10 Ways Comic Book Movies Keep F*cking Up Female Characters

Let's look to Iron Man 3 for perhaps the biggest middle finger to women in comic book movies. Rebecca Hall's turn in the third Iron Man film may not be that memorable, which may have something to do with the actress being reduced to nerdy scientist Maya Hansen, whereas Guy Pearce's Aldrich Killian took all the villain glory.

We had expected a bigger role for Hall, and director Shane Black openly admits that a last-minute script edit changed the lead villain from female to male:

"In the earlier draft, the woman was essentially Killian – and they didn’t want a female Killian, they wanted a male Killian. I liked the idea, like Remington Steele, you think it’s the man but at the end, the woman has been running the whole show. They just said, 'no way'."

There are certainly points of the script where you would find yourself thinking, "I bet she is the villain," but Hansen just sort of vanishes into nothingness in the final act. Hall herself said that the experience was "heartbreaking," but that hopefully a change in the tide could see women's rights trickle down through cinema.