MCU: 10 Things You Learn Rewatching Iron Man 3

7. This Might Be Downey Jr.'s Best Iron Man Performance

Tony Stark Iron Man 3
Marvel Studios

When it comes to the MCU, not many have been able to embody their role as brilliantly as Robert Downey Jr. has. He just is Tony Stark, and while he was incredible in Captain America: Civil War, he may have conjured his best performance for Iron Man 3.

To Civil War's credit Stark did feature as a part of an ensemble, so it makes sense that Iron Man 3 gives the character more to do. It's his film after all, and in portraying a Tony at the end of his tether, suffering from the after-effects of his run-in with the Chitauri, Downey Jr. is given a license to explore the character fully. You truly get the sense that this is a man in need of urgent help, confiding in his machines instead of turning to his friends, and when it all boils over it looks real.

Iron Man 3 deals with a whole bunch of hefty themes, whether it be the War on Terror, the Military Industrial Complex or something else. The most pressing ones, however, are also the most personal; anxiety, depression and even PTSD are all broached, and in grounding Marvel's most larger than life character, Iron Man 3 finds real salience.

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Content Producer/Presenter

WhatCulture's very own resident movie guy, Ewan has been working in the content creation biz for over 10 years now, having started as a freelance contributor to WhatCulture Gaming all the way back in 2015. After graduating with a First-Class Honours in History from Northumbria University in 2017 (where he won a prize for a totally killer dissertation on the Watergate years), Ewan took on the role of Comics Editor at WhatCulture and quickly developed WhatCulture Comics into one of the biggest superhero-focused channels on YouTube. He followed this with a brief hiatus at Screen Rant in 2021, where he worked across the Gaming and Film sections as a writer and editor, before returning to WhatCulture as a Senior Content Producer / Presenter in 2023. He started his own podcast, We Love Dad Movies, in 2022, and has contributed several written pieces to the Eisner-nominated comics website Shelfdust as well. In his current role, Ewan incorporates his love of cinema, comic books, and history into written pieces and video essays for WhatCulture's Film & TV channel, as well as WhatCulture Gaming and WhatCulture Horror, with a particular focus on nineties-era Dad Movies, old school Westerns, and Golden Age Hollywood Noir. John Carpenter is his fave, and he thinks Batman Beyond should never have been cancelled. If that's your vibe, you'll probably like his stuff.