Sorry, Robert; Russell and Ripley beat you.

Let’s be honest with ourselves here. Iron Man 2 was doomed from the start. Iron Man rocked our faces when we weren’t even expecting faces to be rocked. So that put the bar immensely high for the sequel. All the way to see Iron Man 2 I kept telling myself it wasn’t going to be that good. And, hey! I was surprised. It was good. Sam Rockwell really stole the show as the annoying mastermind-in-the-making. And this movie even had TWO gorgeous and awesome reddish hair women to celeb-crush on. Plus they upgraded Rhodes from Terrence Howard to Don Cheadle. But I digress. It still  wasn’t as awesome as Iron Man. It was, however a sequel that delivers and is well worth watching.

I actually had pretty low expectations for Robin Hood as well. I mean, I was optimistic, but I’ve seen a few disappointing epic films in recent times. Clash of the Titans, Troy, Prince of Persia (unseen yet, but only technically, as I’ve seen the preview for a year and a half now), Beowulf, and Alexander are a few that were unable to match the hype and–(neologism alert)– “epicity”  their trailers exuded. So I wasn’t expecting much from it.

Was I wrong.

What a fantastic retelling of the folk tale of Robin Hood. Believable, love-to-hate-em-but-they’re-almost-cool-too enemies, beautiful but strong, emotionally pure but distant damsel/heroine. Ripley and Russell remain a knockout combination. I especially loved seeing Little John played by recently famous-from-LOST-guest-role Kevin Durand.

The story is great. The plot is one that keeps your attention from start to finish. The music is superb. Even the end credits are amazingly artistic. Time and money well spent.