One Man Reviews Iron Man 3

In honor of the New York City Comicon your ever humble narrator, Lord of Lords and sower of the precious seeds of House Barbados across the faces of many of your girlfriend's upthrust bosoms, Dane Barbados Jr. himself has decided to finally watch the much maligned Iron Man 3.

Despite making a legion of comic book fanboys viciously angry over the treatment of the Mandarin, which we shall come to, Dane Barbados Jr. found this film to be an enjoyable romp from nearly start to finish.  Iron Man 3 is a much more focused and directed character piece, as helmed by director Shane Black, having less spectacle and more introspection, shining a light on Robert Downey Jr's Tony Stark and his issues following the Battle of New York as depicted in "The Avengers", feeling like it had less hands involved in shaping the film.

As always, Robert Downey Jr. completely embodied Tony Stark still being a brash and charismatic jerk while still displaying character growth over the character displayed in the previous two Iron Man films as well as the Avengers, crumpling into panic attacks at the mere mention of New York or wormholes, burying himself in his work, churning out hastily constructed armors (from Mark VII in the Avengers to Mark 42 at the start of IM3).  Despite his personal difficulties Stark is still able to snark with the best of them, delivering one-liners and retorts with wild abandon.

Gwyneth Paltrow sleepwalks hazily through her role as she is want to do in almost any role she appears in but the character of Pepper Potts has much more to do in this film, managing to handily escape the bounds of a mere damsel in distress.  Jon Favreau, though in the film less than in the past iterations still retains his innate likability.  It may have something to do with him apparently packing on an additional 15-20 pounds between films.  Fat people generally have an air of jollyness Dane Barbados Jr. has found.  Don Cheadle as Jim Rhodes, the newly christened "Iron Patriot," effortlessly dispels all memory of that role's former occupant, making it all his own, dishing out believable action moments and comedy in equal measure.  Guy Pierce is also surprisingly believable both as the broken and nerdy Aldrich Killian and the suave, fit and confident businessman he becomes, still showing the vulnerability of who he was before and possessing none of the more cartoon like qualities of Iron Man 2's Ezekiel Stane.  And then there's Ben Kingsley.

Iron Man 3 also has the distinction of being a comic book movie released this year that is not afraid to show color, humor and heart, all three elements on display front and center, shown most heavily in a section of the middle of the film with an armorless Tony Stark befriending a young boy (Ty Simpkins) who puts in a rare non-annoying performance, somehow able to make a a child on film somewhat endearing.  

And then, we have the Mandarin, the focal point of the rage of a million virgin nerds.  In the realm of comics the Mandarin has over the years emerged as one of Tony Stark's oldest and most dangerous villains, a Fu Manchu-like yellow peril villain possessed of ten magic rings created by aliens shaped like giant, wingless, dragons wearing purple short pants.  How, exactly, was this expected to be translated in modern film?  A modern film with substantial Chinese financial backing no less?  An impossibility declares Dane Barbados Jr.

What we have instead is an ambiguously brown terrorist leader with an american southern accent and a Chinese name capturing and utilizing the tricks of media and theatre to deliver his message of terror to the United States.  Except we didn't have that at all.  We had a loopy, drug addled, British actor portraying the character of the Mandarin, delivered in a wildly hilarious performance by the aforementioned Kingley, acting as a front for the true mastermind, Aldrich Killian.

All of this was brilliantly foreshadowed throughout the film.  In the introductory scenes we are told that Killian is helming a new start-up scientific think-tank called Advance Idea Mechanics, or AIM, a long standing villainous faction from the books and a clear tip off to readers of the comics.  Astute eyed viewers will see Killian sporting a multitude of rings, foreshadowing him as the true leader of the Mandarin's Ten Rings organization.  It is in the climax where we are told, by Killian himself, that he is the true Mandarin, a fact illustrated (literally) by the tattoos of dragons that look suspiciously similar to the creators of the comic Mandarin's rings adorning his chest to cement that yes comics fans your Mandarin is here.  A shady and sophisticated businessman who prefers to operate from the shadows, just like the most current incarnation of the character in the book.  Kinglsey, as the "the Mandarin," himself sums it up in one of his terror videos, citing the fortune cookie as not Chinese, but an American invention, hollow and full of lies, much like himself.

Past that the film is loaded with allusions and shout outs to the books, from as obvious as the inclusion of the Iron Patriot armor from Marvel's Civil War event and aftermath to as subtle as a scene near the end where Stark transfers from armor to armor moving from the Silver Centurion suit, to the classic red and gold to a  charcoal colored suit reminiscent of the War Machine armor, giving a tribute in minutes to decades of Stark's armor progression.  The film also picks elements from several notable stories in the book including Warren Ellis' "Extremis" arc as well as Matt Fraction's recent "The Five Nightmares" arc.

All in all, gentle reader, Dane Barbados Jr. can offer a sincere recommendation of Iron Man 3.  It isn't perfect, as nothing is but the finely chiseled form of Dane Barbados Jr., but it does contain solid acting, directing and cinematography.  Plenty of laughs and a surplus of exciting action.  It stands to reason that anyone seeing an Iron Man film would be a fan of the armors and if so the climactic battle is truly a rollicking good time.

In conclusion: there's a reason why so many of your comics nerds have never been face to proverbial face with the beauty that is the female genitalia.  If they have as unrealistic expectations for the opposite gender as they do films then they shall ever remain encased in the crusty tube sock that is their own virginity.

Post Scriptus:  There are spoilers.  I suppose I could have mentioned that at the start.  I just didn't care.

One Man Reviews Pacific Rim

"It is a beautiful poem to giant monsters and robots" -Gullermo Del Toro

Good day faithful reader, your liege lord and perennial better Dane Barbados Jr. arrives on the scene to tell you that Gullermo Del Toro's Pacific Rim does not contain a single original moment.  Your ever humble and ever superior narrator correctly surmised every, single, plot-point within the first 10 minutes.  Dane Barbados Jr. is also here to tell you that the previously mentioned points matter as little as your opinions to me, as my lessers, because Pacific Rim is an absolute fucking blast from start to finish.

Pacific Rim is a perfect summer action blockbuster.  A stylish love letter to anime, the closest thing to a successful live action anime that this author has seen, and considering that this author has seen everything that matters, that is truly quite the feat.  It really does say something about the abject stupidity of the American movie-going populace that Michael Bay's Transformers films were rousing successes while Pacific Rim languished domestically and didn't come alive until the foreign box office receipts hit.  

And truly, "Pacific Rim" is the antithesis of "Transformers" with Del Toro effortlessly and casually illustrating, by way of comparison, why he is a master of near-Barbadian calibre and Bay is a typical hack.  "Pacific Rim" has no wasted moments, every single scene is in the service of entertaining its audience and moving forward the action.  There are no scenes of robots wise-cracking, no robots humping a female's leg, we do not spend 40 minutes with a selfish loser or 30 minutes with parents and pot brownies, there are no middle-aged men in thongs, there are stereotypes but no racism, no shoe-horned in romantic arc, there are no scenes of a vapid, meth addict looking whore grinding suggestively against a motorcycle.  In fact, "Pacific Rim" actually excels in it's depiction and treatment of women in general.  There is absolutely no pandering to the crass, uncivilized, lowest common denominator that comprises the majority of you mouth breathing simpletons.

Every held breath is warranted, every laugh is earned, the awe that the audience feels is genuine in this film.  The plot, such as it is, is basic, well worn and tried and true; giant monsters (dubbed "Kaiju") emerge without warning from the waters of the Pacific Ocean to wreak havoc.  We, in turn, construct Jaegers, equally giant robots, with a staggering range of names that exude pure badassness and function on a unique two-pilot, mind-sharing system, to fight them.  Over the years the Kaiju get bigger and stronger, adapting more capable tactics and overwhelming the Jaegers leading to a final, desperate, push to close off the breach on the ocean floor that births them into our world.  That's the gist of it, glossing over some of the more detailed plot points.

And it is a testament to Del Toro and his team's skill how little of this is explicitly said.  We aren't told that the Kaiju are getting smarter and the upgrades in their tactics aren't directly pointed out every scene.  Perhaps an overestimation on his part but Del Toro elevates the intelligence of what could be a purely mindless action flick by allowing the audience to inherently realize what's going on when we see Kaiju begin to specifically target cockpits and reactors, when they evolve attacks that directly target the electrical systems of the Jaegers, or gain the ability to fly and excrete powerful acid when faced with a seemingly insurmountable wall.  It is all on the screen.

The fight scenes are an orgy of movement impact.  Del Toro forgoed utilizing motion capture technology to animate the Jaegers as he felt that human movements would not scale up realistically to that size.  It proved to be a wise choice as the Jaegers and Kaiju have a heft about their movement that lends a stunning sense of weight to each punch thrown.  One can feel the hits, throws and tanker ships used as baseball bats as they connect.  The figures on screen do not come off as animated creations as much as real presences which is quite the feat.  In addition the action is framed in such as way where one can actually see what the fuck is transpiring on the screen with no quick cuts, no Wayne's Worldian zooms, epitomizing the excessively poor fight choreography that's come out of Hollywood for the last decade.  Dane Barbados Jr. did not have a 81-inch curved Ultra HD OLED installed into the wall of his palatial penthouse to look at a mess of thrashing pixels that are supposed to be two robots fighting or count the sickly ribs in Megan Fox's sides and the pockmarks on her cigarette smoke saturated face.

And, to Dane Barbados, perhaps the greatest visual feast for the eyes is the amount of glorious, saturated, cartoon-like, color on display.  So many movies have gone the way of the Nolan-helmed Batman movies or Zak Snyder's Man Of Steel which sap all color and life making films nearly monochrome and as lifeless as Megan Fox looks like she would be in bed.  There is more color in Pacific Rim, a film that takes place almost entirely at night and in the rain, than in most of this year's non-animated blockbusters combined.

Then, we come to the cast.  If you are a fan of character actors then this is the film for you with a veritable who's who of the greats:  Charlie Hunnam (Sons of Anarchy, near unrecognizable without the beard), Idris Elba (The Wire, Luther, Prometheus, Thor), Charlie Day (Always Sunny in Philidelphia), Burn Gorman (Torchwood), a vocal performance from Ellen McLain (GladOs of Portal) and titans of industry Ron Perlman and Clifton Collins Jr. who have been in more things than I care to list.  Everyone puts in exactly the performance that is needed, imbuing just the right amount of character and archetype into their superbly badassly named characters.  Idris Elba stands out as Marshal Stacker Pentecost bringing just the right amount of emotion into the standard cool and controlled commander archetype, exuding the authority and confidence that a name like that would command.  Female lead Rinko Kikuchi also shines as the intelligent, courageous and ass-kicking Yeager technician Mako Mori, portraying a rare cinematic female that is assertive and strong without coming off like a crotch-stomping feminist or crumbling like a leaf at the flex of the male lead's pecs.

Dane Barbados Jr. could spend all day extoling the virtues of the film and noting the expertly crafted details Del Toro included, like the all diegetic lighting, how the weather gets worse as the character's situation does and improves as the tables turn, dedicate a paragraph to Clifton Collins Jr's hair and sideburns but alas, to your eternal disappointment no doubt, such things just cannot be as Dane Barbados Jr. has money to spend, chilled vodka to quaff from the small of a nubile young handmaiden's back and a call to make; if the military of your ever-humble narrator's distant and subservient homeland has not begun the development of a rocket punch for his personal usage, then they surely need to, for Pacific Rim has inspired him. 

"It is my duty to commit to film the finest fucking monsters ever committed to screen and it is my duty to create the greatest fucking robots ever committed to screen." -Gullermo Del Toro

"Mission Accomplished" -Dane Barbados Jr.