Joe Rogan’s Pitch To Robert Downey Jr. On How Iron Man Could Return To The MCU Isn’t Half Bad

For the first time since 2014, Robert Downey Jr. is starring in a movie outside of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. It must be a challenging role in a prestige drama, one free of CGI and talking animals, right Oh, nope, it’s Dolittle, which is currently sporting a 13 percent rating on Rotten Tomatoes (sample review headline: “Dolittle: Well, It’s Better Than Cats!”) and — prediction time — will not become the next highest-grossing movie ever. So it’s no wonder that when RDJ guested on The Joe Rogan Experience podcast, he was mostly asked about Iron Man, and whether he’ll return to the MCU. In short: no.

When asked by host Joe Rogan about reprising the role that made him the face of the MCU, Downey Jr. replied, “If I pick the jersey back up and put it on, wouldn’t you feel a little bit like, aw crap … To me, starting up again is off the table. I feel like I’ve done all I could with that character. There would have to be a super compelling argument and a series of events that made it obvious. But the other thing is, I wanna do other stuff.”

Like Dolittle, apparently. Undeterred, Rogan pitched how Iron Man could come back:

“Here’s what I think, they go through a few semi-lackluster Avengers movies without you. There’s a moment where the world’s fate is at stake and they’ve realized they need a super genius. Then, they figure out how to restart that time machine… You step out of that machine and the entire crowd goes wild.”

Everyone is happy to see Tony Stark again, except for Gwyneth Paltrow, who didn’t realize he was gone. You can watch Downey Jr.’s episode below.