Iron Man 3 Director Shane Black had a tough act to follow. The hype that surrounded the Avengers and the praise it got after being released was massive. But I’m glad to say that Iron Man 3 was not only a great follow up to not just the Avengers and the Iron Man Series, but it’s just as good as the first Iron Man in my opinion.

Here’s a quick plot setup for the movie (again, spoiler free, don’t worry): Post-’Avengers’ Tony Stark is suffering from panic attacks due to the attack on New York (as seen in the Avengers). As a way to cope, Tony Stark begins to build numerous prototype suits for just about any emergency or situation in order to be sure that he’ll be able to protect his loved ones, especially Pepper Potts. However, a new terrorist threat emerges in the form of the 10 Rings, led by the Mandarin. At the same time, a mysterious person from Tony’s past, Aldrich Killian, surfaces with a vendetta against Stark.

When compared to the previous Iron Man films, this is much more of a character driven story. In fact, for a majority of the film, you’ll be seeing Tony outside of a suit rather than in one. But rest assured, that doesn’t mean that there isn’t as much action. In fact, I feel that the action choreography in IM3 is quite creative. The humor found in this movie is great as well. Tony’s snark/sassiness is set to maximum. As this is Robert Downey Jr’s fifth portrayal of Tony Stark (counting the cameo in The Incredible Hulk), all of his one liners and retorts feel quite natural, as we come to expect this sort of behavior out of him.

The rest of the cast do a stellar job with their respective roles. Major props go to Ben Kingsley’s portrayal of the Mandarin, which surprised me as being a bigger role than I expected (leaving it at that to avoid spoilers).

However, there are certain aspects of the film that I feel that the comic fans in the audience would find controversial, since it’s a different interpretation of the Iron Man lore. But the movie was still good regardless, so the more open minded fans would be able to overlook it.

I thoroughly enjoyed this movie, since in my eyes, it hit just about every mark. It doesn’t try to be  Iron Man 1 again (which was a reason why Iron Man 2 fell flat with audiences), but rather it continues the story that the previous films has set up. That might be something that Marvel Studios has realized. Sequels don’t have to be ‘bigger’ to supersede the previous movies, but now that all of major players of the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been set up, they can make continuations and new stories for these heroes to venture.

I’m not going to give a rating on the film, but rather I’m giving this movie a heavily regarded recommendation to everyone. I assure you that you will not leave this movie disappointed.