Title: Iron Man 2
Platform: 360 (PS3, Wii, PSP)
ESRB: M
Publisher: Sega
Developer: Sega Studios San Francisco
Rating: 
Review By: Eric Stuckart
Games like Iron Man 2 only reinforce the stereotype that movie franchise games tend to allow for the quality to be completely thrown out the window in favor of getting it on shelves by the time the movie premieres. It also shows that the best of intentions don’t always pan out. (more…)
Title: Secret Identity Crisis: Comic Books and the Unmasking of Cold War America
Publisher: Continuum
Writer: Matthew J. Costello
Review by: Jason King
Secret Identity Crisis, written by a professor of political science from St. Xavier University on Chicago’s South Side, contextualizes the development of Marvel Comics – though nearly all of this discussion focuses on a very small number of superheroes – through the Cold War. This book’s academic roots are ever-present, and as such the book may prove too lofty for some. This is clear early in the book when one is given a fairly thorough chronology of Cold War America social and intellectual history, with large sections dedicated to less exciting topics. Indeed, comic books and superheroes are so sparse in the first chapter that it is doubtless some readers, more interested in histories of superheroes than in anti-Communist consensus, will find this book very disappointing. (more…)
Title: Iron Man 2
Directed by: Jon Favreau
Written by: Justin Theroux
Produced by: Paramount, Marvel
Rating:
Review by: Bill Jones
The 2008 comic-to-movie Iron Man was a bit of a surprise hit. Not necessarily an out-of-left field kind of surprise, but Iron Man up until that point didn’t have the prominence of the likes of Spider-Man and the X-Men. In fact, other producers deemed Fantastic Four, The Hulk and The Punisher more worthy titles to adapt first. And despite being in the apt hands of Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby, the script throughout the entire movie felt like something that was teetering, and could just as easily have fallen from the greatness it achieved to the kind of movie one might watch hung-over on a Saturday morning during a marathon of action flicks on TNT, alongside wonders by Steven Seagal and Chuck Norris.
But Iron Man instead found wide critical acclaim, thanks in part to the fan service-guided direction of Jon Favreau. And of course, even more of the success is arguably owed to Robert Downey Jr., who played the characters of Tony Stark and Iron Man to perfection, turning what could have come across as simply arrogant and smug dialogue into something charming in the way of a playboy James Bond. The film still suffered from the lack of a true villain, and it wasn’t high art. It didn’t quite touch the likes of Spider-Man, X2 and The Dark Knight, but it was a hell of a lot of fun. It’s hard to say the same about Iron Man 2. (more…)
By John Gustafson
The official first day of Chicago Comic-Con began with Marvel’s Ultimate Panel moderated by Jim McCann, with panelists Editor Mark Paniccia, Assistant Editor Lauren Sankovich and returning writer Mark Millar. This was Marvel’s first opportunity to publicly reveal new details for the line’s reboot after the major Ultimatum wave, and their excitement rang true. (more…)
