Iron Man 3 (2013)

“My armor was never a distraction or a hobby, it was a cocoon, and now I'm a changed man. You can take away my house, all my tricks and toys, but one thing you can't take away - I am Iron Man.”

            Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) reflects on where his life is presently at. To look at where his life is now Tony looks back to a time thirteen years previous when he was in Bern, Switzerland for New Years Eve. At the time he was Tony Stark the billionaire playboy without a care in the world with a girl on his arm to take back to her room for the night. On the way up to the girl’s room he is stopped by a crippled messing looking man named Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce). Aldrich is a scientist and wants to work with Tony on a project. Tony is just thinking how he is getting lucky that night with the girl Maya he is with and in a very dick move he tells Aldrich to meet him on the roof in five minutes with no intention of going up.

            In her room, Maya tries to explain to Tony how she is working on limb and tissue regeneration (*at least that is what I think it is*). Tony listens for a little bit and then leads Maya right to the bed as she is trying to explain that the process still has some things to be worked out. Almost as soon as she says that her plant she is testing her experiment on blows up in one small part.

            Back in the present Tony is having a hard time dealing with his experience fighting off an alien attack in New York as part of the Avengers. He is having trouble sleeping and functioning normally. Tony gets a call from Happy (Jon Favreau) that there is a man in the office who has come to speak to Pepper about one of his inventions. Happy is not technologically savvy so he cannot get the man on camera but Tony is not worried. The man speaking to Pepper is a totally new and majorly improved Aldrich Killian. Aldrich created new technology that can project the brain and its thoughts into the air much like Tony can do with his machines and the computer. 

            A new villain comes up in the form of a man called The Mandarin (Ben Kingsley). He has high jacked American TV feeds and threatened to blow buildings or anything relating to Asian culture in America. Happy has followed security guards from Aldrich’s team to Grauman’s Chinese Theater. Unfortunately that is one of the sites that The Mandarin has chosen to target. Happy is injured but the one guard walks out of the rubble looking like he is caught on fire and all his limbs and other injuries heal instantly. Tony takes this attack personally because of Happy. To the news and to the world he gives The Mandarin his address and tells the criminal to come and get him instead of other people.

            Well needless to say that Tony is attacked. His house is blown to pieces and Pepper has been kidnapped. Before all the chaos he had set Jarvis to send him to Tennessee to check out a story. Jarvis takes Tony to Tennessee. The suit is ten kinds of messed up and needs to be fixed. He sets up shop in the garage of a home where a little boy lives. Through the boy and some of the locals he finds out about the story he was seeking. A building was blown up by a man and five other people were killed. The five that were killed their outlines are on the walls. Tony notices this and figures out the supposed killer walked away he did not blow up. Some further digging and he finds Aldrich’s experiment with Maya’s technology that she had been experimenting with. The tests did not work because all the people ran hot and blew up.

            The Mandarin makes another broadcast. The government thinks they have an exact location in the Middle East so they send James Rhodes (Don Cheadle) who has become known as the Iron Patriot since he stole one of Tony’s Iron Man suits. The location is false. Tony is able to track the real location down to a mansion in Florida. He finds the man calling himself The Mandarin is not really who he claims to be and the real Mandarin is more deadly and hell bent on getting back at Tony and Iron Man.

            I liked Iron Man 3 more than Iron Man 2 even the first Iron Man. I liked the trickery of The Mandarin as a dummy for someone else and their agenda. I felt there was more of a story here and also that Tony was not as much of an ass like he was really focused on other people instead of himself. I guess working the Avengers pulled his head out of his ass. Since the story was good I did not mind that the length it felt like it did not drag like the other two. I have to throw this out there that Guy Pearce makes an incredibly hot and awesome villain. I have had a thing for Pearce for about twelve years ever since I first watched him in Memento. Anyway, Iron Man 3 is my favorite out of the Iron Man trilogy. It is the only one of them that I would not mind watching again.  

            Bonus: The Marvel One- Shot: Agent Carter is an extra feature on the Iron Man 3 Blu Ray/DVD. If you are insane and are not convinced of how incredible the character of Agent Peggy Carter and how fucking amazing Hayley Atwell is as the character you need to watch this One Shot. The woman (and I am talking about both character and actress here) is badest of all bad asses. She is the HBIC. If you are already an Agent Carter fan and have not seen this you will be drooling over Peggy/Hayley and jumping out of your seat in excitement. (You can watch the One-Shot here)

            This has been your daily Agent Carter PSA… now go watch the damn show!