Iron Man 2
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50 free Iron Man 2 trivia questions with answers — entertainment quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Iron Man 2 is the 2010 sequel that opened Marvel's second year of films, with Robert Downey Jr.'s Tony Stark dying slowly from the palladium in his chest while Mickey Rourke's Ivan Vanko builds his own arc reactor and a pair of whips. It introduced Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow, swapped Terrence Howard for Don Cheadle as Rhodey, gave Sam Rockwell's Justin Hammer a dance, and ended with a hammer in the New Mexico desert. This quiz covers the story and the production: the villains who were combined and cut, the actress who nearly played Black Widow, Rourke's self-funded cockatoo, the tattoo Feige erased, the working title, the Monaco shoot that Bernie Ecclestone vetoed, the green screen made of shipping containers, the Sherman Brothers' Expo theme, the AC/DC album, the $4 billion Disney deal that arrived mid-production, the box office and the Oscar nomination. Fifty questions, four options each, with a short explanation after every answer. Play on your phone or print it for a quiz night.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Who directed Iron Man 2?
Jon Favreau
Jon Favreau directed the first two Iron Man films and also acts in both as Happy Hogan, Tony Stark's bodyguard and chauffeur.
Q 02Which MCU film came between Iron Man and Iron Man 2?
The Incredible Hulk
The Incredible Hulk opened in June 2008, weeks after Iron Man, which makes Iron Man 2 the MCU's third film; Robert Downey Jr. turns up as Tony Stark in its final scene.
Q 03Which element in Stark's arc reactor is slowly poisoning him?
Palladium
Palladium powers the arc reactor in Stark's chest and is slowly poisoning his blood, until he synthesises a new element from a diagram hidden in his father's 1974 Stark Expo diorama.
Q 04Who plays Ivan Vanko, the Russian physicist with electrified whips?
Mickey Rourke
Mickey Rourke toured Moscow's Butyrka prison to research the part and decided to deliver half of Vanko's lines in Russian.
Q 05Vanko is an amalgamation of Whiplash and which other comics villain?
Crimson Dynamo
Crimson Dynamo supplied the surname: in the comics Anton Vanko was the first man to wear that Soviet armour, while Whiplash was a separate whip-wielding villain.
Q 06Which pet did the actor playing Ivan Vanko buy with his own money for the character?
A cockatoo
A cockatoo was the actor's own idea, along with Vanko's tattoos and gold teeth, and he paid for both the bird and the teeth himself.
Q 07In Iron Man 2, Tony Stark's portable Mark V armour unfolds from what?
A suitcase
A suitcase: the portable suit assembles around Stark when Vanko ambushes him mid-race in Monaco and wins him the fight, though the armour comes out of it severely damaged.
Q 08Who replaced Terrence Howard as James Rhodes?
Don Cheadle
Don Cheadle took Marvel's call at his child's laser-tag birthday party and was given about two hours to decide, without knowing where Rhodes's story would go.
Q 09Terrence Howard claimed Iron Man's star 'took the money that was supposed to go to me' and did what?
Pushed him out
Pushed him out, Howard said on a 2013 talk show: he had been the first actor hired for Iron Man and its highest paid, but says Marvel offered far less than his contract promised for the sequel.
Q 10What name does Natasha Romanoff use while posing as Stark's new assistant?
Natalie Rushman
Natalie Rushman was a S.H.I.E.L.D. plant: Nick Fury had sent her undercover to keep watch on Stark, and the truth comes out when the pair meet him at Randy's Donuts.
Q 11Which actress was in early talks to play Black Widow before Johansson?
Emily Blunt
Emily Blunt was the director's pick, but Fox exercised an option left over from her Devil Wears Prada contract and put her in Gulliver's Travels instead.
Q 12What did Scarlett Johansson do before her casting as Black Widow, hoping it would help her land the part?
Dyed her hair red
Dyed her hair red: she had first met the filmmakers a year earlier to talk over Marvel's heroines, then arrived at their second meeting as a redhead, hoping they would like it.
Q 13Who plays rival arms dealer Justin Hammer?
Sam Rockwell
Q 21Which comics storyline did Iron Man 2 reportedly tone down to protect toy sales?
Demon in a Bottle
Demon in a Bottle is the comics arc about Stark's alcoholism; studio executives reportedly feared a drunk Iron Man would hurt overseas marketing and toy sales, so the film keeps only traces, such as his armoured birthday binge.
Q 22What does Tony Stark build at home to create a new element in Iron Man 2?
A particle accelerator
A particle accelerator: Stark builds a makeshift one in his workshop, and when Agent Coulson turns up a prototype of Captain America's shield there, he uses it to prop the apparatus level.
Q 23Which Iron Man 2 game villain later appeared in Ant-Man and the Wasp?
Ghost
Sam Rockwell had been considered for Tony Stark in the first film, then signed on as Stark's rival while he was still waiting to see a script.
Q 14Which Iron Man 2 character is an elderly Englishman in the comics, to his actor's surprise?
Justin Hammer
Justin Hammer is an ageing English billionaire in the comics; the film remade him as a younger American who envies Stark, and his actor had to ask an interviewer, 'Is he an older guy?'
Q 15Which Iron Man 2 actor signed a nine-film Marvel deal?
Samuel L. Jackson
Samuel L. Jackson told a reporter 'Maybe I won't be Nick Fury' in January 2009; a month later he had an option to play the spy chief in nine more Marvel films.
Q 16Garry Shandling's senator character was named after which radio host?
Howard Stern
Howard Stern lent his surname to Senator Stern, the director has said; the senator who demands Stark's armour for the government is later exposed as a Hydra ally in Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Q 17In his Iron Man 2 cameo, Stan Lee is mistaken for which TV personality?
Larry King
Larry King is who Stark hails him as: Stan Lee filmed the cameo dressed as the talk-show host, after the first film had Stark take him for Hugh Hefner.
Q 18Which tech CEO plays himself in Iron Man 2's Monaco restaurant scene?
Elon Musk
Elon Musk takes Stark's compliment on his Merlin rocket engines and replies with a pitch of his own: an idea for an electric jet.
Q 19Who played the boy in an Iron Man mask whom Stark saves from a drone in Iron Man 2?
The director's son
The director's son, Max, wore the mask; Spider-Man: Homecoming's director later floated the idea that the boy was a young Peter Parker, and Kevin Feige said the maths might work.
Q 20To whose memory is Iron Man 2 dedicated?
DJ AM
DJ AM spins the records at Stark's drunken birthday party; his planned one-day cameo stretched to about a week on set, and he died in August 2009, months before the film came out.
Ghost is a male saboteur in the comics and the game; on film the role went to Hannah John-Kamen as Ava Starr, and Marvel Studios' official history says an early Iron Man 2 story already included the character.
Q 24Iron Man 2's writer Justin Theroux co-wrote which 2008 comedy?
Tropic Thunder
Tropic Thunder starred Robert Downey Jr., who then urged Marvel to hire its co-writer for the Iron Man sequel.
Q 25Iron Man 2's storyboard artist Genndy Tartakovsky created which animated series?
Samurai Jack
Samurai Jack's creator was brought in because the director loved that show and his Clone Wars shorts, and wanted an animator's feel for rhythm in the film's fight scenes.
Q 26Whom does Tony Stark appoint as the new CEO of Stark Industries in Iron Man 2?
Pepper Potts
Pepper Potts gets the job because Stark, who secretly believes he is dying, is putting his affairs in order; she is soon watching TV pundits question her qualifications.
Q 27Which English actor voices J.A.R.V.I.S., Tony Stark's AI butler, in Iron Man 2?
Paul Bettany
Paul Bettany got the part after acting beside the director in Wimbledon; five years on, the disembodied voice gained a body when J.A.R.V.I.S. became Vision in Avengers: Age of Ultron.
Q 28Which Formula One boss overruled Iron Man 2's permission to film at the Monaco Grand Prix circuit?
Bernie Ecclestone
Bernie Ecclestone overruled Monaco's government, so the crew flew over one Rolls-Royce Phantom to drive the circuit, added the racing cars digitally and staged the crash in a California car park.
Q 29Which Mad Men actor appears in old film reels as Tony's father, Howard Stark, in Iron Man 2?
John Slattery
John Slattery, Mad Men's Roger Sterling, plays Howard in a reel that ends with the distant father telling Tony that his greatest creation is his son.
Q 30Where in New York City does Tony Stark stage the Stark Expo in Iron Man 2?
Flushing Meadows
Flushing Meadows hosted the 1964 World's Fair and still has its Unisphere globe; the film faked most of its Expo in Los Angeles, against a five-storey green screen of shipping containers at the Sepulveda Dam.