Invincible Iron Man #1

Not much doubt about what the comic book event of the week is as the new Invincible Iron Man book hits the shelves just in time to benefit from the success of the film.

People new to comic books who try this out because of the film will not be disappointed as it very much has the same feel to it but they may be confused by some of the differences, e.g. here Jim Rhodes also has an armoured suit and Tony Stark is now teetotal following a long battle with the bottle some years ago (which is hinted at in the film).

But these differences are inconsequential, unlike in Spiderman where the success of the film recently forced the comic to undo many years of continuity to align itself with the film.

The important question is whether the book is any good and the answer to that is a resounding "yes"! The characterisation is spot on, the plot is gripping and worthy of Iron Man (no hopeless "d" list super-villains here) and the artwork beautifully captures the mood, the action and the technology.

This is a really good book.

Iron Man is a great movie

As an avid reader of comic books I always look forward to films based on characters I love but the experience has been mixed with the good films (e.g. Batman I and X-Men I) roughly balanced by the weak films (e.g. Hulk and Superman Returns) with quite a few so-so films in the middle (e.g. all 3 Spiderman films). So I am delighted to say that Iron Man is absolutely one of the good films.

The film tells the origin of Iron Man which is a creditable update of the original story with the war theatre changed from Vietnam to Afghanistan. Iron Man is then brought quickly up to date and leaps forty years of comics history in, er, a single bound.

The explosion count for an action movie is fairly low and while their is plenty of high-octane action the real strength of the movie is in the characterisation and dialogue. There are also some laugh out loud moments, particularly when Tony Stark is working with his voice-activated factory robots. The ending is really cute too!

After the film came the obligatory visit to Pizza Express and now comes the wait for the DVD.

Ultimate Iron Man returns

Lots of good comics this week to keep me going through the Christmas holidays, including two new Hulk comics (Warbound and Aftersmash), but the one that I am looking forward to reading the most is Ultimate Iron Man II by Orson Scott Card. All I need to do now is to get the Christmas shopping out of the way so that I have time to read them all!