Kevin Feige Tells ALL The Secrets About IRON MAN 3

Marvel Studios’ top exec Kevin Feige can’t seem to keep his mouth shut concerning IRON MAN 3, revealing huge ladles of spoilers at every opportunity. Well, maybe they’re not “huge” spoilers, but he’s definitely playing a little loose with secret info. Like this latest bit about The Ten Rings and Mandarin…

“The Ten Rings is a terrorist organization that we set up really for the eagle-eye fans. Yinsen, in “Iron Man 1,” says they call themselves the Ten Rings, and that was our allusion to the ten rings of the Mandarin. In “Iron Man 2,” in a deleted scene, it is a member of this Ten Rings organization that gives Whiplash the credentials that allow him to infiltrate the Monaco race and come in and cut Tony Stark’s car in half. In this movie again we wanted to explore a little bit more of this terrorist notion of the Ten Rings, which is why you’ll sometimes see the Ten Rings’ flag as seen in “Iron Man 1” behind the Mandarin in a couple of his terrorist videos that he puts out around the world. But it all goes to the ten rings of the Mandarin himself, and you will see the famous ten rings on Sir Ben, and, frankly, fitting Sir Ben with the ten rings as designed by Russell Bobbitt, our prop master, was one of those “Oh my god we’re actually doing this; the comics are coming to life in front of us” moments on “Iron Man 3” and Ben wears them well. Then the moment when the ten rings came in and we watched Sir Ben fitting them for the first time was great too.”

“When we were casting the part, we wanted somebody whose ethnicity was not specific and we wanted somebody who was a spectacular actor. Sir Ben Kingsley was interested and it all fell into place. There are many different incarnations of the Mandarin; he’s sort of pulled from all the comic books to create this very unique and very iconic villain. When you first hear his voice in the trailer, it is unexpected. That came about because we needed Sir Ben to record some dialogue for a Comic-Con piece that we’d done. He said that he had been working on the Mandarin’s voice, so we let him try it. We all didn’t know what to think at first until we started laying it into the picture and said, “My God, it’s brilliant.” It’s fascinating and you can’t out your finger on what it is or where it’s coming from, which is exactly what the Mandarin is in this movie. So having Sir Ben on board is amazing and I think he’s going to surprise a lot of people with his performance.”

Or how about this deluge of backstory for Rhodey’s use of the Iron Patriot armor…

“A few years ago in publishing, they created a suit called the Iron Patriot, which was an advanced Iron Man suit painted red, white and blue with a star on it. In the comics it’s a different character that wears it and utilizes it. But we really loved that image; we thought it was a striking image. And coming off of “The Avengers” where you have Captain America and Captain America is such a symbol for The Avengers, we thought it would be fun if the United States wanted to have their own version of that. Of course, Captain America works for the United States, but as he’s more of an Avengers hero the US Government said, “We want our own,” which is why they take War Machine and rebrand him as the Iron Patriot. Shane Black and I [seeing] the Iron Patriot for the first time [was an exciting reveal] and what the guys at Legacy had done with this suit. Each suit gets better and better. The Iron Patriot practical suit that was worn on set is the best practical suit they’ve ever built.”

“Now over the course of the film we learn that there was a nefarious purpose behind that. It’s a great example of how sometimes you take and stay true to a character as pulled from the comics, and sometimes the comics can be the kernel of an idea that you then flesh out and build into something else. One of the best things about being a part of Marvel Studios is that you have the house of ideas; you have the publishing division that comes out with dozens of books a month and we flip through almost every one of those books every month and just pull things and don’t know where they could be used. But you know, a few years ago we pulled out the Iron Patriot and said, “That’s cool. Wouldn’t that be fun to play with that someday?” And you’ll see it in Iron Man 3.”

I love spoilers as much as the next bourbon soaked, brown bearded fanboy, but this is just too damn much Feige! Save some for the Blu-ray special features!

SOURCE: MS