[Samari]

Originally Posted by Vallen Chaos Valiant

Spoiler for reply:

The reason Tony is without armor for so long, was to prove that Tony Stark is the hero and not the suit. That he can McGuyver junk together in a hurry and still be a threat. He IS Ironman, as the ending proclaimed.

The Iron Patriot got over-heated. Essentially the Extremis turns the user into a fire elemental. When it gets too hot, the suit deforms and freezes up. And the Extremis can actually overpower the suit one-on-one. Had Tony got time he probably could have built a suit of armour strong enough to ignore the heat, but not in the duration of the film. As we see in the end, the combination of super-strength and heat allows Pepper to punch through Ironman chest plating with her fist.

Spoiler:

Did they mention that act about the armor freezing up in the film? I don't remember. I was tired at the time I saw the film and didn't feel very well so I may have missed some exposition, but I don't remember that. From a lot of the fight scenes, like the one on the plane, it seems like every time an suit came into contact with a member of the extremis ability it would have frozen up and fallen over like Iron Patriot did if your explanation is correct. Things just seemed a little inconsistent to me. And I guess Iron Patriot must have really been frozen for a long time for them to pick him up and fly him all the way back to their facility and chain him up. Rhodes must have been in there for like half a day.

As for Tony being able to save the world without his armor, I get that. But I came to see Iron Man kick ass, not Tony do his McGuyver thing. There were some moments that were appreciated, but after a while it got kind of ridiculous to me how he was able to secret-agent his way into the compound. I could see him building all of those homemade gadgets, but to be able to dodge bullets and parade around like a ninja and take out every guard without his armor was a little bit unbelievable for his character within the established universe for me.