10 Most Irritating Subplots In The Marvel Cinematic Universe

4. The Real Mandarin - Iron Man 3, All Hail The King

Easily the most shocking aspect of the MCU to date was The Mandarin in Iron Man 3. We went in expecting Ben Kingsley to be playing the famous comic book villain, only for Shane Black and Drew Pearce to pull a complete 180 on us, revealing that Kingsley's character was in fact an actor named Trevor Slattery, and later that the "real" Mandarin was, in fact, Guy Pearce's Aldrich Killian. However, with the recent Marvel One-Shot All Hail the King, this was played with once more, as Slattery ends up being visited in prison by a member of the real Ten Rings (played by Scoot McNairy), who breaks him out so that he can meet the real Mandarin once and for all. After the huge outrage from comic book fans surrounding the daring interpretation of The Mandarin in IM3, this short film felt like a way to apologise to those who felt burned by the portrayal, but by this point, the whole thing has become pretty irritating regardless of which side you're on. The Mandarin needs to be dropped so that Iron Man can train his sights on whomever his next villain might be.