WarMachine Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Do you know what it's like to have the new War Machine just appear before you at a table? It's really kind of startling. Because I wasn't at the panel, I had no idea who (beyond Robert Downey Jr. and Jon Favreau, of course) was actually at ComicCon. But wham, suddenly there was Don Cheadle who just seemed to apparate into the chair from an unspecified location. It was like an Iron Man 2 parade which would have only been cooler if they'd been fresh off the set, and still in their costumes. Oh yeah, and obviously he was really nice, too ... and tall. Tall like War Machine!

Check out what Mr. Cheadle has to say on spin-off possibilities, on wearing the suit, on the relationship between Rhodey and Tony, and much more ...


So, that War Machine suit is pretty f--cking cool.

Pretty cool, yeah. I've got a couple of them in back. [laughs] On Ebay so, if anyone wants to jump in on that ...

What's the reserve?

I can't go too much into detail, but check them out!

[Reporter asks about the real chemistry Robert Downey Jr. discussed a few minutes before]

You know it's great, especially in a movie that has so much about it that isn't real, that has so [much] that you can't see, or touch, or feel, or understand -- to have an actor like Robert who is steeped in acting tradition, where we really are trying to go after real stuff, and feeling very similar to what I like to do. So it was very encouraging to be able to grab onto something that felt real in that whole huge thing that was Iron Man 2.

Go below the jump for the rest ...

As Jon Favreau Tweeted last week, Iron Man 2 begins filming today -- and while we still don't know what storylines the new film will tackle, we do know one that it won't: Demon in a Bottle.

Robert Downey Jr. brushed off the rumors with a "Not Really" to the MTV Splash Page. "As a matter of fact, I think that's probably best saved because it's such its own storyline. We're going for the interim space [between the origin and Demon] which is more a look behind the mask of someone who says he's Iron Man and what it really is to become a superhero."

That teaches us all not to read too much into a scene that involves Tony Stark puking into a toliet. But I bet we'll still see Stark knocking back a few, especially since Don Cheadle is supposed to don the War Machine armor.

In the meantime, the man who was supposed to be War Machine is still upset. Terrence Howard sat down with Sci-Fi Wire to complain about Marvel, who he insists didn't honor the cast contracts, but that the cast should have stuck together. All those rumors of diva behavior sound a little more truthful now, even as he wishes the best for Cheadle. "Yeah, I'm definitely looking forward to it. I want to see what happens with that. I want to see Don Cheadle become me. I want him to do better than me. That's what I really want to see. I think he can."

We know that Terrence Howard was upset and confused about being dropped from Iron Man 2. Robert Downey Jr. admitted he was in the dark about the decision. Guess who else was perplexed by it -- the new Rhodey himself, Don Cheadle.

IGN caught up with Cheadle, who was quick to describe the sudden and surprising offer from Marvel: "I got a phone call from my agent saying they were offering me the part. That was kind of it. It happened very fast, and I had a very short time to answer. Literally, overnight. I was unaware of what was happening with Terrence. And when they called me I asked what was going on with Terrence. I've worked with Terrence, I've known Terrence for a long time. And they said they were moving away from him. So it's not like I was taking Terrence's job, because the job was already gone. Someone else was going to do the part. I don't know who the next person in line was, but that's who they were going to. And I literally had a few hours to accept the job or not. "

And it sounds glorious! Jon Favreau is doing a lot of press for the upcoming Iron Man DVD, and he sat down with CHUD to give an interview so long, it's been split in twain. Naturally, talk turned to plans for Iron Man 2 and 3, which Favreau is deep in the process of writing. Among the highlights:

-- War Machine is likely to be in the sequel, as Terrence Howard's Col. Rhodes had too little screen time in the first film. They want to make up for that, and give him a crack at wearing the suit.

-- The Mandarin is the overarching, behind-the-scenes villain, but he comes with a lot of racial and superpower baggage that is difficult to put on screen. Starships, dragon aliens, and ten magic rings that can upset the power of the universe don't really fit into the realistic universe Favreau has aimed to put Iron Man in. And yes, Favreau is concerned about how the various Avengers will fit into that world, too. Hulk and Captain America are feasible (and the cross-over has pretty much been forced on the former), but he's not sure about Thor. (Who is?)

-- The recent hostilities between Russia and the U.S. have made a lot of Iron Man's arch enemies current again -- and we might actually see Crimson Dynamo pop up. (I vote yes, so we can get the Black Widow introduced to audiences.)

-- Demon in a Bottle is coming. Expect to also see some elements of Matt Fraction's Iron Man run pop up -- the movie and his work have a real symbiotic relationship going on. There may even be a partnership forming ...

Now, isn't that a nice way to start the weekend? There's more where that came from on CHUD, but remember to come back and geek out in the comments.

The following post may contain spoilers, so beware!

The entire Iron Man crew are currently making the press rounds (they'll be in NYC on Sunday, so expect a slew of quotes to come flying next week), and already director Jon Favreau knows exactly where he wants to go with the Iron Man sequels -- so much so that he's dropped a bunch of hints in the first film, due out May 1. He tells Rotten Tomatoes, "I've got another two movies in my head; I'm ready to go and I know the cast feels the same way," he said. "Now it's out of the hands of us, of the filmmakers, and it's even out the hands of your readers. I know all the people who have been following this for two years are going to go and see the movie, and maybe they'll see it twice and I'm very grateful for that. If everybody comes out to see the movie and it's successful, then I'm sure Marvel's going to want to do another."

Be careful with that RT article because they do spoil some stuff, like whether Samuel L. Jackson actually shows up in a cameo role as Nick Fury. But perhaps the biggest set up for a sequel -- spoiler warning -- comes when Jim Rhodes (Terrence Howard) glances at Stark's Mark II Iron Man suit and says to himself, "Next time baby." It certainly looks like the second film would involve Rhodes in costume, possibly as War Machine, but as IGN points out, Rhodes first dons another suit in the comics. Howard told them, "If you've read the comics you'll know that that is the next phase, but there is another intermediate phase in there where he would have to put on his best friend's suit for a period of time."