There he is! Welcome back, Cardboard Iron Man!

Incidentally, I sat down to watch Iron Man 2 while producing this comic and realized that I had plotted something that was in the trailer, but not the final movie.

In the trailer for the film, Tony and Pepper have an exchange where Tony says he’s going on a dangerous mission and might not make it back. Pepper kisses the Iron Man helmet and tosses it out of the back of a cargo plane. Tony dives after and and says “You complete me!” before dropping out of view, scooping up the helmet and rocketing onto the stage of the Stark Expo. Watch it.

That scene’s not in the movie. Instead, Stark, in the full suit simply jumps out of the back of the plane.

That’s fine. It was just kind of a forehead-slapping moment for me.

Anyway, sorry the comic is a little bit late. As things are winding down, I’m finding myself more and more enticed by doing larger and larger comics. Six panels here, eight panels there. It kind of adds up in unexpected ways.

I’m planning on living inside this arc for a little while. Tom’s attendance at The Avengers will likely live on the site for the next two months or so. Looks like that won’t be a problem considering the movie did over $207 million in box office over the weekend.

Much like everyone else, Cami and I went to see The Avengers last Friday night. I hadn’t been to a big, popular movie on opening night in a while and immediately wanted to kill all of the teenagers in attendance.

Okay, that’s a generalization. But I definitely wanted to kill the kids sitting behind me. They took up the whole role, shifted around in their seats constantly and Would. Not. Shut. Up.

Waiting for the movie to start, I can hear one of them sitting directly behind me whine “Why did we have to sit behind tall people?!”

Expecting there would probably be a problem later on, I turned around and said, “Hey, I can hear you.”

Sure enough, there was a problem later on.

Look, I don’t have a problem if your loud and rowdy waiting for the movie to start. It’s annoying, but you’re excited. I get it. I don’t even really have a problem if you’re talking through the trailers. Nine times out of ten I’ve already seen them online anyway. But once the opening credits start and you’re still squawking? Then I have a problem.

I think I’ve addressed this on the site before, but I have a three-phase approach to dealing with obnoxious movie goers.

STEP 1: Calmly look over my shoulder, try to catch the offender’s eye to let them know that there are other people present that they are disturbing.

If that doesn’t work, I move on to…

STEP 2: Turn around completely in my seat and stare at the offender until we lock eyes and they know that I am certifiably crazy.

And if that doesn’t get the point across, I jump right to…

STEP 3: Turn around in my seat and tell them at normal conversational volume “SHUT. UP.”

With these goons, I had to employ my three phase technique in the first 15 minutes of the movie. It worked. The girl that wouldn’t stop talking pretty much immediately shot straight up in her seat.

What’s always funny about this is that the people who are talking almost NEVER notice that I’m staring at them until it’s too late. It’s always their friends that notice me first. In this case, this girl’s friends were trying to interrupt her and make her aware that there was a man with blood-red eyes staring holes into the back of their head. But as it goes, these people are typically too self-involved to listen to anything but their own yapping maw.

Incidentally, Cami hates when I do this. She hates confrontation. She saw that I was getting annoyed with these teens before the movie even started and suggested we move elsewhere. I might have entertained the idea if the teens were there first and we sat in front of them. But it was exactly the opposite. We were there first and – as juvenile as it sounds – they invaded our space. I’m not one to retreat in those situations.

Civility in theaters blows and it’s getting worse. I’m not the first one to comment on this. But it sure as hell doesn’t get any better if you quietly slink away from these loudmouths. I pretty much view that as an endorsement of their behavior. Nuh-uh.

Incidentally, there was a family sitting next to us that brought what looked to be a 3 year-old with them. I don’t really have a problem with parents bringing young kids to PG-13 movies. It’s not what I would do, but I’m not in a position to say that’s not what other parents should do.

But what was interesting was that it was the Dad who was kind of out of control. Very loud commentary throughout. Wasn’t annoying, exactly. Just kind of… interesting.

I’ll give you a for instance. There’s a scene in the movie where Captain America (played by Chris Evans) chases after Thor, who has just abducted Loki. The Black Widow (played by Scarlett Johansson) tells Captain America not to go after them – they’re basically gods. Cap responds with the line “Ma’am, there’s only ONE God and he doesn’t dress like that!”

It’s a funny line, ruined somewhat for me when the guy sitting next to me responded “THAT’S RIGHT!”

Nevermind you’re talking at the screen for a minute. Why are you treating it like someone in the movie suggested there WASN’T one God? It made me wonder if – the whole time – he was mad at the idea that Thor and Loki were in the movie. I immediately pegged him as a Glenn Beck fan, or something – looking for an excuse to be offended.

I dunno. People are funny.

You might have noticed that I have spent very little time actually reviewing The Avengers in this space. That’s intentional. I don’t really want to review it. All I can say is, if you haven’t seen it yet, you need to get on it quick.

I actually have to applaud the internet for not dumping a bunch of spoilers leading up to the film. Considering that Europe got The Avengers a full week ahead of the United States, you’d think web sites would be littered with information. But that wasn’t the case. People kept a lid on things – which I think reflects and endorsement toward the quality of the film.

People don’t really have a problem spoiling a movie that sucks. Who cares, right? But if the quality is there, people generally want you to have the same experience they had so you can form a little bond around it. That’s exactly what’s happening with The Avengers.

I can say that The Avengers was everything I wanted it to be. They did a hell of a job juggling the story lines of each of the main characters and it felt very balanced to me. While Robert Downey Jr. tends to get the best lines, The Avengers is not Iron Man 2.5 – it could have very easily been that. It would have made sense to put the other characters in orbit around him. But they didn’t play it that way and the movie is better for it.

Something else I’ll say about the movie is that I loved the fights. I won’t spoil anything except to say that the film does a great job of mixing different characters together in a myriad of different combinations. Some fights you expect to see, others you don’t. But all of them are satisfying.

Last thing I’ll say, there’s a scene in the film where the characters are kind being torn apart at the seams – a lot of interpersonal conflict. There are so many barbs and insults flying back and forth across the room. Everyone gets dealt on by one character or another. Watching made me think that I never want to get into an argument with Joss Whedon, ever. He’s kind of a master at a withering put-down.

So that’s it. Go see The Avengers and expect more adventures with Cardboard Iron Man in the coming weeks!

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See you soon!