And there it was,the movie began.The film had a short prologue with images of Tony's suits blowing up accompanied by Tony's narration.After that,the Marvel and Paramount logo popped up accompanied by Eiffel 65's ever famous song "Blue",telling us that the opening scene is a flashback set in Bern,Switzerland in the year of 1999 (which is also the year the song was released).There,we get introduced to Maya Hansen,the inventor and developer of Extremis,an experimental regenarative treatment intended to to allow recovery from crippling injuries.We also get introduced to Aldrich Killian,a disabled scientist who offers Tony Stark a place in Killian's company,Advanced Idea Mechanics.Tony turns the offer down,leaving Killian upset and humiliated.After that,we are brought to the present day which shows us Tony having anxiety attacks after what happened to him during the alien attack in New York.Restless,he has built dozens of Iron Man suits to defend himself and his loved ones.Then,a series of bombings occur led by the terrorist The Mandarin leaving forensic scientists crippled with lack of evidence.When another bombing occurs,Stark Industries' chief of security,Happy Hogan is left injured and hospitalized leading Tony into making a televised threat to The Mandarin.Upon the time The Mandarin gets news about Tony's threat,he responds by blowing up Tony's Malibu Mansion with helicopter gunships.Maya came to warn Tony and survives the blast together with Pepper.Tony is believed to be dead after said incident.Meanwhile,Tony escapes with his Iron Man suit but crash lands 10 miles out of Tennessee,where his suit gets dented,cranked,and yes,destroyed.He wasn't able to return back to California due to his armor's insufficient power .In that town,he teams up with Harley,a 10-year old boy.Then,he investigates a previous bombing case once again led by The Mandarin,which is very similar to the bombing that injured Happy Hogan.There,he discovers that the bombings weren't really triggered by bombs,but instead,he finds out that they were triggered by a soldiers subjected by Extremis,which at the stage of this experiment,can cause the subjects to explosively reject it from their body.After the subjects exploded,their deaths were used to cover up Extremis' flaws by doing a terrorist scheme.Tony witnesses Extremis when Mandarin's agents Ellen Brandt and Eric Savin attack him.With Harley's help,Stark arrives in Miami to infiltrate Mandarin's headquarters using simple,improvised weapons.In that HQ,Tony discovers that Mandarin isn't actually a terrorist,but instead,a sleazy drunken British actor named Trevor Slattery hired by Killian to cover up for the Extremis' soldiers' deaths to be told that those bombings were made by Mandarin and not by the rejected Extremis soldiers.Stark gets captured by Killian and it is revealed that he is the real Mandarin and has kidnapped Pepper and subjected her to Extremis to gain Stark's help and fix Extremis' flaws and thereby saving Pepper.Hansen has a change of heart,but Killian kills her.Killian has gained control of Rhodes' suit,The Iron Patriot and is on board the President's plane,Air Force One intending to abduct the President.Remotely controlling his Iron Man armor,Tony saves some surviving passengers but cannot save President Ellis from Killian's abduction.Tony and Rhodes trace Killian to an impounded damaged oil tanker where Killian intends to kill Ellis on live television.The Vice President will become a puppet leader,who will follow Killian's each and every one of Killian's orders in exchange for Extremis to cure his daughter's disability.Stark goes to save Pepper and Rhodes saves the president.Stark summons all of his Iron Man suits,remotely controlled by JARVIS to provide air support.Rhodes takes the President to safety,while Tony discovers that Pepper has survived the Extremis subjection.But before he can save her,a rig collapses around them and she falls to her apparent death.Stark faces Killian and entraps him in one of his Iron Man suits that self-destructs,but fails to kill him.We later figure out that Potts has survived the fall and kills Killian with her Extremis powers.After the big showdown,Tony orders JARVIS to "clean the slate",meaning to destroy every Iron Man suit of his to devote his attention to Potts.The Vice President and Trevor are arrested.With Stark's aid,he destabilizes Extremis' effects on Pepper and Tony undergoes a surgical procedure to remove the shrapnels near his heart.He throws his chest arc reactor in the ocean,promising he will always be Iron Man.
The plot was okay for me,and i liked the fact that they were experimenting to take the dark route.Turns out,the film wasn't dark at all unlike the trailer promised.It was actually still cheesy due to the heavy action which is really necessary for a Marvel film.But i had conflicts with the plot.Firstly,i was a little annoyed with the fact that the plot-line was similar to The Dark Knight Rises on so many levels.From the theme to the plot twist.But not the villain.Speaking of plot twist,that's one of the things i hated in the plot.The twist was just not surprising,but instead really depressing and might piss you off.Even the ending was similar to TDKR's.Anyway,the acting here is good.RDJ as typical 'ol Tony Stark added with anxiety attacks.RDJ's performance here wasn't his best.Somehow,i still liked his performance in Iron Man 2 better.Guy Pearce's performance was good,but i was annoyed with him.Gwyneth Paltrow's perf. here was awesome,her dialogues were good.Don Cheadle's performance was a little similar to his' in Iron Man 2.Ben Kingsley would be really epic as the "real" Mandarin,but turns out,he isn't.I really hated the twist,but i was relieved to see Ben Kingsley as Trevor Slattery instead.But i would still love him more if he really was The Mandarin all the time,blabbering great epic words complete with villainous pauses.The score here is handled not by Ramin Djawadi nor John Debney,but instead we get Brian Tyler,the dude who scored Fast Five and other films.His scoring was good,but not great as Ramin Djawadi's on Iron Man and John Debney's on Iron Man 2.But i loved the score made by him when it was played in the end credits.It was just so comical,funky and it seems like it's the type of music placed on superhero cartoons.The visuals in here are the best.Really.The explosive climax outdid the drone battle in Iron Man 2's climax.And the Air Force One rescue was breath-taking.Too bad i didn't see it in 3D.If you're a comic book geek,you would definitely love the comic-book style end credits complete with clips from the Iron Man trilogy.Shane Black on taking the director's chair was a nice change,for he tried to experiment Iron Man 3 with dark tones underlying.But turns out,didn't work so well.Jon Favreau would still be a better director for Iron Man 3 than Shane Black.No offense.That's really just my opinion.I just really hated the plot twist so much that made this film disappointing.The trailer was misleading and deceiving.The film's tone isn't t dark at all.It was just trying to be a political-thriller.Overall,Iron Man 3 really made efforts to outdo the first film in so many ways,but still,it failed to do so.Though i appreciate Shane Black's direction on this.But for me,Iron Man 1 is still the best for it's freshness and simplicity even without all the heavy action scenes.
Iron Man 3 gets 7.5 over 10 stars.The third outing outdid the last but not the first.The first is still the best in my opinion.
*Iron Man 3 is still showing in local theaters nationwide*
*For more Iron Man action,check out Iron Man 1 & 2 on DVD and Blu-Ray distributed by Magnavision Home Video*
*Love the post-credits scene BTW,though i forgot to mention that*
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