Well, this
is a fantasy/comic adaptation after all...however, I do I agree with much of what you said, being an advocate of keeping things "real" and close to things that are remotely possible in the physical world, at least, in addition to keeping as close to possible to the comic stories...
Let me address:
How does a man survive being run into by a Bentley repeatedly? He had no suit. Just the whip "prosthesis'"?
I agree wholeheartedly here, and was thinking about that just the other day (that sequence) -- he had nothing on to suggest "super protection" from something like a speeding, very large and heavy automobile...
Cracking the firewall. That was just hoky and not even necessary.
I think Favreau put that in there just for a goof, and so Rourke's reply of "Software's ****..." could be laughed at; overall, I agree that it was unnecessary.
And what was all that antiquated firepower scene all about? Most of that was seen in Predator two decades ago.
I was thinking about this too -- the shoulder-mounted gun on Rhodey's suit seemed antiquated when put into perspective and it didn't seem to hold up to squat when faced with one of Rourke's whips during the end fight sequence.
And why did they always have to fight within whip distance? Seemed silly to me. They could fly, couldn't they?
The suits sure could fly -- but I think Favreau did an outstanding job on the fight sequences, notably the first Monaco race track scene where it got to the point that Rourke's whips began to piss Stark off, and when he had enough of being thrown around, the "hero juice" kicked in and he handed Rourke his *** by twisting out of his whips, punching him pretty much unconscious and ripping his power pack out of his chest, ultimately flipping him around to land on his back. I thought it was very cool.
I also felt there was plenty of "flying around" action towards the end when the HammerDroids attack the Stark Expo, and Tony and Rhodes have to evade them (well, Stark has to evade the drones and War Machine); the within-whip-distance thing during the skirmish between Rhodes, Stark and Vanko at the very end was effective, but not long enough.
And I hate it when it takes two heros to defeat a villain -- like what Raimi did in
Spider-Man 3, having Parker face both Sandman and Venom, and he couldn't do it without Harry's help. Ridiculous. I didn't like the fact that Rhodes had to help Stark in order to defeat Vanko by putting their suits' energy together...
And with a set of chompers like Varko had, whou would have been fooled by his fake death other than a blind man with no hands.
LOL -- but what do you mean by this?
The escape sequence was hokey -- you are lead to believe he's escaping from prison, beating up guards and blowing up cells, but then he just willingly goes into the arms of two guards who put a bag over his head, and throw him into a van...
what? Why would he assume these are the guys who helped him escape, unless they mumbled something to him in Russian or French to tell him so?
I could go on but it was this intermittent sillyness that marred an otherwise good movie.
I know. Its a movie and I did like it. Just seems that it could have been better with just a little more effort.
Perhaps this sentiment is a good way of tallying it all up -- but as a comic adaptation, I thought it was a great ride. I can't wait for the third one, which is supposed to introduce the Mandarin. I hope Favreau doesn't screw that up, because reportedly, he's having a lot of trouble bringing this character to the big screen.
