Flying the friendly skies in Iron Man. (Paramount Pictures)

The next few months at the multiplex are going to feel like some newfangled grouping of the Justice League of America. Batman, The Incredible Hulk and Hellboy will all soon be returning to the silver screen, fighting evil, their own personal demons and, more than likely, the poison pens of curmudgeonly critics. The first of these superhero spectaculars, Iron Man, arrives today, on tsunamis of advance press. And it sets the bar surprisingly high.

For those who gave up comics at puberty, a refresher course: Iron Man was born in 1963 in an issue of Marvel Comics’ Tales of Suspense. Boy genius Tony Stark – MIT student at age 15, inheritor of weapons manufacturers Stark Industries at 21 – is severely injured when one of his munitions plants blows up, embedding shrapnel near his heart. He is subsequently captured by North Vietnamese warlord Wong Chu – the original series took place against the background of the Vietnam War – who forces him to make weapons. Instead, Stark, with the aid of a fellow prisoner, builds a high-tech armoured suit. Then, in the political spirit of the time, Iron Man starts to kick Commie butt.

In each new comic incarnation, Iron Man’s origins have morphed as radically as his costume (once simply a bulky, gunmetal sheath). In each instance, he’s injured in a war: Vietnam, the first Gulf conflict and in the recent movie, Afghanistan. We first meet Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) as he’s crisscrossing the Afghan desert in a Humvee, highball in hand. AC/DC’s Back in Black blares from a boom box. “To peace,” he toasts wryly, downing his whiskey after giving the military a demo of his latest smart bomb.

Stark’s a billionaire industrialist and playboy, a breed not exactly known for its heroic ideals. Arrogant and narcissistic, Downey’s Stark is equal parts Bill Gates, Richard Branson and Charlie Sheen. He’s not just the smartest guy in the room, but also the sexiest and luckiest. Until, of course, his Humvee is blown up by someone using one of his missiles. Stark is captured by a Taliban-like outfit called the Ten Rings. Keeping him alive with a jerry-rigged electromagnet planted in his chest and powered by a car battery, the Ten Rings force Stark to build them a weapon of mass destruction. Political awakenings don’t come any more painful. Prodded by his fellow prisoner, Ho Yinsen, Stark quickly realizes his own complicity in this cruel foreign war. The first suit he builds is a crude cross between Robocop and Brad Bird’s The Iron Giant that allows him to fly and shoot flames from his wrists.

Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) tweaks his Mark III armour in Iron Man. (Paramount Pictures)

When Stark finally busts out of the cave he’s been secreted in, he returns to the U.S. and demands that Stark Industries cease making weapons immediately. Sure, it’s Barack Obama-era wish fulfillment – wherein self-interest turns to self-preservation and then self-awareness – but it lends Stark, and Iron Man, a complexity that’s rare in the comic-book movie universe.

Stark’s sudden peacenik transformation doesn’t sit too well with his old pal Obadiah Stane (a fiendish, natty Jeff Bridges), who’s a bit more committed, let’s say, to the company’s bottom line. As Stark holes up in his swank, high-tech Malibu HQ – which makes the Batcave look like your Dad’s garage workshop – to tinker with his suit, Stane sets out to destroy him.

Actor-director Jon Favreau has made three previous feature films: Made, Elf and Zathura, amiable entertainments all. Iron Man is similarly charismatic, playful, even warm. Favreau is comfortable with big-screen special effects, but not overly showy about it; he rarely lets them upstage the nuanced, even grown-up script by Children of Men’s Mark Fergus and Hawk Ostby. There are silly moments, to be sure; in one instance, Iron Man speeds halfway across the world in order to save a single Afghan villager. But these scenes are few and do not interfere with the film’s pleasures.

Much has been made of Iron Man as an allegory for Downey’s own post-addiction, post-prison resurrection. Regardless of the plausibility of this dimension, the actor fills the film with a wealth of sad-eyed charm. In the comic, Stark is brought low by alcoholism, something thankfully only hinted at in a couple of scenes. (At a party, Downey orders a Scotch with the line, “Quick, I’m starving.”) Downey is buff but not Brad Pitt-buff, seductive but not George Clooney-seductive. The film’s big, satisfying irony is that as Stark figures out how to turn his body into a magical machine, he learns how to be even more human.

Favreau has wisely surrounded Downey with deft supporting players. Bridges, bald and bearded (and gussied up in an enviable wardrobe), makes an excellent, even complicated villain. As Stark’s devoted assistant, Pepper Potts, Gwyneth Paltrow brings a freckle-faced freshness to a small role. Terrence Howard’s James Rhodes is a military officer and Downey’s best friend. It’s a part that’s mostly reactive but lays the groundwork for bigger things to come in the inevitable franchise.

Generic heavy metal riffs, an obvious pun, course through the movie, but the cover of Black Sabbath’s Iron Man isn’t heard until the end credits. The movie version of the song lacks lyrics, but Ozzy’s original final line says it all: “Iron man lives again!” Let the Summer of the Superhero begin.

Iron Man opens May 2.

Jason McBride is a Toronto writer.