Wasted potential, terrible advertising

Rating: 6/10 (2 February 2014)

You think I mean that they screwed up the Mandarin with magic rings and all that smoked stuff... no, I'm not. What I mean with 'Wasted potential' is with the Mandarin that they established HERE.
An intimidating terrorist who I actually enjoyed a little more than the comic book Mandarin, with some fantastic techniques to get fear out of respect from other people, as well as having an army of radioactive people who shoot fire; what could go wrong?
Alright, so it was pretty well established that Guy Pearce's character (Aldrich Killian) was a villain by the middle of the movie. Even then, I was still enjoying it. But then, they completely get rid of that fantastic villain concept they created and turned it into something lazy...
Another disappointing part was that they advertised this as a film which, like The Dark Knight Rises, would include Tony Stark (being serious) at near-death. And he sort of was, for about 20 minutes, and it was taken as a joke, with the kid and everything...
Also, there's not much Iron Man in here, that's right, the best action scene we get is saving people from falling off a plane. Why do that when you have the Iron Patriot armor and you can put it to fight against the original; or the Mark 42, 41 or any of the over 35 armors that ultimately get destroyed... needless to say, that was worthless, as RDJ is already signed on for Avengers 2 and 3, so...
They made us think this film would be as well balanced as the first one, but they didn't deliver; terrible advertising, the film was filled with hit-or-miss jokes and unfunny gags, they made us think this was going to be a serious, smart, action-packed, dramatic Iron Man movie, which we desperately needed if they wanted to revive the franchise after the terrible lazy fest that Iron Man 2 was...
Finally, I'd like to add that, while the final sequence was fun, everything went down when Tony Stark calls the Mark 42, and then, it gets destroyed and he starts running away... you've got at least another 30 armors to choose from! Are you retarded or what? And then, they supposedly kill off Pepper, which I thought was a brilliant move, but then they bring her back for a non-spectacular finale that doesn't leave me satisfied.
Iron Man Trilogy went downhill with Iron Man 2, and while the third one is better than the second, it still isn't enough to equal, if not improve, the first installment, or even its own advertising and expectations.
Sorry, 6/10, hire some other writer for the next one...