Before Don Cheadle took the reins on War Machine and managed to do quite a bit with a relatively smart part, Terrence Howard had the first turn as Colonel James Rhodes in the first Iron Man film. Based on his take on Rhodey though, it's probably a good thing that Howard never got to put on the War Machine armour. Rhodey is meant to be a tough and commanding leader, but Howard's performance was soft-spoken, meek, and definitely not leadership material. It was difficult to picture how such an unassuming guy could lead a bunch of troops into battle, let alone one day commanding the War Machine armour without needing to ask for a book of instructions. Not only was it tough to buy Howard as a high ranking officer in the military, his rapport with Robert Downey Jr. seemed more along the lines of a nagging house-wife than best friend. Thankfully, Howard was fired after the first film and replaced by the infinitely better Don Cheadle. Howard has still made occasional bitter-filled comments about how Marvel treated him and how they didn't want to pay him properly. This stuff might or might not be true, but here's a new theory, maybe they fired him because he just wasn't very good?