Iron Man 3 The Mandarin in Iron Man 3...Love it or hate it? - Part 1

[Saitou Hajime]

Where's any objective evidence of that?

None, hence the inverted commas.

 

[cherokeesam]

None, hence the inverted commas.

Oh. I misunderstood.

 

[ThanosOfTitans]

I just hate people that recist seeing flaws in a movie just because they enjoyed it. I loved The Dark Knight Rises and my enjoyment of it was 11/10 but I see it's not flawless, I really enjoyed The Amazing Spider-Man but I recognize it's flaws. But some of these guys, even after a sensible argument just can't say "oh I kinda see where you're coming from, but I still enjoyed it myself". Kinda petty

This topic isn't going anywhere. I'm gonna leave with these words: the twist didn't work on solid logic, but hey, if some of you enjoyed it, great. I personally hated it


cheers to you all

I agree with you. I hated the "twist." I hated the movie's interpretation of the Mandarin, but I still enjoyed the movie. I was entertained. That being said, I'll never support this movie with a dollar of my money going forward. lol It probably won't even get a second viewing from me. The traditional Mandarin (10 alien rings and all) is my favorite interpretation and Iron Man 3 kind of just threw it all away.

 

[KRYPTON INC.]

Much like the S:TM vs MOS debate I feel a little like a man without a country in this "debate". I would have loved to have had a Chow Yun Fat or like wise respected Chinese or Asian (i.e a Ken W. type) actor play the part of a truer to the comics Mandarin with super powered rings of alien origin. I don't think any of that is by it's nature cheesey or racist unless you go out of your way to make it so. You don't have to do a Lo Pan caricature or the like at all. Plus alien tech had been established in AVENGERS. Added bonus, with the alien tech Stark having panic attacks would have a more understandable trigger. But having said all of that.... What we did get was fine. Worked for the themes and plot of the film and was entertaining. I am always excited when adaptations of comic books are closer to the source, but I accepted long ago that we were never always going to get that. Even from MARVEL STUDIOS.

 

[metaphysician]

They totally could have used an alien tech Mandarin. The problem is, it wouldn't have been a minor change, it would have required an entire new movie to be written from scratch, down to the "paragraph summarizing the themes and concepts for the film."

 

[MichaelChen]

The rings are a problem even in the comics. They clash with the themes of the character.

The original Mandarin origin has him as an aristocrat who spends all of his fiefdom's money making himself into what amounts to a super-soldier, a science and martial-arts ubermensche. This results in him going broke, and his fiefdom being taken away from him.

He's a metaphor for several things:
(1)The military industrial complex. He's a government going broke from military spending, in one man.

(2)The Nazi ideal. He's someone who has become perfect in mind and body from a macho teenager's vain perspective: a science(implicitly weapons inventing) and martial arts hypermasculine monster.

(3)Imperial Japan. He's constantly karate-chopping everything and he's perpetually enraged.

(4)Aristocrat villains. Specifically, the sort of aristocrat villains who in western fiction tend to be really brilliant fencers and hunters, and whose dominant character traits are misogyny, class bigotry, and thinly-veiled barbarism.

The Mandarin is an odd case of someone who has effectively two origins, and the second origin is kind of a stupid shark-jump. His first origin is this layered metaphor that makes for a classic villain. And his second origin is a bunch of stupidity that makes a mess of his first origin. I can't help but wonder if Stan Lee started the origin sober and in the zone, then got stoned and crapped out the stuff about the rings.

 

[Victarion]

Any good writer could make the rings mesh with Mandarin.

 

[ThanosOfTitans]

Any good writer could make the rings mesh with Mandarin.

Exactly. There is no excuse for the underwhelming Mandarin Marvel introduced on the big screen. I mean, seriously. Mandarin is really the only thing that interests me about Iron Man and it was fudged.

 

[metaphysician]

Any good writer could make the rings mesh with Mandarin.

Anything is possible for the man who doesn't have to do it. Don't say its easy to make the rings work. Say *how* you would make the rings work.

 

[Adamantium Man]

Exactly. There is no excuse for the underwhelming Mandarin Marvel introduced on the big screen. I mean, seriously. Mandarin is really the only thing that interests me about Iron Man and it was fudged.

So, you don't care about the man vs machine dichotomy, Tony's ambiguous moral history, the self-made hero theme, the fact that Iron Man is a hero by his own design as opposed to those who have heroism thrust upon them by accident, and all those things that make Iron Man an interesting hero in his own right? You define Iron Man by one of his villains who was a caricature when he was conceived and has fared little better over time? Seriously?

In that case, what business did you have watching the first two movies, or The Avengers, or anything else that didn't have Mandarin in it but did have Iron Man?



I don't get it.

 

[ThanosOfTitans]

So, you don't care about the man vs machine dichotomy, Tony's ambiguous moral history, the self-made hero theme, the fact that Iron Man is a hero by his own design as opposed to those who have heroism thrust upon them by accident, and all those things that make Iron Man an interesting hero in his own right? You define Iron Man by one of his villains who was a caricature when he was conceived and has fared little better over time? Seriously?

In that case, what business did you have watching the first two movies, or The Avengers, or anything else that didn't have Mandarin in it but did have Iron Man?



I don't get it.

You seem to be implying that the Avengers revolves around Iron Man and his story? Last time I checked the Avengers team doesn't consist solely of Iron Man.

I go to the movies to support Marvel and comicbook movies in general. Who are you to question that?

I actually enjoyed the first Iron Man movie, it's a great movie. I was entertained by Iron Man 3 but its interpretation of the Mandarin ruined the overall experience for me. Point blank.

We don't agree...you attempting to justify Marvel's cinematic interpretation of the Mandarin by berating the version I prefer won't change that. I'm a big boy capable of thinking for myself. I hope that sticks in the future.

 

[Crimz]

There is no excuse for not having the 10 rings at all. I don't see why they changed the Mandarin so much, Ben Kingsley was awesome until that scene.

 

[Victarion]

Anything is possible for the man who doesn't have to do it. Don't say its easy to make the rings work. Say *how* you would make the rings work.

Alien tech crafts the body of the rings; Extremis powers the rings. Ten Rings spies learn about Tony's PTSD from the Chitauri invasion. The Mandarin does a deal with one of Thanos's agents sent to Earth after the events of The Avengers. This agent is on Earth to gather intel on the Avengers for Thanos. So Mandarin becomes one of Thanos's lieutenants on Earth.

If you'd rather detach the film from the greater MCU, the Mandarin heads the Ten Rings and learns about Killian's Extremis project. The Mandarin's Ten Rings gets Killian's attention and enter into his employ. Killian uses Ten Rings as terrorist boogeymen to advance his corporation. Through their partnership, Mandarin is able to infiltrate Killian's company and obtain the Extremis. Afterward, Mandarin double-crosses Killian and kills him. Then we'd learn that Mandarin holds disgust toward self-styled heroes, and goes to war against Tony Stark. The Mandarin would target Tony because he sees Stark as the figurehead of the Avengers.

 

[cherokeesam]

Alien tech crafts the body of the rings; Extremis powers the rings. Ten Rings spies learn about Tony's PTSD from the Chitauri invasion. The Mandarin does a deal with one of Thanos's agents sent to Earth after the events of The Avengers. This agent is on Earth to gather intel on the Avengers for Thanos. So Mandarin becomes one of Thanos's lieutenants on Earth.

If you'd rather detach the film from the greater MCU, the Mandarin heads the Ten Rings and learns about Killian's Extremis project. The Mandarin's Ten Rings gets Killian's attention and enter into his employ. Killian uses Ten Rings as terrorist boogeymen to advance his corporation. Through their partnership, Mandarin is able to infiltrate Killian's company and obtain the Extremis. Afterward, Mandarin double-crosses Killian and kills him. Then we'd learn that Mandarin holds disgust toward self-styled heroes, and goes to war against Tony Stark. The Mandarin would target Tony because he sees Stark as the figurehead of the Avengers.

lolwut

*Extremis couldn't power the Rings. Extremis is biological in nature; it powers *living* things, like plants and people. It doesn't give "magic powers" to inanimate objects, like rings.

*Why would Thanos give a **** about the Avengers? Thanos doesn't give a **** about Earth, let alone its "mightiest heroes." Loki is the one who wanted to take over Earth; not Thanos. Thanos just gave Loki a mercenary army to accomplish this. (And odds are he set Loki and the Chitauri up to fail anyway, because his true designs lay on Asgard, not Midgard.)

*The bit about Kingsley double-crossing Pearce could work just fine. Some people have brought up this alternate theory before, and I don't see why that wouldn't have worked structurally. Thematically, however, it goes against what Black was trying to say about us creating fake "boogeyman" villains to justify our "war on terror." The whole decoy Mandarin is absolutely essential for the theme of the story.

*I don't buy the thing about Kingsley wanting to declare war on heroes and targeting Tony Stark in particular, though. That's not how terrorism works. Terrorism targets *civilians,* particularly those who can't fight back. It's simply mass murder designed to scare civilians into paralyzing fear.

Of course, a *real* Kingsley-Mandarin would have an obvious excuse to target Tony Stark: revenge. But then, that makes him a simplistic, boring villain with transparent and hackneyed motives. And again, that goes against the theme of this movie.

 

[Victarion]

Decoy Mandarin is fine, too. Killian just needed better motives. Perhaps I should've been more specific with "War against Tony Stark." Obviously he'd be targeted Tony and the civilians that look up to Iron-Man as a hero. The rings stabilize the Extremis so that Mandarin can sling it like magic.

 

[MichaelChen]

That would over-complicate a character who, frankly, could use a bit of simplifying in the comics, to make all his power in-keeping with his themes. His themes are about social darwinism. To quote one of his speeches: ""to know you are superior, in mind, in body, in spirit, is everything!"

The Mandarin is like Khan Noonian Singh, an ubermenche master of science, war, and straight up fighting. The rings just get in the way. The rings are like sticking fuzzy-dice on review mirror of an otherwise cool car. The rings need to go away in the comics, not get added to the movies.

 

[Victarion]

That would over-complicate a character who, frankly, could use a bit of simplifying in the comics, to make all his power in-keeping with his themes. His themes are about social darwinism. To quote one of his speeches: ""to know you are superior, in mind, in body, in spirit, is everything!"

Okay. Taking your post into account, the Mandarin views Extremis as a challenge. Something powerful and dangerous to be mastered. To that end, he creates each of the rings that let him sling Extremis in different ways.

 

[Nathan]

Alright, I finally got off my ass and watched the Movie today. So I can join in on the discussion now. What the bloody f**k? Seriously? After all Marvel has been able to pull off, even giving us Asgardian Warriors from another realm, they turned the least outlandish character of them all, into a goddamn actor with drug problems. How can you do this to someone's arch nemesis?

 

[metaphysician]

In what way is the Mandarin the "least outlandish character"? He's a mess of kludgy elements often stuck in a bizarre costume.

 

[Ms. Marvel]

And people said Marvel Studios were too safe.

 

[Adamantium Man]

1) You seem to be implying that the Avengers revolves around Iron Man and his story? Last time I checked the Avengers team doesn't consist solely of Iron Man.

2) I go to the movies to support Marvel and comicbook movies in general. Who are you to question that?

3) I actually enjoyed the first Iron Man movie, it's a great movie. I was entertained by Iron Man 3 but its interpretation of the Mandarin ruined the overall experience for me. Point blank.

4) We don't agree...you attempting to justify Marvel's cinematic interpretation of the Mandarin by berating the version I prefer won't change that. I'm a big boy capable of thinking for myself. I hope that sticks in the future.

@1 I'm not implying that at all. The Avengers as a team are not even topic of this discussion. You, on the other hand, seem to be implying that Iron Man and his myth solely revolves around the Mandarin, and I dared to question that.

@2 Again, I'm not questioning that. See #1. Who are you to put words into my mouth?

@3 Fair enough.

@4 I'm not "berating" anything, nor am I trying to change your way of thinking, I'm just trying to understand. You come across as very hostile, though, so I must have offended you somehow. Sorry about that.

And as to you being a big boy, I'll just take your word for it. End of discussion for me. Jeez.

 

[MichaelChen]

Okay. Taking your post into account, the Mandarin views Extremis as a challenge. Something powerful and dangerous to be mastered. To that end, he creates each of the rings that let him sling Extremis in different ways.

No. Just get rid of the rings. He's not Ring-Man. He's a mad scientist and schemer with superhuman martial arts abilities that allow him to karate-chop the armor to pieces. Simplifying that into him being mad scientist who mad scienced himself into being able to karate-chop the armor to pieces is fine.

 

[BlackFox]

any good writer could make the rings mesh with mandarin.

qft

 

[SilentWarriorZ]

It would have been completely different If Mandarins Rings were Real thing and huge Dragons like Metallic monsters Attack Ironman But still it could be tough choice as far as in the previous Ironman movies none of them take tony to his limits but killian .

 

[Ms. Marvel]

Hmmm, I would have to agree with Jeremy Jahns (a reviewer on youtube). Killian is the Mandarin like my god mother was santa clause when I was a child.