The fourth Captain America enters a Brave New World of sequelizing Marvel leftovers
The film teases a fresh start for Cap, but it strands Anthony Mackie with a bunch of MCU loose ends.
Photo: Disney
For better or worse, Captain America: The Winter Soldier may go down as the most consequential movie in this never-ending Marvel superhero cycle. Sure, Iron Man was more of a universe-enabling shocker hit and The Avengers showed how big a team-up could get. But Winter Soldier, simply by the virtue of its enduring quality, gave the series a dramatic array of gifts-turned-curses that lingered in the MCU: The presence of directors Joe and Anthony Russo; a washed-out, “realistic” color palette to match its mostly-grounded action (apart from the flying/falling airships, presumably included by Feige fiat); the ambition and the pretension to proclaim itself a genre riff, as much “paranoid conspiracy thriller” as superhero adventure (just let them have it); and proof that Captain America could be a viable contemporary character, not just a gee-whiz throwback. It worked so well that throwing back might be just what Marvel hopes for when re-introducing Cap to the big screen, with the mantle now worn by ex-Falcon Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie)—a character added to the universe (memorably, on Steve Rogers’ right) during that earlier movie. Indeed, coming at the end of a cycle of Marvel movies set largely in space, alternate dimensions, or both, Captain America: Brave New World is well-positioned to provide unfussy relief for those who prefer their superhero stories set in an alternative version of our world, rather than in a series of multiversal what-ifs.
Like Winter Soldier, Captain America: Brave New World has a conspiracy-based plotline, is set largely in and around Washington, D.C., and features its lead hero openly questioning how (or whether) to work with the government that’s attempting to wield him for supposed good. With those elements in place, it’s only natural that the movie would act as an unofficial follow-up to some of the MCU’s most beloved material. Yes, this is the long-awaited simultaneous sequel to The Incredible Hulk from 2008, the Falcon And The Winter Soldier TV series, and Eternals.
OK, the Eternals connection is minimal, though Brave New World is the first MCU movie to really make a major plot point out of the giant Celestial statue that’s been sticking out from the Indian Ocean since the end of that woo-woo epic. But this film does feel like an extended finale from somewhere within the nonexistent multi-season run of Falcon And Winter Soldier, a notably terrible Disney+ series that took nearly six hours for Sam to confirm that yes, he would indeed accept the Captain America position he was offered in Avengers: Endgame. (It was a streaming event that could have been an email.) Brave New World finds Sam a few years into his new gig, occasionally joined by his replacement Falcon, the excitable Joaquin (Danny Ramirez), but not leading a full crew of heroes like Steve Rogers did in his assembling prime.
That doesn’t sit right with newly elected president Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross (Harrison Ford, stepping in for the late William Hurt). Once settled into office, President Ross reaches out to Sam in hopes of starting a new Avengers. (Fans may nod excitedly; Iron Man may be dead, but how is it that a universe that still includes Shang-Chi, Captain Marvel, Doctor Strange, Spider-Man, Thor, and a new Black Panther has gone this long without forming a new Avengers squad? Are they worried they’ll have to invite Kingo?) Before that project can move forward, however, Sam’s old buddy and mentor Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly), an earlier super-soldier introduced in the TV show, takes a shot at the president. Sam, sensing some kind of mind-control at work, attempts to prove Bradley’s innocence, and as a result runs afoul of various characters from that Incredible Hulk movie no one much likes.
