Ironheart Season 1 Review

This is a DynaMic Network Podcast. 

Hi, welcome to the Dynamic Duel podcast, a weekly show where we review superhero films and debate the superiority between Marvel and DC by comparing their characters in stat-based battle simulations. I'm Johnny DC. 

And I'm his twin brother, Marvelous Joe. And in this episode, we're going back to doing one of our review episodes, this time a review of the Marvel television series, Ironheart, on Disney+. Yeah, it's been a while since we've done a review. 

I don't think we've done one since the Thunderbolts movie came out. We've been getting through a lot of the duel episodes, but this whole month of July is going to be jam-packed with reviews. Yeah, not only are we reviewing Ironheart, but also Superman next week and two weeks after that, Fantastic Four. And then the week after that, Sandman season two. So we hope you get out there and watch this stuff, listen to our reviews, and then we'll get back to the duels. Yeah, but before we get to our review, we're going to break down the comic book movie news to come out this past week, which is a lie because there was none. Yeah, I do want to say R.I .P. Julien McMahon, who played Dr. Doom in the 2005 Fantastic Four franchise. He died of cancer at age 56, which is way too young, way too fucking young. So thoughts and condolences to his family and friends. 

As always, we list our segment times in our episode description, so feel free to check out the show notes if you want to skip ahead to a particular topic. Our artificially intelligent duel simulator, AJ9K, has a quick message for our listeners. So listen up. 

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Thanks AJ9K and thanks to everyone who supports the podcast. Guys, be sure to tune in to the other shows on the DynaMic podcast network this week, including the console combat podcast, where hosts John and Dean simulate battles between popular video game characters. In yesterday's episode, they determined who would win between Crash Bandicoot and Bubsy. 

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Visit dynamicpodcast.com or click the link in our show notes to listen to all of the shows in the DynaMic podcast network. But with that out of the way, quick to the no prize. A no prize is an award that Marvel used to give out to fans. Our version, the dynamic duel no prize, is a digital award we post on Instagram for the person that we feel gave the best answer to our question of the week. Last week, we asked you guys, what movie do you think we'll be making more at the Worldwide Box Office? 

Superman or Fantastic Four First Steps and why? And this question pertains to the entire theatrical run at the Worldwide Box Office. We got a lot of answers. Let's go ahead and run down our honorable mentions as well as the no prize winner. Our first honorable mention goes to Daniel Alonzo. Who said? 

Oh, Fantastic Four is going to destroy Superman. I mean, people that aren't even superhero fans want to see Pedro Pascal. So that alone is going to bring people Marvel fans have been waiting for a great Fantastic Four movie, which this looks amazing. I mean, I like the thing, but I've never been a fan of Fantastic Four and neither have my brothers and we're all hyped to see this movie. But Superman, dude, Superman sucks. Like, and not even DC fans want to watch this one. What hope do they have? Really? 

I don't know, Daniel. I'm a DC fan. I want to watch it. Maybe you suck. No, I think he's right. I think you guys have no hope. I mean, like he said, the Fantastic Four First Steps movie has Pedro Pascal. What star our audience is going to see in the Superman movie? Rachel Brosnahan, bro. Really? Freakin' Miss Maisel. Yeah. Okay, okay. Great answer, Daniel. Our next honorable mention goes to Matt from Texas. Who said? 

Hey guys, Matt from Texas here. I'm going to preface this by saying I am going to see both of these movies. But for the film, my feel is going to make the most worldwide. It's probably going to be Fantastic Four. 

Both have been getting a lot of hate online. Superman more than Fantastic Four. And I feel like more people enjoy the MCU and want to see how this movie is going to connect to all the future films coming out. And not many people care about another Superman film. 

You know what really? Like I'm only seeing hype for this movie. I think in general, there's a lot of hate for the superhero genre online, which saddens me because you know, this is peak cinema just a few years ago. 

And all of a sudden, you know, the genre isn't as in vogue as it once was pre-COVID. I just see a lot of uninformed opinions when I scroll around out there and it just, you know, it pisses me off to no end. So I've been kind of staying off social media more than I already usually do. 

Because every time like a Fantastic Four TV spot or Superman image comes across my feed, it's just nothing but negativity. Great answer, Matt. Our next honorable mention goes to Travis Herndon, who said, What's up, dynamic dudes? 

Travis here, shout out to me in between. So my answer would be Fantastic Four. Why? Because Superman movie is a dime a dozen. We have multiple Superman movies throughout the years. Now you can make the same argument about Fantastic Four. But here's the thing, Fantastic Four is back at Marvel. It's back home with people that know what the hell they're doing with it. Plus, it's part of a bigger overarching story that's going on. Meanwhile, Superman is just a simple Superman movie. 

You know what else is back home, Travis? Me at your mom's house. Since when are you so good with your insults? Like, I put you down all the time when you never have good comebacks. I don't know, man. It just gets to me when people talk about it at Superman. I think he makes a good point, though, in that this Fantastic Four movie is to the Fantastic Four franchise as Spider-Man Homecoming was to the Spider-Man franchise. You know, there have been multiple iterations of this throughout the years, but I think people are aware that now that the franchise is back with Marvel Studios is going to be more true to the spirit of the characters than ever before. I just have a really hard time believing that people are really excited for a Fantastic Four movie. Being that, like Travis said, we have had multiple Fantastic Four movies. They haven't done as well as the best Superman movie, both box office wise and critically. Like, we have yet to get a good Fantastic Four movie. Which is why people are craving one. No one's craving a Superman movie when they could just go back and watch, you know, the Christopher Reeve movies, right? 

Or Man of Steel, depending on, you know, what decade they grow up in. But a great answer, Travis. We want to give a quick shout out to Kai-O-G, Lorenzo Valdes, and Peter Troll for taking the time to visit our website and leave an answer. Thank you guys so much. But the winner of this week's still prize is Alex Albro. Who said? 

Hey guys, I think it'll ultimately be Superman making more money largely because it comes out first. I think the Fantastic Four is more cast appeal, but I really do think the success of the Fantastic Four is somewhat based on Superman. Even good Marvel movies recently have been tracking with low numbers, and even though both are team-up movies and all that, I think just the rebirth of the universe and just the great American hero, Superman is more attractive to just the general casual fan, as well as, you know, the hardcore fans are going to show up either way. 

You know what else is more attractive to the casual and hardcore fans, Alex? Your answer. Very well said, my friend. I also like his point that people seem to be kind of soured on the MCU as of late, as evidenced by the recent box offices of Marvel films of late. Like Deadpool and Wolverine, which made over a billion dollars? No. I'm talking about Captain America, Brave New World, and Thunderbolts. 

Oh, yeah. Well, I mean, if anybody's gonna save the MCU or the superhero genre at the box office, I can guarantee you it's not gonna be DC. It's gonna be Superman, of course it is. 

Who else would it be? It's gonna be Marvel itself that pulls itself out of its own fire. And it'll, if you're lucky, bring DC up with it. I feel like you're gonna learn a very hard lesson this year and I'm here for it. I'm here for that growth experience you're about to have. When have I ever learned a hard lesson in the course of this podcast? And how many hard lessons have you learned, Jonathan? 

I mean, enough to know how wrong you are. Okay. All right. 

So as per usual, I think we mentioned this on the podcast already. Jonathan and I have a bet going as to which of these films actually will grow more at the Worldwide Box Office in their theatrical runs. Jonathan has yet to win one of these like annual bets that we make. So stay tuned to see if that changes later on this year. Spoiler alert, it won't. And once again, this motherfucker's gonna owe me money. Remember this, folks. 

Jokes on you, I've never paid once. That's true. I do want to point out that we went with Alex for the no prize win, but everyone else who answered besides those who got the honorable mention answered with Superman. So actually Superman did get a majority of the answers from our listeners. You can't prove that. You can't prove anything. But great answer, Alex Albro. You win this week's no prize. If you, the listener, want to shout out winning your own no prize, stay tuned to later on this episode when we'll be asking another question of the week. 

And now that that's done, onto the question of the week. For those of you who have seen Superman in its opening weekend, what did you think? Yeah, give us your best 30 second review. We'd love to play in our next episode in which we're reviewing the Superman movie. Record your answer at dynamicduld.com by clicking on the red microphone button in the bottom right hand corner of the screen, which will prompt you to leave us a voicemail. 

Your message could be up to 30 seconds long. And don't forget to leave your name in case we include you on the podcast. We'll pick our favorite answer and award that person a dynamic dual no prize that we'll post to Instagram. Be sure to answer before July 13th. Right, because on July 13th, we'll be recording the next episode. But now let's go ahead and move on to the main event of this episode where we review the Marvel television original series on Disney plus Iron Heart season one. Okay, Iron Heart six episode first season was produced by a Marvel television created by Chinaka Hodge and stars Dominique Thorne, Anthony Ramos, Alden Ehrenreich and Sasha Baren Cohen. 

It was executive produced by Ryan Coogler, the director of Black Panther Wakanda Forever, where the Iron Heart character made her first live action appearance. In it, Riri Williams was an MIT student who engineered a vibranium detecting machine, which is a rare metal which had been heavily sought after by the world's governments. She was brought in by the Wakandans for protection from Namor and the telekinesis, building a vibranium suit of armor for the battle between the nations. At the end of that story, Shuri, the new Black Panther, made Riri leave the armor behind and return to MIT. We knew by the time of Wakanda Forever's release that an Iron Heart series was being produced and I remember at the time being less than excited because I wasn't a huge fan of Riri as a character in that film. If you listen to our review of Wakanda Forever, I think I remember saying that Iron Heart felt inconsequential despite being the catalyst for the events in the film and that I thought Dominique Thorne was less than capable of leading Korone series as an actor. I think if I would have known then what I know now, I would have been a little more excited for this Iron Heart season because not only were most of my earlier concerns dispelled, but there were a lot of interesting themes and characters at play here in this season. Ultimately, I think that the Iron Heart series is worth watching for fans. I'm not sure general audiences will get much out of it because it doesn't seem like essential watching, but if you're interested in smaller and more personal stories and getting some world building from the magic side of the MCU, be sure to watch Iron Heart season one prior to listening to the rest of this review because we will be delving into spoilers here. 

Yeah, I think I would recommend it as well, which is something that's kind of surprising for me because I went into the show with the lowest of expectations. I was not really looking forward to watching this at all, but not only did it surpass my expectations, maybe because they were so low, maybe not, but also a lot of the preconceived notions I had about the series in general turned out to be way wrong. Yeah, the marketing was a little off for the series and I'm not entirely sure why. It almost seems like Marvel or Disney thought that the show would be less well received than it probably is. I mean, it's doing well among critics, maybe not by fans. 

It's hard to gauge this early out, but yeah, I would say I recommend it largely because of the deep themes that I think the show successfully addresses. You know, we're talking repressed trauma, sins of the fathers, selfishness versus heroism, the validity of artificial sentience, and the central question at hand, which is how far will you go to get what you want? What lines would you or wouldn't you cross and why? It's a great question and the idea of superhero selfishness is largely ignored in Marvel and DC films and shows because for the most part, comics deal with uncommonly upstanding selfless individuals. Right, heroism is selfless. 

And realistically, a lot of people who would receive these superpowers would have to decide to what degree they would use them to serve themselves and or others on the fact that Riri makes so many of her choices in her own interest. And even at the expense of others, it definitely doesn't make her heroic. But she's also not really a villain, even if she and others question that in the course of the season. And especially when you consider the reasons behind her reason behind her armor. Right, that's a question that's posited to her multiple times like why are you doing this? And often her answer is because I can. 

Yeah, right. They asked her why the suit? Why is the money to complete it so important? Why was that worth getting expelled? 

Why was that worth stealing for? As you said, she responds with because I can and for a lesser series, maybe that would be enough in terms of motivation and maybe that reasoning would speak to the self assurance and hubris of the hyper intelligent. But the show goes deeper because because is not really an answer. So as we learn for Riri, it was all a trauma response. And she was obsessed with building her suit out of the unprocessed grief of witnessing her best friend and dad bleed out in front of her. From out of that, you know, she was smart. She knew there existed a president of an armored hero who could protect people in Iron Man. So she became hyper focused on making an armor because she didn't know how else to process her emotions. I thought that was fantastic. 

I thought that was a really well done exploration. But even beyond that, because we all know building a suit alone doesn't make you heroic, you know, you have to help people and Riri mostly just helps herself in the show. What's fascinating is that the series actually addresses that in the final episode, the hood calls her out saying, you thought you were one of the good guys. What are you doing with that armor? You're not rescuing people from burning buildings or saving car crash victims. And I thought that was a particularly complex moment because, you know, she kind of was helping others and preemptively fighting the hood to protect her family and friends. But she was also fighting for the artificial life that she created. And while the show never explicitly discusses the value of digital sentience and whether that's really worth fighting for, I like how at least the topic was addressed. Yeah, it was very timely, especially with the advent in recent years of AI and its common use. Well, yeah, I don't know if something like chat GPT could really be considered an artificial intelligence or if it's just, you know, a conversation, but I don't know enough about the technology to really comment on that. But I will say that I'm not really willing to steal or cross other ethical boundaries for the sake of my chat GPT conversations at this moment. Well, I mean, you say that, but it's not like you have an AI programmed to respond and look like a loved one who has passed away. 

That's valid. I'd have to think about that. Just the fact that I think that may be possible now is kind of terrifying. It's interesting, for sure, for sure. 

And it does make me wonder how AI chat technology will be used in the future in that regard, missing loved ones and stuff like that. This is all to say, Iron Heart season one touched on some heavy shit. And that's just like a part of the thematic bits. We'll talk more about the themes when doubling into characters like the hood. But I think the best thing about the show is that beyond the special effects and the plot turns and the acting, there was this subtext of something deeper. 

Right, definitely a subtext. I don't know if it's delved deep enough in any kind of meaningful way to be satisfying. It definitely didn't. But I did appreciate that it broached certain subjects, I guess. 

Yeah, I agree. The themes were great, but they don't always make a good show alone, right? You need the other elements there for a quality superhero show, including, oh, you know, sticking the landing at the end. 

The worst thing about the show probably was the ending. I thought it was way too ambiguous as to whether or not we were looking at a vision of the future where Riri sold her soul to Mephisto, or maybe she didn't sell her soul. I probably think that she did, but that would also take the series down a route that I wouldn't want it to go, because then she's probably got to get her soul back. And then the show is going to dive deeper into the magic stuff, and Riri really belongs in the world of science fiction, you know, the tech side of Marvel. 

Yeah, no, I agree. I despised this ending. I couldn't believe that they ended this season this way, especially because even Ryan Coogler has admitted that he doesn't know where Riri is going to appear next, whether they're going to have a second season of the show, or what. Right, the Marvel mid-credit and end credit scenes were great back in the beginning when we knew that for sure these upcoming projects were greenlit and confirmed. When the fate of a franchise is kind of up in the air and we don't know what's coming next, it can be highly frustrating when things are ambiguous, because we don't know if they'll ever get resolved. We've had a number of post-credit and mid-credit scenes from Marvel now that are left dangling. 

There's so many loose plot threads that I think I've lost track. Also, one thing I didn't like about the show were some of the acting. Aside from, you know, the main cast, I thought the supporting cast was a little bit cheesy, especially with the hoodscrew, clown slug, and the blood siblings. I thought we're not great actors if they even were actors, and I don't think they were good adaptations of their comic book counterparts, which I guess is forgivable because they're obscure, but what's less forgivable is that they were cheesy. 

Well, they were borderline caricatures by the end. Right, in the comics, the blood siblings are aliens. They're called the blood brothers, but here they made them either female or non-binary. One or the other slug was, I think, trans, and then clown. 

I wasn't quite sure which clown she was an adaptation of in the comic books, but they kind of brought down the show, I think, and it's not because of the gender fluidity of the group. I'm all for representation. I mean, Iron Heart herself is an example of representation within Marvel comic books, where they decided to bring this kind of like hidden figures type element with a strong black smart woman taking on the Iron Man legacy. But if you're going to have representation in your show, you got to make sure it's done well, otherwise it's just going to put people off. Well, you have to make sure it's believable. You know, when it's not believable, it's just pandering, and I feel like the same way about the blood siblings. Like, I didn't think they could kick anyone's ass. Yeah, I don't know if they were actual aliens on the show, but maybe they were, and maybe that's why they were so formidable. 

It wasn't addressed regardless. Now, I would agree with you when I came to the supporting cast of the Hood's crew, but I actually liked the acting of Riri's supporting cast from Natalie to Xavier, and even her mom, Ronnie, I thought did a fantastic job. Oh, for sure. Yeah, they were all great. The third thing that I didn't appreciate about the season were the number of plot holes. 

There were a lot of fucking plot holes, maybe not quite as much as Secret Invasion, but I definitely want to address them in the course of this review to see if maybe we could get answers. But first, let's get into our character breakdown. Starting with Ironheart, aka Riri Williams, played by Dominique Thorne. Man, I was so much more impressed with Dominique Thorne's acting in this series. She legitimately blew me away with the reality of her performance as Riri. So much so, that I was shocked that I ever even doubted her. 

I felt like a piece of shit. Well, she was given so much more to work with in this show than she was in What Kind of Forever. I agree. I that she gave a fantastic performance in this series. 

Absolutely. Like when she was feeling defensive and like no one else could help her with her problems, I was like, just leave her alone. And when she had panic attacks, I was like, breathe, girl, you're gonna pass out if you don't breathe. Like I was into her performance. 

It was just so believable. I'm still not sure she entirely has the presence yet, but I will say that at the end of the show, that giant afro really helped. I wish she had that all the time because when I finally saw her with the classic Riri look, I was like, holy shit, that's her. That's Riri Williams. And I feel like I saw the character for the first time. 

I thought the same thing, actually. I much preferred the afro. That was a cool look. 

Yeah, it's a staple of the character in the comic books. And I got to say Dominique Thorne rocked it. Now Riri's arc was complex as we discussed a little bit earlier. When you look at Natalie's origin, how that intelligence emerged from Riri's brain while she was mapping it for her AI system. 

That's actually straight from the comic books. Riri mapped her brain for her suit system and was surprised to see her late friend from childhood show up. In the comic books, that's treated as more of kind of like a novel oddity than like a psychological reveal. I like to think that the showrunner saw that moment from the books and decided to explore that more and explore the grief behind that and maybe make it the reason behind everything. And emotional trauma can be an acceptable means of letting your character be a little morally loose. Because like look at the Punisher. The only reason we as comic book readers accept his immoral behavior is because we can see the psychological reasoning behind it. So in hindsight, we can say, okay, Riri, you stole and you played Robin Hood. 

And now we know why it's fascinating. But I do think that it brings up two big issues. One is that it doesn't make Riri particularly endearing because she's a thief. It's not a huge issue because you still root for her despite wanting to flick her upside the head a few times. But the second and more important thing is that I feel like there's a plot hole in that someone as intelligent as Riri would find a better way to earn money. Riri says at one point that she's doing this stealing because she has to. But I don't understand why she sees it that way. Why would her options be so limited if she's one of the most brilliant engineers on the planet? Right. She was creating all kinds of gadgets at the beginning. 

That's how we're introduced the character at the beginning of this series at least. So why not sell those? Exactly. Like she can make a fortune selling her advanced AI or the force field watches or something like that. I really don't believe for a second that she felt that she had to resort to crime. 

Maybe it was her impatience that led her to do that. But that goes back to point one where she's not very endearing. I don't know if she wasn't endearing. I think sometimes she wasn't likeable. But I think the struggle she had, the moral one, made her slightly endearing because she was doing bad things. But she had a moral code. 

She knew what she was doing was wrong. It never really identified as a thief because of that moral code, you could say. And it made for a really compelling thematic arc. It was kind of like watching to see how far she would kind of spiral down and how she would get herself out of that. Yeah, kind of developed into an arc of redemption to see how she would overcome these failings of guilt that she had. Which made the ending that much more tragic, I would say. 

Yes. And that much more heartbreaking, not only because it wasn't satisfying, but also because it kind of broke her arc, I would say. Yeah, she didn't really redeem herself, it seems like. 

And so it left her arc incomplete and the audience without closure. Such a bizarre choice. So really. 

Yeah. Regarding the iron heart suit, I was really hoping for a final suit design at the end that looked more like the main one that she wears from the comic books, or at least the pink, black and gold one. And readers of the comics should know what I'm talking about. I don't think it would have to be pink in live action. 

I think you can still go red because the pink is probably a little bit too dainty for Dominique Thorn's version of iron heart, who's a little bit rougher than the comic book reary. But in the comic books, that design is really sleek and awesome and not bulky like in the show. Well, I liked the final suit. 

It probably didn't have enough color, you're right. But I did like that they used pieces from the barracuda that her dad built her to create it. I thought that was pretty cool. 

Yo, she and her dad built it. And yeah, that was a really nice touch, for sure. Let's go ahead and move on to the hood, aka Parker Robbins, played by Anthony Ramos. Dude, Anthony Ramos almost carried this entire season. I thought his performance was fantastic. I first saw him in Hamilton. I really haven't seen him in much else, but he's an incredible actor. He's really good. I've seen him in Hamilton and Twisters and in the Heights. 

The dude can kind of do it all. And while I thought that initially he was going to be pretty shallow and this was just like a petty revenge kind of arc, when we learned that this was all because his dad abandoned him, that blew me away. The character was really cool once I learned that. 

Yeah, his whole arc is that he was trying to get back what he felt was kept from him when he was kicked out of his house at the age of 12 by his rich father. That reveal was fantastic. And when you can understand the motivations of a villain like the hood, it makes things so much more interesting because suddenly you're kind of rooting for the villain. Right, the villain becomes sympathetic. The character was so good that I'm convinced that's why they had the mid-credit scene that they did, where instead of being defeated, it looks like they were wanting to continue the hood story arc. Does he become a whole sympathy angle? 

Otherwise, you're going to have an Ezekiel stain type situation, which we'll get into a little bit later. But first, I want to address the plot hole of why didn't the hood just go straight to his father? Like, why did he decide to go this all-round about way and hire a crew and introduce a ton of liabilities and variables to the situation? He could have just literally gone to his father and threatened him to get his estate. Well, he wanted more than the estate. 

He wanted... It was interesting because the hood only went after organizations that were affecting poor Chicago communities. So he had somewhat of an ethical grounding. But then, you know, he's out there having his cousin kill the Rampage guy and tie up loose ends. So I don't know if the hood was maybe a corrupting influence on him because it also seemed in the flashback scenes that he wasn't a 100% evil guy. Well, I kind of took his whole ethical approach to the companies they targeted, not as genuine I took that as a way to manipulate his crew to get them on board. Yeah, I think that's totally valid for sure. Great character, great character in that regard. 

Yeah. What did you think of the actual hood? I thought it looked cool. You know, it looked like straight out of the comic books. It looked old, but kind of stylish. 

I thought it was going to look cooler. Not going to lie. Really? Like what? 

I don't know. I think I expected something that maybe fit a little bit better. It was a little bit more flowy and supernatural looking. It was a little heavy. Like it was made out of leather or something. 

Maybe if it was made out of like a lighter fabric, it would have flowed more, but I didn't mind it at all. I did like the scarring that was going on with him and like how they were trying to cover it up with tattoos and how the tattoos got more elaborate as each episode progressed. I thought that was really cool. And I also liked the nod to characters like Cassilius, how they were tainted and physically affected when they kind of made deals with these dark entities. 

Yeah, that is interesting. I guess I didn't think about the tie into Cassilius, but yeah, his body was getting all fucked up too in his dealings with Dormammu. What's interesting is that in the comic books, Parker Robbins got the hood by killing a demon that was wearing it who had ties to Dormammu. So his hood did get his power from the dark dimension and they kind of had an Easter egg reference to that in the show because Zelma thought that the hood came from Dormammu. 

Though later it was revealed to be Mephisto behind everything. Let's go ahead and move on to Ezekiel Stain, played by Alden Ehrenreich. Now I like Alden as an actor. 

I think I've only seen him in solo. I wasn't sure what to think of the character from the marketing because Joe McGillicuddy was an alias. But once he was revealed as Ezekiel Stain, I was like, yes, like this guy definitely deserves to be a villain within the Iron Man franchise. And I was kind of disappointed that they transformed the character into a more sympathetic henchman type role. It was really hard to get a beat on the character because on one hand, you know, he was a tech ethicist and he didn't have like malicious intentions, really. But also he was a black market dealer and seemed to have this kind of dark streak to him. The show kind of seemed to want it both ways with this character. 

And that was kind of unsatisfying. I did think it was cool that they made him the son of Obadiah Stain. Is that a real character from the comics? 

Yes. Yeah, Zeke Stain is Obadiah Stain's son. He was a second Iron Monger and he is interesting because he takes a more biotech route with his superpowers just like in the show. 

OK. And he developed a way for the body to use like 90 percent less energy and the energy gets transmitted into these energy enhancements that he has on his body. Very similar to how he was in the show. Does he have a different look in the comic? 

Because I kind of feel like they missed an opportunity to make him more monsterish, almost like Frankenstein's monster. Well, he's more of like a cyborg and he can like manifest it to look more like a suit of armor, but he's always part machine, part human. And that's kind of his whole shtick as an Iron Man villain. 

It's less about creating a suit of armor and more about merging man and machine to become a true Iron Man. Yeah, I think they missed an opportunity to make the character more tragic. He ended up being kind of lame in the way that he was just kind of a puppet. I didn't like that. 

Well, he lost the fight by getting kicked in the balls, right? Yeah, I was weird. I love that. Didn't love that for him, especially since he's a lot more formidable in the books. And I guess during that first fight, he was quite the force of nature, but the second fight was just disappointing and embarrassing. I'll say, though, that it is nice that Marvel is revisiting some of its earlier plots in projects like this one and like Captain America Brave New World. Oh, yeah, totally. 

I definitely got excited when they found a way to squeeze an element of the Iron Man movies into the show for sure. Let's go to move into our final character. We're going to discuss and that is Mephisto played by Sasha Baron Cohen. Now, he only had a small part in the show. He was only in the final episode, but you know, Sasha Baron Cohen is a pretty big actor who's led some of his own films. And I thought his approach to the role of Mephisto was pretty interesting. I don't know if you noticed, but in Mephisto's conversation with Riri in the reflection of his spoon, you can see the actual demonic looking character. Oh, I did not catch that. 

Really? Oh, dude, you got to go back and look at that because it's scary as hell. Like, I don't know if you've seen the film in Sidious or if you know of that classic shot where the demon guy is poking out behind Patrick Wilson's head. But it felt kind of like that. Like he has these glowing eyes and he's all red. It's really fucking creepy. 

And I was really pleased with that look. Oh, I just googled it. Yeah, no, I didn't need to see that. I was hoping that they would give a full on reveal of the Mephisto character. But in hindsight, I kind of like this a little bit more where he's almost like too evil to actually look at outside of the demonic appearance. You know, the overall approach that they seem to take with the character was this very Faustian type angle where, you know, he is a smooth talking deceiver. 

Right. He'll grant any wish you have in exchange for your soul, essentially. Yeah, very charismatic. I could see why they went with Sushabar and Cohen for this particular role because he has the range in that he can be conniving but also charming and convincing. And he did this weird thing with accents that really made you feel like he was a being of the world and had been doing this for a while. 

I'm just glad he didn't break into his Kazakhstan accent. And my name is Mephisto. I like sex. 

It's nice. I was trying to figure out why they even incorporated someone like Mephisto into an Iron Heart series. But it does make sense in terms of the theme of how far will you go for the things you want? What bigger price is there than, you know, your own soul dealing with a character like the devil himself? So then it kind of clicked for me why he was here. Well, I also think it's appropriate that he's in a show that deals with the morality of good and evil. When Riri is trying to choose the path between good and bad to have the ultimate adversary be the embodiment of bad, of evil, I thought that was an interesting approach. And what's also interesting is that it seemed like she did sell her soul. I don't like. 

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Let's go ahead and move on into the episode highlights. The first episode was called Take Me Home. In it, Riri Williams requests for MIT to extend her grant to rebuild the Iron Heart armor is denied and she's expelled from the school after getting caught completing assignments for other students in exchange for money for her work. Riri takes off in her new suit of armor to her hometown of Chicago, but she is locked out of the suit en route. After crashing and gathering the pieces, she returns home, where it's revealed that she, her mother, Ronnie and her friend, Xavier, are still grieving the deaths of Riri's late friend, Natalie and stepfather, Gary, who were both killed in a drive by shooting. She's approached by John, the cousin of Parker Robbins, aka the Hood, to join their crew. After passing a booby trapped audition, Riri is hesitant to join, but the hood convinces her with financial compensation and the promise that their theft will serve the community. Back home, Ronnie suspects something is wrong and probes Riri, suspecting she has unprocessed grief. 

After falling asleep while mapping her brain to create a new AI for her armor, Riri awakens to see that the intelligence is a recreation of Natalie. Now, one of the signs of a good character is that they have what's known in literary terms as a ghost, because it's something that haunts them from the past, whether it's shame or guilt or loss. I find it really fascinating that they gave Riri a literal ghost in Natalie. I thought that was really smart because she absolutely is haunted by Natalie. So for her to pop up accidentally was a great source of conflict throughout the whole season. They did it really well. 

Absolutely. And they could have based the entire season off of that conflict alone. And maybe they should have spent more time on it. But yeah, it was so well done, especially progressing through the episodes where it culminated with Natalie believing she's real and trying to meet her brother, Xavier, him rejecting her and then ultimately her dying, essentially, and Riri coming to terms with how much that AI meant to her, despite being standoffish with it at the beginning. 

Fascinating stuff. It was hands down the best part of this series by far, I think. I was really surprised to see Eric Andre show up in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. He played a character called Stuart Clark, also known as Rampage in the comic books. I thought it was funny how he kept trying to get people to call him Rampage in the show. But Rampage was the successor, basically, to Micro and he assisted the Punisher in the comics. 

And I think it would be fucking awesome if it turns out that Stuart didn't actually die. And then he ends up teaming up with John Berndthal's Punisher character. All right, he would be a great foil for that character. 

Yeah, he's such a great comedian. Now, is John a character in the comics? Yeah, the cousin John. 

His name is John King. He's the hood's cousin as he is in this show. And he's part of his gang. He helps him out. At one point, he gets recruited into another gang called the Zodiac. And I think that was the only time he had superpowers. 

But yeah, otherwise, he basically serves the same function that he did in the show in the comic books. Cool, let's get to know. Episode two was called, Will the real Natalie please stand up? While trying to come to terms with the Natalie she created, Riri meets with the hood's crew to discuss extorting the CEO of a new underground private highway system called Tunnel. Needing more parts to complete her armor before the job, Natalie helps Riri track down a black market arms dealer named Joe McGillicuddy in the Chicago suburbs. 

He takes her to his arms bunker and Riri finishes her armor before the heist. The crew's hacker, Slug, gives Riri a computer virus on a flash drive, though she's startled by Natalie and loses it. Improvising, Riri helps the crew still pull off the job with hood teleporting into the CEO's car and extorting her. Escaping the underground tunnels, Ironheart is confronted by a guard at gunpoint and Natalie freezes. The hood saves her with magic bullets, covering Riri's escape back home. 

At the hideout, John tattoos over the hood's magic scars, which grow worse the more he uses his cloak. Now could the hood teleport? I didn't think he could. I thought he could just turn invisible. Is it like Frodo? Yeah, he could teleport, he could turn invisible, he can imbue weapons with Hellfire. 

He's a pretty cool character and we're definitely going to use him in a duel in the near future. But his power set does speak to another plot hole that I have in that, you know, forget the fact that he probably could have gone straight to his father. Why couldn't he just go straight to the CEOs? Why did he need all these elaborate plans when he can literally sneak by anything and just show up like in their home or something? 

Yeah, just make him sign the contracts at gunpoint. So much easier. Exactly. That is a plot hole, right? Yes. 

Yep, I would say. Now in your character breakdown, you didn't mention the actress who played Natalie. I thought she did a fantastic job though. I thought from the trailers and everything that she was going to be super cringe, but she wasn't. She was fantastic. 

Absolutely. Yeah, she's played by Lyric Ross, who I haven't seen in anything else before. But I thought she brought a lot of heart to the character of Natalie, even as an AI for sure. It was kind of weird to see Natalie on a computer screen trying to figure out how to escape into the rest of the house because she's kind of talking to herself on a screen. 

But beyond that, yeah, there was a lot of humanity in her performance. Episode three was called We Endanger Girl. After celebrating their success, tensions rise in the crew when demolition expert Clown touches Parker's cloak and John Reprimands them. The hood announces their next target, a biotech company named Air Loom. Jo visits RiRi at her home, blackmailing her for engineering help with his biotech designs. Learning from the police that former crew member Rampage was killed, RiRi suspects the hood and John of tying up loose ends. She decides to get a sample of the hood to study it and learn more about what kind of threat he poses. 

RiRi visits Jo and learns that he is Ezekiel Stain, the son of Obadiah Stain, the Iron Monger, but that he abhors his father. She borrows a sample of his biomass skin design in order to get her laser cutter through Air Loom's metal detectors, which she can use to get a piece of the hood's cloak. However, during the heist, RiRi's laser is detected by security sensors and triggers a CO2 defense system. RiRi tries to help rescue the crew, but is discovered by John out of her armor and with a piece of the hood's cloak. He tries to kill her, but RiRi escapes with her armor's help, losing the biomass skin sample in the process and leaving John to suffocate. The crew flees and the hood is distraught over the loss of his cousin. 

He sees in a vision that RiRi was responsible for his death and RiRi has a panic attack over the disastrous turn of events. This was a good episode. I think this was my favorite episode. Just because of all the tension of RiRi working for the guy who she thinks maybe trying to kill her and figuring out how she was going to get to him first. I thought it was a cool episode. 

It was pretty good. There is another plot hole here though, in that a laser can cut off a piece of the hood. You would think it would be heat resistant. 

You would think, but also by the end of the show, RiRi ends up incorporating magic into her suit of armor and that ends up deleting Natalie, which leads to the deal with Mephisto. You know what would circumvent all of that? A shit ton of lasers? A fucking shit ton of lasers. Like the ones that Iron Man used in Iron Man 2, where he was fighting alongside War Machine and he told him to duck and then he spun around and killed all of those hammer droids. Just fucking put some of those on the Iron Heart armor. 

You'll be able to cut through anything, including that fucking cloak and just destroy it. Okay, take it back. This is not a good episode. This whole show sucks now. I understand why scientifically she wanted a piece of the cloak, but I really think they kind of shot themselves in the foot with the reveal that it could be cut with a laser beam. 

Especially when you're dealing with a character like Iron Heart who can shoot fucking lasers. Major plot hole. What the heck? Yeah, yeah. But yeah, other than that, great episode. Episode 4 was called Bad Magic. In a flashback, we see Parker and John attempt to rob a mansion, but are discovered by security. In the present, RiRi meets with the crew and suspects that the hood knows she was involved with John's death. She returns home and analyzes the hood piece she recovered, which she learns is magic. She goes to visit Ezekiel and discovers that he's been arrested for the discovery of his biomech tech found at the heirloom crime scene. She visits the prison to apologize, and Parker deduces the connection between RiRi and Ezekiel via news of the arrest. 

Afraid for the safety of her family and friends, RiRi fashions them force field-emitting watches. Her mother, Ronnie, offers to help whatever situation she's in and accompanies RiRi to Stanton's, a book and candy shop, to learn what might destroy the hood's cloak. Madeline Stanton, a former comertase trainee and her daughter, Zelma, learned that the hood is working with an ancient evil until RiRi that it cannot be destroyed. The hood sneaks into Ezekiel's cell to form an alliance against RiRi and helps him escape prison. Natalie tries to help RiRi by bringing her friend Xavier to her, but he's upset that the AI isn't as late sister's likeness. The crew uses Ezekiel's biotech designs to outfit him with cybernetic enhancements, secretly putting the hood in charge of the programming. Parker informs the crew that their next job is to kill RiRi for being responsible for John's death. A lot of plot holes in this episode. 

Let me break them down and see if we can get answers. First of all, why didn't the hood just go after RiRi's family right away if he suspected her of being responsible for John's death? He said earlier that he had plans for her, but you also can bend bullets, bro. Yeah, just shoot her at that point, right? Why not? 

Why all the complicated schemes? The hood is not a very efficient villain, I'll say, in this season. Next plot hole is if RiRi suspected the hood and John of being responsible for Stewart's death, which she later brought up with Clown during their fight in the next episode, why didn't she bring that up with the crew earlier? That Stewart was dead, because the crew would have questioned it at that point. I know, there's something to be said for a dramatic timing though, and maybe she really didn't fully trust the crew. 

That's fair, that's fair. Maybe that one's not a plot hole. But how did authorities track the biomass skin to Ezekiel Stain, considering that a lot of his stuff was black market and off the books? That's exactly what I was wondering. Now, to be fair, he did mention to her that this black market stuff could be traced back to him, but it was not clear how. And if it could, I was like, bro, what is the whole point of the black market then? I thought this stuff was supposed to be untraceable. 

Right. Those are all the plot holes I have for that episode. Other than them, I did enjoy episode 4. I really liked the scene where RiRi tried a bunch of different scientific means to destroy the cloak. 

I don't know, I thought some of them were kind of basic. Like she tried a small bomb, she tried acid. I guess she could have tried more lasers. Right, so it's like a laser can cut it, but the heat couldn't, the bomb couldn't? You just ruined the whole show for me. 

Sorry. Episode 5 is called Karma's A Glitch. In it, Natalie and the Iron Heart suit are captured by the crew while RiRi meets with Zelma at a White Castle. Zelma explains her belief that the hood belongs to Dormammu before the crew ambush and attack RiRi. She traps the blood siblings with a force field watch, knocks Clown out with her own explosive, and manages to get her armor back before being run down by Slug. However, Zeke shows up and uses his biotech energy and physiology to shut down and destroy RiRi's armor. However, instead of killing her, he spares her life and tells her to leave the city. She runs home and tells Ronnie to pack her bags to leave, confessing everything. RiRi admits her obsession with building the suit was based on her trauma from Natalie and Gary's death, and her mom takes her to the garage where the drive-by occurred and reminds her of the good memories also had there. 

Inspired to build a new suit and fight back, RiRi recruits her friends to transform the Plymouth Barracuda her and her dad restored into an upgraded armor. Convinced magic is the only means of stopping the hood. She has Zelma perform a ritual to imbue it with magic energy. Meanwhile, Parker, believing RiRi is dead, controls Zeke's body and uses him to invade the mansion from the flashback, reveals to be his estranged father's house. 

Revealing that he was kicked out at age 12 and now has controlling stakes in his dad's businesses, he forces him to sign over his estate. Zelma's Iron Heart Armor. Now this was a great episode, but there is one small plot hole, and that is why didn't the hood accompany the crew at White Castle? Like the hood was there for all the other jobs that the crew was doing, and I don't know what he was doing at the time they were trying to kill RiRi, but if he had joined them, he would have been there to either finish the job or at least see that Ezekiel Stain was lying to him. Yeah, you kind of put too much faith in Zeke, I guess, which made no sense because he was new to the crew and he hadn't earned that trust yet. 

Well, I was still trying to figure out how Zeke was able to defeat RiRi so easily. Was his electricity draining her battery? Is that what it was? 

It seemed like it kind of short circuited her systems or something like that. Okay, that makes a little bit more sense, but you're right about the hood not being there. He definitely should have been to contribute. And confirm the kill. I did think it was a little weak that Zeke just told her to run away. It felt kind of like a convenient cop out. Despite the fact that the show went out of the way to establish him as more of a morally gray person, but that in itself is also a cop out considering he is a villain in the comic books. It was all just too convenient. 

Absolutely. I hear that all the time where it's like, oh, superhero movies are done. Why doesn't the villain just kill the hero when he has the chance? This is the perfect example of that. 

Yeah, for sure. I will say I did love the White Castle fight showing how resourceful RiRi is outside of the armor. It kind of reminded me of Iron Man 3, where we saw Tony Stark take out all the henchmen at what he thought was the Mandarin's mansion. And you know, he went to Home Depot and got all creative. Here, RiRi had to get creative inside a burger joint and really prove her metal. I don't know why Zelma didn't help her. Yeah, I guess she could have used her magic to help fight back, right? She seems like a pretty powerful sorceress. I mean, she's not that powerful. She's still learning in the books she is Dr. 

Strange's librarian. Oh, interesting. But I mean, she could transform candy into other candy. Right, exactly. So she could like transform one of Clown's bombs into candy. Into candy. 

Yeah. The sixth and final episode is called The Past is the Past. In a flashback, Parker and John split up after being discovered by security. Cornered, Parker is approached by Mephisto who helps him magically escape. He assures Parker that he can help him achieve his desire for power, respect and wealth by giving him the cloak in exchange for his soul. 

And Parker accepts the deal. In the present, the hood argues with Zeke about the emptiness of his ambitions. RiRi tries to recreate Natalie but can't and vows to defeat the hood and use its magic to bring her back. 

Parker accuses Mephisto of not fulfilling his end of the bargain, but Mephisto threatens to replace him with someone more capable. Ironheart and Zeke fight in a rematch, and he allows her to knock him out to reset Parker's programming override. She confronts the hood and the two fight with the hood transforming into a demonic figure. RiRi detonates a magic energy blast that seemingly destroys her armor, but it's revealed to be a holographic illusion and she removes the hood's cloak and he's left in pain without it. Leaving the hideout RiRi is confronted by Mephisto who also assures her he can help her achieve her desires. In a vision of the future, or perhaps, reality, RiRi hacks the suit's magic to recreate Natalie, or as it turns out, resurrect the real Natalie. Dark magic scars form on her skin. 

In a mid-credits scene, Parker asks Selma for help. Now the ending aside, I really liked the final battle between Ironheart and the hood. I thought it had a great tit for tat momentum in that she was able to negate his invisibility and teleporting magic, but he transformed into a demon who was ripping her armor apart. But then she set off a magic blast that hurt him but also left her vulnerable. There was a lot of back and forth that felt very satisfying in terms of who's going to win. The hood was definitely a good villain. 

I did find it odd that Mephisto or Mephisto, apparently, is pronounced Mephisto. He was agreed to every single aspect of our bargain. I'm like, no you didn't. You promised he would be a king. What are you talking about? Well, he did achieve that. 

He was sitting at his father's table. I don't know. When Mephisto said that, I was just like, whatever bro, no you didn't. The devil is a liar. Yeah, he definitely didn't tell him about the whole magic scarring thing. I think if he would have admitted that, maybe he wouldn't have gone through with the deal. Although Riri knew about the magic scarring and she still went through with the deal too. So weird. 

Such a weird choice. Do you want there to be a season two of this? You know, I really like the character of Riri Williams, especially what they did with her in this season. 

I would like there to be a season two, but I don't want it to continue the story of where they left it off here. I think Riri belongs squarely again in the tech side of Marvel, not the magic side. And I would like to see the hood return, but maybe as a villain against someone like Moon Knight or Blade or Ghost Rider or something like that. That'd be cool. 

I keep hearing rumors that Mephisto is going to kind of take over for Kang as the primary antagonist for this upcoming multiverse saga. How would you feel about that? I could totally see that working, for sure. That'd be awesome. 

Mephisto is a big enough character to hold his own against an entire Avengers lineup. If they do that, I kind of wish they would have introduced him in a different project than this show. Well, if they do do that, maybe it'll get more people to watch this season in the future. Overall, there was a lot to like about the show, a little bit to dislike, a lot to question. It's kind of a mixed bag. I think the strong elements within it really do a lot to make up for its shortcomings. The season definitely carries a subtext of deeper emotional meaning and thematic importance despite the weak supporting cast, the plot holes, and the ambiguous ending. All things considered, I'm rating Iron Heart season 1 3.5 stars out of 5. A fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. 

I would agree with you that it's a mixed bag. The lead performances were great. The special effects were great. The themes were great. That said, I do think the writers dropped the ball in several instances, including the ending, including the plot holes. I do think ultimately the good outweighs the bad, which is why I would still recommend it. 

So I would agree with your 3.5 star rating, especially if Mofisto is going to be a major player in the MCU going forward. And especially if they're able to clear up the ending with a subsequent season or some other project. I think that would actually make this season better if they cleaned everything up in a satisfying manner. Still probably not to elevate the show beyond a 3.5 star rating though. But that does it for this review. H.J .9K, help close us out. 

Next episode is not as good as this episode, because it's going to be a review of the Superman movie, which is almost certainly going to be 3 stars or under. H.J .9K, 5 stars. It's going to be a 5 star start to the new DCU. Just you wait. 

But that does it for this episode. We want to give a big thanks to our executive producers, John Staroski, Zachary Hepburn, Dustin Belcom, Mickey Mathen-Geehan, Nathaniel Wagner, Levi Yatn, Austin Wisalowski, AJ Dunkerly, Nick Obanto, Scott Camacho, Gil Camacho, Adam Spees, Dean Molesky, Devin Davis, Joseph Kirsting, Josh Leiner, Mike Williams, Oscar Galvez, and Paul Graves for helping make this podcast possible. And we'll talk to you guys next week. Up up and away, true believers. 

For the Gen Z fam, Iron Heart was low-key mid but didn't take crazy L's in its flop era and is giving scabiddy toilet-riss vibes on God. Period.