Eleven movies later, and Iron Man still frequently comes out at #1 when people rank the Marvel Studios releases from best to worst. However, based on how it was made, it really is a surprise that it ended up being watchable at all, never mind a truly great superhero movie. The script that the actors were working off during filming only really focused on the story and action set pieces, so much of the movie's dialogue was either written during shooting or ad libbed. That's an unconventional approach to making a movie as big as Iron Man, but it obviously worked out well, and it's a method Marvel has since used for almost all of their releases (in terms of changing things as they go, not shooting without actual dialogue). Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau reportedly thrived with this approach, but it left Jeff Bridges more than a little stressed. He's since described the process as making "a $200 million student film", but admitted he enjoyed the challenge and that it turned out great.
