If you haven't seen it already, the Internet is abuzz with hype for the Iron Man 3 extended trailer. The tone is grittier than its previous two iterations — compared to the macho, brash Stark of Iron Man 1 and 2, Tony's besieged by insomnia, and his life (and more importantly, Pepper's) in danger from the sinister Mandarin.
Reactions on Twitter range from the emotionally ecstatic (most of them, but we'll spare you except for this one):
Whoa, pretty deep for an analysis only hours after the second trailer made its debut.
Some previous analysis on the character of the Mandarin comes from io9, which asked several Asian-Americans to weigh in with their thoughts.
Says Marjorie M. Liu, who has written for Marvel Comics: "What's amazing is that China through its economic might has succeeded in extracting from Hollywood what civil rights groups and Asian American petitions have been unable to: more respectful representations of its citizens. If only every minority group had a massive economy!"
Gene Yang, who published a critically-acclaimed graphic novel comic called "American Born Chinese" in 2006, weighed in as well. "My own take — and the point that we make in SHATTERED, which is an anthology that's all about upending and reinventing cliche images of Asian Americans — is that a good villain is not a bad thing. If Kingsley, a terrific actor, can bring authenticity, three-dimensionality, complexity, and that dark charisma that's central to a great bad guy's success to the role, then I'll be the first to cheer him on. If, on the other hand, the Mandarin ends up as another Fu Manchu manquee with no real backstory and nothing but lame buzzphrases to flesh out his character, then I'll boo louder than anyone."
Leave your own thoughts in the comments!
