iron man 3

iron man 3

After being on pause for over a month and a half, Marvel’s Iron Man 3 is back shooting — with no apparent interruption to its planned release next May.

Principal photography was halted Aug. 16 when Robert Downey Jr. hurt himself while performing a minor stunt. Downey’s rep says the injury was to his ankle, and after taking off several weeks to recuperate, he’s now back on his feet.

Filming has resumed in south Florida, where a replica of the Malibu, Calif., seafood restaurant Neptune’s Net was recreated for a sequence in the movie, which has been revealed in some snapshots from onlookers. The actual restaurant is a popular seaside hangout for surfers and bikers, which accounts for all the choppers in this photo of Iron Man and the character believed to be Don Cheadle’s Rhodey, a.k.a. War Machine, sporting red, white, and blue armor similar to the comic book character Iron Patriot.

Or … are we looking at a guest appearance by Chris Evans’ Captain America, trying out some old Iron Man armor with a yankee doodle paint job? (Just a random theory.)

Stark’s cliffside home in the Iron Man movies seems to be in Malibu, so maybe they decided to grab a bite at Neptune’s Net in lieu of shawarma.

The image also captures a clean look at the new Iron Man armor, which is programmed to remotely clamp onto Tony Stark’s body, similar to the storyline in the comic book seriesExtremis, Warren Ellis and Adi Granov 2005-2006 tale in which Stark is injected with a serum that fuses his body to the control system for his armor.

Although it may seem hard to believe that such a long delay in shooting would not cause a similar postponement in the release date, Marvel reps insist the May 3 debut for Iron Man 3remains on track. Although the studio wouldn’t comment to explain, it’s fairly easy for special effects work to continue on a movie like this even if on-set filming gets postponed.

The delay due to Downey’s injury could very likely lead to some late nights down the road for director Shane Black and his post-production team as they put the finishing touches on the movie, but apparently won’t cause a big enough disturbance for the studio to consider pushing back from that prime, start-of-summer date on the calendar.