An Ain’t It Cool News reader attended a panel at the Omaha Film Festival on which filmmaker Shane Black was speaking and eventually he was asked about Iron Man 3, a movie he was rumored to be writing and directing last month, something that was never confirmed either by Walt Disney Pictures or Marvel Studios. Fans of Shane Black’s directorial debut Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang should be excited about seeing him reunited with Robert Downey Jr. as it was that film that helped Jon Favreau and Marvel make their decision to go with Downey for the role of Tony Stark in the first place.
Black told the film festival audience that he’s scheduled to meet later this week with Downey, who will be contributing to the story, and that Black himself will be writing the script as well as directing. Marvel Studios clearly must know that not everyone was happy with the previous sequel and Black said they’ve decided to focus on Iron Man and Tony Stark for the third movie, rather than bringing in other heroes from the Marvel Universe. And according to Black, they plan on going back to "self-contained single-character stories" following The Avengers.
Black also told the audience:
"Iron Man 3 will not be another ‘two men in iron suits fighting each other’ film. Instead, it will be more like a Tom Clancy-thriller, with Iron Man fighting real world villians."
This is certainly an interesting take on the character that’s not too far removed from some of the better Iron Man comic book stories from the ’80s, and maybe that means will be seeing the likes of Spymaster and Madame Masque in the third movie. Who knows? Maybe we’ll even see Downey and Black reunited with their Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang co-star Michelle Monaghan in the latter role, even if that would be quite a drastic departure from the "nice girl" roles she normally plays.
Either way, look for a lot more developments on this exciting direction for Iron Man 3, which is currently set for a May 3, 2013 release
