On Feb. 14, “Captain America: Brave New World” was released nine years after the previous Captain America’s movie release. Based on Marvel Comics, the film was set to meet high expectations as the first independent movie to follow Steve Roger’s successor, Sam Wilson.
At the beginning of the movie, at the request of President Ross, Captain America and Joaquin Torres, the new Falcon, embark on a mission to Mexico to recover a stolen sample of the newly discovered element, Adamantium. Soon after, during a meeting at the White House, Isaiah Bradley, an abandoned super soldier, unknowingly under mind control, fires a gun near the President and is imprisoned, while the real culprit, Samuel Sterns, is later revealed to be manipulating people’s minds as part of his revenge against President Ross for previously running experiments on him. This led to Ross being turned into Red Hulk. Ultimately, Captain America stops the chaos, Sterns is taken into custody, Bradley is freed and Ross is sent to an asylum to get rid of Stern’s mind influence.
It is important to highlight the fact that this film housed a cohesive storyline. The film connected all of the big action moments to be a continuation of the overall mission for the U.S. to have the first sample of Adamantium. Although the focus wasn’t explicitly stated during the film except at the start and the end, “Captain America: Brave New World” made sure to fuse the goal throughout many action scenes.
Similar to other Marvel films, “Captain America: Brave New World” was action-packed, and rarely gave viewers a break. The overall pacing of the film was quick, but fitting for an action movie.
“One of my favorite moments was when Torres came close to death when fighting against the fighter pilots, because it implied that he would die. He ended up surviving and being recognized as a hero,” said freshman Jules Singh.
Being a work of Marvel Studios, this film was overall very enjoyable, and definitely an engaging and interesting watch. However, comparing this film to the other greats in the Marvel universe, it seems to underperform in some areas.
Relating to previous films, this film seems to fit nicely within the development of Captain America. This movie in particular played a huge role in the introduction of the new Captain America. Towards the end of Marvel’s “Avengers: Endgame,” Chris Evans, the actor for Captain America at the time, passed his shield to Mackie, the actor for Falcon at the time, signaling a change of role for following movies.
In “Captain America: Brave New World,” Anthony Mackie’s role of Captain America was displayed for the first time. His new role is certainly played well, but doesn’t completely fill the shoes that Evans left behind.
“He did [a good job stepping up to a new role], while also putting his own twist to the role,” Singh said. “He wasn’t a carbon copy of Evans, and how he portrayed Captain America.”
Although the role of Captain America was changed, Marvel still made sure to develop the characters thoroughly with a distinction between Mackie and Evans.
“The development of Captain America was displayed very well through this movie,” said junior Alex Nunez. “We learned of many different things he was able to do while he got into more fights.”
Comparing this movie to previous Captain America movies, “Captain America: Brave New World” seems to have mixed opinions. Previous Captain America movies have been better watches overall, so naturally, this movie proves to be slightly lackluster.
“I’ve definitely seen better, but it was a pretty good movie overall,” Nunez said. “It had some interesting concepts that I really enjoyed, so it’s definitely up there with the best … One thing that would have made the movie so much better is if there were two Hulks and they just battled it out instead of Captain America fighting. That would have been so much cooler to see.”
The public agrees — “Captain America: Brave New World” scored an underwhelming 49% on Rotten Tomatoes.
The themes of power and politics circulate throughout the film, from the beginning of the movie when there was controversy between American citizens about the new president being close to superheroes. The film highlighted the importance of heroes’ roles to fight for citizens’ safeties against villians. This was shown through President Ross directing Captain America to lead missions.
Since future Avengers movies are on the horizon, and the fact that this movie revealed a considerable amount of information, this movie definitely seems to have a significant impact on future Marvel storylines. The film itself felt more like a setup than a standalone movie.
“It does [have an effect on future Marvel storylines], because it implies that they’re forming a new Avengers group,” Singh said. ”There are two new Avengers movies coming out in the future, so [this movie is] probably a lead-up.”
Ultimately, “Captain America: Brave New World” played a great role as a continuation of the Marvel storyline, though the film itself wasn’t the best work in the Captain America series, making it worthy of three and a half stars out of five stars.
