Iron Man 3: Stripped Down and Saved

Iron Man 3 does not pretend to be profound.

Oh, it's a fine movie—fun and funny and thrilling and full of Robert Downey Jr. cracking wise and all that. Moreover, it allowed me a pretty cool pair of 3-D glasses. A fellow reviewer said that he was going to use his for his next welding project.

My Iron Man 3 glasses, as modeled by my daughter's stuffed dog, Mr. Reeces

But while the original Iron Man and its (admittedly disappointing) sequel had some reasonably obvious messages of purpose and redemption, this chapter felt a little depth-challenged—a pure popcorn muncher on the surface. Sure, I understand that superhero movies aren't necessarily (ahem) suited to Russian novel-level musings about life and death and whatnot. But Christopher Nolan's Batman movies spoiled me—and the Iron Man 3 trailers got me primed for something grittier and deeper than we've seen lately from the Marvel movie universe.

(An aside: Can you imagine what sort of movie this would've been had Terrence Malick directed it? I imagine Iron Man walking through wheat fields. The armor surrounds me, binds me, imprisons me, he'd say, staring at a sky smeared with irredescent clouds. Please, restart my faulty ARC reactor. Make me whole again.)

But there's an element here worth, I think, a bit of space. And it centers on the fact that Tony Stark spends so much time outside his suit.

Now, I touched on that topic in my Plugged In review (you can read it here, if you like), but to recap a bit: The bad 'un du jour here is The Mandarin, a nefarious Bin Laden-like bully who promises to engulf the United States in a storm of terror. And when Tony Stark (Iron Man) calls The Mandarin out on national media, the villain blows Stark's Malibu casa into tiny cornflakes-size pieces.

Now, this is critical, because Stark's power is mostly derived from all his metal suits, all of which he builds in his state-of-the-art workshop. The attack sends his favorite suits, his workshop and most of the rest of his worldly possessions down to the briny deep—and Iron Man himself, for that matter. Stark survives, but just barely. And his suit is much the worse for wear. It gets him to Tennessee but conks out right after. Even Jarvis, Stark’s ever-present computerized helpmate, goes silent. And while Stark thinks the suit can be fixed and recharged, he's largely suitless and gadgetless for a good chunk of the movie. The guy goes from having everything to having nothing in one quick helicopter attack.

We're all familiar with the whole "rags to riches" narrative—something like you'd find in Victorian-era books by Charles Dickens or whatnot, where a slave or street urchin or down-and-outer reverses his luck through talent and gumption to success, fame and fortune. But Christianity (a faith that’s positively revels in paradox) features far more in riches to rags stories (that often still have, again paradoxically, happy endings). Take a look at Joseph, who started out rich, then was sold into slavery, got rich again, then was thrown in jail, then finally rose to political power where he saved his whole formerly estranged family. Or there's King David, who after a pretty good run as king of Israel, was usurped by his own son and forced to flee. He eventually reclaimed the throne, but learned a lesson or two from his experience. Everyone from Adam to Paul experienced a material fall of some sort. And indeed, you could cast Judea's Babylonian exile as a riches-to-rags honing. God often seems to be a proponent of the whole "no pain, no gain" school of thought: When we get too comfortable and self-assured, we find ourselves in a period of sometimes extreme discomfort, where we rediscover meaning and realign our priorities.

Dickens wrote a riches-to-rags-to-salvation story of his own, by the way: A Christmas Carol. In it, Ebenezer Scrooge begins the story rich and bitter. But through a night full of scourging, suffering and self-revelation—when he's shown his past impoverished state and comes to grips with his own present moral bankruptcy—he awakes to find himself a reformed man, rich in every sense of the word.

This is particularly interesting, considering that Iron Man 3's makers had A Christmas Carol in mind when they produced the thing, which explain why the summer's first blockbuster was set at Christmastime. Stark must deal with the "demons of his past," as he calls them, struggle with today's trials and recast the future in a more positive light.

But there's more at work here that feels even more spiritual. See, Stark isn't just stripped of his metal wonder suit as a sort of psychological boot camp: He must humble himself in order to be saved.

We all know that Stark, as Iron Man, is a superhero. Superheroes save people. And he does his share of saving here, too. But without his bulletproof suit, Stark is vulnerable. He's in the need of saving—and in this movie, he is saved, repeatedly. By his girlfriend. By his best friend. By some kid he meets in Tennessee.

And that, in a roundabout way, is a deeply Christian message as well. The faith tells us that we can't rely on our own powers (supercharged armor or no) for salvation. We can't save ourselves. We are in need of saving.

Now, I’m pretty sure the movie’s makers didn’t intend to slap in a spiritual metaphor. It doesn’t really feel like that kind of movie. Still, it is interesting. And a little profound, whatever the movie’s actual intentions might’ve been.

Would Superman Wear Superman Boxers?

So I was putting on my favorite pair of superhero boxers the other day, and I began to wonder: If Superman was in need of new underwear and he happened to see a pair of Superman-themed boxers in his local Walmart, would he buy them? Or would that be too weird?

This is not the first time I've asked myself questions along the same lines. Oh, not about underwear: I rarely get too obsessive about underwear. At least not to write a blog about.

But if clothes do make the man, what happens if a man wears clothes that have an image of the self-same man? Or even a symbol of that self-same man? Would it be unseemly, for instance, for Tim Tebow to buy a Tim Tebow replica NFL jersey? Does Jacqueline Smith actually wear Jacqueline Smith-branded clothing from Kmart? Would Che Guevara, if he were not dead, be comfortable wearing a designer Che Guevara T-shirt?

Once upon a time, I would've said that few celebrities would wear something so obviously connected with their celebrity. It would feel just too self-promotional. But that was before the Kardashians rose to power. Now everyone knows that promoting one's personal brand is practically a full-time occupation, no matter how bizarre it might feel.

Truth be told, I once when into a Barnes and Noble branch and bought one of my own books. It doesn't make much sense, really: I've got a box of the self-same books in my closet, and even if I didn't, I could probably just write the whole thing again if I was really desperate to read it again. But still, I figured that buying my own book might trigger a sudden sales riot: "Why, look at that wonderful book that man is buying!" I hoped to hear people say. "I must get one, too!"

Alas, I did not trigger a riot. No one even recognized my picture on the back of the book. Another branding experiment gone awry.

But back to the point.

Superman doesn't seem like he'd be interested in promoting his own Super brand. He doesn't seem to need the money, and he would be quite famous enough for lifting aircraft carriers and flying and stuff. And, unlike many reality stars, he doesn't seem the sort to bear his underwear in order to increase his, ahem, exposure.

As such, I'm almost positive that he, as Superman, would never buy himself Superman underwear at Walmart--not even if it was the only underwear left. And if someone gave branded underwear to him as a gift or part of a sponsorship package, he would likely try to give them away--to some sort of underwear-poor country in South America, perhaps. He's a modest fellow.

But Clark Kent--now, that's a different story. Superman's alter-ego might well buy Superman underwear. Indeed, he might actually seek it out. After all, any Lex or Lois would know that Superman would never, ever wear Superman underwear. Which would make Superman underwear a perfect disguise for Clark Kent. It would fool even more people than those glasses of his.

Batman, on the other hand ... It'd really be just an extension of all of his Bat-branded doodads: The Batmobile, the Batcave, The Bat-copter, the Batpole, the Batphone, The Bat-asprin located in his Bat-medicine cabinet in his Batroom. He'd buy Batman underwear in a Bat-flash.

Yeah, let's face it. Batman may be a tortured soul, but he knows all about branding.