It was only a matter of time before Hollywood realized how classic comic books can make such rich, ideal source material for intelligent, full-blooded blockbusters when done right. Richard Donner understood it first in Superman back in 1978, Sam Raimi raised the bar in the new millennium in his first two Spider-Man films, and Christopher Nolan re-energized the increasingly lifeless Batman franchise in Batman Begins. Now here is actor turned director Jon Favreau as the unlikely man to reboot another superhero thought to be forgotten in Iron Man.

Diehard comic book fans would know that Iron Man was one of the earlier Marvel superheroes from the 1960s but this first cinematic adaptation keenly updates him and his alter ego, Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) to the current postmodern age of military warfare. In fact, the opening act of the film has that Catch-22 feel reminiscent of Andrew Niccol’s Lord of War as it introduces Stark as the rich, womanizing owner of a large weapons factory. His weapons are only supposed to support the American military fighting in Afghanistan but the chaos of war never provides any means to ensure that.

Stark finally comprehends that when he is captured after a surprise military attack from the Taliban. He was originally there to give a military demonstration of his latest weapon but while in captivity sees firsthand that the guerillas can have just as easy access to his products, too. Thankfully, he is also a highly resourceful man who, with another fellow captive, Yin Sen (Shaun Toub), plans and succeeds at an escape by building a durable bulletproof metallic suit armed with small missiles and rockets to make him fly.

All of this may sound a little too serious for a summer movie but it is easy to forget that the comic book is really a serious art form, too, with greater emphasis on the human flesh and blood dimensionality behind the mask (as originally enlivened by Stan Lee, Don Heck, Larry Lieber, and Jack Kirby). Favreau and his writers, Mark Fergus, Hawk Ostby, Art Marcum, and Matt Holloway, respect that tradition here and are not afraid to sell their superhero as one who battles with his smarts and not his might and not against just a cartoonish adversary but a real world of political hot zones. It is also a great asset for them that Robert Downey Jr. is simply fantastic in perfectly balancing the humorously playful aspects of his hedonistic billionaire persona and his emotional and physical heroic transformation into seeing the errors of his moneymaking ways and becoming Iron Man.