11 details you may have missed in 'Iron Man' that hit harder after watching 'Avengers: Endgame'
by Kirsten Acuna- If you watch “Iron Man” after seeing “Avengers: Endgame,” a few moments will hold more weight.
- You’ll fully understand why fans cried when Tony Stark’s daughter asked for a cheeseburger at his funeral.
- A fictional Rolling Stone cover in the movie also predicted that Stark would save the world.
- Visit Insider’s homepage for more stories.
Now that most of Marvel’s movies are streaming on Disney Plus, you may be revisiting some of the older films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe catalog.
And if you’ve seen “Avengers: Endgame” recently, some of the moments and lines of dialogue may play differently or hit harder a second or third time around.
A good one to revisit is 2008’s “Iron Man,” the movie that kicked off the MCU more than a decade ago. “Endgame” sprinkled a lot of references back to the earlier Marvel movies throughout its three-hour running time. It’s easy to miss some of them the first time.
If you’re doing your own Marvel binge, here are a few moments you may have overlooked in “Iron Man” that may make you emotional all over again.
Tony Stark wanted to save the world all the way back in 2008. He actually did it in “Endgame.”
Foto: This fictional Rolling Stone cover hits especially hard after watching “Endgame.” Source: Marvel Studios
During the opening montage sequence, a fictional Rolling Stone cover says Stark wants to save the world. At the time, it was merely talking about his company’s defense weapons.
More than a decade later, that cover holds a different meaning. Stark literally put his life on the line to save not just the world but the entire universe in “Endgame.”
Tony’s mind drifts to Pepper when his life is in danger in both “Iron Man” and “Endgame.”
Tony hears Pepper Potts’ voice calling out to him as he’s being waterboarded in “Iron Man.” He’s unsure whether those are his final moments, and his thoughts go to her.
The moment parallels the opening minutes of “Avengers: Endgame” when Tony records a message for Pepper when he thinks it’s all over for him.
“Please know when I drift off, it’ll be like every night lately. I’m fine. Totally fine. I dream about you. Because it’s always you,” Stark says.
The sound from this hammering scene in “Iron Man” was later used at the end of “Endgame.”
When Stark is told to finish the Jericho missile by the next day in “Iron Man,” he gets to work on finishing his Iron Man suit instead. The audience watches as he hammers the first Iron Man helmet.
The hammering sounds were later used for “Avengers: Endgame” in place of an end-credits scene. The moment was meant to pay tribute to the hero who kicked off the first decade of the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
The “Avengers: Endgame” coeditor Jeffrey Ford told Insider’s Jason Guerrasio the moment was the idea of Marvel Studios’ president, Kevin Feige.
“Kevin came in and said, ‘I got an idea, and I want to try it – what if we have a little audio flashback at the end with Tony?'” Ford said. “So we dug through the elements of ‘Iron Man 1’ and found the exact piece of sound from the print master. We laid it in against the logo and adjusted the rhythm slightly. We showed Kevin and he gave it his blessing. We thought this was a great send-off.”
Tony asks for a cheeseburger the moment he gets home after being held captive in Afghanistan in “Iron Man.” His daughter asks for one at his funeral in “Endgame.”
Stark sits down and eats the burger during a press conference he gives.
In “Endgame,” his daughter asks for a cheeseburger during his funeral, making the moment even more poignant.
The cheeseburger has significance for Robert Downey Jr., too. In 2008, the actor told Empire magazine he credited a burger with turning his life around after addiction.
“I have to thank Burger King,” Downey said, according to the New York Daily News. “It was such a disgusting burger I ordered. I had that, and this big soda, and I thought something really bad was going to happen.”
As Tony’s press conference begins, he tells the press he never said goodbye to his dad. In “Endgame,” he finally got to.
In “Endgame,” Stark travels back in time with Captain America and meets his father. The moment gives him much-needed closure.
That thought of never being able to say goodbye to his father obviously sticks with him.
In the event he didn’t survive traveling through time or a fight with Thanos, Stark recorded a hologram video to say goodbye to his daughter and his wife. He probably didn’t want Morgan to feel the same way he did all of those years ago.
Tony’s original arc reactor should make you tear up for a few reasons.
Pepper’s gift to Tony, emblazoned with the words, “Proof That Tony Stark Has A Heart,” was floated out on a lake during his funeral service, but take another look at the reactor’s colors.
Notice anything?
Right before the Avengers go back in time in “Endgame,” they put their fists together in a circle. Together, their hands re-create the look of the arc. In turn, the Avengers are proof Tony has a heart.
A Tony Stark benefit mentioned in the middle of the movie takes place at the Disney Concert Hall.
The moment may seem like some well-placed Disney synergy, but that’s not the case.
“Iron Man” was released in 2008 by Paramount Pictures. It wasn’t until the following year, when Disney purchased Marvel, that the film was under the Disney umbrella. It’s a convenient coincidence to see that moment in the movie now.
Pepper tells Tony he’s going to kill himself from putting on the Iron Man suit in the first movie.
The suit did eventually lead to his downfall, but he also wound up saving the world.
When Pepper learns Tony has built a superhero suit in “Iron Man,” her first reaction is to quit. She tells him she’s not going to be a part of it. That last part didn’t work out as she initially planned.
Bonus: There was a hint at “Age of Ultron” in a magazine article shown early in the film.
At the benefit for Tony Stark near the film’s start, pay close attention to the biography on his life. An article inside the MIT Technology Review says Stark was working on a “simple theorem,” which posited that artificial intelligence “can be imbibed with personality through alternative programming.” It’s noted that Stark was putting the finishing touches on two prototypes that “will listen to him and learn from his behaviors.”
Stark interacts with one of his prototypes in his lab throughout the movie. It looks as if it was the foundation for Stark’s sentient AI in “Age of Ultron.”
Another bonus: The storyline for “Captain America: Civil War” was also set up in “Iron Man.”
A newspaper near the film’s start tells us Tony’s parents died in a car crash in 1991. In “Captain America: Civil War,” we learn a brainwashed Bucky Barnes actually killed them on the road.