Iron Man 2: Critic Reviews

It's a shame that Marvel saddled Iron Man 2 with the baggage of other films.

Downey's head and heart are in the right place, but the movie is more in pieces than whole, and more about iron than about men.

You're left wanting more, but not quite the "more" Iron Man 2 works so hard to supply.

Twitchy, talky, muscly Robert Downey Jr strengthens his grip on the role that made him a player in this spectacularly efficient and efficiently spectacular sequel to Iron Man.

The action sequences are fun, though not as exhilarating as in the 2008 original, and the dialogue can be zingy.

Often playing like it has been jury-rigged from bits and pieces of a longer, smarter movie, Iron Man 2 seems chiefly intended as a placeholder for its next dozen or so sequels.

The general excellence of the casting trumps the inarguable excellence of the technology.

This sequel to the 2008 mega-blockbuster fires on more cylinders than the first film, yet relies on star Robert Downey Jr. more than it does kinetic energy and rock 'em-sock 'em technology (which it has in spades).

This sequel, alas, settles for old elements in a new alloy -- less iron, lots more lead and tin.

Not better but pretty good nonetheless.

Superhero Stark remains intriguing.

While the title is "Iron Man 2," what we're being given is "Iron Man Squared." There's too much going on, and all the characters and plots and revelations and foreshadowings do not fill the film but bloat it.

It doesn't come close to the emotional heft of those two rare 2s that outclassed their ones: Superman 2 and Spider-Man 2. But Iron Man 2 hums along quite nicely.

To find a comic-book hero who doesn't agonize over his supergifts, and would defend his constitutional right to get a kick out of them, is frankly a relief.

Iron Man 2 is a polished, high-ozone sequel, not as good as the original but building once again on a quirky performance by Robert Downey Jr.

What saves it is Favreau's work with the cast.

The movie settles into a series of ho-hum conflicts and complications, and the requisite slam-bang ending is perfunctory at best.

Favreau's a workmanlike filmmaker who gets virtuoso performances from his leads, particularly Paltrow and Cheadle, but most of all Downey.

This cluttered, awkward blockbuster is held together by safety pins and movie-star charisma.

There are too many new characters, too many crossing story lines, not enough romance and our hero's a smug jerk for the first half hour. Who cares? Iron Man 2 still rocks.

Bigger, louder and dumber than its predecessor, Iron Man 2 is still a lot of fun.

It is all very-very-very entertaining.

Iron Man 2 isn't as much fun as its predecessor, but by the time the smoke clears, it'll do.

There's so much clunky exposition in the script attributed to Justin Theroux that it seems forever before the first action sequence, which has surprisingly mediocre special effects.

If the morality, the pathos of death, the tenderness of the would-be romance between Tony Stark/Iron Man and his assistant, Pepper Potts, are missing, Iron Man 2 is still a fun ride.