We share the same world, don't we? This world you would die to save.
Samuel Sterns, Captain America: Brave New World
Today Karli and I saw the new MCU Captain America film, Brave New World on the big IMAX screen at Silver City.
It's not bad.
Which is interesting, because there certainly seems to be a public perception that it is at least somewhat bad, as per its 49% Critics rating on Rotten Tomatoes. However, the 79% Audience score suggests that the people who have seen the movie enjoyed it.
Personally, I found it to be a perfectly acceptable piece of Sunday afternoon entertainment. The performances are good - Anthony Mackie in particular does well in presenting the challenges of taking on the iconic mantle of Captain America - the action scenes are well choreographed, there are some tense dramatic moments, and I was amused to see Liv Tyler make an unexpected and long-overdue return to the MCU,
Was it perfect? Of course not. There were certainly things I'd change about the film: I would have enjoyed more of a focus on the political thriller aspects of the story, Timothy Blake Nelson's Leader* is massively underutilized as a villain, and I did struggle a bit with Harrison Ford as the new General/President Ross, but overall I found it to be suitably watchable.
However, I probably bring a different perspective to the MCU experience, based on decades of comic book reading. Some reviewers complain that the film panders to fans with too many Easter eggs, but that description of the movie's multiple references ignores the fundamental nature of the Marvel Comics Universe.
Ultimately, the MCU is a single ongoing storyline**, in the same way that the original Marvel Comics continuity is. Nothing happens in a vacuum: the Chitauri invasion of New York in The Avengers leads to the events of Spider-Man: Homecoming, and Thanos' Blip isn't a stand-alone event that simply came and went over the course of two Avengers movies, it's a historical event that's still being processed in people's minds, with consequences that are continue to echo across the MCU.
Similarly, regardless of its relative success as a movie, the events of Eternals are a part of the MCU timeline, with the discovery of adamantium deposits in the gigantic corpse of Tiamut the alien Celestial creating the potential for a global power struggle for control of this new resource.
Tiamut, Isaiah Bradley, Sidewinder, Red Hulk, Betty Ross, even the Leader - these aren't Easter eggs, they're building blocks from the massive edifice that is the Marvel Comics continuity.
As such, Brave New World's narrative pulls together multiples strings to create a plot that's deeply embedded in the MCU's timeline, a plot which also plants the seeds of future developments in the Marvel universe - and that may be the film's biggest flaw. In many ways it's a transitional film, a bridge to the next chapter in the story by foreshadowing the rebirth of the Avengers.
Ultimately, it may be most accurate to think of Brave New World as being literally a comic book movie: a mid-run issue with some good action, useful character development, and a couple of crucial plot points, but really, the big climax will be in Issue 12.
- Sid
* In fact, I'm not certain he's ever referred to by that name, although there's one moment later in the film where I would have sworn that he said he was the hero. Since I'm reluctant to invest in another showing, now I have to wait until the film's Disney Plus streaming debut to confirm that line. The good news - at least for the purposes of checking dialogue, if not the movie's success - is that if it doesn't perform well at the box office, it will be streaming sooner rather than later.
** For the full breakdown on Marvel Comics and its status as the world's longest continuous story, recommended reading is Douglas Wolks' epic All of the Marvels (I talk a bit about All of the Marvels elsewhere.)
