D. Arachi of Fully Filmy noted that American mappillais are often characterised by their attractive looks, tallness, fair skin, ownership of an expensive car and better grasp of English than the film's Tamil protagonist.
[1] Film critic Anuja from Behindwoods noted that an American mappillai was "an affected gentleman with a penchant for branded clothes or stifling suits worn in the peak of a tropical summer and of course, a horribly pretentious accent".
She added, "his spoken Tamil is enough to make the ears bleed and his ego is usually the size of Texas", while noting the character typically "provides a lot of fodder for comedy".
[2] In her thesis Watching from an Arm's Length: The Foreign Hand in Tamil Cinema, Preeti Mudliar notes "the foreign mapillai (groom) finds that his status as a foreign-returned groom is undermined by either his villainous intentions, his fundamental inferiority to the values and virile appeal of the local son of the soil, or the comic relief he provides as a misfit in the changed landscape of the society he was once a part of.
Other prominent examples include Diamond Babu (Madhan Bob) in Thenali (2000), Samuel (Abbas) in Minnale (2001),[2] Arvind Singh (Prakash Raj) in Azhagiya Theeye (2004),[2] Mithun Tejasvi in Sandai (2008),[2] Roy (Benito) in Vinnaithaandi Varuvaayaa (2010), Rakesh (T. M. Karthik) in Nanban (2012),[2] Gautham (Rajeev Ravindranathan) in Vettai (2012),[2] Deepak (Rahul Ravindran) in Vanakkam Chennai (2013) and Ashwin Kumar Lakshmikanthan in Oh Manapenne!