1045. MCU 1: Iron Man 2008)

In 2008, Wizard Magazine was still at the height of its influence. For me, very unquestionably, that was the year of The Dark Knight. I obsessed over The Dark Knight. I believed, as I still do, that it was not only one of the best superhero movies ever made, but one of the best movies ever, period. But Wizard insisted Iron Man was…as good. Possibly better.

This was before anyone could reasonably expect the Marvel Cinematic Universe to become as big as it did. Certainly, Nick Fury shows up in the post-credits sequence introducing filmgoers to “the Avenger Initiative,” but it was Iron Man himself who was the revelation.

If you’d polled filmgoers even a year prior, they would have had no idea who Iron Man even was, much less the Avengers. Iron Man was well-known in comic book circles, but he wasn’t exactly Spider-Man. The original Spider-Man films, and the original X-Men trilogy, were over, by 2008. The Fantastic Four had already spectacularly failed to provide Marvel with a third film franchise. And here comes…Iron Man.

But it wasn’t just Iron Man. It was, of course, Robert Downey Jr. At that point in his career, he’d already begun rehabilitating his image. The studios were willing to work with him again. But audiences still thought of him in terms of his late ‘90s scandals. They had, really, forgotten all about him.

So Tony Stark was a reintroduction, and as it turned out, a perfect fit for an older, more experienced, more relaxed actor, a total departure from the templates established in every other successful superhero movie to that point.

It was also special effects capable of selling Iron Man. If anything, he actually looked cooler than Spider-Man. Coloring in comics can’t really pull off that kind of shine.

But subconsciously, the selling point was very similar to Tim Burton’s Batman some twenty years earlier.

Burton’s Batman was a deliberate pivot away from the popular take on the character, still frozen in the image of the TV take itself twenty years earlier. He made Batman moody, and he stuck him in a rubber suit. He made him look like Darth Vader.

In 1989, Star Wars had actually begun to fade in the popular imagination. Fans had started to drift to other things. Nothing had quite matched Star Wars. At that point nothing could! But the ride seemed to be over. And then Tim Burton dresses an icon in black, and lets the image do most of the work, an imposing figure. In the original films, Darth Vader is all presence. 

In 2008, it’s three years after audiences have gotten to see Vader in a very different light. It’s the origin most fans probably weren’t even aware of, despite the original novelization bringing it up, almost as an aside, that burnt body encased in that outfit (“more machine now than man”). Thirst for the Vader who suddenly seems ripe for new adventures becomes very evident, later, when audiences see him tear through a corridor in Rogue One (2016). 

But in 2008 they’re left with Vader at the cusp, bursting free from his origin in Revenge of the Sith (2005), suddenly vital again, and no place to go…

Then Tony Stark builds his armor, and it’s safe to cheer again. Safe to be a fan! At the start of a whole new saga…