10 Things You Gotta Know About Iron Man 2

We talk with Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson and Jon Favreau about the superhero sequel

By Todd Gilchrist May 05, 2010 9:02 PMTags

This you know already: Robert Downey Jr. puts on a metal suit again this week in Iron Man 2. Scarlett Johansson has something to do with it and Mickey Rourke's a bad guy with electric whips. Oh, and this thing will probably be huge.

But there's so much more to the super sequel, so we cornered Downey, ScarJo, Gwyneth Paltrow and director Jon Favreau to get the scoop.

Here are the 10 things you gotta know about Iron Man 2:

1. The cast is bigger, better. ScarJo, Rourke and Sam Rockwell are new to the scene. Plus, Paltrow returns as love interest/right-hand to Tony Stark (aka Iron Man), Don Cheadle replaces Terence Howard as Rhodey (and gets to play with a tricked-out iron suit), Samuel L. Jackson takes a larger role—and Downey couldn't be happier: "I felt a little bit like a comanager of a baseball team that got an even better lineup in the spring," he says.

2. RDJ keeps pounding drinks—but it ain't booze. In the sequel, Downey's constantly swilling chlorophyll, the stuff that makes plants green. His idea, too. "I Googled it, and it said if you have any radioactivity overload," he tells E! News, "then chlorophyll will combat it." Handy tip—if you happen to have a nuclear battery in your chest.

3. Jon Favreau just wants to make you happy. Says the director, facing pressure to follow up his blockbuster: "We knew people were going to show up. We just wanted to make sure everybody who showed up had a good time, and this was going to be as or more fun than the last party."

4. DJ AM makes a cameo. During a wild birthday party, Stark demands that the DJ lay down a "fat beat." It's Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein on the turntables, in a scene filmed just two months before his death.

5. Scarlett really likes her catsuit. Johansson's new character, a Stark assistant with tons o' secrets (fans familiar with Black Widow know what's up), steals more than a few scenes. "I was hoping the fans would respond to my interpretation," she tells E! News, "so that I could continue to don the catsuit for other installments."

6. Stuff you saw in the trailer isn't in the flick. A version of an early scene, when Tony Stark is introduced with fireworks and cheerleaders, found its way into trailers—but not the movie. "That was a great image that we love," Favreau explains, "in a scene that's going to be in the DVD."

7. Favreau fed himself a juicy role. The director got onscreen to square off against the film's actual superheroes, but Downey tattles that maybe he didn't stick to his diet. "The scene where he gets his ass handed to him by Scarlett, it was originally a longer scene," says Downey, teasing his director for hitting on-set pizza instead of training. "Maybe he was just too emasculated to actually let it be in the movie."

8. Despite all the boy-toys, ladies kick ass. Says Scarlett: "A sexy secretary or a girl swinging around by her ankles in a catsuit, that's innately sexy. But the fact is these characters are intelligent, they're ambitious, they're motivated and calculated." Paltrow adds she was relieved to have ScarJo on-set. "Last time it was just boys everywhere," she says, "so it was just nice to have a girl there to hang out with. And nice to have Mickey Rourke there to scare my children."

9. RDJ drinks the blood of unicorns. Well, no, but he does have other secrets for looking all young and handsome. "He takes such good care of himself," says Paltrow. "He does his martial arts and his yoga and all of his holistic stuff."

10. You'll wanna stay for the credits. Stick around for a postcredits scene that teases to something bigger going on in the Marvel movie universe. Hint: It's not about the Hulk or Captain America.