Review: Iron Man 3

Tony Stark is sure on the roll at the moment, four straight movies, four straight positive reviews (Iron Man 2 is well-received, just that is not that good as the others), Marvel and Robert Downey Jr. has teamed up together to make this iron clad superhero, from known only by comic books fan to everyone's favourite superhero right now. If you ask movie audiences today who is their favourite superhero, a whole of them will say Iron Man, and Iron Man 3 makes sure that streak continues.

Iron Man 3 continues few months after the events of Marvel's The Avengers, where genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist Tony Stark (played by RDJ) suffers from visions and anxiety from the New York attack. To add up to his problem, the Mandarin and Aldrich Killian, who the latter is the inventor of biological upgrade, the Extremis, under his heels and threatened to kill him. The movie also sees the return of Pepper Potts, who Tony loves and wants to protect from harm and James Rhodes, who return as Iron Patriot aka War Machine mk. II.

Storytelling wise, Iron Man 3 is probably the strongest in the series, where the story and theme of the movie is slightly darker and more serious than the previous two, and a certain plot twist here and there (I won't say it cuz it will spoil the movie out). But the movie manages to keep the great one-liners and humours intact, which is a really good thing to see. One of my favourite moment from the movie is when Tony hangs out with a kid known only as Harley, which is really funny and kinda sweet. It feels good that Pepper Potts got the chance to have a go at certain action sequence suiting up as Iron Man.

The chemistry between Robert Downey Jr. and Don Cheadle (War Machine) has clicked this time around. Previously seemed like a hit or miss between the duo, they have finally found a dynamic that works well for the, which is just what the movie needs.

The miss of the movie is probably Rebecca Hall's character as Maya Hansen, former love paramour of Tony Stark, her character is underdeveloped and too shallow to consider her as important. Although, Aldrich Killian fared much matter, his motives towards the national attack and Extremis is a bit blur at times.

Now, move to the action sequences. Action sequences doesn't disappoint, especially during the climax battle sequences, where the whole troop of Iron Legion appears to fight alongside Iron Man and War Machine, which brought a lot of audiences go WOW!!! or WOO!!! Not to mention that with the latest upgrade, Tony Stark is able to summon his Mk. 47 armor just by thoughts, which shows a lot of cool moments.

Iron Man 3 is one heck of a movie, in terms of storytelling, this is one of Marvel's best efforts, it is smart, mature yet funny in many ways. Robert Downey Jr. has achieved something, he is Iron Man, Iron Man is him, just like Sean Connery is James Bond, Harrison Ford as Hans Solo and Indiana Jones. If one day Robert Downey Jr. decided to hang up Iron Man suits, Marvel will have a hard time choosing a successor, because he has set the bar too high. Despite some of the shortcomings, Iron Man 3 is thoroughly and highly recommended to everyone who loves a good popcorn flick.

Score: 4.5/5

Five Top My Chemical Romance's Songs

It's been almost a month since the disbandment of one of my favourite band, My Chemical Romance. I've been listening to their song lately and I've been thinking, which of their five songs are my favourite, including my all-time favourite, Welcome to the Black Parade. I made my decision and these are the five songs.

No. 5 I'm Not Okay (I Promise)

The song that started my loving towards My Chemical Romance. It's not particularly special in any way, but due to the inclusion of the song in Burnout 3: Takedown, I've started to take notice on My Chemical Romance.

No. 4 Planetary (GO!)

This song is from their latest album, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys and is included and the "Spec 1.0" intro of the popular racing franchise, Gran Turismo 5. I love the song because it's loud! And in some ways catchy!

No. 3 Helena

One of the reason is the song matches the music video, and another reason, it's kinda like a metaphor to the band's disbandment.

No. 2 Teenagers

This song is from what I think is their best work they've made, The Black Parade, which contain a lot of my favourite songs. Teenagers is an alternative rock and it's loud, but it's catchy and sometimes feel like a Top 40 pop hit as well, you rarely get that in songs like this. This song even gets approval from my aunt, who doesn't like this kinda song and genre.

No .1 Welcome to the Black Parade

Well, it's unsurprising, isn't it? The long undisputed No. 1 in my book, Welcome to the Black is and always will be my all-time favourite My Chemical Romance's song, all musics even. What sets apart this song is, it has nice lyrics, a beautiful slow start and a very loud towards the end. It's even incredibly catchy, I always can't get enough of this song.

A New Phone Purchase Conundrum

I have been using my HTC Desire S for more than two years, in the real world, that's not a very long time, but it is in the world of tech, especially when life span of gadgets are very short. My Desire S (Ass if you wanna name that) has been under a lot of problems lately, which signals the end is nigh. So, I've decided this year is the year I change my phone.

This time (around March) is the perfect time to change phone every year. Why you ask? It is because this period is usually when phone companies introduce new phone technology and upgrades, and year end is usually slight tweak in software updates and rehashes. Buy around year end means you are going to get disappointed fast because it is close to brand new tech.

Now, I'm doing research for quite some time now, I've ended up with a choice of two phones. This is where the problem starts, I equally like these two phones, the HTC One and Sony Xperia Z. I didn't make my decision on Samsung Galaxy S IV because no. 1, I don't really like the phone as it looks like Galaxy S III S and no. 2, my sister won't let me get near any Samsung products (you should ask her), so I would love to forget about the S IV. And don't get me started about the iPhone.

So, let compare the two phones in question, shall we? For starters, they are both a full HD smartphone capable of displaying 1080p visuals, both are quad-core processors, LTE ready, Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean and upgradable to 4.2.

Now let's put up the differences. Sony Xperia Z has a 13MP camera, 1.5Hz S4 Quad processor, TFT screen, whereas the HTC One has 4MP 'Ultrapixel' camera, 1.7GHz S600 Quad processor, SLCD screen. Sony uses glass for the phone's front and back where HTC uses full aluminum unibody contruction, both looks very solid. And Sony UI looks more like Android skin and HTC One is customized by HTC itself called the Sense 5.

For me, specs are irrelevant to me right now, flagships are so advanced these days that some of the performances differences are not significant to each other. Right now I am thinking of which exterior looks will get my attention most. On the Xperia Z, we have a very high quality all glass construction which is magnificent to look at, it looks absolutely classy in every way. On the other hand, we have the HTC One, which has a unibody aluminum construction that set the bar for smartphone's build quality, it is also looks very pretty in silver.

The question for me now is: Should I go for the glossy glass construction of Xperia Z? Or go for the industrial design aluminum unibody HTC One? It's a touch choice. I managed to test out the Xperia Z last time I went out for a walk and find it quite comfortable, despite my small hands and the phone's large dimension. Now, I am waiting for HTC One to test it out. One of these two will be my communication companion for the next two years at least. It will be the toughest purchase decision I will ever make.