The Iron Man films might be my fourth favorite superhero franchise, behind Nolan's revision of Batman, the X-Men series, and the Spiderman trilogy. I enjoyed Iron Man 2 for three reasons: the strong cast, the special effects, and Robert Downey Jr. Reprising his role as Tony Stark, Downey uses his natural wittiness to maximum effect. At times though, he just comes across as a pompous asshole. His nonchalant approach to acting is entertaining to watch and makes me think he's just being himself in the roles he chooses. That being said, there's a lot of flaws and clichés in this film. Unfortunately, with these big budget blockbusters, the studio puts too many constraints on the director. Too much time is allocated to action scenes and there's way too many characters for the audience to have to care about. As with the latest Batman movies, an important supporting character had to be replaced by a similar and more talented actor than the first installment. I really hate when that happens!

Iron Man 2's cast is the best I've seen in a superhero movie. Aside from Downey, the rest of thecast includes: Mickey Rourke, Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson, Don Cheadle, Sam Rockwell, and Samuel L. Jackson. Since none of them get enough screen-time and are given nothing to really work with here,their talents go to waste. The plot is basically just more of the same from the first. Instead of showing how Tony Stark becomes Iron Man, we now get to see how he maintains being Iron Man. Gwyneth Paltrow returns to her role of Stark's primary love interest and Scarlett Johansson plays Stark's new personal assistant. It's a shame that Scarlett is only in this movie for her sex appeal. She deserves more screen-time and a better script to work with. The two most fascinating characters are the antagonists played by Mickey Rourke and Sam Rockwell. Rourke plays a crazed Russian hellbent on revenge against Stark. He's a very intimidating and interesting character. Too bad the only things we know about him is that he has a genuine love for his father and pet bird. Rockwell, playing Stark's rival Justin Hammer, is very entertaining to watch. He has perfected the art of being a douche and the results are quite convincing.

Recently, one of my favorite actors has been Don Cheadle. He replaces actor Terrence Howard as Stark's best friend, Lt. Colonel James Rhodes. This role is so meaningless that they could have found any African-American actor to play it. As with all big-budget films, a recognizable face is all that matters. For Iron Man 2, they just happened to get the popular actors who actually do have talent. That brings me to Nick Fury, played by Samuel L. Jackson. Why is he in this movie? The answer comes in 2012, in the form of another big-budget superhero movie titled "The Avengers." Iron Man 2 is merely the platform for introducing another huge blockbuster to the masses. These Hollywood producers and executives are smart. They don't care about bringing down the quality of one film in order to create awareness for the next. Iron Man 2 will rake in tons of money regardless of how convoluted the story becomes. More time should have been devoted toward the central plot instead of wandering off into subplots. This film would have been stronger without the additions of Scarlett's and Sam's characters. The overkill doesn't go unnoticed by everyone.

I thought the first half of Iron Man 2 picked up where the first one left off. The second half got a little sloppy. The end battle scene was anticlimactic and somewhat of a letdown. It's almost like the writer ran out of ideas and settled for a disappointingly lazy climax. The first confrontation was more exciting than the last. Don't get me started on how laughable a certain (over-choreographed) fight scene is near the end of the film. It's unbelievably unconvincing and feels like it was just thrown in there to let it be known that this certain character is a bad-ass.

Even with all of the negatives involved with Iron Man 2, the pros still outweigh the cons. This is a solid popcorn film that aims to entertain. The stingy film critics who don't recommend Iron Man 2 would be lying if they said there's nothing to enjoy here. It's entertaining the whole way through and provides a few laughs. The talented lead actor and director, Jon Favreau, understand that Iron Man is much more engaging without his mask on. For fun and entertainment, Iron Man is your superhero.