20 Must-See Billion Dollar Movies

13. Iron Man 3

iron man 3
Marvel Studios

Gross: $1,214,811,252 (#20 of All Time)

The Mandarin twist was completely hysterical and utterly brilliant. Glad we got that out of the way.

The MCU's third (and last) Iron Man solo film has been overshadowed for years by the uproar surrounding the aforementioned plot twist, which is infuriating because there's so much more to it than that.

It's got a fantastic script, great gags, delightful action sequences and one of Robert Downey Jr's best performances as Iron Man; let's not forget about that just because of one controversial story change.

This is the best Iron Man solo movie (and a great bounce back following the disastrous Iron Man 2) and proved that The Avengers had not been a fluke and that the MCU was here to stay. It's one of the MCU's strongest films even now, largely thanks to its ever-reliable star and writer-director Shane Black's terrific work on the movie.

Hey, at least it was better than the next MCU film, the franchise-worst Thor: The Dark World.

Contributor

Film Studies graduate, aspiring screenwriter and all-around nerd who, despite being a pretentious cinephile who loves art-house movies, also loves modern blockbusters and would rather watch superhero movies than classic Hollywood films. Once met Tommy Wiseau.