Iron Man 3: 10 Moments We Probably Won't Get To See

6. The Mandarin's Dragon Hands

mandarindragon The Mandarin€™s not an easy character to adapt. The guy is definitely a product of a different era. He was created in the early 60s and was obviously based on Fu Manchu and his visual appearance embodies some of the worst aspects of the Yellow Peril stereotype. When he was first introduced, he even had a buck-toothed grin. Over time, this was toned down significantly, but he still walked around with a Fu Manchu mustache, robes, and wielded magical rings he stole from alien dragons. He was also heavily steeped in mysticism, rejecting technology and they even decided to make him a descendant of Genghis Khan, because any evil Chinese guy must be related to Genghis Khan. It€™s very clear that Marvel has found the Mandarin difficult for a film adaptation for some time. Iron Man and Iron Man 2 director Jon Favreau found said that while he thinks the character has to appear, the way he€™s been depicted is problematic. Iron Man 3 director Shane Black was more blunt, coming right out and calling the Mandarin €œa racist caricature.€ So it€™s not likely we€™ll be seeing this little aspect of the character, introduced in the 90s as a prelude to the Hands of the Mandarin crossover. After the Mandarin lost his hands, vaporized by the energy of his own rings, he was in a coma. And while in that state, his hands began to grow back, except now they were dragon-like - green, scaly, and tipped with long claws. Because I suppose the Mandarin wasn€™t enough of a racist caricature at this point, they had to literally give him dragon hands. The 90s were a very weird time for comics, especially the Avengers. I guess we should at least be thankful that Marvel didn€™t go the route of the Iron Man animated series at the time and make the Mandarin entirely green (a fate suffered by numerous Asian villains in 90s cartoons). Likelihood: Black seems to be approaching a very real-world version of the Mandarin, one who likely won€™t even possess his powerful rings. So dragon hands is significantly less likely.
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Percival Constantine is the author of several novels and short stories, including the Vanguard superhero series, and regularly writes and comments on movies, comics, and other pop culture. More information can be found at his website, PercivalConstantine.com