"You're watching Iron Man, Thor, Captain America and The Avengers? What is this, a DC marathon?" - My brother.


I have a confession to make: I’ve never seen The Avengers. Or Thor. Or Captain America. Or Iron Man 2. Yeah, I don't really get to the cinema too much.
So to make amends for my sins, I embarked on a purgatorial Marvel marathon to catch up on the films I missed - all four of the above culminating in the crossover finale, The Avengers. I skipped a couple of bits: I've seen Iron Man about three times, and the Hulk is, well... I'm going to flat out veto that one.


Let's start, then, with Iron Man 2. The first Iron Man film was surprisingly good - mostly due to the genius casting of Robert Downey Jr - so my expectations were high.


Unfortunately, while the first instalment was a tightly-focused narrative on the spiritual rebirth of a playboy who happens to fly around in a mech suit, the sequel swaps out the majority of its wit and charm for LOADSA ROBOTS.


 I remember back when the film was released that a lot was made of villain Whiplash, or more specifically the actor playing him, Mickey Rourke. As the film opens with a montage of  whiplash developing his mega powerful, um, whips, I couldn't help but find myself thinking: is this really the best villain in the Iron Man catalogue? After all, The Dark Knight had the Joker; Spiderman 2 had Doc Oc; even Fantastic Four 2 had Silver Surfer.


Mickey Rourke makes his best attempt to ooze charisma, but he has so few lines that he ends up playing a character who's less of a super villain, more a bodybuilder with asperger's and a creepy obsession with Tony Stark.


Can we focus on the whips for a moment? I realise it's probably an classic aspect of the character - his name is Whiplash, after all - but compared to Stark's mega-suit, it seems a bit underpowered. The way it burns through his clothes to reveal his rippling torso facilitates impressive entrances (future super villains, take note), but wouldn't it be more practical to equip himself with some, y'know, explosive projectiles?


They try to make up for this lame superpower (and pretty boring backstory) by making him apparently unbeatable in physical combat, as well as a brilliant engineer and hacker. But it's all futile, because at the end of the day he's just a guy with some stupid whips.


 Thankfully the true foil to the smarmy Tony Stark is Justin Hammer, another billionaire entrepreneur who, unlike Whiplash, manages to be complex, hilarious and sympathetic at the same time - and all this without slipping into in a metal suit. Who would've thunk it?

Then as well as the lovely Pepper Potts, there's a new and bizarrely capable female character. Hang on, that could be misconstrued - I mean that she's more organised, attractive and dangerous than any other character in the film, or in fact any other film, regardless of her sex. But it's okay guys, because she's actually Black Widow, a superhero! And superheroes can do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING, as we all know.


As for Tony Stark himself, though there's something poetic about the way his own suit is slowly draining his life away, it seems to be a mere excuse for upgrading his suit to have a canon-friendly triangular light in its chest, with some cliche daddy issues thrown in to conjure up some emotional resonance (protip: they don't really work).


Oh, and though I hardly expected "proper" science from a Marvel, the creation of a new element by zapping frickin' laser beams around is frankly insulting. Did these writers even pass GCSE chemistry?


Verdict: A decent start to my Marvel Marathon, but sadly no match for the original film. Here's hoping Thor can deliver more heart and fewer exploding robots. On second thoughts, can't a film have both?