Corona | Coming Attractions

From Marvel comes this new Iron Man 3 teaser poster featuring Don Cheadle posing in the Iron Patriot armor. Yes, we remember that back in Iron Man 2 Rhodey was in his then-new War Machine suit. So what's the deal now, and how did the army officer manage to switch suits and names? We're sure that all will be explained in the third movie, but it's likely got something to do with selling more action figures to fanboys.

It's here: the first real and official teaser poster for Iron Man 3. Not a tagline in sight but there's plenty to think about when the poster shows a battered Tony Stark, seemingly out of control and in broken armor, falling rapidly to Earth. Are we seeing both the physical and emotional fall of Iron Man?

Marvel's website has teased fans for Tuesday' upcoming release of the first Iron Man 3 movie trailer, asking them to click on an action on the website in order to get an early visual taste of what's to come. And they've had success!

The company has released a very short 17-second teaser of the new trailer, so don't expect to be watching Tony Stark and his new Iron Man armor in action for very long.

As mentioned above, the full Iron Man 3 teaser trailer for the movie will be released online on Tuesday, October 23. 

Two exciting news breaks to report to you today about Iron Man 3.

The first comes from Latino Review and is an exclusive to that site. According to our pals, in-between the events seen in The Avengers and Iron Man 3, Tony Stark has been busy building dozens of new Iron Man suits.

They say that Stark will prepare an impressive 40 different suits so he can control multiple armors during his battle with The Mandarin's forces. The yellow-and-red suit that we've seen pictures of (and seen on the right) is the Mark XLVII (47). When Pepper Potts asks Tony what happened to the other 39 suits, Tony enigmatically smiles.

Read more of what we'll see in Latino Review's exclusive.

The second piece of news concerns casting. Chinese actor Wang Xueqi will play a character named Chen Lu in the movie, who comic fans know as the Radioactive Man. In the Iron Man comics, Radioactive Man is a known associate of The Mandarin, and that will likely also be the case in Iron Man 3.

At their Iron Man 3 stage event held at the San Diego Comic Con, everyone learned that Ben Kingsley is indeed playing the bad guy we've all been waiting for: The Mandarin!

As they did two years ago to promote their Thor and Captain America films, Marvel will be handing out posters featuring conceptual artwork but this time it's from Iron Man 3. The image shows Tony Stark (looking like Robert Downey Jr.) surrounded by armed men. On his leg and arm are pieces of the Iron Man armor. If the rumors about the sequel's storyline borrowing from the comics' "Extremis" story arc are to be believed, then we could be seeing confirmation that Tony will have the ability to make the armor appear on his body at will.

Marvel Studios released the first photo from the set of b showing Robert Downey Jr. with his back to us, standing inside his armor vault. There are seven Iron Man suits to be counted in the room, which is three more than the number inside here back in Iron Man 2.

No, it isn't the love child of Tony Stark and Steve Rogers/Captain America that you're looking at. Instead, this is a spy photo taken this week of James Badge Dale wearing what appears to be a Iron Man-esque suit of armor with a patriotic coat of paint. Comic book fans who keep up on their Iron Man lore believe that Dale's character is Eric Savin, a wounded soldier who is given a new lease on serving his country by donning the Iron Patriot armor.

A set of the spy photos shows Dale prepping for a scene involving extras dressed as high ranking officers.

There are several new casting additions to mention for Iron Man 3. First on the list is the return of one of the supporting players from the franchise, Tony Stark's driver and personal bodyguard Happy Hogan. Hogan was played by Jon Favreau, the director of the first two Iron Man movies. While Favreau won't be returning as director on Iron Man 3, he will play Hogan again.

The return of Favreau as an actor could be seen as his way of unofficially endorsing handing the helming of the Iron Man franchise over to Shane Black.

Next up is actor Ashley Hamilton and his new job in the film. He'll be playing a minor villain called Firepower that was introduced two decades ago in the Iron Man comics. Back in the 1990s Hamilton had a short stint on the soap opera Sunset Beach and in smaller budget films.

Filming on Iron Man 3 began last Wednesday.

More Iron Man 3 casting news to report as actor James Badge Dale has landed the part of a villain named Savin in the sequel. Dale is making the transition from TV star to supporting player in features, starring in Disney's upcoming Lone Ranger film as well as with Brad Pitt in the zombie end-of-the-world thriller World War Z.

Well, Jessica Chastain has backed out of playing that scientist part in Iron Man 3. Marvel was quick to find another to fill the job, and the new top candidate is Rebecca Hall.

Hall's character is rumored to be the scientist that invents the Extremis nano-virus that threatens the world. She's originally from England and has starred in The Town, The Prestige, Frost/Nixon and the upcoming Lay the Favorite.

During today's Marvel presentation at CinemaCon, a video showing Iron Man 3 director Shane Black was shown to the attendees. Black said that his movie would be more like a "technological thriller" and a "crisis movie", putting Tony Stark "through the wringer." Black also said that his film's villain will be someone that is terrifying for today's modern world but he didn't go as far as to mention any names.

Filming starts on Iron Man 3 in three weeks.

Infernal Affairs star Andy Lau is in talks to play a friend of Tony Stark in Iron Man 3. That bit of unconfirmed news came from a Hong Kong-focused entertainment website called Neon Punch, and they followed their original report up with more detail.

"Andy Lau's character will be an old friend of Tony Stark that represents China’s technology sector – and will use China’s armored heroes to HELP Iron Man defeat 'The Mandarin' who is seen as a terrorist against both the US and China," said the site.

This scoop gives some insight into the recent announcement that IM3 would be a China co-production. The Chinese government is notorious about censoring or outright banning American movies that depict any Chinese character in a negative or embarrasing light. Neon Punch's scoop tells us that Lau's associate character will somehow be using Chinese "armored heroes", whatever or whoever those are, which gives us some indication as to why China would be more positive about associating itself with an American-made Iron Man 3 movie.

The Tree of Life star Jessica Chastain is the latest actor in negotiations to join the cast of Iron Man 3. Sources tell THR that , if she does land the job, Chastain's character won't be the sequel's female lead but a supporting character. The big actress role is still assigned for Gwyneth Paltrow who will reprise the part of Pepper Potts for the third time. Additionally, the trade states that Potts will have a "beefed up presence" this time around.

Guy Pearce is in contract discussions to join the cast. If his deal closes the Lockout actor would play the role of Dr. Aldrich Killian, a scientist introduced a couple of years back in a Marvel Comics' story that retconned ol' shellhead's origins. That storyline, called "Extremis", updated Tony Stark's Iron Man armor and gave him augmented powers based on nanotechnology. [Full story]