Directed by Jon Favreau. Starring Robert Downey Jr, Don Cheadle, Mickey Rourke, Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson, Sam Rockwell, Samuel L Jackson, Jon Favreau, Garry Shandling 12A cert, gen release, 124 min

Tony Stark returns in an enjoyable but overly cluttered sequel, writes DONALD CLARKE

WELCOME BACK, Mr Man. Please have a seat and prepare yourself for some bad news. After examining all the data and consulting all the specialists, we have confirmed that you are suffering from a severe case of Spider-Man 3Syndrome. This dangerous, though not necessarily fatal, condition results from a compulsion to include far too many iconic characters and situations in a high-profile sequel. Just have a glance at the evidence.

The rambling, modestly entertaining Iron Man 2focuses on the semi-robotic superhero's dispute with a Russian maniac, played by Mickey Rourke. It also details an attempt by Col Rhodes (Don Cheadle, replacing Terrence Howard) to save an increasingly barmy Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr) from himself by relieving him of his shiniest Iron Man suit.

Who’s this now? It’s Scarlett Johansson, all heels and huskiness, as Natalie Rushman, a new employee of Stark Industries who might just be working for Samuel

L Jackson’s (hello to you, too) paramilitary law-enforcement agency. When Mr Stark, Iron Man’s alter ego, is not flirting with Ms Johansson, he’s carrying on a rivalry with Justin Hammer (Sam Rockwell), a competing arms manufacturer, or making poor old Pepper Potts (poor old Gwyneth Paltrow) weep with longing and frustration.

Got it? Pity the writer who had to reduce that to a three-line pitch.

So, Iron Man 2is far too busy and far too disorganised. It is overly concerned with keeping the Marvel Universe in balance and preparing the ground for upcoming franchises such as The Avengersand (look closely) Captain America. But, for all that, it does remain reasonably entertaining.

The key to the series’ charm is unquestionably the character of Tony Stark. The superhero tradition has often permitted alter egos to exhibit rampaging, near-sociopathic character flaws. Usually, however, the Peter Parkers, Bruce Waynes, Clark Kents and Bruce Banners

tend toward a kind of hopeless introversion. Stark is one of the few comic-book characters whose personal life is notably more eventful than that of his crime- fighting persona.

Iron Man 2begins with a surge of AC/DC and a sickeningly kinetic shot of the titular entity descending from the clouds towards a massive exposition hosted by Stark Industries. At the end of the first film, Stark revealed the true identity of Iron Man and, in the interim, the superhero has become his company's own Mickey Mouse.

Downey Jr has enormous fun with the character – Stark’s Expo address suggests a sharper dressed, but no less messianic Steve Jobs – and, discovering new twitches at every turn, suggests that there is still plenty of mileage in the self-destructive nut.

One imagines the actor, always keen to frustrate expectations, rather enjoyed the complicated (not to say worrying) politics of John Favreau’s film. Following that opening display, Stark gets summoned before a senate committee that wishes to place the Iron Man suit in the hands of governmental agencies.

In love as we all are with Stark (and Downey Jr), we inevitably find ourselves siding with the lone inventor over the sinister stooges for the US military. But hang on. Surely it’s more sensible to place a weapon of mass destruction in the state’s hands rather than with an only marginally less eccentric version of Hugh Hefner?

At any rate, those scenes are actually more entertaining than the somewhat perfunctory action sequences that (eventually) blast their way across the screen. Everybody is an Iron Man today. Rourke becomes an Iron Man with electrified whips. Cheadle becomes an Iron Man with too many guns. Various drone Iron Men appear to make up the numbers. You just don’t know where to look for Iron Men.

No doubt Iron Man 2will make a fortune, but somebody needs to bring a degree of focus to the enterprise before embarking on

No 3. There’s still time to reverse the effects of S-3 Syndrome.