You know who made the Interview. Seth Rogen. Have you seen his other movies?? Stupid, funny, shit. Kim Young Un had always being the butt of the joke by American Comedians. You know who else is also the butt of the joke? W Bush.
But let talk about Un for a second, the guy who mandate hair cut. Who invite Dennis Rodman over and woo him. Have you seen Vice documentary on this? The real documentary is even funnier than the Interview.
The shifting in gender roles is factored by many things and not just by anime/manga. But anime/manga does push the boundary of imagination like that of Hollywood or like classic literatures like 20,000 leagues under the sea, or The time Machine, etc.
Yes.. In Hollywood, people are always pushing for more diversity which meant more Asians. Asians here is not necessary Chinese ethnic nor Chinese citizens. However, if it is a good film, I don't see why not. Manga/Anime is extremely popular even though they Japanese protagonist mostly.
Film like Heroes, or Red Cliff has some fan base in the west. Etc. But you need to understand context. People are more well versed overhere with European history and not so much with chinese history unless something popular like 3 kingdoms. Even then, the 3 kingdoms fanbase is small in comparison to everything else.
Red Cliff (2009) - Box Office Mojo
Red cliff net some 627k in the states. Hero net some 53.7 million in the states. It is also about buying advertisement and commercial. Do the Chinese willing to put couple of million dollars buying tv airtime over here. Red Cliff didn't hence it barely made a million. Hero actually did.