Shane Black Now Co-Writing Marvel's IRON MAN 3?

Updated: I'm not even sure this is news but Cinema Blend reported on Friday that Shane Black would be 'co-writing' Iron Man 3 alongside Drew Pearce and that his 'ideas are behind a lot of what€™s happening with the script they€™re working on', presumably the previous talk of the new threequel being a 'Tom Clancy style thriller' with minimum superhero characters. This is fine but is that really much different to what was reported at the beginning of April when Drew Pearce (No Heroics) was hired as head writer and we were told Shane Black would be 'working closely' with him on the new script? The truth to me seems unmovable - Pearce has been brought in to curb Black's R-Rated eccentricites and to make sure Marvel's vision of what Iron Man 3 should be will be imprinted on Black's script. When it comes down to who gets the final say, it will be Pearce. Original article follows... It's been a tough few weeks to swallow for comic book film fans what with Darren Aronofsky's bailing on the Wolverine sequel and the hard to watch self-destruction acts that Warner Bros are demonstrating with their future plans for their flagship DC Characters.... so the news today that Shane Black WON'T now be writing Iron Man 3 just unnecessarily depresses us further. Despite words from Black to the contrary at the Omaha Film Festival last month, it now appears that the gifted scribe will only direct Iron Man 3 - Deadline reporting that Marvel have just hired Drew Pearce for the writing duties. Pearce's credits include a failed attempt to get Brian K. Vaughan's Runaways off the ground and duties on the irreverent U.K. superhero show No Heroics... a CV that doesn't hold up to much rigour when you look at Black's legendary screenplays for Lethal Weapon, The Last Boy Scout and Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang... the latter, a successful collaboration with Robert Downey Jr that acts as the best evidence I've seen so far of a writer who could come to grips with the Tony Stark character. We are told that Black will 'work closely' with Pearce in putting together the script that is now being written from scratch but we all know what's happened here. Marvel have brought in one of their guys who is familiar with how they want their films to go and who they know they can manipulative to get the Iron Man 3 story told the way they want it, and Black will probably, sadly, be little more than a director for hire. They attempted the same thing with Jon Favreau on Iron Man 2 and the director's lack of control completely ruined what could have been a great sequel. Hiring Black to write and direct seemed like a no-brainer to us, but Marvel couldn't even get that right.... I mean after all, why bother hiring Black, one of the greatest writers of his generation but who has only directed one movie, to helm Iron Man 3, if not to scribe it as well? It makes no sense. It's like asking Quentin Tarantino to act in a movie but not have him write or direct it. It's just not something that any sane person would do... Still there is a crumb of comfort for Death Note and Doc Savage fans. At least Black will be able to work on those screenplays this year as he awaits what Marvel deliver him with Iron Man 3.