I've been trying to ignore it but the time has come to hand out some credit to Iron Man. Deadline Hollywood is predicting a mammoth $75+ million opening this weekend and the flick is getting some very good reviews. Wil got an early preview and says "it's the best comic book movie since Sin City, and blows Transformers and the last two X-Men movies into oblivion." At first I thought that was pretty high praise, but then I realized that the last two X-Men sequels sucked and that Transformers has never been complimented as being high-art. It made ridiculous amounts of money -- they all did -- but when has that ever been a metric of quality? I could have Frank Miller shit in his hat or, if you don't know who he is, put an Apple sticker on my crap, and retire right then and there just off the accumulated interest.

What I wonder is if people would put Marvel's self-financed flick on the same level as Sin City, because if that's the case, then this is obviously a pretty big deal. Why? Because we're talking about one of the best films ever as far as I'm concerned, and as an unfortunate side effect -- not unlike allergy meds that make you bleed on the inside and lose all your hair before you finally die in agony just so you can stop sneezing -- it reminds us that we haven't had more Sin City since 2005. It also happens to be the first big flick for Robert Downey Jr. since god knows when and comes right before the release of Tropic Thunder, giving his career two huge shots in a matter of months.

Also answered apparently is the question of whether or not a comic/graphic novel can exceed its source material in quality. Says io9 -- thanks Wil for the link since I can't seem to tolerate reading most of their junk myself -- the answer is an enthusiastic yes.

With all things pointing green (big stacks) for Iron Man, I can't help but feel a little left out in the cold here. None of the trailers I've seen have drawn me in because for all the hype and praise, I still don't know what the movie is about. That's fine for cable and network syndication and even rental, but when you're spending $10 for the ticket, $10 for a $1 drink, and $3 in gas, I think they need to work a little harder at the pitch.

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