'Iron Man 3' Reviews *SPOILERS*

Now that you mention that I see your point. I now remember how Whiplash was doing his 'hack' job like he was doing near the end. I guess then the Justin Hammer character only thought he was in control whereas 'Killian' really was in control. Still though I see a similarity in the two characters even if one was more superficial or whatever word would be used to describe it. So in IM2 you have a blond dude thinking he's the Puppet Master when he's really the puppet. In IM3 you have the opposite. You have a supposed terrorist in 'the Mandarin' who's really the puppet instead of the one who's in control. So maybe things are reversed somewhat but I still came away with that feeling initially anyway.

Won't be long, IRON MAN 3 is about to join the billion dollar club. Pretty awesome to see it soar so high, especially when the last two didn't come anywhere near that milestone. I wouldn't be surprised if the reception of AVENGERS had anything to do with it, as that was a worldwide hit as well. Here's hoping THE DARK WORLD gets a nice boost.

^ Strange how relatively little of that is coming from America. The numbers are nothing to sneeze at though- $174 million for Weekend #1 and $72 million for Weekend #2. And yeah, ideally Avengers will help Thor... who, I think, needs a shot in the arm more than Iron Man.

I looked at Box Office Mojo last night & the domestic total was only like 298 million which still ain't anything to sneeze at & it has made back it's budget but the film's foreign total is what's so spectacular. This reminds me of other films where the domestic was so-so but it blew it out of the water when you go world-wide. You know, the kind of films where they have the domestic at like 29% & the foreign at 71%. This sort of thing never ceases to amuse me. But here's hoping that MAN OF STEEL blows them all out of the water!

I've noticed that trend with other franchises. The last PIRATES film was the lowest grossing film domestically, yet internationally it's the biggest the series ever had. SKYFALL made just over 300 domestically (though that is a major boost for that franchise domestically) while internationally it was as big as THE AVENGERS in that market. I'm very curious to see how well STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS does, as that franchise never was that big of a hit outside the states (one of the films didn't even get a theatrical release because of that).

IRON MAN may not be making AVENGERS numbers in the states right now, but I think in the long run it will still be a very impressive run once it passes 400 million.