There really isn’t a way to review Ironheart outside of just calling it what it is: bad.
It’s a bad show. It’s bad on every level. From the lazy bad cinematography to the lackluster bad graphics, bad wooden performances, and bad writing, Ironheart is the culmination of everything that’s gone wrong with Marvel television. It’s not just a misfire—it’s a final nail.
Riri Williams in Ironheart – YouTube, Marvel Entertainment
If Echo was lifeless and Secret Invasion was dull, Ironheart is downright insufferable.
The show feels like the endgame of the M-SHE-U, where every creative decision revolves around identity first, and storytelling last—if at all. There’s no subtlety, no nuance, no curiosity about heroism or conflict. Instead, what we get is a self-righteous character surrounded by a parade of unlikable people delivering one smug lecture after another.
A Show Obsessed With Tearing Down Legacy
Within the first 10 minutes, Ironheart makes its ideological goals crystal clear.
Tony Stark, the founding icon of the MCU, is not honored or even questioned—he’s dismissed outright. Riri and others assert that Stark’s only value was his money, as though genius alone isn’t allowed to exist unless it comes in the right identity wrapper. There’s one line where Riri says she isn’t gonna badmouth Stark because of everything he did for the industry, but that sounds more like a concession than actual respect.
Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man in Avengers: Endgame (2019), Marvel Studios
Never mind the fact that for the Mark 1 Iron Man suit…and say it with me here: folks: “TONY STARK WAS ABLE TO BUILD THIS IN A CAVE! WITH A BUNCH OF SCRAPS!”
Ironheart, however, isn’t interested in legacy—it’s interested in revision.
Riri’s college expulsion plays out with cartoonish absurdity. While expelling Riri, the dean of MIT delivers a bizarre speech about how they’re both strong and brilliant Black women. It’s a line meant to elevate Riri’s importance, but it lands as a laughable insertion of ideology into what should be a dramatic moment.
Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man and Don Cheadle as War Machine in Captain America: Civil War (2016), Marvel Studios
The dialogue doesn’t sound human—it sounds like it was written by a DEI consultant doing improv.
An Unlikable Hero with Questionable Morals
Of course no Ironheart review is complete without discussing Ironheart herself.
Riri Williams is not just unrelatable—she’s unlikable. She’s arrogant, cold, and completely lacking in empathy. She constantly reminds the audience that she doesn’t want to be a hero, has no moral obligation to anyone, and is building her suits and AI “because I can.”
Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams in Marvel Studios’ BLACK PANTHER: WAKANDA FOREVER. Photo by Eli Adé. © 2022 MARVEL.
That’s not strength—that’s narcissism. Her every action is self-serving, yet the show insists we root for her because of her identity and not her choices. They try to dress it up in a narrative about her dead ste-father but it just rings hollow.
By the end of episode three, Riri commits a stone cold murder.
There’s no ambiguity.
The dislike ratio for the official Ironheart trailer as of June 12, 2025 – YouTube, Marvel Entertainment
She has the ability to save someone—easily—and instead she watches him die and then agonizes over that and the fact that she left a crucial piece of tech behind at a crime scene.
This is our protagonist…
A Cast of Cartoonish Caricatures
The only major white male character in the show is a reclusive, anxious nerd who exists purely to be used, mocked, and sidelined by Riri. He exists to be bossed around. He’s a punchline. He has no agency, no purpose, no arc. He’s there to show how powerful and cool Riri is by comparison.
Then there’s Riri’s “crew,” a ragtag group of criminals we’re somehow meant to root for. Why? Because the show says so.
Shea Coulee in a music video – YouTube, Shea Coulee
There’s no charm, no charisma, no code. They’re just a diverse group of thieves and liars, and the show repeatedly reinforces the idea that stealing from the rich is not only acceptable—it’s righteous. Wealth redistribution becomes the moral compass.
Rich people deserve to be robbed, according to Ironheart and Marvel by extension. In some cases, the implication is they deserve harm. Because they’re rich.
Tech Nonsense and Magical MacGuffins
The science in Ironheart makes Star Trek look like a documentary. Riri claims she can’t afford to build her AI, then immediately does exactly that in her bedroom with a laptop. Not only that—she creates a fully realized artificial intelligence that embodies her dead best friend, even giving her a projection necklace so she can follow Riri around like a sci-fi ghost.
Dominique Thorne as Riri Williams in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022), Marvel Studios
There’s no explanation, no effort to ground it. It’s just pure, lazy magical tech that does whatever the script demands. Fabricators and holodecks on the USS Enterprise would be embarrassed to compete with the plot convenience machine in Riri’s closet. At least Star Trek tried to explain its pseudo science in a way that makes sense before the modern age of Khan blood and time crystals. (That’s a review for another day…)
Cringe Writing and Bizarre Dialogue
The exposition in episode one is painful. Characters repeatedly tell Riri things she already knows—just so the audience can hear it.
“Riri, you remember your dead dad and how you used to work with him in a garage on a specific car? And your best friend who also died that I’m gonna now describe for you?”
The dislike ratio for the second Ironheart trailer as of June 12, 2025 – YouTube, Marvel Entertainment
It’s like listening to someone read her Wikipedia page out loud. She’s getting her own Ironheart review video within the show’s dialogue. The entire show is written like a first draft that no one had the guts to rewrite.
And the tone? Modern girlboss smirks and “I’m better than you” swagger dominate every scene. There are multiple moments where Riri could be humbled or challenged, but instead, the show doubles down on her being perfect and misunderstood.
She never learns. She never struggles. She’s just awesome—and everyone else is in the way.
The Only Spark: The Hood
The one remotely interesting element I can mention in this Ironheart review is The Hood, a supernatural criminal with hints of dark magic and demonic influence. Why is he compelling? Because he’s tied to Mephisto, the long-rumored devil of the Marvel universe. But even this intrigue feels accidental—an echo of a better story the show doesn’t want to tell.
The Hood in Marvel’s Ironheart – YouTube, Marvel Entertainment
The Hood’s motivations are murky. His scenes are tonally inconsistent. But at least there’s a sense of danger when he’s on screen, a sense that maybe something might actually happen. Unfortunately, it never does, and this series is halfway over.
The Bottom of the Barrel
Let’s be clear: this is the worst thing Marvel has ever released.
Ironheart makes She-Hulk look like Daredevil (the Netflix one…). It has no stakes, no charm, no characters worth caring about. It glorifies crime, mocks its own universe, and offers nothing of substance.
There are no redeeming qualities. None.
Robert Downey Jr calls in to say “Iron Man loves Ironheart” – YouTube, Good Morning America
If Thunderbolts had started to turn things around, Ironheart just slammed the brakes, flipped the car, and set the wreckage on fire.
Don’t waste your time. Don’t even waste the energy it takes to scroll past it.
Final Verdict: 1/10 – An unwatchable disaster.
What’s your Ironheart review? Sound off in the comments and let us know!
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BLMheart. This culture wars nonsense is a pox on entertainment. Disney (Marvel) is a disease. Diseaseney. I think this will hurt Fantastic Four. People are at the point of being enraged.
Well, at least the trailers were accurate and Ironheart is actually an insufferable twat in a show with no redeeming features. To think they could have left this thing buried in the warehouse it has lived in for 3 years already and taken the tax write off ala Batgirl. Yet this thing, inexplicably, has a 69% Rotten Tomatoes viewer score when it sounds like it should be soooo much lower.
IMDB user scores it at 4.5 yet their highlighted review is from Slashfilms saying how Ironheart is a “Breath of fresh air.”
People thinking about going to see the Fantastic Four needed a neutral palette cleanser, but Ironheart is battery acid. Marvel would have been better off – not by much – if they’d delayed this and let the vague memory of the ok-ish Thunderbolts movie be what people think of Marvel pre-FF. Instead, with the taste of Ironheart in their minds, hopefully people skip FF in droves.
Marvel needs FF to fall flat on its face, especially if the rumors of the plot are true and it is yet another “Girlboss don’t need no man to save the day!” movie. And WE need FF to trip on its own writing which, once again, regurgitates the same tired story and characters that have caused Marvel to drop from billion dollar brand to a million dollar brand.
They will devalue Marvel so much some company will eventually be able to buy the brand/IP by scrounge change from couch cushions.
Well said, sir!
Grammar. Females are heroines, not “heros” – A hero is a bloke.
But they are not referred to as Superheroines.
A collection of females who are heroic are heroines. If it’s mixed, then it’s Heroes. It’s the same principle as Prince vs Princess.
Nobody deserves the mental damage of watching this MSheU slop.
Whoever gave this show the greenlight does. They should be tied to a chair and forced to endure this so that we don’t have to.
I didn’t think it was possible for Marvel to make a worse show than She-Hulk, but from what I’m hearing across the board, they managed to find a way.
It’s funny because I didn’t even know this had come out, and I’m glad I was unaware of that. Looks like I’m finally managing to completely divorce myself from the MCU.
Why do they tell fans who should naturally be here not to watch, while making comments that disparage the previous work, not just this one?
Moreover, pushing diversity and inclusion to the forefront feels secondary when considering the actual quality of the work.
Was the original really that popular? There’s too much to watch—only die-hard fans can keep up.
May I present: bob iger, everyone! bob iger’s………………..,
……….,
…., brought you this. Enjoy!
Leadership! Stockholder confidence!
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