Iron Man 2 was a disappointment. There, I said it. Don't get me wrong: there's plenty to like about the movie. But the flick just didn't live up to the great promise of Iron Man, richly overflowing with Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Jon Favreau, and others. Of course, you throw Don Cheadle, Sam Rockwell, Scarlett Johannson, and Mickey Rourke into the mix and you end up with a better set of ingredients than the first round. But the recipe still doesn't end up quite right, and the end product left me wanting more.

Sure, you get the "normal" superhero needs; you've got a set of super powers unlike anyone else's, you've got a beautiful love interest, you've got an evil villain or rather a pair of them, and you've got a challenge greater than what the superhero can combat (initially, at least) on his own. Ivan Vanko (Rourke) and Justin Hammer (Rockwell) play their parts to the hilt, but somehow, they don't carry the gravitas of Jeff Bridges' Obadiah Stone from the first one. There's something comical about the bad guys, especially Hammer, that makes them laughable, even while they're perpetrating heinous crimes against the United States and Tony Stark (similar to Max in The Losers).

And this time around, Stark has outted himself as Iron Man, he's recognizing his own fallibility/vulnerability as the chemical that keeps his body going is also killing him, and he's fallen prey to his own newfound fame and glory. One of the things that I thought was ridiculously lacking in the film was any recognition that Stark drunk himself into a stupor several times in the movie; while commenting on the "addictive"/destructive powers of the palladium, there's never any condemnation of the negative use of alcohol. I even read somewhere that a fan or reviewer was completely shocked that they hadn't even touched on Stark's alcoholism in Iron Man 2! Sure they have; they've just left it open to be interacted with in the third movie.

So, we've taken the superhero subject and the "drunken" subject, leaving us with three possible themes to focus on. Obviously, there's the role that Stark's father plays in this story (from the grave) but Tim Berroth has already tackled that one, and suffice to say that I do subscribe to the belief that most stories boil down to being about fathers and sons. Next, one could tackle the story of Stark and Pepper Potts (Paltrow) and we could look at what it means for there to be "a great woman behind every great man." It's quite possibly one of the firmest supports to the movie, and it's certainly a different take on what might be an otherwise average hero movie. Both women, Potts and The Black Widow (Johannson), are provided with substantial, determining roles in the film, and they are certainly moral, corrective compasses in Stark/Iron Man's life.

But the last aspect of the movie, and the one I'll close with, is that of the political/social nature of the flick. Like the graphic novels/comic books, the storyline includes the battle between the United States government and Stark Industries over the proper ownership of the Iron Man technology. Should it be privatized or public? Can the government claim something that they didn't create or pay for simply because they decide that it is a matter of public security? It's all about resources, and whether you want to make it about the Na'vi people and their nature-loving religion, or about Stark and his inventions, there's a "how can we best use our resources" question that's being asked in this particular film.

I certainly wouldn't put this one above any of the Superman, X-men, or (new) Batmanmovies, but I'd say it ranks higher than films featuring Daredevil, Elektra, and maybe even The Incredible Hulk. It's got more dialogue than a bunch of them, but it tries to do too much sometimes and not enough at others. The battle royale is pretty sweet, and the special effects are excellent, but I'm left feeling like I watched the Empire Strikes Back without much of a purpose. Somehow, let's hope the third chapter bounces back with some classic comic book flair.