when it really didn't need to be. I'm not demanding realism from it, what I'm criticizing is that it doesn't even bother to make internal sense with ITSELF. I just greatly enjoyed a movie called "Man From Earth", which featured a 14,000 year old man who accidentally launched the myth of Jesus, for Pete's sake! You HAVE to admit that the palladium poisoning and Tony's solution was utterly stupid a problem, particularly when they establish in the first movie that he doesn't need to physically have the thing in his chest, that even a cables from a car battery will do. Then, making a similarly silly solution. There are tons of ways they could have handled it that weren't goofy, even if they involved fictional science. They could have avoided ALL of that with better writers. The writers were clearly of the school that think that no one listens to the dialogue of an action movie and weren't concerned with a plot that made particularly large amounts of sense. In other words, the people that rely on what you are doing, making it somehow that if you put any critical thought about what you just witnessed, some how you are enjoying the movie wrong and that it is a personal failing.

[Zor]

Hell, they might have even supplied a villain with some common sense. All Vanko would have had to do to ruin Tony Stark at the Stark Expo was to have SOME of his Hammerdroids shoot up the crowds of innocent bystanders that were around. Even if Stark successfully stopped the Warmachine suit and mopped up the Hammerdroids, those things could have killed alot of people before Iron Man could really deal with them.

He actually did just that. The Navy Drones fired off a salvo of artillery missiles into a crouded area at the Expo.

Zor

[Simon_Jester]

Rationalize how?

Before, you were claiming that it was merely only tougher than the carbon fibre body of the F1 racer, claiming that it was merely tougher than something flimsy and thus the whip around his neck thing wasn't so bad.

Yeah. I screwed up not thinking about the engine blocks. On the other hand, a tank is a LOT tougher than an engine block

This seems like you are talking about apples and oranges. How does the Fully Armored Version apply at all? Further, how does this address the criticism that if the weapon that we saw slice through the engine block of a vehicle with NO RESISTANCE somehow is stopped by Tony Stark's neck, when we know there can't be remotely that much metal in the way AND Whiplash was juicing up the power when he did it.

Hmm. Integral force field, the whips not being as effective when not moving... in a comic book context there are a shitload of reasons. In real life, Tony's head should have popped off like a grape, but in real life he bashed his brains out on the ceiling of his lab months ago and the fight in Monaco never happened.

ANY of the Iron Man suits couldn't have been that well armored around his neck, not if he is displaying the full range of motion we see. Unless you can provide an explaination about how Vanko's whips could effortlessly go through large blocks of steel, but suddenly be stopped by Tony Stark's neck, then you have to concede the scene is broken.

No. I do not.

The travel suit is made out of the same material as the Mk III suit from the first movie. The Mk III was ridiculously durable. It took an artillery shell with no obvious damage, and it took being knocked out of the sky by the artillery shell with equal ease. Now, if the suit were several inches thick, that would be broadly consistent with known technology. But it isn't. The suit is much too thin to handle the kind of punishment it takes in the first movie, not if it's made out of, say, ordinary steel.

The Mk V is lighter-armored, and the gorget (neck armor) is obviously going to be relatively thin compared to the breastplate and such... but it's still made of the same ridiculous material that, in roughly inch thick plates, took a hit from a tank. Which means I can't assume it will submit to Vanko's whips the way an engine block did, because that material is one hell of a lot stronger than the stuff they make engine blocks out of. Even if the plates on the neck are relatively thin (and, as you say, they must be), we know nothing about their composition, and therefore nothing about their damage resistance.

The two aren't remotely the same. The Mk III suit had to be assembled by mechanical arms in order for Stark to put it on, the Mk V was so light that Happy could carry it one handed. Further, they TOLD us in the first movie what Stark made the Iron Man suit out of (stainless steel, with a fictional gold-titanium alloy overtop to prevent the icing problem) and I assure you a block of stainless steel the size of a brief case isn't something that Happy is moving short of a dolly.

Stainless steel wouldn't have survived that tank hit. Something else is going on. I don't know what, and to tell the truth I'm not sure I care, but I know there is something else.

Not really. Mostly, I suppose I was just drawn into a bad position when I took exception to your using the warning sheet for anhydrous lithium hydroxide with the implication that it's representative of whatever the hell they injected him with.

Conceded, but in solution LiOH isn't much better, even in a dilute limit. For one thing, it's more basic than blood and another, Li+ ion is viciously reactive.

Hmm true.

Of course, I watched the movie again tonight with my brother, and I could swear the chemical is identified as "lithium dioxide," which may well be bullshit chemistry but renders your entire argument kind of moot.

Because I don't think they did that bad a job, or that the plot was that nonsensical.

Are you claiming then that how they treated Vanko and his actions were consistant and they didn't end up writing themselves into a corner where they had to make Vanko act stupid in order to give Iron Man the win? Or that the whole situation with Tony Stark getting heavy metal toxicity from the Arc Reactor wasn't ridiculously contrived and could have easily been solved in five seconds if Stark was actually as smart as it is claimed, in a way that doesn't involve pissing over nuclear physics and chemistry (like, you know, taking out the reactor, connecting it to leads, and sticking the leads on the terminal of the magnets in his chest, thus isolating the hazardous element... "isolation" being an engineering practice he would have heard about in school)?

I'm claiming they did an acceptable job. Definitely not flawless, not at all, but acceptable.

Of course you can do it! There are movies that do it all the time. Technobabble isn't the use of far out future technologies or even IMPOSSIBLE technology, but how it is presented. StarWars has impossible technology, but it isn't laden with technobabble.

That's because Star Wars doesn't revolve around the technology. When it does... they use technobabble. Remember "motivator unit?" "restraining bolt?" "hydro-spanner?" "Tibanna gas?"

Technobabble. It's inevitable whenever characters actually interact with technology that doesn't exist yet. Hell, we could take real technology, write a story about it and send that story into the past and it would sound like technobabble. What the hell would "Metal Oxide Semiconductor Field Effect Transistor" sound like to someone who'd never heard of them? That's a real piece of technical vocabulary; those things are one of the cornerstones of all modern technology... but to the average citizen, that's no more informative than "invert the plasma phase."

I can live with technobabble. I don't like it; I wish movies would get in the habit of slipping a graduate student a few hundred bucks to try and write more convincing technobabble (not least because I could make some money that way). But I can live with it up to a point, and Iron Man doesn't pass that point.

You HAVE to admit that the palladium poisoning and Tony's solution was utterly stupid a problem, particularly when they establish in the first movie that he doesn't need to physically have the thing in his chest, that even a cables from a car battery will do.

Hmm. One thought that occurs to me: read a little deeper into this. Iron Man doesn't need an arc reactor in his chest. He needs it to power the suit, but he could just as easily insert an ordinary DC power supply in place of the reactor.

So why is he wearing the damn thing? So he can make Iron Man suits that only he can wear, because they interface with the nuclear reactor in the wearer's chest and he's the only man alive who has one. He knows sticking the reactor in his chest will kill him, but he still wears it and still builds his suits accordingly.

The conclusion? Stark is more afraid of losing the monopoly on being Iron Man than he is of dying.

[Shroom Man 777]

And he doesn't tell anyone too!

Jesus, if they delved deeper into THAT psychological fuckup problem and instead of having SHIELD bullshit handwave that problem away with Samuel L. Fury taking an infodump on Papa Starko, we instead get some more intercharacter dramas with Pepper and Rhodes being Starko's superbestfriend and together with the power of friendship help Starko find out the cure to his problems - by, say, confronting him on the fact that he's a fuckoff, then it would've worked better! To an extent, the movie did do that with Pepper and Rhodes getting pissed at him, but it would've been better if they continued and developed the drama and waaaangst from that instead of having some shits from SHIELD come in with some lithium peroxide or whatever and stabbed it in Tony's dick or something. Blah blah blah blah strak strak strak!

[Havok]

Hmm. One thought that occurs to me: read a little deeper into this. Iron Man doesn't need an arc reactor in his chest. He needs it to power the suit, but he could just as easily insert an ordinary DC power supply in place of the reactor.

So why is he wearing the damn thing? So he can make Iron Man suits that only he can wear, because they interface with the nuclear reactor in the wearer's chest and he's the only man alive who has one. He knows sticking the reactor in his chest will kill him, but he still wears it and still builds his suits accordingly.

The conclusion? Stark is more afraid of losing the monopoly on being Iron Man than he is of dying.

Actually, no. Stark is afraid of letting his tech into the hands of the military, because he thinks that the people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit solely as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone. Gee, I wonder where he got that idea from.

As for making suits only he can wear, I guess you missed that whole part of Rhodey using the suit? It isn't a matter of pride with Stark, it is a matter of trust.

And yeah Stark could use a fucking car battery the rest of his life instead of the mini ARC, but that is a precarious and dangerous proposition and leaves him exceedingly vulnerable.

As for him continuing to use the suit in the second movie even though it is killing him... how many times does SHIELD, the government, Stark etc, have to say that they 'need Iron Man back on duty' or some other version, for you to get that he has become a valuable part of the US's national defense system and viewed as integral to national security?

[Havok]

And he doesn't tell anyone too!

Jesus, if they delved deeper into THAT psychological fuckup problem and instead of having SHIELD bullshit handwave that problem away with Samuel L. Fury taking an infodump on Papa Starko, we instead get some more intercharacter dramas with Pepper and Rhodes being Starko's superbestfriend and together with the power of friendship help Starko find out the cure to his problems - by, say, confronting him on the fact that he's a fuckoff, then it would've worked better! To an extent, the movie did do that with Pepper and Rhodes getting pissed at him, but it would've been better if they continued and developed the drama and waaaangst from that instead of having some shits from SHIELD come in with some lithium peroxide or whatever and stabbed it in Tony's dick or something. Blah blah blah blah strak strak strak!

This I agree with. Tony, Pepper and Rhodes should have gotten more focus.

[Simon_Jester]

Actually, no. Stark is afraid of letting his tech into the hands of the military, because he thinks that the people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit solely as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone. Gee, I wonder where he got that idea from.

I take it there's more evidence for this interpretation than for mine?

As for making suits only he can wear, I guess you missed that whole part of Rhodey using the suit? It isn't a matter of pride with Stark, it is a matter of trust.

I'm pretty sure Stark's thinking of Rhodes as a successor: he'll wear the suit after Stark dies. Going by my picture of Stark (which, yes, I get it, you disagree with), Stark can just bring himself to accept the idea of his very best friend wearing the suit. You can say that's about trust, you can say it's about ego; I'd say it's about both. Stark trusts Rhodes to use the suit right, but note that Stark doesn't tell Rhodes "hey, you can wear the suit."

Why wouldn't he bring that up, if he trusts Rhodes to wear it while he's alive? As it is, Rhodes pretty much had to sneak into the lab on his own initiative while Stark was out to get to a wearable suit at all. Rhodes needed an equalizer to take on Stark in his armor, but as far as I know there's no evidence that he was sure he'd be able to wear one of the suits.

If the scene at the birthday party hadn't gone down the way it had, the fact that Rhodes can wear the Iron Man suits might well not have come out until Stark collapsed entirely. How does that make sense if Stark is keeping the tech to himself purely because he distrusts the military (except, apparently, for Rhodes).

And yeah Stark could use a fucking car battery the rest of his life instead of the mini ARC, but that is a precarious and dangerous proposition and leaves him exceedingly vulnerable.

Doesn't have to be a car battery. I can imagine a lot of much more stable and durable DC power supplies than that which would fit into roughly the same space as the arc reactor without poisoning him. For a little magnet, he really doesn't need a megawatt power plant.

As for him continuing to use the suit in the second movie even though it is killing him... how many times does SHIELD, the government, Stark etc, have to say that they 'need Iron Man back on duty' or some other version, for you to get that he has become a valuable part of the US's national defense system and viewed as integral to national security?

If Stark were willing to give up being the one and only Iron Man, he'd just say "I am retiring as Iron Man for health reasons." The only way it makes sense for him to work himself to death as Iron Man, even given how important Iron Man is to America's security, is if Stark's desire to be Iron Man trumps his desire to not die.

[Shroom Man 777]

And he doesn't tell anyone too!

Jesus, if they delved deeper into THAT psychological fuckup problem and instead of having SHIELD bullshit handwave that problem away with Samuel L. Fury taking an infodump on Papa Starko, we instead get some more intercharacter dramas with Pepper and Rhodes being Starko's superbestfriend and together with the power of friendship help Starko find out the cure to his problems - by, say, confronting him on the fact that he's a fuckoff, then it would've worked better! To an extent, the movie did do that with Pepper and Rhodes getting pissed at him, but it would've been better if they continued and developed the drama and waaaangst from that instead of having some shits from SHIELD come in with some lithium peroxide or whatever and stabbed it in Tony's dick or something. Blah blah blah blah strak strak strak!

This I agree with. Tony, Pepper and Rhodes should have gotten more focus.

One of the best parts in the first Ironmang is when we see Pepper Potts, cute as a button, actually crying (v_____v) when Starko comes back. Tears of joy, haet job hunting, heh. And also when Pepper confronts Starko when she finds him in his Ironmang suit with bullet holes, and she's asking him what he's doing, and he gives a very emotional response on how he's doing this so he can protect the people he cares about and he needs Pepper to steal that Stane stuff with the USB thing. And, yeah, also when Rhodes rescues him in the desert. Next time you ride with me! Oh, and when Rhodes gets piss drunk too, that was a total laugh.

Man, Pepper. Gwyneth! ^__________________^ So adorables!

[Shroom Man 777]

Actually, no. Stark is afraid of letting his tech into the hands of the military, because he thinks that the people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit solely as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone. Gee, I wonder where he got that idea from.

I take it there's more evidence for this interpretation than for mine?

Your interpretations are THE SAME!

Hav: "Stark is afraid of letting his tech into the hands of the military, because he thinks that the people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit solely as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone" = Simon "Stark is more afraid of losing the monopoly on being Iron Man than he is of dying."

He's afraid of losing the monopoly on being Iron Man more than he is of dying BECAUSE he's afraid that losing the monopoly on being Iron Man will let his tech get into the hands of the military, BECAUSE he thinks that people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone, and that is something he's more afraid of than dying.

He doesn't want Iron Man tech to end up being like the Jerichos in Iron Man 1, that got carted off and sold to Mohammad Jihads in Bakalakadakistan by Stane. Because that really made him angsty and emo and angers and supersads .

And yeah Stark could use a fucking car battery the rest of his life instead of the mini ARC, but that is a precarious and dangerous proposition and leaves him exceedingly vulnerable.

Doesn't have to be a car battery. I can imagine a lot of much more stable and durable DC power supplies than that which would fit into roughly the same space as the arc reactor without poisoning him. For a little magnet, he really doesn't need a megawatt power plant.

Indeed. Either way, if someone wants to take it, putting the ARC in his chest won't stop 'em. Look at Stane!


I think selfishly hoarding Iron Man tech is a perfectly valid move on Stark because America Fuck No! And, yeah, I don't think he'd trust the American government OR his own company with something so lethal as Iron Man tech. Which is why he can only rely on himself to do stuff as Iron Man, or someone he trusts like Rhodes. But I think the whole poisonous ARC Heart arrangement is still pretty stupid.

[Stofsk]

Does anyone know why they dropped the actor who played Rhodes in the last film, and went with Don Cheadle with the sequel?

[CaptainChewbacca]

Does anyone know why they dropped the actor who played Rhodes in the last film, and went with Don Cheadle with the sequel?

There's a lot of rumors, but basically its this:

Before Iron Man, RDJ was a liability and Terrence Howard was the bankable star. Consequently, Howard got more money for the first movie. When Iron Man blew out all expectations and made RDJ one of the most bankable actors in hollywood, the studio noticed.

They were all committed to Iron Man 2 (and 3, I think) but nobody had agreed to salaries. Terrence Howard tried to hold out for more money or screen time (not entirely sure) than the studio was offering. Eventually, he gave in and said 'Fine, I'll take the deal' but when he did the studio told him 'Sorry, time ran out' and gave the part to Cheadle.

AFAIK, everyone got along well on the set, so it wasn't actor conflicts.

[Havok]

Actually, no. Stark is afraid of letting his tech into the hands of the military, because he thinks that the people in power will use it to create an army of Iron Men and use the suit solely as a weapon with no regard to helping anyone. Gee, I wonder where he got that idea from.

I take it there's more evidence for this interpretation than for mine?

You mean aside from Stane trying to kill him and take it and explaining how he was going to use it to make the ultimate weapon so the US would be dominate for the foreseeable future? Or the government actively trying to get the armor from him to give it to the military? Really though it is the same point, you just attribute it to Stark being selfish, while the movie clearly attributes it to not trusting those who would get the tech if he let it out of his hands.

As for making suits only he can wear, I guess you missed that whole part of Rhodey using the suit? It isn't a matter of pride with Stark, it is a matter of trust.

I'm pretty sure Stark's thinking of Rhodes as a successor: he'll wear the suit after Stark dies. Going by my picture of Stark (which, yes, I get it, you disagree with), Stark can just bring himself to accept the idea of his very best friend wearing the suit. You can say that's about trust, you can say it's about ego; I'd say it's about both. Stark trusts Rhodes to use the suit right, but note that Stark doesn't tell Rhodes "hey, you can wear the suit."

I guess you missed the parts where Rhodey repeatedly turned down Tony's offer to come work with him on the project, before and after he knew about the Iron Man suit. I'm sure he just wanted him to come take notes and y'know, not use his piloting skills.

Why wouldn't he bring that up, if he trusts Rhodes to wear it while he's alive? As it is, Rhodes pretty much had to sneak into the lab on his own initiative while Stark was out to get to a wearable suit at all. Rhodes needed an equalizer to take on Stark in his armor, but as far as I know there's no evidence that he was sure he'd be able to wear one of the suits.

Again... did you miss the part where Rhodey knew, by heart, the code to Tony's workshop and how Jarvis, who wouldn't even let the reporter chick touch his control pad in the first movie, let Rhodey not only access the armor, but wear it and use it to fight with Tony. Jarvis could have easily deactivated the suit even with out Tony's input. Clearly Rhodey has a level of trust that only Pepper and possibly Happy share with Tony. The fact that he hadn't told Rhodes has nothing to do with a lack of trust but with the character flaw Tony has of taking everything on himself and not wanting to burden other people with his problems.

If the scene at the birthday party hadn't gone down the way it had, the fact that Rhodes can wear the Iron Man suits might well not have come out until Stark collapsed entirely. How does that make sense if Stark is keeping the tech to himself purely because he distrusts the military (except, apparently, for Rhodes).

Do you not get that Tony, despite his brilliance, is a very flawed character? You are nit picking this shit as if you want Stark to be perfect and right all the time when that runs so opposite to his character it isn't even funny. They even put a fucking scene in the movie explaining his flaws.

And yeah Stark could use a fucking car battery the rest of his life instead of the mini ARC, but that is a precarious and dangerous proposition and leaves him exceedingly vulnerable.

Doesn't have to be a car battery. I can imagine a lot of much more stable and durable DC power supplies than that which would fit into roughly the same space as the arc reactor without poisoning him. For a little magnet, he really doesn't need a megawatt power plant.

I offered an opinion on why he maintains the mini arc in his chest in an earlier post. So I'll just let that stand.

As for him continuing to use the suit in the second movie even though it is killing him... how many times does SHIELD, the government, Stark etc, have to say that they 'need Iron Man back on duty' or some other version, for you to get that he has become a valuable part of the US's national defense system and viewed as integral to national security?

If Stark were willing to give up being the one and only Iron Man, he'd just say "I am retiring as Iron Man for health reasons." The only way it makes sense for him to work himself to death as Iron Man, even given how important Iron Man is to America's security, is if Stark's desire to be Iron Man trumps his desire to not die.

The mini ARC is killing him regardless. The movie doesn't state, that I can remember, how much, or if at all, the use of the suit is hastening that. Correct me if I am wrong on that though. Given that the suits can have their own ARCs now though, I doubt that Tony would over look the little fact that he could still be Iron Man and not kill himself by simply using the suits ARC, over his chest piece.