When 'Iron Man' came out, I said, 'Oh - they are trying to have some fun.' It was a relief because every superhero movie had become so damn serious. Some people love that, but for me, it's a weird thing to watch. A man with a cape can have fun, but I won't listen to a lecture from him.

You could say that Iron Man was a second-tier character, and it turned out very successfully. I simply think it's down to the movie itself, and whether people enjoy the movie, are involved in the movie, and that it entertains them. From that point of view, the movie has to stand alone.

I never got a chance to participate in one, but I wanted to be in an iron man match. I really just wanted to go in there and I remember pitching a couple of times too, and it wasn't necessarily for an iron man match, but I wanted to just go out there for a full hour and just do a match.

I learned this through Iron Man - it really doesn't matter what I think about who he is because everybody has such a huge idea about what they think the guy is. You can't just rely on your instincts and your imagination, you have to match up with what the expectations are from the people.

'Spider-Man' seems to have a different tone to the pure Marvel stuff, but I really enjoyed the 'Guardians Of The Galaxy' and 'Iron Man' movies. I love the special effects and how it seems very real, but at the same time, it still lives within the realm of Marvel. That's got to be a lot of work.

When Captain America is in a room full of Marvel superheroes, he is always Top Dog, even though his powers are pretty modest. He could be stood next to Thor, Iron Man, whoever. He is the one that everyone looks up to. To me, that is Superman, too. Even de-powered in the Legion arc, he was still Superman. Still Top Dog.

Eventually I got the call for 'Iron Man,' and I read sides that had nothing to do with what I did in the movie, and I performed it once while no one was in the room - it was videotaped, and I'm sure Shane Black was watching it from his helicopter or something. And then I got a call the next day that I was going down to shoot it.

I think that part of the reason that 'Iron Man' was so successful was that we really chose to break new ground in a new area tonally, cast wise, the way we depict the hero, what his abilities are. It felt fresh in a genre that is beginning to feel stale if it's not done with the proper amount of inspiration and a strong voice or tone.

'Iron Man 3' was very educational. There's a train that starts moving which already has so many moving parts, and it's a constant process of animatics and storyboards and consulting meetings, and it's a very mechanical process once the script is written. It's sprawling, and they're throwing money at it to get these things accomplished.

I make the joke, all the time, that if you have the word "man" and a number in the title, like Batman 2, Spider-Man 2 or Iron Man 12, you'll get it made. The kind of movies I make, studios don't make them. I've made a lot of movies, and at Castle Rock, we've made 125 movies. None of them get made at a studio. I've got to scrounge around for money, every time. I just like to tell stories. I'm a storyteller, so I want the most people to see it.

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