Much of this is due to the presence of co-writer/director Shane Black, who brings a fresh and invigorating perspective to the Iron Man universe. Jon Favreau deserves every ounce of praise one can give him for the work he did on the first two films, not just in casting the exquisite ensemble, but cracking how to best represent a ‘comic-book’ spirit in live-action without sacrificing an ounce of psychological complexity or emotional realism. Those are the fundamentals of Tony Stark/Iron Man as a character, and are the reason he has been so widely embraced on film.
With Shane Black on board, they remain the foundation of this franchise. But Black builds out from that foundation differently than Favreau did, and at this point in Tony’s story – especially after the game-changer that was The Avengers – it feels extremely natural, and highly rewarding, to have a fresh pair of eyes on the material.
Black employs his own set of stylistic tics and obsessions – fans of Kiss Kiss Bang Bang in particular will recognize the Christmas setting, flashback opening that informs both the narrative and thematic arc to come, witty and unconventional narration with a clever framing device (which even extends into the usually non-director specific post-credits tag), and a mystery plot the hero must piece together amongst many absurd twists and turns – but what really interests me here is how he employs his own particular thematic lens to analyze Tony Stark. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang deals with how the face we present to the world – or try and sometimes fail to present – is so often at odds with the identity we feel inside, and how struggling to come to terms with this dissociation is both an arduous and rewarding process.
These are the ideas behind Iron Man 3 as well, albeit taken to the Nth degree. Of all the films Marvel has produced thus far, Iron Man 3 feels structurally and thematically tightest, for Black has tailor-fit every single aspect of this story to directly parallel or inform Tony’s personal arc. The Mandarin fake-out – an absolutely wonderful surprise that the Disney marketing team gleefully helped establish by putting Ben Kingsley front and center in advertisements – isn’t just a hat trick, but a major thematic turning point. By building up a seemingly ‘iconic’ villain, and then knocking him down only to leave Aldrich Killian standing as the true opponent, the film underlines how easy it is to manipulate through image and project an identity predicated on lies.
This notion of intentional dissociation is an important one for Tony Stark to encounter, for he himself is tortured by deep-seated insecurity stemming from his own dissociative impulses. One of the major visual motifs of Iron Man 3 is that of Tony’s suits acting independently from his body. When we get to the climactic action sequence and there are dozens of suits flying and fighting on their own, it is not just a dazzling VFX conceit, but a natural extension of the film’s basic thematic fabric. Tony Stark is insecure at this point in his life, and unable to tell where the suit stops and the man begins. Early on, especially in his interactions with Pepper, he treats his suit as an extension of himself, essentially deprioritizing his own flesh-and-blood body in favor of the metallic creations he believes defines him. And yet once his ego gets the better of him and he invites the Mandarin to destroy his home – and most of his equipment – he is left in a remote Tennessee town with only his physical body to rely upon – the start of a journey that will lead him to understand, internalize, and ultimately overcome his crisis of identity.
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