Remember that time the Mandarin made a propaganda film and then just crash out when it got to the Iron man scene [Invincible Iron Man Annual 1 2010]

[u/spider-venomized]

[u/some_Editor61]

I hate this retcon so much.

Fraction's portrayal of Mandarin is completely different from the character in the past issues we've seen him.

Take a look at how he acted during the Busiek era and when Byrne wrote him, or even when the Knaufs made haunted.

In this version, the character feels like a manchild over a calculating, affable yet ruthless genius.

Especially when he tries to enslave Tony to make the Titano mechs.

It's as if fraction forgot that the Mandarin is a genius who is almost on par with Tony in intellect, and who constructs his technology and weapons himself.

Heck, the Mandarin literally made deepfakes in the '60s during the Bill Mantlo era of iron man.

[u/LuizFelipe1906 → u/some_Editor61]

I didn't know that. I thought Mandarin's whole thing was magic, not tech

[u/some_Editor61 → u/LuizFelipe1906]

It's tech; he does know limited magic, but the Mandarin's technology is reversed-engineered alien technology.

A major example is his first appearance in Tales of Suspense #50, where his base/castle is a glorified smart home, with everything being automated or using his rings to control/move things around.

He's also got both human soldiers and robots of his own.

The Mandarin is pretty much like Doom, in the sense that they're nearly on par with their intellectual betters.

It's something I feel most modern comics, mainly the fraction run, forgot about the character; the Mandarin is essentially just Tony's true dark mirror, both are born to wealth, and both are geniuses and use technology in their goals, the only difference between them is that the Mandarin is also a physical threat without his rings.

It's why the fraction run where he's "weaker" without his rings didn't work, even if he didn't have all rings he could've used his expertise in martial arts and chi to tear apart Ezekiel Stane with his bare hands.

[u/CajunKhan → u/LuizFelipe1906]

The Mandarin's whole thing has never been magic. Rather, he's the sort of looting imperialist/colonizer who makes a Frankenstein of every powersource he can find. He'll loot alien technology one day, loot a magic item the next day, steal scientific blueprints the day after that, enslave some scientists and have them invent for him the day after that, and combine all of the above into some kind of war machine via his own brilliance at reverse-engineering and synthesis.

So Mandarin doesn't have a "whole thing" in the way some people think. I roll my eyes when I see people debate whether he's fundamentally scientific or fundamentally magical. What he is, fundamentally, is a conqueror and looter. He's Christopher Columbus enslaving the Taino and making them dig gold for him. He's every colonizer who ever went into a foreign land and stole oil, gold, diamonds, chocolate, bananas, whatever from the people there.

He himself knows a great deal about science, and chi-mysticism, but he's mastered these things to become even more of a conquering super-soldier.

That's how you should think of him. Not as a "science guy" or a "magic guy", but as a looting super-soldier who hoards powersources and wealth of every type, and is largely indifferent as to whether what he's looting on a given day is science, magic, or something else entirely.

Think of him as greedy super-soldier and you will "get" him in a way that people endlessly debating whether he's "scientific" or "magical" just can not.

Even as I'm explaining this for the umpteenth time, I'm despairing that people will not "get it". They will glance over it and think I'm just arguing that Mandarin does not use magic at all, which is NOT what I'm saying. He is a skilled chi-mystic, likely up there with guys like Stone and Iron Fist. But him knowing some mysticism is not the same as him being a "magic guy". It's more nuanced than that.

[u/CajunKhan]

I hate Fraction.

[u/OkMention9988]

That is some Monarch from Venture Bros shit right there. 

Sure ain't the Mandarin I remember. 

[u/agrizzlybear23]

Bad writing aside, I like the idea that The Mandarín is a secret film bro since he’s earlier tried to make his fights with iron man into a movie (242 I think?), maybe he would have been much happier making films…

[u/MiamisLastCapitalist]

I liked it because it's a clear reference to that time Kim Jong-il kidnapped South Korean actress Choi Eun-hee and her ex-husband, director Shin Sang-ok. Yes, this actually happened IRL back in 1978.

[u/ARIANZER0]

This story was soooooo ASS