The 'Iron Man' helmer deferred to the acclaimed directors.

Jon Favreau, the director of Marvel's Iron Man and Iron Man 2, says that directors like Martin Scorsese and Francis Ford Coppola should be free to criticize Marvel and superhero movies. "These two guys are my heroes, and they have earned the right to express their opinions,” Favreau told CNBC in an interview Tuesday morning. “I wouldn't be doing what I'm doing if they didn’t carve the way. They served as a source of inspiration, you can go all the way back to Swingers.... They can express whatever opinion they like.” Over the past few weeks, Scorsese has heaped criticism on Marvel and so-called theme park movies, saying that they are “not cinema.” Director Francis Ford Coppola followed suit this week by telling the press "Martin was kind when he said it's not cinema. He didn't say it's despicable, which I just say it is."

In the CNBC interview Favreau also discussed the rapidly changing entertainment landscape, which he says is creating “a great deal of uncertainty” but also “a lot of opportunity.” As an example, he used Scorsese’s The Irishman. “You see Scorsese with The Irishman, I don’t know that that would have been possible, with that budget level, and the technology required to tell that story, in a more traditional model,” Favreau said.