Welcome to my MCU Rewatch, where I write an analysis of the MCU movies in the order of theatrical release. In this installment, I talk about how Tony is able to redefine himself in the midst of one giant panic attack.
Release Date: 3 May 2013
Distributor: Paramount
Director: Shane Black
When things are overwhelming and you can no longer function, the thing to do is redefine yourself by taking away everything that makes up who you are. The example off the top of my head is Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed. This redefinition of the self is the basis of Tony Stark’s character development in Iron Man 3. Unlike Cheryl Strayed in her titular memoir, Tony’s redefinition is not self-imposed.
For Tony (Robert Downey Jr.), the things that make up Iron Man/Tony Stark are two-fold: the Iron suits and Pepper Potts (Gwyneth Paltrov). It goes against my principles to liken Pepper Potts, a human, to an item that defines a man, but the movie does it quite often. I’ll get to this later in this essay. For now, let’s focus on what it means to Tony that these things are taken away from him.
Back to Where it All Began
Tony finds himself at the pit of despair (more or less) while in Tennessee. With nothing but a prototype unit that’s lost all power, Tony breaks into the garage of a random house and meets a little boy named Harley. Harley is excited to be working with Tony, who is supposed to be dead at this point, and takes some liberties in pushing Tony’s proverbial buttons for the sake of talking about a giant wormhole over New York City. It should be said that Tony Stark has PTSD and it manifests as anxiety attacks with the reference of New York, giant wormholes, aliens, and anything related thereof.
Despite the pushing of the proverbial buttons, it’s Harley that helps Tony most of all. Who is Tony but a mechanic that is very good at building and fixing things? Remember how he was a child prodigy and his father was proud of him but never in front of Tony? Remember when he made a miniaturized arc reactor from scraps in a cave? Remember when he created a mini Hydron Collider and synthesized a new element in his basement? Remember how the basis of Tony’s superpowers are his abilities as a mechanical engineer and not as a man in a metal suit?
Tony rebuilds himself from scraps for one thing: to save Pepper Potts. Tony admits early in the movie that his worst nightmare is being unable to save Pepper, who is the love of his life and foundation of everything he does. And his worst nightmare totally happens. First, Pepper is kidnapped by Aldrich Killian (Guy Pearce) who believes himself Tony’s rival in a lot of things. Pepper undergoes Extremis treatments while captive. While Tony attempts to save her, she ends up falling a considerable distance to her supposed death. Tony takes his anger out on Aldrich, but it’s Pepper that delivers the final blow. In the end, Tony learns to let go of Pepper’s safety because she knows how to take care of herself.
It is only when he’s lost all sense of control that he’s able to regain it on his own terms.
The Political Nature if Iron Man Villains
Iron Man 3 is the third and final Iron Man movie in the MCU. If there is a theme for Iron Man’s villains, it’s that they all appear to be external threats to the United States but are actually internal. First, Iron Monger uses a middle eastern terrorist cell as a puppet. Then Hammer Industries uses Tony’s Russian counterpart to cause trouble. Finally, the American thinktank AIM develops very unstable technology and finds a clever way to divert the blame by creating a fake terrorist called The Mandarin.
It feels as though the Iron Man movies wants the audience to know that a lot of threats will not come from outside the United States, but from inside it. Iron Man is hardly the only franchise that does this. See The Avengers, The Incredible Hulk, Captain America: the Winter Soldier, and a handful of other MCU films.
Part of the beauty of this theme lies within Marvel’s subtle social justice messages that are starting to show through. If the biggest threat is internal, then it’s best not to be a good little soldier and question your authority, be it intelligence organization, corporation, or government, whenever you have the chance. One of the unintended aspects of this theme is by not further marginalizing the voices of the marginalized. So far, the supposed villains in Iron Man have been from groups previously vilified in American pop culture: terrorists in Afghanistan, Russian scientists, and . . . intellectuals? (What even is The Mandarin? He’s white, but dressed in Chinese iconography and fashion. You know that douchebag that’s super into Buddhism? Is the Mandarin supposed to be a personification of that dude?)
However, the movies do nothing to sympathize with those marginalized voices. Ivan Vanko (Mickey Rourke in Iron Man 2) is still carted away to jail because of his attacks against Tony’s person. The Afghanistan terrorists are not given a redemption arc before their death at the hands of Obadiah Slane (Jeff Bridges). Trevor Slattery (Ben Kingsley) is too stupid to be a real villain.
The Portrayal of the Wimin
One final point about Iron Man 3 is the portrayal of women characters. We have two main ones: Pepper Potts and Maya Rand (Rebecca Hall).
Pepper is regulated to a trophy wife for most of the movie. Despite, you know, running what has to be an international company and putting up with Tony’s antics, she’s not given much agency in the film. She shows a little more competence when her house is attacked with her still inside it than she’s shown in previous combat encounters, but she’s still a “trophy” (her words) for much of the film. She’s the thing Tony doesn’t want to lose most of all. She’s a prize for Killian. It’s no wonder she gets violent and strikes the killing blow against the villain.
That killing blow still feels out-of-character for Pepper. The scene at the house foreshadows Rescue, the moniker Pepper dons when she acquires an iron suit for herself in the comics. But the reason Pepper wants to simply rescue and NOT attack is because she’s not a violent person. So then why the moment of violence at the end?
I understand that Marvel wants to start showing more women in badass-type roles. I prefer it if it wasn’t totally out-of-character. Pepper’s real badassery happened at the end of Iron Man 2 when she uses bureaucracy to arrest the CEO of Hammer Industries. That’s Pepper’s strength, not taking out an iron suit in midair with her bare hands.
Maya’s character I like. Her heart is in the right place, but there’s ambiguity with her motivations. She plays two sides when her heart belongs to one, and I feel that warranted more explanation (or sympathy) by the narrative. It’s disappointing she was sidelined and, as a result, not given her due. Maya is supposed to be a complicated character, but Hall is given barely any screen time to really make the character stand out.
The good news is Iron Man 3 passes the Bechdel Test! It’s not the first MCU movie to do so (Iron Man 2 takes that claim) but it’s still worth pointing out.
Tune in next time when I look at Thor: The Dark World for the first time in about six years.
Random Thoughts on Iron Man 3:
- Tony is a dick to everybody, but it’s especially apparent when he’s a dick to kids. Case in point: signing a little girl’s drawing by writing “help me” in a speech bubble. Cast in Point 2: His interactions with Harley.
- Tony is supposed to be dead, on the lam, and still manages to have enough money for a spare car, at least one hotel room, and two cart-fuls (approx $1000) of stuff from a hardware store. Where the hell did he get that money? Does he have an account not tied to his name just for this reason? How can he access his funds if he’s supposed to be dead? Inquiring minds want to know!
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