Iron Man 2 - a chip off an old concrete block [REVIEW]

The film also lacks urgency. The world seems to turn against Stark after a public altercation with Vanko in Monte Carlo, but the gravity of the situation never quite registers. Escalation, a thread that "The Dark Knight" captured rather well, is almost nonexistent. Stark's drunken antics during his birthday would be more interesting had he been unable to perform his duties as Iron Man, and something truly terrible, like a major catastrophe, actually took place. As it is, the whole second act with Stark's pity party of one lacks any depth, making his subsequent quest for redemption pointless.

SHOOT: Excellent review this by Roger Ebert. Rather go and watch Robin Hood [Ebert pissed on that movie too, but never mind. I give Iron Man 2 a 7/10 and Robin Hood a 8.5/10.

clipped from blogs.suntimes.com "Iron Man 2" never questions how Stark deals with his lack of anonymity and the restructuring of his defence company with his responsibilities as Iron Man. But, more importantly, the real missed opportunity is how Stark could reconcile Iron Man the weapon and Tony Stark the peacenik, and that's a pity. That's not the only plot point that floats aimlessly, like Stark's daddy issues or the extended cameos from Sam Jackson and Clark Gregg ("Hey Kids, Did you know that there is an Avengers movie coming up? Here's Captain America's shield, wink, wink"). Even a delicious scene between the two main villains, Mickey Rourke's leathery physicist Ivan Vanko and Sam Rockwell's clueless arms-dealer Justin Hammer, where the former keeps repeating that he "vants his burd," seems to be a remnant from an earlier draft, with a potential pay-off where Vanko would kill Hammer, and make a quip along the lines of "I said I vanted my burd."