User blog comment:LoveWaffle/We Didn't See It Coming - Iron Man 3 and the Future of the MCU/@comment-1618941-20130513213620/@comment-1895174-20130514020322

The other half of the joke was using an English character pretending to be a mastermind as a send up of Hollywood's tendency to have British masterminds behind Machiavellian criminal plots.

Of the various places/website I've been to where the movie's been discussed, I've never come across that.

''This was explained in the movie. Killian needed Stark to correct the Extremis problems, and the plan was working until Stark escaped.''

But why Stark? Am I to believe Hansen hasn't worked on the Extremis formula since 1999? Or that there are no more scientists willing to be bought out by this company about to land an extremely lucrative contract?

Feige stated recently that Thanos hasn't yet been cast

And it's too late to add someone to the cast. But Thanos himself doesn't have to appear in order for this to happen. Thor et al would return to Asgard from the battle with the Dark Elves, to find it smoldering, the site of a recent battle. There may be some Chitauri left over, Thor beats them, then a frail Odin tells Thor the Chitauri took the Gauntlet. Roll Credits.