Thales

Same here. I saw it more as a corrupt businessman (the soon-to-be-Iron-Monger) representing the dark side of corporate greed, and Tony Stark as it's awakened moral compass.

People can read whatever they want into movies, often suiting their own political agendas.

I remember last year in history class, when we were studying Islam. Our teacher gave us an editorial about how Aladdin help propagate bigotry towards Arabs, then told us to write a page response on how it showed stereotypes. Two of the main points in the editorial were that Jafar gave off the impression that all Arabs were evil with scraggly beards, and also that the scene in which Jasmine's hand is almost cut off for stealing portrays Arab society in a bad light.

I thought this was reading way too much into a Disney movie, and that the children of America would certainly not care. But I responded to the points anyway.

In my response, I pointed out that all of the good characters like Aladdin, Jasmine, and the Sultan were all Arabs too. In fact all of the characters were Arab, so shouldn't the villain Jafar be Arab too? I also said that at the time, such corporal punishment for theft was common. In fact, such a punishment is stated in the Qu'ran and exhibited in Sharia, which obviously still exists.

But such a response was not appreciated in a freshman World History class, and my teacher simply wrote at the bottom of my page, "I understand you like the movie, but try to examine it from other people's points of view, not just your own."

Just as my teacher found Aladdin racist and I did not, this reviewer sees vilification of America where I do not. I just see them both as enjoyable films with far less inflammatory moral messages.