With Jessica Chastain unable to make the shooting schedule work and is out of Iron Man 3, Marvel Studios has moved quickly to one of their other picks by bringing in Rebecca Hall to take the poorly described “sexy scientist” role for the feature. The role, unnamed at this point, is not considered to be the female lead role in the traditional sense as that’s currently filled by Gwyneth Paltrow as Pepper Potts, the longstanding love of Tony Stark’s life. What Hall’s character is expected to be is the rival genius scientist that puts Stark in a complicated situation, both intellectually and likely on the action level as well.
Filming for the feature is expected to begin shortly, resulting in a quick casting as Shane Black takes over the directorial duties. The feature is set for release on May 3rd, 2012, and will be the first post-Avengers film and will get a lot of scrutiny to be sure. The film is working on location in both North Carolina and China for its storyline with Ben Kingsley already signed on.
[Source: Deadline]