CON: Iron Man 2/2

MARVEL STUDIOS PANEL

IRON MAN

As you might have read, Jon Favreau showed a sneak peek at the IRON MAN footage at Paramount’s Thursday panel. He didn’t stay long though and didn’t have any talent with him so he came back on Saturday as part of the Marvel panel with a few guests.

Gwyneth Paltrow was a surprise for the crowd and we in the press only found out about her appearance earlier that day. You could tell by the sudden throngs of cameramen near the front of the panel that she certainly is in demand, even though she’s taken time off to be with her family recently.

Before the Q&A portion of the panel got started, Favreau asked the crowd who didn’t get to see it on Thursday. There was a big round of applause and he said that none of the actors had seen any of this footage either so he was really excited to get their reaction. He ran the footage again and even the second time, it still blew me away. Definitely the best reception of any movie at the Con this year. The fanboys were in love and deservedly so.

Favreau talked about how Stan Winston built the Iron Man suits including versions of the old armor and the new, shiny armor that were worn by the actors on the film. Downey was asked what it was like to wear the Iron Man armor on set and he said that in the beginning he told Favreau he wanted to wear it as much as possible but once he saw the stuntmen getting knocked and bounced around he wasn’t sure if wanted to stick to that plan. But he was in the armor as much as it was feasible for him to do so.

Paltrow then got the obligatory, “What made you want to play Pepper Potts?” question and she gave her obligatory response. She really loved the character but mostly it was the chance to work with Robert Downey, Jr. and the rest of the cast that drew her to the movie. She said she had been looking for a project to work with Downey on for a while and when IRON MAN came to her, she knew it was going to be a lot of fun.

Terence Howard also got the same question and he joked that he finally wanted to work on a movie with a budget. Then he seriously said that he didn’t think of IRON MAN as a comic book movie because every movie is like being in a comic book to him. He said getting to be an actor is just like playing pretend and being able to do that makes him feel like he’s a kid again reading comics. It’s all fun to him so he considers IRON MAN just like any other movie he’s done.

Not to be outdone by Gwyneth’s answer though, Howard gave some props to Downey. He spoke of how he’s one of the most down to Earth actors he knows and that he can just be himself no matter who is around. He said he was incredibly intimidated going into a table read with Downey and Gwyneth but once he met everyone he felt at ease and it wound up being the most fun he’s ever had on a film.

Someone in the crowd asked how they plan to market the film considering Iron Man is a “lesser known” character. Marvel Studios head Kevin Feige said he didn’t think Iron Man was a lesser character, he’s just one of their characters who hadn’t had his own TV show yet. That was really the only difference in his eyes. He said he felt that Iron Man was one of their strongest characters.

Favreau was asked why he decided to cast his film with non-traditional action stars and he said that he cast IRON MAN just as he would’ve if he were casting an indie movie. He’d go see this cast in any movie. Casting them was easier, he explained, with Marvel Studios who are essentially an indie studio and want to see their properties done absolutely perfectly.

Then it was time for a special guest:

Favreau brought out another “star” of IRON MAN, Stan “The Man” Lee. He commanded his usual ovation from the crowd. Downey talked about meeting with him over lunch at Beverly Hills to pick his brain about the character and his inspiration when creating him. A lot of what Stan told him went into how he shaped his character.

Favreau said he wanted Downey to play Tony Stark/Iron Man as a an imperfect guy cause that’s how he likes his heroes. He wanted to explore how far you could push a person and still have them be sympathetic. He says he loved Han Solo even after he shot Greedo first. Iron Man lives by a code and he thinks the audience will respect that and like him even more for that.

That was about it for the panel as Favreau asked the crowd if they wanted to see the footage one more time to a raucous cheer (pretty much the only time this stunt worked at the Con – a few other panels tried it and it was usually met with tepid applause). IRON MAN will definitely be one of the most anticipated films of 2008 based on what we saw that day.