To the Guys Who Have Watched Iron Man 3 (Spoilers!)

Also, a friend brought this up, the mandarin could still be somewhere. Think about it. I'm not sure, but the mandarin that was revealed isn't the terrorist who works out of afghanistan or similar places. In this movie, outside of having the name "mandarin" he doesn't seem like the "mandarin" at all. And he brought something up that almost went unnoticed by me, why does amy and killian continue to reference "the master" even when we have already been revealed to know that that isn't him? Right before amy died, she mentions "the master". By that point, we had already been shown that the "mandarin" isn't the head of anything. It makes no sense. Unless "the master" is someone else entirely. With this information. I believe that he will be brought into the fold in iron man 4. It seems as though the avengers would have 3 movies. Iron man is already done in 2013. Avengers 2 comes out in 2015. Avengers 3 would come out around 2018(?). Leaving an entire 5 year gap between the last time we've seen iron man, and the conclusion of the avengers. I suspect another one before then.

I agree, their Mandarin was laaame, so was their little take on the Iron Patriot, pointless. I didn't even think the action was that great, it looked impressive but it was just Iron Man suits left right and centre, overkill for me. I thought Guy Pearce was great in it but his powers were kind of stupid.

@ssejllenrad: I don't know about Iron Man but I think it's something that could be used in a future Cap movie. Say the government wants Cap to do something but Cap is morally against it. They try to use Iron Patriot to replace him as a symbol and show how superior he us because of the armor being more powerful. It's also something that can be replicated for other heroes. I think it would have been introduce in in a future Cap movie instead of Iron Man. It would also add to the shared universe feel of the movies.

Also, there's this on the Iron Man 4 rumors.

Shane Black: “There has been a lot of discussion about it: ‘Is this the last Iron Man for Robert?’ Something tells me that it will not be the case, and will be seen in a fourth, or fifth … But I can be a little excited…”

And this

Marvel’s President, Kevin Feige: “certainly our plan to continue to have Robert Downey in the persona of Tony Stark for many, many years to come.”

This seems to point to Marvel intending to push for Robert Downey Jr. to continue making Iron Man films, but what it really comes down to is whether Robert wants to continue playing Tony Stark.

Feige went on to say that he felt as though Tony Stark could be a lot like James Bond, where one actor (Sean Connery) is always thought of as the original, but that the public would grow to accept different actors playing the role as time moves on.

Weird he mentions james bond. I thought the ending credits did have a "james bond" vibe to it.

@dernman: Sounds good but I think Marvel's original intention for the Iron Patriot is the best. Norman Osborn creates it as the leader of the Dark Avengers, to replace both the suit of Iron Man and the patriotism of Captain America. Bullseye replaces Hawkeye, Venom replaces Spider-Man etc. I love this idea of an evil impostor version of the team, imo they would've been a great enemy for the 3rd Avengers film but they've just shot down any possibility of that by pointlessly giving the suit and name to War Machine.

The movie was amazing I thought.

Haha, I thought it was absolutely hilarious! Such a good movie! Sounds like everyone is just a little mad? ;)

@the_stegman: Im beginning to think you are trolling the IM3 threads because everyone i go into one, I see your exact same comment saying how much you hate this movie with ridiculous/irrelevant points

To an extent people that dislike the movie seem to dislike it for drastically different reason - some of which are honestly related to be confusion. I'm reading people calling his removal of that metal in his chest as plot-hole, despite narration saying how he perfected Extremis and that allowed him to finally be free of it.

I honestly didn't see Killian turning out to be the Mandarin coming. Tinker Toys? Where did Tony Stark whine once in this film? He announces at the very end of this film "I am Iron Man" in his narration - that was kinda the whole character development. The Suit was a cocoon for him to grow in, to be safe in - here he's finally free of it completely - Clean Slate was his way of destroying that anxiety, of moving past the events of Avengers and moving towards tomorrow.

It really just was some fan-service for comic-book fans, largely the repaint didn't do anything of any significant outside serve as a bit of believable side-humor (as in I could see people in marketing turn War-Machine into Iron Patriot).

He's not trolling, he just didn't like it - although I think that stems from not taking a lot of it as it was intended leading to a degree of confusion.

Hopefully gonna watch it during the week! Possibly weekend.~

@isaac_clarke:

I honestly didn't see Killian turning out to be the Mandarin coming.

Well you're lucky. Everyone I saw it with did.

Tinker Toys?

Yes. Ton'y ingenious billion dollar suits were destroyed left and right in this film. He wasn't in a suit for more than (what felt like) mere seconds at a time.

Where did Tony Stark whine once in this film?

Did we watch the same movie? The whole anxiety attack bit. The guy was a damn prisoner of war and he rose to the challenge. And now I'm supposed to just believe he's having panic attacks because he glimpsed through a black hole? Maybe if they went into it more it would have made sense. Otherwise it felt contrived and made him seem whiny which, I may add, is out of place for his character. It was even out of character in this same movie as he's freaking out one minute then giving that little kid all this tough love ("Dad's leave all the time, don't be such a pussy about it"). Face it, everything in the movie was set up to be one big joke after another. The joke's weren't even that great. It was overkill and left the movie feeling rather hollow. Favreau and Downey nailed the right balance of humor and action in the first 2. This one was amateur hour.

He announces at the very end of this film "I am Iron Man" in his narration

Then that would make it all the more ironic that he couldn't be anymore unrecognizable from the Iron Man that I know and love from the comics and movies by the end of the film.

- that was kinda the whole character development. The Suit was a cocoon for him to grow in, to be safe in - here he's finally free of it completely - Clean Slate was his way of destroying that anxiety, of moving past the events of Avengers and moving towards tomorrow.

No, the suit was first a way for him to protect himself and then became something more - a way for him to protect innocent people. Him being able to lose the arc reactor was rushed and thrown in at the end as if to change the status quo for any subsequent Iron Man movie (Avengers 2 being the next one). They should have followed the real Extremis storyline and allowed Tony to be injected with the serum. That would have opened SO many more doors for the character (as evidenced by the comics still exploring those ideas today).

Also, as I've already said the anxiety he feels throughout the movie is just used as a contrivance to make Avengers 2 have some sort of meaning. But it's forced and it's obvious. They went about it all wrong. They could have made the Avengers events relevant without using such a stupid plot device. Also, where were the rest of the Avengers, or SHIELD for that matter, when the President was being held hostage in an Iron Patriot suit!?

The real Extremis storyline is about Iron Man coming to terms with the bad things he's done in the past. And in the end the realization he has is that, though he's done a lot of wrong and provided people with the means to kill, he is at least now trying to better himself. This is the storyline they should have explored. They could have still included Mandarin and taken more elements from The Five Nightmare's storyline as well.

Only clue to it was the set, but I was just assuming that was part of Mandarin's rouse. I have no idea how you guys saw it coming.

@extremis said:

Most of the suits going poof where post-avengers suits designed to do various tasks, most of them not even remotely combat ready by design from my view. For the most part he wasn't in the suits for long - although given the beat-down his suits had in Extremis, I didn't mind the lot of proto-types or various purposed suits going boom.

@extremis said:

Having anxiety attacks given the events of Avengers isn't so much whining. Being taken captive is one thing, jarring to be sure - the issue here is his entire universe more or less imploded - prior to Avengers he had a very good idea of where he was in his universe, the moment he goes through the cosmic-cube portal any sense he had of everything imploded - his center shifted you could say. Now he's living in a post Avengers world, where Gods, Gamma Monsters and alien invasions are actually a thing. He's sporting PTSD from going on a suicide mission.

The kid was more or less an unspoiled / uncorrupted version of himself - it's less about tough love and simply being tough on himself. Wasn't a big fan of 2 and personally I'm glad we actually get see Stark get some major character development.

@extremis said:

Tony Stark redefined the character - he's never been the character from comics and if anything the comics have been endeavoring to be Tony.

@extremis said:

I don't see what you're saying contradicts with the suit being a layer between him and the rest of the world. During those anxiety attacks he was rushing straight into it like a protective shell - I'm not sure how much more clear the symbolism could be there. He was injected with Extremis - that's why they where able to remove the arc-reactor and the Shrapnel in his chest. That much was acknowledged in his narration.

His anxiety had nothing to do with Avengers 2 - it was entirely because of the ramifications of the original Avengers and likely won't be mentioned every again in any subsequent sequels or at the very least not play any role in future films - clean slate quite literally was him getting past it.

Where where the Avengers? Somewhere, we won't know the exact happenings of these characters till their films to put it all together. To be more specific:

• Thor's in Asgard - that or the events of his film are keeping him fairly occupied.
• Captain America is on assignment from shield with Black Widow, that or given how expedient the events where in this film / AIM's ability to hide it's tracks - likely didn't have time to make a move.
• The Hulk was somewhere and after the film he chats with Tony.

He's already come to terms with that though - that was Iron Man 1 and 2. Albeit you could argue a bit of 3 given he acknowledges the events happening here are entirely his fault, but that is more of a stretch. I'm not saying I wasn't disappointed by the lack of an actual Mandarin, mainly because Kingsley was doing amazing at giving me a threatening villian before the twist - but having the audience's perception of what we would think the big bad terrorist is (in a sense, having any pre-conceived notions of where he would be or his appearance) being turned on it's head was I thought a brilliant piece of narrative. I like stuff like that and it doesn't entirely remove the possibility of a more real Mandarin making a scene, although Killian for now was the Mandarin all along.

Just to note: Ben Kingsley was amazing this film, he easily did a fantastic job.

@isaac_clarke: I actually thought this was Ben's worst acting in a while, when he was mandarin that was, His acting was poor.

I thought it felt more like The Dark Knight Rises with small elements of Begins.

@pyrogram said:

I was more so thinking the drastic shift of character he had - from"bad guy" we want to see Tony pummel for being such an moral-less killer to rather an eccentric / adorable character. I don't know, the last good movie I saw with Kingsley in prior to IM3 was Hugo, although I can't say I had any issues with his Mandarin here - outside him not being it. I think Kingsley was probably one of my favorite features of the film.

I understand that people dislike change, especially when one of the story arcs it was based on was so influential for Tony Stark, but it's a comic book film that while aimed at fans like us, is also made for people who couldn't care less about the source material. Honestly, people should just be glad that comic book films are so popular in this day and age and that Iron Man of all people is easily the most widely accepted amongst them all.

I was perfectly fine with Tony removing his arc reactor from his chest, it happened in the comics, why not the film. Perhaps people assume it's because it's the end of the line for RDJ as Tony Stark and it worked them up, I don't know. According to Marvel and Shane Black, it's up to RDJ if he wants to continue or not but they are fully willing to make several more films with him.

True. I agree with this.

Actually, this is a very good idea, provided that Shane Black does this in Iron man 4 (so he won't get canned)

The thing isn't so much the change, it's that they had no idea how it happened despite the narration saying he used Extremis. Some people are on the boat that they think this is the end of Tony, which seems unlikely.

I guess it was somewhat unclear, but he did say that he cured Pepper which could insinuate that he did in fact fix Extremis and used it on himself which was what allowed him to take out the shards from his heart.

@isaac_clarke:

Most of the suits going poof where post-avengers suits designed to do various tasks, most of them not even remotely combat ready by design from my view.

How is Iron Man going to make 30 plus suits that are not combat ready? Since when does Tony Stark half-ass all his work? Not only this, but he's been working harder than ever since Avengers 1 (which was to be expected) and in the end we get all these shit suits falling apart left and right. This is a reason why I'm unhappy with the interpretation of Tony in IM3. It's inaccurate. The other movies deviated from the comics in many aspects as well but Favreau understood the true nature of the character.

For the most part he wasn't in the suits for long - although given the beat-down his suits had in Extremis, I didn't mind the lot of proto-types or various purposed suits going boom.

Well his one suit got a beat down in Extremis. Then he had to upgrade. That was the point. But they might as well have called this abomination Expendables 3, considering the life span of these new (supposed to be) state of the art suits.

Having anxiety attacks given the events of Avengers isn't so much whining. Being taken captive is one thing, jarring to be sure - the issue here is his entire universe more or less imploded - prior to Avengers he had a very good idea of where he was in his universe, the moment he goes through the cosmic-cube portal any sense he had of everything imploded - his center shifted you could say. Now he's living in a post Avengers world, where Gods, Gamma Monsters and alien invasions are actually a thing. He's sporting PTSD from going on a suicide mission.

IDK where you are getting the PTSD thing. Maybe they mentioned PTSD in the film and I missed it. But anyway, If he ever had PTSD it would be after being a prisoner of war if anything. Tony under stress just works harder, distances himself more sure, but he stays like a rock. As I've already said they could have given resonance to events from Avengers 1 without using the contrivance of Tony Stark having anxiety attacks. You call it character development, but as you even said its all over with by the end of the film, so what sort of development really happened? The answer is nothing. The character didn't go through a real change. Sure he lost his anxiety, but it was never part of the character to begin with. We've been tricked, essentially, into thinking this "change" matters but it doesn't. Any real character development involves a change from within the character. This movie isn't building on the character. So what we really see is just the removal of a plot device that they introduced earlier in the movie. The reason it's a plot device is because it was an easy way for them to give relevance to what happened in Avengers. It's lazy writing because, as I said, we don't see a real change come from within the character. And all great stories, at their heart, tell about a change from within the character. Hence why this movie feels so hollow.

Also, I've already given some ideas as to how they could have explored the character better.

The kid was more or less an unspoiled / uncorrupted version of himself - it's less about tough love and simply being tough on himself. Wasn't a big fan of 2 and personally I'm glad we actually get see Stark get some major character development.

Once again, we've been tricked into thinking this is character development. Tony's anxiety exists solely to link the events from Avengers to IM3. That's why it's gone by the end of the movie and that's why some of us, who realize this, are left feeling rather dissatisfied. It's not real character development. Extremis by Warren Ellis is. I saw a thank you to him in the sea of credits. Only wish they would have actually paid his story due respect.

Where where the Avengers? Somewhere, we won't know the exact happenings of these characters till their films to put it all together. To be more specific:

• Thor's in Asgard - that or the events of his film are keeping him fairly occupied.
• Captain America is on assignment from shield with Black Widow, that or given how expedient the events where in this film / AIM's ability to hide it's tracks - likely didn't have time to make a move.
• The Hulk was somewhere and after the film he chats with Tony.

Yeah I thought all those things possible, however, there is no mention of it at all. Now that this super team the Avengers exists, we might need to understand why they can't be around all the time. But whatever, I actually wasn't too bothered by that. My friend leaned over and asked me that while we were watching the movie and all I could say was "well I guess theyre taking care of their own problems". Does seem kinda silly though with the President kidnapped and all.

I was more bothered by SHIELD. Where was that whole organization while the country's president and entire nation was in peril?

Look if you enjoyed the movie more power to you. But the truth is there are a ton of plot holes in this thing and there wasn't a whole lot of weight to it. It felt hollow and contrived. It upsets me, obviously, because I am a fan of the character. I think as comic fans we are all lucky we get these big movies, but that doesn't mean I won't criticize it when I KNOW it should be better.

@extremis said:

Notice the ones with jack-hammers for arms? The heavy lifting suit? A lot of these suits were designed for a number of purposes, most notably not for combat as far as I can tell. He built those suits while he couldn't sleep, it's less about working harder and more of him trying to work through his issues. They weren't falling apart left and right, they where being melted or smashing into something for an explosive effect.

@extremis said:

So you don't have an issue with semi-meta human sporting Extremis trashing Tony's most modern suit in the comics - but when a host of peolpe with Extremis are destroying multiple suits built within months of one another with similar levels of ease it's a big deal?

@extremis said:

I'm not sure if it was specifically mention, since he was having anxiety attacks - but given he can't sleep and when does he's dreaming of the events of Avengers - it's a somewhat good guess he's suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. He wasn't tortured all that much as a prisoner, he was held captive and threatened - more or less his experience was akin to journalists being attacked and captured by insurgents.

He's fully accepted his past and the universe he's currently living in - a post Avengers universe. It's why he blew up the suits that represented his anxiety from Avengers and was finally able to break free of that armored shell - removing the arc reactor. I think at this point you're just being oblivious when you're insisting nothing happened.

The questioned raised in Avengers by Captain America - who is Tony Stark without the suit, by the end of this film - without the suit he is Iron Man.

@extremis said:

This movie is the Marvel Universe's epilogue to the event of Avengers and Tony by the end of the movie accepts that and he himself embraces a new path forward that doesn't consist of being trapped in the past. It's less of a trick and more of a factoid. Having Tony sit there, after already dealing with his history in the first Iron Man would have just been silly and unnecessary. Simply put that portion of Extremis was already integrated into the narrative of cinematic Iron Man.

@extremis said:

The only time the other characters where referenced were in tiny bits of fan-service in the form of Cap's proto-type shield, a bit of footage from the Hulk at the end of IM2 and a reference to the land of enchantment in IM2. Outside that these characters, while their stories were closely linked or happening quite literally within the same time-frame weren't mentioned in each other's independent movies. Cap's film might mention IM3, we don't know - regardless trying to play it off as if AIM wasn't keeping the ball rolling rather quickly or that the Avengers have each other on speed-dial isn't something established quite yet in the cinematic universe and we shouldn't expect them to have much crossovers in-between films.

SHIELD was having trouble locating Loki after he stole the cube and was working with what was assumingly AIM and Hydra operatives in Avengers. If they had the time to react, to find the President and save him maybe that's one thing - but it takes time to do this and that's assuming they were even in the position to help.

Name a plot hole. I'm starting to wonder if people even know what those are, given they keep talking about them - but aren't mentioning them. The only ones that come to mind pertain to Iron Patriot, so I'd start there at least.

@isaac_clarke:

Name a plot hole. I'm starting to wonder if people even know what those are, given they keep talking about them - but aren't mentioning them.

Ah yes plot holes. Those things people mention so discretely yet never quite spell out. So let me be clear on this: you assume people don't know what plot holes are simply because plenty of them agree that IM3 is filled with them? What kind of blind loyalty is that? Did you ever think that maybe it's because there ARE various plot holes from the film? I've explained many to you as well as other people have in this thread and others on this forum. It's just that no one has put in parentheses (plot hole) after each statement. This makes me think YOU don't know what a plot hole is. I'm pretty sure I've laid the inconsistencies out rather coherently. If you understand what these flaws are in a film, then you would recognize them when people point them out. I don't have to spell them out for you any further. I don't need to educate you. Do it yourself. Go watch the movie again, you missed a lot of things the first time. I've pointed out various plot holes and inconsistencies within the film. I've also explained why the "character development" you perceived happened is actually just a plot device.

SHIELD was having trouble locating Loki after he stole the cube and was working with what was assumingly AIM and Hydra operatives in Avengers. If they had the time to react, to find the President and save him maybe that's one thing - but it takes time to do this and that's assuming they were even in the position to help.

So wait, you are giving SHIELD a pass because it takes time to save the President? We are talking about SHIELD here. Don't you think they should be all over this? Is it not in their interests to have intel on this sort of thing? Also, if the case is that they aren't around for some reason (why that may be true I have NO idea) there should have been some mention of it in the movie (then maybe we would have an idea). As I've already stated, we are now in Phase 2 of the MCU. This is a post-Avengers world as we both agree. Meaning they have to address these things to us now. Now that we know all these characters and organizations exist the subsequent film's have to address their existence. We can't pretend SHIELD and the Avengers don't exist for an entire movie. This is what Marvel Studios signed up for. All it would have taken was one scene to clear these things up, but they didn't. Once again another plot hole. There. I finally spelled one out for you.

I'm not going to comment on everything else you've said because it's mostly redundant now and also because I just don't want to. You seem incapable of accepting that this film has flaws. That's fine. I won't bother pointing them out to you anymore then. You love the movie, great for you. I wish it was as good as you think. But there's plenty of us who don't like it for good reasons. Get used to it.

In all honesty, the twist was so far out there for me that I really enjoyed it. I mean, I was expecting some kind of twist, but nothing like that...that was...wow...

It got me to thinking if AIM was right behind the Ten Rings from the get go...

It was an average marvel movie, nothing special, but it was a fun time. Maybe Avengers set my standards too high? Or maybe all those damn trailers ruined every part that was supposed to be awesome?!

The movie could've been better but after the first half hour the direction went downhill and then plateau'd at average. Nothing really stood out for me or gave me that big cheesy fan grin like Iron Man 1, or even Iron Man 2. It was really just.....average and easily looked over in my opinion. Also, this is more of a personal gripe I guess, but there was way too much humour. Its like almost every word that came out of a characters mouth, especially RDJ, was a quip, one liner, or sarcastic joke. How am I supposed to take the movie even remotely seriously when the main characters cracks a lowkey joke moments after the supposed death of his girl?? Oh, and they make Tony to be a puss. I bet bank Thor and Cap aren't gonna piss the bed everytime someone brings up New York.

C-

I agree with you on number three and four. His new suit wasn't even fit for battle but he insisted on using it. The villain wasn't really evil he wasn't a good guy but not evil. If you wanted to make him evil then specify whether or not he was doing the human testing legally. Really it was just a misunderstanding the only thing he did wrong was not take credit for the explosions (if it was legal and an accident, which we assume it was he could have gotten off the hook) and try to kill the president.

I thought it was the best marvel studios film. I don't read Iron Man comics but I thought the movie was funny without taking away the seriousness of the film.

@extremis said:

The only 'plot hole' someone bothered mentioning was Tony Stark removing his arc reactor in his chest, despite the narration saying during the whole procedure that he perfected Extremis and has clearly used it to get that shrapnel out of his heart. That's it and it wasn't even a plot hole.

Maybe what is a plot-hole from the film? Telling me about the inconsistent durability of suits from the prior films, despite none of them having to deal with insanely hot temperatures or the latter suits not even designed around combat isn't a plot hole. You're completely ignoring my point because it doesn't fit you're visage of the film where apparently the heavy lifting suit is a suit designed to fight off alien-invaders. Telling me his anxiety was an elaborate rouse / a plot device that was out of character, because he was held captive in Iron Man 1 (quite literally making a life-changing friend, playing board games and stress free environment) is more of a shock to his system then within a week learning of gods, monsters and aliens - who he runs a suicide mission to stop - exist - this is not a plot-hole. You complaining that this wasn't a direct rip from Extremis despite most of those plot elements being integrated into the previous films already isn't a plot-hole.

Plot holes are the things that can't be explained away in less than a sentence or two. Like Batman finding his way into Gotham from a desert, without money from half-way across the world. To something as minor as Doc Ock finding Parker in a diner in NY city somehow in Spider Man 2. In other words poor story telling that can't be rationalized without being fan-fiction.

Plot devices aren't plot holes.

@extremis said:

No, but you twisted my words anyway. The events of the President being kidnapped, to being publicly executed was planned in advance and happened in a very short amount of time. It took an considerable amount of effort to locate Loki and given how easily AIM was hacking televisions nationally without being traceable by anyone that wasn't Stark - it would have to take time for them to get any sort of rescue going, time they didn't have and that is largely the reason we likely didn't see SHIELD. Not because they weren't attempting to rescue him, but because it's literally events happening within hours by AIM.

This was all assuming they where even in a position to help the President.

It isn't a matter of accepting anything. I've already made it clear there are valid complaints to be had. Your's however have nothing to do with the quality of writing. Simply 'I've totally told you a super duper bunch of plot holes!' and 'I'm mad because this isn't a direct rip of Warren Ellis' work on Extremis' - which for some reason you want to have Tony after Avengers moping about because of his past despite already dealing with that primarily in the first film. It's ridiculous.

Make some valid criticisms that are worth commenting on, childish complaints that had nothing to do with the quality of the film.

I just watched the movie with my 7 year old brother. Needless to say, my brother loved the movie with all his heart and joy. I, on the other hand, dozed off during like 10 minutes of the film. My friend woke me up after he saw me sleeping in my chair. I though the movie was a sham and was really badly done. The action was good, but the rest of it was lackluster...to put it nicely.

Some issues I noticed in the movie (well more like personal annoyances), but i will list them as follow:

1) What was the point of the Mandarin? I know he's the scapegoat for Killian's evil plan to rule the world. But, seriously? He was totally unnecessary in the movie. They took a great Iron Man villain and reduced him to a drug addicted actor, who lived in an imitation playboy mansion in Miami.

2) Too much stuff happening at once. This reminds me of Spider-man 3 where they decided it would be cool to stick about 100 things into one movie and hope cohesion formed somehow. They should have took the idea of AIM and Extremis, and rolled with those two.

3) Too many 'mental' problems happening with Tony Stark. They should have just continued his battle with the bottle and how he uses it to cope. Instead they bring PTSD and panic attacks onto the screen. So along with being a billionaire-philanthropist-playboy-genius, he's also a man who suffers from a myriad of mental problem!! Oh man that sounds so impressive, he's so damaged that he can continue tinkering with stuff and making cooler suits. Really kind of disjointed.

4) Cheap laughs and bad villain. Killian was lame, face it. He was basically the Justin Hammer guy from the second movie. I even mistaken him for Justin Hammer at first, given that I was asleep, when they mentioned who he was. Boring, stereotypical, power hungry villain. The same as the last two villains. At least the evil Russian dude from the second movie just wanted vengeance and didn't care about anything else.

5) I didn't get the point of him destroying his whole entire Iron men army. How are they supposed to explain him wearing an Iron Man suit in the next Avengers and Iron Man movie? Tony says it was an effort to spend more time with the people he cares and that he was hiding behind his armor, you know points that were brought up in the last Iron Man movie. Also whatever happened to his alcohol addiction, I assume that just disappeared into the black hole known as the plot-hole.

6) Rhodey was reduced to cameo role, for a lack of a better term. They did no character development for him and had his suit hacked...again. Hey, if the previous people who upgraded your armor were crazy psychos, let's have another group do the same thing!

7) My last and biggest issue was how they treated two great actors. Sir Ben Kingsley and Don Cheadle deserved better than the garbage they gave them.

Well I'm done with my rant.

1. Mandarin was a fabricated terror threat that was used to pin the explosions from Extremis experimentation. Killian's plan from there was to control the US Presidency, as well as the greatest threat to national security to reap tons of money from his Extremis soldiers.
2. A lot did happen, but not quite at once. You falling asleep is going to be the reason for this sudden brush of confusion.
3. He had PTSD, that's it. He never had a battle with the bottle, in IM2 he was suffering from depression because he was dying, after that he got into stable relationship and was no-longer being poisoned by the tech in his chest.
4. The amount of jokes was a bit much. Justin Hammer filled the void that Tony Stark made when he stopped making weapons for the military. AIM was a think-tank working towards making super-soldiers. He was more or less a Peter Parker gone bad.
5. The host of suits represented his anxiety from Avengers, since he more or less built all during the nights he couldn't sleep. Him blowing them all up was a physical representation of him letting go and adjusting to a post Avengers world. The issue here, he's been suffering from the events of Avengers, spending his nights having nightmares of his trip through the portal or not sleeping at all - his relationship with Pepper was strained / the only thing keeping him going - this wasn't an issue in IM2. He never had an alcohol addiction, I have no idea why you're under this impression from IM2 - he was drinking after that too as I recall.
6. His role in this film wasn't a cameo, he was largely in it a number of times either talking with Tony, flying around in the Patriot suit - actually jumping out of it to tussle with Extremis opponents, getting into gun fights and rescuing the President. That is not what a cameo is.
7. What garbage is that?

It sounds like you slept through most of the movie and woke up very confused. This will fairly impact your opinion of any film. Although you might want to re-watch IM2 since you're sporting a fairly off opinion of it - as him somehow being an addict to alcohol.

@isaac_clarke:

1. Mandarin's role was unnecessary. It was utterly useless. It played no purpose to the story line at all. Why couldn't they make AIM an evil entity (like in the comics) and just have Killian's role within the Organization be secretive. It was an unnecessary addition, similarly to James Franco's role in the 3rd Spider-man.

2. Nothing exceptional happened at all. The only thing I fell asleep through was the boring Killian talk with Peppers about joining AIM.

3. He was drinking heavily in IM2 and was intoxicated to the point where Rhodey took the War Machine and left with it. Tony was always self-destructive, even before the poisoning incident. It just became more apparent since he's was going to die.

4. Killian was a boring villain. You want someone who's memorable, or at least has some cool accent/ personality. He brought nothing new to the table.

5. I understand the 'symbolic representation' of his armor, given that the movie pretty much forced it into people's face, not to mentions Tony's own monologue pretty much summed this up. It was uncalled for and frankly really unnecessary. He could have easily gone through his symbolic change without blowing up the very armor he needs. The fact that he would be sporting a new armor in the next Iron Man and Avengers pretty much slaps this concept right in the face.

6. He was reduced to a very limited role. His suit gets stolen (again) and he's reduced to Tony's sidekick. At least in the second one he was helping in the end and had a personality. In this one he ends up being used as a plot device and nothing more. No character development is done for Rhodey. The little kid from the town had more screen time than Rhodey did.

7. The entire movie. Ben Kingsley should have never been hired if his role was just to play an addicted actor living in playboy mansion. You hire great actors to act. It seems it was more for shock value, then actual acting purposes.

@extremis: You do realize SHIELD isn't a US organization right? There are other problems around the world they could be dealing with that we aren't aware of like Cap 2 or the SHIELD tv series. You also forget that majority of the movie takes place over 3 days and when the president was captured for only a few hours so even if SHIELD tried to free him, they wouldn't be able to get there in time.

all 4 of them? wow. that's not nice.

this thread is hilarious and i'm thoroughly enjoying watch you all bicker and/or complain like three year olds as though someone broke your favorite toy.

however, i wanted to put this argument into the perspective of my wife, who has never read a comic book in her life but absolutely loves the marvel films with iron man being her favorite character. she absolutely loved the film, considered it far superior to iron man 2, and loves the asberger-like characterization Downey portrays Tony. when i explained the mandarian to who after the film she bluntly stated "yeah, that wouldn't work in these films." shocking! a person with no comic book experience who never saw a superhero movie before iron man (she never saw the nolan batman trilogy, spider-mans, or anything else of the 21st century) understands the rules and concept of the marvel movie universe without even knowing the differences to it and the original canon.

why do i bring this up? its not to gain approval with my spouse (she teases me constantly about how much i talk about this stuff rather than just enjoying the movies and leaving it at that) but to highlight a major and growing fault i've grown concerned about in the comic book community. as our favorite characters become more and more liked by the common audience, like my wife, as a community we seem to be becoming angry at this and retreating behind canon to point out everything "wrong" with new interpretations (which is what these films are.....a completely new take on characters no different than any other Elseworld or What If...? study) because they are no longer just our characters. i for one can not be happier that i can enjoy these movies with my wife even if she's never going to read an issue of iron man. she gets excited for these films to come out as much as i do.......and that's awesome. that's what we should want. just as video game culture has exploded in the past 20 years, we should be encouraging the explosion of popularity for these characters.

at the end of the day this was a great film, with good humor (much better than im2 which i felt the cast really wasn't into the story), an honest take on the symptoms of PTSD (and no, the film never said PTSD but considering i work alongside men and women affected by it everyday I can tell you that's what was being shown and though I thought the ending breezed over it too quickly everything else shown was spot-on.....feel free to argue that point if you want), and great action sequences. Downey and Kingsley were spectacular, the underlying concept of corporate greed (which all three films focus on in some way) combined with real world ideas like focus groups (how many times in the news has the white house been criticized for not using the word terrorist.......so why are we surprised the film would bring up the idea of changing War Machine to Iron Patriot?.... come on, this isn't a hard concept to grasp) and sensationlist/media frenzy terrorism and I think the film hit all the right points.

if we can't just go and enjoy these movies than who is more at fault......the millions of people who never read a comic book and walked out of the theater pleased by the experience they had or the die-hard fans complaining about changes that are occuring to a fictional character in a completely different mediums and with a comp,etely different history than the comic book sour e?

1. Completely true ifyou ignore what I just said. AIM was the bad / evil -think-tank of the film. Why would Killian's position need to be a secret?
2. We're not talking exceptional, we're talking an assortment of events / happenings. So the talk that out-lined what Extremis was? That was for less than five minutes? His talk consisted of trying to get Stark on-board with AIM to perfect Extremis.
3. It was revealed within the first five minutes of the film he was being slowly poisoned and it was spreading at an exceptional rate - all as he put on a front dealing with it in the back-ground. It was the clear reason he was drinking as much as he was, the party was the closest Tony was going to get to demon in a bottle. Outside that he wasn't drinking compulsively at all prior.
4. Considering Stark's other villains where simply evil versions of him or at least aspects of him - he was a fresh change of pace for not going straight into another suit to fight Stark.
5. Considering the number of people that keep saying they don't get the armors being destroyed in 'clean-slate' the film didn't shove it enough in people's faces. Despite him more or less retreating into it like a cocoon earlier in the film when he had his first anxiety attack. He doesn't need any of those armors, the last three films shows he can produce the things in a couple of hours. THOSE armors specifically were made during those sleepless nights, the symbolism ends with them being destroyed and the transformation he undergoes, the removal of the arc-reactor and shrapnel are out of his chest - him crafting a new armor by the next film isn't going to change anything or slap any concepts in the face.
6. He was sporting the same role he had in the three other films, a recurring character that helps Tony Stark - the only difference isn't a samurai jack ish final fight with drones. He hasn't gotten any significant development in any of the other films, all that can be argued is his full acceptance of his current role as War Machine. Not remotely what is called a cameo.
7. Well if you think the film is garbage there isn't much point to continuing this. This was probably one of the best Ben Kingsley movies since Hugo and Don has more or less come out of this film fully accepting his role as war-machine.

When in doubt, hate - hate till the sun comes up or goes down. Even if it doesn't make any sense.

M-MY NAME IS TREVOR...

Bullcrap, but still hilariously funny. I'm not a huge Mandarin fan so it didn't bother me that much.

I don't see a Batman Begins connection. The Ra's al Ghul revelation was awesome. This... was not. Though I do see a similarity between this and TDKR.

My biggest problem with the movie is more that he didn't get the Extremis upgrade, but eh.

@jedixman said:

He perfected it in Pepper and used it to remove the reactor in his chest as-well as the shrapnel. It be a little silly if Pepper ended up the only character with Extremis and not Tony.

I thought the movie was quite average.

Did he? To what extent, though? I wanted to see greater technopathy and overall enhancements, which Tony had after he got Extremis.

Maybe that's what happened, but they didn't really make it clear that Tony got the shot.

1. You didn't say anything reasonable. Mandarin was a scapegoat for an organization that no one knew was evil to begin with. The whole entire concept was crap. AIM could have easily been a organization of scientists who happened to have questionable morals and illegal business. They could have mirrored it after some organizations in real life and how they operate (fronts, mafia companies, etc.).

2. If an event is not exceptionally important to the plot, then it's pretty useless no? You accuse me of having been confused by a non-existent plot. I was merely pointing there was no plot to be confused by.

3. Tony always drinks. Hell, they made a joke about it in Iron Man 3.

4. Villains are meant to be foils to their heroes. That is the whole point of a villain to begin with. Killian did nothing to enhance Stark's character or represent some dark side within Stark. He gave Pepper powers for 5 minutes and that was pretty much it.

5. The armors were there for no other purpose then to get the the comic book fans excited. Given that they didn't appear until like the last 5 minutes of the film, their significance to the plot was non-existent.

6. So you're trying to argue that since Rhode's got no love in the other two films, he shouldn't get any love in this one either? In the first movie he played supporting role, in the second one he represents what would happen when the armor became a weapon for the government. In the third one they gave him an unnecessary paint job and had his armor taken from him, again. The armor itself had more screen time than Don Cheadle did.

7. If you really think it was one of Ben Kingsley's best roles in recent mind then there is truly no point in discussing this anymore. His 4 minute promo for Prada used his acting better than his role in this. His acting was good in this movie, but the use of his character was disappointing to say the least.

You can sit here and praise the movie, but my criticisms are not unfounded. It did not find universal acclaim by any critics and many people didn't like it. The movie had no plot and no character development. It was as hollow as the armor Tony used in the movie. Tony's character development was reduced to witty remarks and hanging out with a kid in a town. His supposed relationship problem with Pepper was instantly solved in the end without any issues. Killian was a terrible villain because he had no real motive at all. The extra armors were unnecessary and blowing them up in the end just proves the insignificance of them to the plot.

Where did it say that Pepper and Tony kept Extremis. I pretty sure they were removing it from her in the end. Also what is the point in having the surgery if Tony had extremis. He would just shit the shrapnels out from his chest with his healing factor. There is no evidence that he gained extremis in the end.

Why can't someone just make a comicbook related movie that actually follows the general idea of what the comic book has built up throughout the years..... Ugh the non-comic fans wouldn't know the difference, but the ones that go to the movies that are actual fans, always get burned and forced into a fit of nerd rage :)

didnt hate it didnt love it. nice paint job and sounds better than IRON RWANDAN i suppose :/

Simple. Killian and the Extremis'd up soldiers were the only ones truly aware of the deception. It makes sense considering the Extremis soldiers are more likely to be extremely loyal to Killian. Now why would Killian continue to address him as The Master? To make sure the act was believable not only to the audience watching the videos but to the random crew that is on the scene. If one of the hired thugs for some reason gets caught and reveals that the Mandarin isn't a real person and just a character made by Killian, this gives any authority the idea that they should focus on AIM. But if they continued to believe that the Mandarin was the real deal even with the knowledge of Killian's affiliation there would still be that fear that would make people more afraid of confronting this terrorists "friends" and not to forget that resources to get a big business shut down and the time it will take in court would be create the belief that the Mandarin will be able to retaliate.

At the same time Killian could be creating a backdoor of sorts, a scapegoat. That should his involvement with the "Mandarin" is found out he can just kill him and claim that he convinced the terrorist that AIM will support him so that he can get close to kill the man. This gives him this status of being a hero despite involvement especially if many would still believe that the Mandarin is the real deal.

the movie was Amazing! I just watched it, it was like Batman Begins, The Dark Knight Rises, and Kick-Ass put together! it was AWESOME! and the thing with pepper was AWESOME!

Iron Man 3 was Pretty Good... but I hated the whole Dark Knight Rises with Tony Stark and Pepper theme at the end but whatever... they really messed up on The Mandarin... I mean what the fack was they thinking turning one of Iron Man's best villains into a Joke in this film ? Ugh, Ben Kingsley talent wasted...

To whatever extent they establish in the subsequent appearance by Tony. Technopathy might be a stretch, although it seems like he was already tinkering with it in this film. I'm just not sure what else would have allowed him to recover so quickly after removing that reactor in his chest.

1. Plot point - the point of the Mandarin was for AIM to remain anonymous despite their test subjects going boom. He was their cover and since when has AIM not been a group of scientists with questionable morals and illegal business practices?
2. You need to make a choice. Either there are "too many things are happening at once" or "nothing is happening at all" - you can't argue both.
3. The issue is he isn't drinking compulsively and therefore isn't an alcoholic. The closest to demon in a bottle the character got was while he was dying.
4. The devil are you talking about? Every Iron Man villain thus far has more or less been a dark aspect of Tony Stark or the industry he represented. Trying to pretend Killian isn't a corrupted version of Stark when you have a well dressed, charismatic, billionaire in the same industry of war happily pushing his own agenda to reap profits. Case and point, Jericho Missile scene.
5. Your entire perception of time is completely off. The suits fighting predominately made up the action for the last 15-20 minutes of the film at least - arguing five minutes is simply ridiculous. And why would only comic-fans find a slew of Iron Men going into battle exiting?
6. No I'm making a clear observation that Rhodes hasn't been sporting in a significant role outside support for Tony in the last two films. Complaining about how War Machine doesn't get enough screen time to fit your fancy in an IRON MAN movie seems a bit on the silly side. No the armor did not have more screen time than Don - this is more you pulling things out of the air to complain about.
7. You're complaints are directed at the usage of Kingsley and how it doesn't fit what you wanted IM3 to use him. It wasn't an observation of the writing behind his character or his actual acting portion of the role - just you don't like how he was used. That's where this conversation entirely pointless for me because I don't care.

When you're complaining about the lack of a demon in a bottle follow-up despite that aspect of Tony being shelved in the previous film or how Rhodes is making a cameo role - I have to disagree - a lot of your complaints simply aren't in the realm of what actually happened in the film or it's previous iterations. The entire film consists of Tony Stark literally the embodiment of the Marvel cinematic universe moving into phase 2 - accepting the events of Avengers - that expansion of said universe and moving forward; trying to play off this film as having no character development when it's entirely a character driven story focused around Stark that ends with him growing as a character seems ridiculous.

The child represented a younger Tony Stark. Clean-Slate was Tony making the effort to move past Avengers and fix his relationship with Pepper by quite literally smashing his anxiety - which was physically embodied in those suits he built while he couldn't sleep. Killian's motives were to gain an administration that wouldn't oppose his efforts with extremis (the current one was mentioned while talking to Pepper at the start of the film as impeding his efforts) and control the visage of terrorism - and reap the rewards of having both in his pocket - that is a very ESTABLISHED motive since he says it right in the film. He blew them up because they are the direct embodiment of his issue, that damage that was impeding him from moving forward - it's the most obvious bit of symbolism in the movie.

Next:

It was made evidence by the attempts of Killian that Stark was the only one that could perfect Extremis. Stark himself acknowledges this when he tells Pepper at the end of the film how he almost had it right twenty years ago while drunk. Later in his narration he mentioned how he does fix Pepper and mentions - why stop there? The lack of months of physical therapy, recuperation at the hospital or a gaping hole in his chest as he gives his shrapnel necklace to pepper or tosses his reactor into the ocean seems to imply something helped with that healing process.

The shrapnel was already established as being incredibly close to his heart - I'm not sure how a healing factor would not have just had it plunge into his heart from all directions. With absolutely no downside to extremis I wouldn't have a clue why he wouldn't take it himself or have Pepper keep the upgrade to keep her safe.