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Will Iron Man’s Realism Clash with The Avengers Universe?

Posted on Tuesday, November 25th, 2008 by Peter Sciretta

Iron Man star Robert Downey Jr addresses his concerns about the announced superhero team-up movie The Avengers in a new interview with MTV:

“If we don’t get it right, it’s really going to suck. It has to be the crowning blow of Marvel’s best and brightest, because it’s the hardest thing to get right. It’s tough to spin all the plates for one of these characters,” Downey tells MTV, later adding: “The danger you run with colliding all these worlds is that Jon was very certain that “Iron Man” should be set in a very realistic way. Nothing that happened in Iron Man is really outside the realm of possibility. Once you start talking about Valhalla and supersized super soldiers and jolly green giants, it warrants much further discussion.”

It’s good to see that Robert has a good grasp on the material. The concerns he has mentioned are the same things that have worried me since the ultimate Marvel team-up movie was first announced. And before comic book fans comment — yes, I am well aware that The Avengers has worked in comic book form for years. I’m currently reading The Ultimates, and it works tremendously. But I think the world that Favreau set-up in the first Iron Man film has very different rules than say the world of The Fantastic Four, or the world that might be introduced in Thor. While the Iron Monger may have been somewhat fantastical, he was still rooted in reality, as is the entire film. It will be interesting to see how Marvel will work this out.

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Comic Book/Superhero, Marvel Studios, Sequels, 

  • filmkid
    he got a good point but still i believe it will work no matter what
  • RDJ is right. I have a really hard time seeing that crappy CG Hulk and Captain America running alongside the Iron-Man Favreau brought to life.

    He hits the valid points I have with crossing over characters who were brought into these well thought-out living worlds. It's not like the Daredevil, Ghost Rider, or FF crap we get from other directors.
  • RDJ isn't talking about realism in that sense.

    He's speaking about how the characters are introduced with actual intelligence and not just thrown into the fray so fans can just smile seeing their characters on the screen together. Making one giant crappy mess. Like X3.
  • Mike Z.
    This is ridiculous. What made Iron Man work is not realism in the sense of "this could actually happen" but realism in the sense of "we may be pulling some of this out of our asses, but we're going to take all of it seriously" instead of tossing it off. Fantastic Four sucks because it's melodramatic one minute and candy the next. Iron Man is awesome because it's deftly handled drama and well-thought-out action. No matter the ridiculousness objectively, people will accept it if you play according to the rules you set up for yourself. Star Wars is no less realistic than Starship Troopers, it's just handled better.
  • jason B
    "Nothing that happened in Iron Man is really outside the realm of possibility."

    dammit i love celebrities! that is just a priceless quote. it's funny how RDJ ripped on TDK, but now is preaching the comic book movie realism that the nolan's brought to the table - the realism that favreau admittedly wanted for ironman...ahh well, i'd love to wax some more but i gotta put my flying robot suit on & go get some dinner.

    just a quick thought though: i think that the LOTR films successfully had a world where human and non-human (cgi) beings shared the screen. it's not impossible at all, it just takes some talent & planning.
  • Yeah that part about RDJ's comment bothered me too. If some suit like that did exist. The person inside would be turned into fucking soup in that thing.

    I'd agree with him if he meant that they sat down and actually tried to put a tangible spin on his suit. Which I'm fine with. In terms of comic book realities. The gadgets and suit you see Batman donning would be much closer to reality in terms of tech than an Iron-Man-type suit.
  • Oh! I know they are going to make this film regardless of anyone's opinion, and for the look of it I'm probably going to enjoy it very much. But I just wanted to point that out from the sense of believability. By burying their own grave I meant, not being very consistent with the way they tell their different stories. But I'm almost certain that the movie is going to be a box office success.
  • I can see his concerns. But I do feel that the Hulk as they have established him now & the Captain America that they are trying to make can still be grounded in reality. I really don't know what they are going to do with Thor.
  • Yeah. Marvel and DC make money on their comics built around the sole fact of not honoring their own canon. Marvel more so than DC I think. It's some sort of comic rights of passage to ruin or re-do anything good that's been established in your own franchise for years.

    This is why I gave up buying superhero comics years ago. Everything gets rebooted every couple of years for a quick dollar. If it's not some characters faux-death announcement, it's another character getting Aids or turning out to be some pop culture reference.
  • Darren
    I think the word we're looking for here is "believability" and not "realism". Iron was awesome cause everything was believable, not because it was realistic. The movie was absolutely not realistic, but it was written and filmed in a way that made me believe that a rich playboy could actually build a suit of armor with scrap metal in a cave. As long as they came make me believe a Norse god can exists, or that a frozen soldier can be thawed out, or a man can grow 60 ft tall I think Avengers will work as a movie.
  • Mr B
    Like the first poster said. If they work with the Ultimate universe they can keep it more grounded in realism than of the original stories. An frankly Ultimates' Thor is probably the only one that wont end up looking like Ghostrider. Keep the Valhalla stuff at a minimum and make Thor seem like he could really just be an insane man with some really good tech. Lose the winged helmet and the cape too.
    Cap, can look more and more like a special forces guru with less shield throwing and more tank driving.
    Since Hulk saps realism with every second. They'd need to keep the green guy off screen until really needed.
  • RDJ fell from the sky in a solid metal suit and survived, this was after he placed a reactor in his own chest..... Yeah Iron man won't fit into the fantastical marvel universe....
  • Brian
    "Nothing that happened in Iron Man is really outside the realm of possibility."

    Does he even know anything about the film he starred in?
  • Gotta agree w/ TGM on this one. If IronMan was based in reality, The Dark Knight was a documentary.
  • He would look like Noodle Man from Robocop.
  • Seriously? IM is as realistic as The Hulk or Thor. Captain America is probably the most realistic out of the four. Plus how can he question if they'll mesh together when he hasn't even seen the Captain America movie and I doubt he's picked up a CA comic recently.
  • do i sense a trace of bitterness?
  • 4site
    Did he even pay attention while making Iron Man? Why does he even speak?
  • dude, you are wrong, all you need is a mini gravity field that works in the opposite direction to which you are flying, it basically stabilizes the inside of the suit, so you dont get killed when flying at super speeds or getting hit by canon blasts. if you know anything about interstellar flight, you would know its impossible to reach lightspeed without one of these stabilizers. so, it is not out of the realm of reality, just out of humans technological reach at this moment. all the aliens have them though.
  • Whut? Gray Hulk was the best Part about the Ultimates. But i completely agree on Thor. He should be the Jesus Hippie he was in the Ultimates.
  • they made that movie years ago, where have you been?
  • "Nothing that happened in Iron Man is really outside the realm of possibility." insert comment about RDJ not knowing anything, that has been said over and over again by people with no thoughts of their own...

    get over it. the movie was awesome, and totally believable. if i can believe it, than it is real (under the definition of truthiness). Think about it. What is 'reality'? Is it what you are told by 'scientists' and 'books' or is it what you believe it is, in your gut? Reality can only be as real as you think it is, its in your minds eye, not a 'fact' or 'rule'. So ask yourselves, can a filthy rich super intelligent man build a lab in his basement and then construct an advanced mechanical suit with the help of his lovable AI creations? The answer is in your gut, and if you're like me, the answer is yes.
  • DoogleberryWinkler
    Nothing about 'Iron Man' was taken seriously... it was cartoony, camp, and tongue-in-cheek. It worked because the actors involved could carry that style (particularly RDJ) and the jokes were actually funny, except more in the realm of television sitcoms, where everyone is funny and full of punchlines. RDJ was simply the caricature of a wise-cracking billionaire playboy we'd all like to see. The movie only worked because the special FX and story were there to back it all up; but it only had a quasi-political message and was full of soap-operatic moments that never went beyond their face value. If not in better hands, it could have easily turned out like 'The Fantastic Four'.
  • DoogleberryWinkler
    To put in bluntly, the thought of a billionaire genius who can sit in his lab and create an advanced suit like that, is simply ridiculous. It would take years and require a huge team of people. Steve Jobs didn't invent the iPod on his lonesome AND THAT IS JUST A TINY LITTLE GADGET! Other parts of the film: where he builds the first prototype whilst in captivity in a terrorist cave; where he falls from the sky at a fatal distance only to land in the ground with his head poking out (like something out of Looney Tunes); where he is the first person to invent A.I. with his worker robot helper full of campy emotions; the scenario of his power cell keeping the shrapnel from entering his heart..... etc etc..... these are all fantastical elements. This is fine too! The movie felt more like a comic book than TDK which was a nice contrast, however, when RDJ compares his film as being the serious one (in lieu of 'The Incredible Hulk' and upcoming 'Captain America') it's obsurd. Gamma rays making a green mutant VS. a nuclear powered man... no difference. They both dealt with pseudoscience.

    I agree about Thor being difficult to handle though.
  • People that worry about this kind of stuff need to be shot in the face.
  • Tony Stark was a fucking genius, duh...but I agree with you...The word SUPERHERO is unfucking realistic...They shouldn't worry of making the movies "realistic", they should worry about making it WORTH the $10...
  • Patch
    Thor will be replace by Howard the Duck.... Hahaha!!!
    By the way, any news about making a Howard the Duck movie?
  • Its weird that an actor is talking about things that probably belong in production meetings. Even weirder, he is talking about them to MTV.

    As for the subject at hand, I think the only realistic or enjoyable parts of the film were Robert Downey Jr. galavanting around like, well, Robert Downey Jr. All the superhero stuff was pretty meh and RDJ is wrong. All the superhero elements of the film are totally unrealistic
  • Mikey M
    All you have to do is see a superhero movie gone wrong like Fantastic 4 or Daredevil.
    Superheroes need to be treated realistically, see Batman and Ironman and the first two Spiderman movies.
    Studios are probably in such a hurry to get this out and make money that dont care about the produdct.
  • The best part of IM was Jeff Bridges performance.
  • Yeah, all of what, 5 minutes of it
  • iron man and the hulk i feel could go together

    and we'll have to see thor and captain america before we can judge it further

    if it is anything like the ultimates it will be amazing
  • Darrell
    Ya... he's not referring to realism as in physics and what normal people see as reality... huh?
    ...if that were the case every scene with RDJ in the suit would have killed him - that crazy inertia logic in which the property of matter by which it retains its state of rest or its velocity along a straight line so long as it is not acted upon by an external force.
    Hurdling to earth and landing in a pile of sand being the best example of "nuke the fridge" physics from Iron Man.
  • Don't forget the credits. They were AWESOME
  • Look damnit!! that's the price they gotta pay for making a movie out of the avengers!!! nobody said they HAVE to make a avengers movie. But this is the same reason people didn't want to see a justice league movie...although the justice league is better than the avengers in my opinion
  • simon2it
    "Nothing that happened in Iron Man is really outside the realm of possibility", except of course for everything that happened.
  • Then I guess that in a certain way Marvel bury its own grave. It's just like Nolan's Batman, despite being excellent, there is no possibility for cross over with most DCU super heroes. Even though, characters like Hulk and Captain America are more believable than Thor.You can put Hulk, CA and Iron Man Together, but the moment you decide to add a god in that story, that's when it becomes a little bit hard to shallow.
  • Marvel will do the crossover regardless if it's a good idea or not. They're always trying to beat everyone in the comics arm race to do it first. If it bombs or not.

    Characters like this need to be set up first properly on their own. Not every one, but most of the first draftees need to be established properly so they can be taken seriously on film.
  • And were back full circle. Like I said, a suit like this is about as close to being real as I am riding in on a unicorn with naked Jessica Biel on it with me!
  • This was my concern aswell.. but I think they're using the Ultimate Marvel series which is more grounded in reality. The only thing we can all say for sure though is: Avengers will be a hell of a ride.
  • I look forward to an Avengers film if it happens, but I agree that it could take something away from the level of realism built up in "Iron Man" or even "The Incredible Hulk" as individual properties.
  • lancelewis
    i think RDJ has expressed some very valid points. i really loved the IM movie, and its basis in some reality could be what helped the mainstream absorb a superhero flick. i am alsi a huge fan of the avengers, and the ultimates, and going with the latter could possibly work. i think ending of Incredible Hulk, with Stark and Nick Fury in discussion was very cool, and it did not alarm me. fingers crossed.
  • James
    Fuck realism, it's a superhero movie, lol. Some characters and villains are more fantastical than others. That's what makes them unique and the stories interesting. There are no rules, ha ha.
  • LordToastButter
    It all depends on how this is set up….but since Marvel is overseeing everything I doubt they will stray into the worlds created by FF and the like. Capt. as a character can fit into the Iron Man universe, but Thor is something else….and what of Ant Man and The Wasp? Tony Stark was flying around in an armored, jet boosted, exoskeleton, that could hit mach 1, without having the G-force effect him, with a uber A.I & a power generator that was been implanted into his body...yeah that's SO not fantastical that Thor, a Super Solider, or an incredibly shrinking man could not fit in to it. That's just plain silly :)
  • Realist
    Oh come on. What reality do you guys live in?
  • Sheriff Dewey
    Oh - it's going to suck now? Kinda like you said The Dark Knight sucked huh? Between this guy and Ed Norton its a wonder how these things get made. Pretentious little jerks. Look, RDJ. Don't think too hard on this one. It's not high art (unless TDK wins an Oscar). Until then it's only a superhero movie. You are playing a billionaire playboy who flies around in a metal suit for cripes sake! The only billionaire playboys we know of have Al-Muhammad at the end of their name. Realm of possibility my butt. And who cares what Jon Favereau wants? Just smile for the camera, pick up your ridiculous check, and leave the details to the dreamers who blessed you with this incredible opportunity.
  • Why does this come as a shock, I'm also betting dollar bills that Iron Man2 will not LOOK as good as 1 , just like spidey.

    (HEAVY SIGH) I wish I could quit you spidey!
  • Didnt you know RDJ's character was Al-Muhammad who had plastic surgery...
  • Sorry, What?
    Spiderman realistic?
    Yeahhhh!?
    Cuz people shooting webs outta their wrists happens all the time.
  • What?
    Havent any of you seen giant green men running around...?
    I have!!!
    Although I must admit, I was a little drunk...
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