Iron Man 2

                On May 7, 2010 the second installment of the Iron Man trilogy was released. This movie was simply called, Iron Man 2. This was the third installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This movie grossed over $623.9 million worldwide at the box office.

                Iron Man 2 takes place 6 months after the events of the first Iron Man. Tony Stark is considered a superstar and uses his suit for peaceful means while refusing to give over the technology to the government. Stark also realizes that the arc reactor that is keeping him alive is also poisoning him. He becomes reckless because he knows he will die soon because of this poisoning but he decides to not tell anyone. Meanwhile, Ivan Vanko is secretly making a suit similar to Starks.

                Vanko attacks Stark in the middle of a race but Stark manages to defeat him. Starks rival, Justin Hammer, breaks Vanko out of jail and tells him to build a line of suits that will defeat Stark. Stark gets into a fight with his friend Rhodes when Stark gets drunk at his birthday party. Rhodes takes one of Stark’s earlier suits for the U.S. Air Force. Stark meets with S.H.I.E.L.D.’s director Nick Fury who tells Stark that his father knew Vanko’s father and that his father invented a new element. Stark puts this new element into is arc reactor so that he is no longer being poisoned by it.

                Hammer reveals his armored drones at an expo for weapons. These drones were led by Rhodes who didn’t know that Hammer was the bad guy. Stark shows up to try and warn Rhodes but Vanko takes over control of the drones and of Rhodes armor. Vanko gets in his own suit of armor while Rhodes gets control of his armor back. Rhodes and Stark work together to defeat Vanko and his drones. Vanko commits suicide by blowing up his suit.

                After the big fight scene happens, Marvel throws in some small references to old and future movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. As Fury talks to Stark there is news footage on of the Hulk going on a rampage. Fury tells Stark that he will only be used a consultant for S.H.I.E.L.D. Also after the credits a S.H.I.E.L.D. agents reports the discovery of a large hammer at the bottom of a crate in New Mexico. This is a reference to the movie Thor which Marvel creates after Iron Man.

                Iron Man 2 wasn’t quite as good as the first one but was still very good. Robert Downey Jr. does an amazing job playing Tony Stark in this movie as well. The fighting sequences in this movie were as good if not better than the first one. The fact that there are more than just 2 suits going at it makes the fights more action packed and exciting.  I liked how in this movie Rhodes played a bigger part. I really like his character and was happy that he got his own suit. Even with all of this, Iron Man 2 wasn’t as good as the first one in my opinion.

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Iron Man

                In 2008 the first installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe came out. This movie was Iron Man. It starred Robert Downey Jr playing as Tony Stark. It was produced by Marvel Studios and was based on the Marvel Comics. This movie was the first in three Iron Man movies that were made.

                Tony Stark was a genius who inherited Stark Industries from his father. This company created weapons that were very deadly and sold to the United States military. Tony is in Afghanistan showing off his new Jericho missile when he gets captured by a terrorist group known as the Ten Rings. He has to have an electromagnet put into his chest to keep shrapnel from hitting his heart. The leader of the terrorist group promises to let Tony Stark go if he builds a Jericho missile for them.  However Tony doesn’t trust him and decides to build himself a suit of armor.

                Before he does build himself the suit of armor he creates an electric generator called an arc reactor. He uses this reactor to power his electromagnet and to power his suit. He uses his suit to fight his way out and fly away but ends up crashing in a desert.  He gets rescued and when he gets home he decides to build an improved version of his suit and his arc reactor.

                Tony Stark uses his armor to attack the Ten Rings. While he is flying home he is attacked by 2 jets. He calls Rhodes, the soldier who rescued him, and reveals his identity in an attempt to stop the attack. While this is happening the Ten Rings are gathering the pieces from Tony’s original suit.

                The Ten Rings meet with Stane, Stark’s company manager, and he creates a new suit using these pieces. However Stane needs an arc reactor so he breaks into Tony’s home and takes the reactor out of his chest. Tony manages to crawl to his original reactor and plug that one in. Stane and Tony fight in their suits but since Tony is using his old reactor his suit isn’t at 100%. However Tony manages to defeat Stane by getting him on top of the Stark Industries building and telling his assistant to overload the arc reactor that is there. A massive electrical surge knocks Stane into the reactor which kills him. The next day Tony announces to the world that he is Iron Man.

                Iron Man is one of my favorite movies that I have ever seen. Robert Downey Jr. plays Tony Stark very well. Tony Stark is portrayed as a cocky, rich guy and Robert Downey Jr. does that very well. However he also shows that Tony Stark goes through a very emotional journey. The rest of the movie was done great as well. The fighting sequences were really cool and the CGI was done very well. All in all this was a great movie and excellent start to a really good trilogy.

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Behind the Scenes of Avatar

                 Avatar wasn’t made like most movies are made nowadays. Since most of the environments they were in were completely computer generated (CG), they needed a way to put the actors into the world. Avatar used a special type of 3-D animation to get the type of incredible looking shots that the movie is known for.

                They did this by putting the actors in special suits that would track their movements. This special suit would send these movements into a computer. Everything else would be done by computer. They would create the fantastic looking alien bodies and put them on the movements of the actors. They would create all the trees and all the vegetation that was used as the background. They created an entire 3-D world in which they put their characters.

                The movie’s director had a special type of camera that allowed him to look directly into this 3-D world. He could move the camera anywhere he wanted and could create his own shots doing this. If he thought something looked out of place he could just move it. He spent hours trying to find the shots that looked best for the movie.

               The director also wanted the facial expressions of the actor to be transferred to the 3-D world. He knew that there was no way that a CG face could replicate the facial expressions of professional actors. To fix this he put cameras in front of the actors’ faces videotaping them. He was then able to put this on the characters in his movie to make them look very real.

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