Iron Man 3 Teams Up Disney and Marvel in a superheros adventure presented by West Coast Midnight Run

IRON MAN 3
Marvel Pictures/Walt Disney Studios
MPAA Rating PG-13
(Action, adventure, sci-fi/fantasy)

Running Time: 1 hr. 49 min.

Score: A-

Starring: Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Guy Pearce, Rebecca Hall, Jon Favreau, Ben Kingsley

Directed by: Shane Black
Story: Drew Pearce, Shane Black

By Catherine Rodriguez

Iron Man fans need not worry, the latest franchise adventure is in top form. Downey, Paltrow, Cheadle and JARVIS reprise their roles and deliver another exciting chapter in the Iron Man saga.

In The Avengers, Captain America, a more stable and successful earlier version of the Hulk, challenges Stark if he’s anything without the suit.

Stark responds without flinching “just a billionaire, genius, philanthropist ... that doesn't play well with others”.

Well it would seem that in this adventure Iron Man meets his match, a foe that is far stronger than Iron Man, quicker and smarter ... without a suit.

What's even worse, Stark is still recovering from all the beatings he took for his pals, The Avengers, in their face off against Loki in New York.

Without missing a beat, Shane Black, Disney and cast deliver an exciting adventure wrapped in the latest military technologies from robotics and artificial intelligence to DNA enhancements and drone technologies, all at the leading edge of research and unleashed against a new foe, a terrorist threat

patterned as a more virulent and insidious Osama Bin Laden.

In this adventure our heroes find out they are out of their league, as the dangers multiply and their foe takes the offensive to the homefront.

Stark loses his well measured and infamous cool. Without a secret identity, the battle becomes very personal and dangerous.

There are many surprises along the way as our heroes’ mettle, and metal, is tested. Iron Man 3 manages to create a lot of personal moments that further enhances the character of Tony

Stark, both with Potts and other surprise characters in the film, including an old friend (Rebecca Hall) that looks uncannily like Johansson Scarlett (The Avengers’ Black Widow). When Hall first makes her appearance in this film, I thought it was Scarlett that was tapped for a cameo role and was masquerading undercover with wig and makeup.

It’s too bad the director and crew didn’t allow the character of Stark to play on the obvious as this would have made a fabulous interlude and would have connected strongly with the entire Marvel series - and I am sure it would have delighted fans and moviegoers

alike - but this is a minor overall point and I am nitpicking.

There is another instance in which this film ties in with The Avengers, but folks need to stay in their seats until all of the credits roll at the end of the movie, there is yet another surprise scene meant to tease the audience.

Iron Man 3 also misses out on a valuable opportunity of exploring an aspect of the Stark - Potts super powers versus romance/love equation as the film wraps up and fast forwards without delving into what could have been a really interesting storyline for Iron Man 4 - that we are certain is in

the works at Disney and Marvel at this time. Is Paramount Pictures involved somehow? Their logo is on the press poster and film clips

Obviously Shane and the Disney/ Marvel team did not wish to muddy the focus with another superhero in the same den that could outperform the super suits that are so much the center of each adventure for our hero.

Iron Man 3 has some spectacular action sequences and stunts up its sleeves and never lets down from the previous two adventures in the series.

This film was of course shot in 3D and

the IMAX formats for a truly amazing hot rod experience.

And if you really dig all of the flying about town without having a Justice League flight ring or being Superman, Disney is also bringing to town the daddy of Iron Man.

Plans are underway to revive The Rocketeer (1991 - Billy Campbell and Jennifer Connelly), an iron man hero from an earlier Art Deco era preceding Captain America.