Iron Man (No Spoilers)

So I know I'm a week behind the crowd with this one, but the Good Doctor was on call last weekend, so we had to wait to catch the first big blockbuster of the 2008 summer movie season.

Tony Stark's company manufactures weapons and supplies them to the U.S. military. While in Afghanistan to demonstrate Stark Industries' newest weapons creation, Stark's convoy is attacked and he, the sole survivor, is taken hostage.

Stark is instructed by a terrorist group to build a missile identical to the one he was demonstrating for the U.S. military. Instead, Stark builds a suit of armor, complete with all sorts of built-in gadgets. Stark escapes and is rescued from the infinite desert by the U.S. military.

Once he's back home, Stark announces Stark Industries will no longer be manufacturing weapons and begins to perfect the design on his suit, the powers of which he intends to use for good.

Yes, it's really as good as you may have heard. There's a beautiful blend of reality which is rarely seen in a comic book movie. At first, I thought I might be watching a war movie, but by the end, the film seamlessly transitions itself into a full-on comic book extravaganza.

At the heart of this newest superhero franchise is Robert Downey, Jr. As no stranger to controversy, RDJ perfectly embodies the narcissistic Stark who, like RDJ, seems to do a complete 180 by the end of the film after getting a second chance. Art imitating life? Who knows?

Two things make Stark a supercool superhero to me. 1.) He's lived a long life of being a money-and-whore-mongering jackass, but takes a traumatic experience and changes himself for the better. 2.) Underneath all that Iron Man armor, he's still just a vulnerable human.

I know some of the complaints for this movie have been in regards to a big chunk of the film focusing on Stark's gadgets and gizmos and his attempts to better the suit of armor. I for one enjoyed all this and thought it made it for some very humorous scenes.

Everyone else did equally well in their respective roles, even Gwyneth Paltrow who managed to not annoy me. Terrence's Howard's role as Stark's BFF is kind of in the "throw-away" league. He didn't seem to do much to help or hinder the action of our superhero. Not that this is Howard's fault: he did a fine job with what he had to work with, but I found myself wondering what was the point to the character at all.

Definitely a great way to start of summer movie season and I'm already looking forward to the next one. After the recent fall of the X-Men and Spider-Man franchises, Batman needs some help holding the world of comic book movies together. I think Iron Man can do the job.

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