Captain America: Brave New World (2025)

Brave New World Leaves Captain America Stranded Neutral

Reviewing Captain America: Brave New World is a lose-lose proposition. It has legitimate issues and, even more vexing, its strongest aspects don’t hold up that well once the viewer has left the theater and has taken the time to mull them over. As far as the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is concerned it’s strictly middle of the road, not bad enough to be upsetting but nowhere good enough to be worthy of a rewatch (let alone reconsideration).

The issue is that, based purely on current events, the actor who has now taken up the mantle of Captain America (Anthony Mackie), and that major plot points in this latest superhero installment revolve around topics of diversity, equity, inclusion, racial injustice, and the dangers of voting a potential monster into the White House, the level of vitriol coming from the worst corners of the public echo chamber are going to be massive. While all of those individuals can go kick dirt for all I’m concerned, they’re still going to suck most of the oxygen out of the room. That means any sincere criticism will either be misconstrued or drowned out entirely, and that’s unfortunate, as there’s plenty here — good, bad, and ugly — deserving of an honest discussion.

This fourth entry in the Captain America series begins with Sam Wilson (Mackie) still trying to determine whether carrying the shield Steve Rogers handed over to him at the end of Avengers: Endgame and becoming the signature superhero for the United States is a burden he should have accepted. This becomes even more apparent after an assassination attempt is made on the life of newly elected President Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford) and former Super Soldier Isiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly) — wrongly imprisoned for 30 years so government scientists could study him like a guinea pig — is unmistakably framed for the crime yet still quickly reincarcerated.

From there events spring into full-blown 1970s conspiracy thriller territory à la Three Days of the Condor or The Parallax View only with a more 21st-century culturally and politically representative bent. The problem is that the film never has the strength of its convictions to meaningfully explore any of those tangents. It’s all elevator music and little else. The tune is familiar and it remains hummable, but there is also no lyrical nuance and, more egregiously, no soul.

Additionally, the feature’s advertising has already ruined its primary secret involving President Ross and the strange bouts of anger that continually seem to be about to overwhelm him. What he will become is never in doubt. This makes the climax have oddly little weight. It also does not help that this turn of events forces Wilson into a place where he becomes something of an age-old cinematic trope: An intelligent, accomplished, and dynamic Black man who is the “magical” savior of a lesser white man, potentially at his own expense.

Yet, many of these flaws are somewhat mitigated courtesy of the steady and confident hand director Julius Onah (Luce, The Cloverfield Paradox) brings to things. The opening action sequence featuring Wilson and his potential new replacement as The Falcon Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez) is masterfully executed. A notorious criminal known only as Sidewinder (Giancarlo Esposito) has stolen a cache of adamantium from Celestial Island (the MCU finally dealing with the giant petrified body of Tiamut left over after the climax of Eternals), and to avoid an international incident President Ross has ordered Captain America to get it back.

It’s a stupendous opening set piece, beautifully filmed by cinematographer Kramer Morgenthau (Creed III) and featuring superb stunt choreography and expertly integrated special effects. Colors pop, and there is solid visual depth that’s typically not part (with notable exception) of the MCU’s overall signature style. This same look and feel is present throughout until, noticeably and annoyingly, a giant showdown between warships and aircraft at Celestial Island, at which point a drab, mutedly muddy visual aesthetic takes over. Until then, though, Onah does a fine job of making most of the film’s action crackle with electricity.

But the film’s primary villain Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson), returning to the overarching story for the first time since the events of 2008’s The Incredible Hulk, is a drab letdown. He’s nowhere near as scary or as sinister as he is clearly intended to be. As for that climax pitting President Ross and Wilson in direct opposition to one another, it’s well-staged and reasonably thrilling, but it also lacks any emotional vibrancy. Even the arrival of a key figure from the President’s past falls peculiarly flat, even if it is nice to see this actor back in the MCU after a 17-year layoff.

Yet the biggest obstacles Captain America: Brave New World cannot overcome are the ones it aggressively builds its foundation upon during its opening stretch. Questions of race. Questions of political injustice. Questions of racial inequity. Questions of Presidential overreach. While the script brings up all of these issues with bold dynamism, it does nothing substantive with any of them. It’s as if the whole thing is stranded in neutral and has no idea how to get the MCU back into high gear.

It’s a toothless attempt at topicality. Because of that, there’s little that feels very brave and even less that struck me as new. Instead, for all of Mackie’s magnetism and Ford’s thunderous dexterity, this all ends up being a lot of superhero comic book status quo. Well staged. Easy to look at it. Even thrilling in fits and starts. But none of it matters or has any lasting resonance, and that’s frankly a super-powered shame.

– Review reprinted courtesy of the SGN in Seattle

Film Rating: 2½ (out of 4)