Iron Man 2

When it comes to the sequel of a beloved summer box office hit, perhaps the most we can hope for is this: That a reasonable person might argue that the second one is better than the first.

No, I don’t personally think Iron Man 2 is better than Iron Man. But it’s not an outlandish perspective. And that’s saying a lot.

Of course, the success of Iron Man begins and ends with Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark, the billionaire playboy/inventor who dons the titanium suit and becomes a one-man militia. Once again, Downey Jr. brings his own brand of antic charm to the role. He’s a cut-up, a renegade, a narcissist. But he has a brooding neediness, too, that makes him a worthy romantic hero.

The person who’s doing the swooning in this case is Gwyneth Paltrow’s Pepper Potts, although she’s a little less dewy-eyed and a little more take-charge this time around (Stark has appointed her CEO of Stark Industries.)

Paltrow has taken a break from acting to raise her children, and I’d forgotten what a good leading lady she can be. Whenever she and Downey Jr. are on screen together, it’s like a classic screwball romantic comedy has broken out in the middle of a blockbuster summer action film.

And since Paltrow plays the nice girl, there has to be a femme fatale, too, Enter Scarlett Johansson as Natalie, Stark Industry’s newest employee—she of the impossibly tight skirts and surprisingly quick reflexes.

The plot is sheer comic book silliness. Mickey Rourke—still pumped up beyond recognition (but somewhere under those tree-trunk biceps and 30-inch neck lurks a real actor)—is Russian physicist (I said it was silly) Ivan Vanko. He thinks that Stark’s dad was responsible for his own father’s exile to Siberia, so he wants his revenge. He teams up with Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), a rival arms dealer—the frustrated Salieri to Stark’s Mozart.

Yes, the acting is top-notch across the board, but I’d like to take a moment to praise director Jon Favreau (who also co-stars as Stark’s driver). This is a guy who knows his way around a comedy—he directed the hilarious Elf and wrote the classic Swingers—and he brings a hipster cool to the Iron Man franchise. He makes action scenes that are both easy to follow and exciting (imagine that!). And he peppers the film not just with crisp, funny dialog—credit a great script by Justin Theroux—but amusing visual jokes, as well. (Giant diorama in a tiny sports car? Never not funny.)

To read my complete review of Iron Man 2, check out the June issue of Baltimore.