UPDATE: The quote was misinterpreted. Abrams helped on the first Iron Man, not Iron Man 3. That’s been changed below

Yesterday was a huge day for fans of ‘Iron Man 3’. With only a few months between now and it’s premiere, Disney released an epic new trailer for the film that have fans wondering if it will top the other Marvel movies that came before it, even ‘The Avengers’. As a result of the new trailer being unleashed into the world, a whole mess of news concerning the Armored Avenger’s next solo adventure has been unearthed. For instance, did you know that J.J. Abrams did some work on Shane Black’s Phase Two-launching film?

Abrams has been in the news quite a bit lately since he landed the directing gig for ‘Star Wars: Episode VII’ in addition to handling Paramount’s ‘Star Trek’ franchise (among many, many other things), and now it appears that he’s been getting his hands into yet another tent pole picture. According to an interview with IGN, Robert Downey Jr. revealed that the ‘Lost’ and ‘Fringe’ co-creator was tapped to provide some help with the third act ofthe first ‘Iron Man’:

“There were a couple times in ‘Iron Man 3’ where our lifeline was we’d call Jon Favreau. ‘What do we do?’ He’d be like, ‘Stick with this. Stick with the love story,’ or whatever. Then he’d say, ‘Wait, didn’t we used to do this same thing with Shane?’ Because we reached out to Shane a bunch, particularly in the first Iron Man.

Then I think we reached out to J.J. Abrams at one point when we were really confused in Act III, and he helped us, too. It’s just interesting. Usually you think, in the legacy of filmmakers that come and go, there’s something so evocative about how strange it is that this particular strain of the Marvel universe was so successful, so what are the reasons for that and how do we keep that vital and just have fun?”

Hollywood’s a small town and a lot of people are friends, so it’s not a huge thing to ask your friends for help. Recently, it was revealed that James Cameron helped out Bryan Singer on ‘X-Men: Days of Future Past’. I’m sure that this happens a lot around town, but Abrams lending a helping hand on ‘Iron Man’ is one of those “icing on the cake” situations. Furthermore, maybe Abrams’ consulting role may expand around Phase Three or Phase Four to a director job on one of Marvel’s future properties. Could you imagine J.J. Abrams doing an Inhumans movie or a Doctor Strange movie?

I was pretty excited for ‘Iron Man 3’ already, mostly because of all the different armors and Ben Kingsley as The Mandarin, but now I’ll be paying close attention to the third act to see how beefed up it is after it recieved Abrams’ help. Do you think the talented director left his mark on Tony Stark’s latest story? Does it make you more excited for the film that kicks off Marvel next slate of films to build towards ‘The Avengers 2’? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

‘Iron Man 3’ starring Robert Downey Jr., Ben Kingsley, Gwyneth Paltrow, Don Cheadle, Rebecca Hall, and Guy Pearce opens on May 3, 2013.