Which is part of the reason Favreau approached negotiations to return to the director’s chair cautiously, not officially signing on to direct until July of that year.įresh off of working with writer/actor Justin Theroux on Tropic Thunder, Downey lobbied for Theroux to take point on the Iron Man 2 script, and so the sequel officially got underway. That gave the filmmakers less than two years to develop and write a script, cast, shoot, and edit the visual effects-heavy movie. Three days after Iron Man hit theaters in May 2008, Marvel Studios announced that Iron Man 2 would hit theaters on April 30, 2010. This would tread familiar territory for Downey, who had his own very public struggles with substance abuse in the past, but it soon became a point of contention with Marvel Studios, who wanted to shy away from anything too “controversial.” These films were, after all, made to sell toys.īut there was another factor that was causing hiccups in the early days on Iron Man 2: time. One comics arc that particularly interested them was “Demon in a Bottle,” which zeroes in on Tony Stark’s alcoholism.
successfully staged his comeback with the 2008 one-two punch of Iron Man and Tropic Thunder (the latter of which earned him an Oscar nomination), Favreau and Downey began discussing ambitious ideas for Iron Man 2.
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But after Favreau and the team became concerned that their original villain for Iron Man, the Mandarin, would be too fantastical, Iron Monger was moved up to Iron Man 1 and the intent was to figure out how to do the Mandarin down the road.Īfter Iron Man became a huge box office and critical success, and Robert Downey Jr. When director Jon Favreau was developing Iron Man, he and his team discussed crafting a trilogy of sorts for the Tony Stark character, with Jeff Bridges’ Obadiah Stane originally intended to become Iron Monger in the sequels. The result is a muddled though not entirely disastrous sequel that, in hindsight, could have had far worse implications for the MCU ahead. So Marvel Studios’ plan for the sequel was to lay even more track for the idea of an extended universe, but a rushed production schedule, creative disagreements, and actors unhappy with unprecedented contract demands nearly derailed the whole thing entirely. The sequel was greenlit quickly after the first Iron Man proved to be a massive success, and after fans went nuts for that Nick Fury cameo in the post-credits stinger. When people talk about the successful high-wire act of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the unprecedented forging of a path towards the team-up film Marvel’s The Avengers, they sometimes forget one major stumble on that road: Iron Man 2.