‘Iron Man 3’: Fans Are Still Annoyed Rebecca Hall Didn’t Get a Bigger Role
While the Marvel Cinematic Universe has spawned several successful projects, it all started with 2008’s Iron Man. While the entire MCU has a devoted fan base, Iron Man holds a special spot as the character who started it all. In 2013’s Iron Man 3, however, fans got their hopes up when Rebecca Hall was announced as Maya Hansen.
However, once the film came out, fans were upset by how small the role actually was.
Iron Man’s film journey
In 2008, the MCU was an idea that had no precedent from before. While superhero movies were a successful enterprise, many of those who came out were not hits. For every Sam Raimi Spider-Man film, there were a few Daredevil movies that failed to meet expectations. It was a movie about a little-known superhero starring an embattled Robert Downey Jr. and a director who was known more as an actor.
Despite this, Iron Man paved the success that eventually gave way to several other franchises in the MCU. However, this also gave the films a special place in people’s hearts. While neither of the sequels were as well-received as the original film, they were the ones that featured the original Avenger, and expectations were a little bit higher than they would have otherwise been.
Rebecca Hall’s involvement
When Rebecca Hall joined the production, she thought that she was getting the role of a lifetime. After taking on the role with the belief that she’d play a significant role in the movie, Hall, like fans, was aghast to find out that the role was greatly diminished. Shen Black claimed that Hall’s Dr. Maya would be the main villain until they decided that a female character was bad for toy sales.
The concerns became a reality, and Hall’s role was greatly diminished. According to Hall, she was already obligated when the changes took place, so all she could do was make the most of her significantly reduced role, which was supposed to end up being the same type that Guy Pearce’s Killiam eventually became. Hall’s role started taking several different forms as they decided what to do with her character.
“Halfway through shooting, they were basically like, ‘What would you think if you just got shot out of nowhere?’ Hall said (per the Toronto Sun). “I was meant to be in the movie until the end… I grappled with them for a while, and then I said, ‘Well, you have to give me a decent death scene, and you have to give me one more scene with Iron Man,’ which Robert Downey Jr. supported me on.”
Despite Hall’s talent and proven ability to take the stage with other stars, her role is mostly forgotten in a sequel that never quite resonated with fans. Fans on Reddit haven’t forgotten about everything she went through, however.
The fans chime in
In a Reddit thread about the things that fans would have loved to see from the MCU rumor mill, several fans spoke about Hall’s diminished role. One Reddit lamented the lost potential of the universe’s first female protagonist.
“I’m still bitter that they treated Rebecca Hall like that, promising a juicy main villain role and then rewriting it into a much smaller one. She still did a great job with what she had, but I do believe the original plan would’ve made for a more memorable film.”
Unfortunately for them, Hall never got to sink her teeth into what may have been a career-defining role in a major blockbuster.
Hall remains a well-respected actress today, but when her role was diminished in the Iron Man threequel, she may have missed her best chance at mainstream success as a big-name actress.
