10 Movies That Had A Bigger Impact Than You Realise

2. B-List Heroes Can Work - Iron Man

What it's known for: It wasn't really expected, but Iron Man shook up the superhero genre more than the likes of Spider-Man and Batman Begins. Although fundamentally it was a rather standard movie (the plot is the typical three act origin story and the action, once Tony Stark's escaped the cave, isn't that memorable), it brought something new to the table - continuity. In print these heroes were built around their crossovers and interactions, but due to rights issues this had never been exploited on screen. That is until Nick Fury popped up in Tony Stark's mansion in Iron Man's post-credit sting; things were changed forever. What it also changed: Considering Iron Man led to The Avengers and kick-started the who;e Marvel Cinematic Universe off it's easy to forget that his feature film was something of a last resort. Marvel was finally ready to step forward as a movie studio (the bankruptcy issues of the nineties were a distant memory), but they'd sold off all their big hitters and were left with only their lesser known properties. Before Robert Downey Jr. became Tony Stark, Iron Man was firmly in the superhero B-list, with the track record for this type of character (Daredevil, Ghost Rider) far from stellar. Iron Man, with Marvel going all in, changed all that, opening up whole new worlds of potential.