Spoilers Marvel Cinematic Universe spoiler-heavy speculation thread

[Christopher]

People ship absolutely any two characters, and will 100% due it if there are two attractive opposite-sex characters of roughly the same age.

Sure, there are bound to be some people whose minds would go there, but they're surely enough of a fringe group that I don't see why they're even worth bringing into the conversation. It's a really distasteful thing to bring up for no reason.

Regardless, there was fundamentally no reason for this to be Scott's movie, when you consider the point was to find a way to introduce a Kang variant into the story to build up the menace for later.

The reason was that it defied people's expectations. You think that's a bad thing, but I find that attitude a failure of imagination. I actually love the idea that this ultimate, all-powerful big bad was defeated by the last guy anyone would've taken seriously as his nemesis. Indeed, that was part of the point of the story, that Kang never imagined that of all the Avengers, Ant-Man had any chance of taking him down, so Kang was defeated by his own inability to look beyond his preconceptions. It's right there in the title of Scott's book -- Look Out for the Little Guy. That doesn't just mean to be considerate of the little guy, it means not to underestimate him.

 

[FredH]

Funny how that works.

LTTP suggestion: It’s not the damage to his face (which he could fix); it’s the shame of having failed to avoid it in the first place. So he keeps it as a constant spur to himself to do better.

 

[DarKush]

Again rational audience embers are not living and dying on the memory of Evans in a role he discarded years ago. For Marvel Studios, all of the pieces for Wilson to become the next Cap were set in place, so there would be no doubt he was going to claim (after Wilson's personal doubts were explored in the D+ series), then make the identity his own for a future in the Marvel movies. That journey was clear to anyone actually watching the films, leaving only those with their ill agenda still arguing that anyone (in-universe) other than Wilson should be Captain America.

The journey wasn't clear to me in the MCU. I knew about Wilson as Captain America in the comics ahead of time so when Rogers gives him the shield in the MCU that made sense, albeit they skipped over Bucky who got it first in the comics. Wilson as Captain America wasn't solidified until the Disney Plus series, which was the intention, and even then, Evans spoke up to definitively declare Mackie (Wilson) as Captain America, in a noble attempt to call off the pitchforks (which were back out way ahead of Brave New World).

Within the MCU, Wilson works in the role a lot more than Bucky. I still find Bucky's new job in Thunderbolts a stretch, like a joke with no payoff. With the proper set up Wilson can carry a film, and the ingredients are there. Mackie has the acting skills, charm, and physicality, but Disney thus far hasn't done a great job of figuring out who the man behind the shield is, why he cares, and that makes it harder to care about him, especially in a climate shrieking about "DEI" this and "woke" that.

I think some of the problems bedeviling the MCU right now is timing. It took them too long to put out Brave New World and Thunderbolts. If they had put those movies out shortly after Falcon/Winter Soldier and Black Widow/Hawkeye came out, I think the cultural climate would've been different and more charitable. Ironheart is getting roasted right now, but I think the reaction in favor of it would've been stronger if it had come out when it was supposed to. The pandemic also did a number on the MCU, whatever creative missteps were also made.

 

[oktay]

Discussing rumors is a waste of time and energy. There's no way to distinguish the majority of false ones from the minority of true ones until something's officially announced, so it makes more sense just to ignore the rumor mill and wait for actual data.

You know, you've opened my eyes to this subject, I won't write about it again until I can verify such rumors, variety, etc. at least here.

 

[Jayson1]

Again rational audience embers are not living and dying on the memory of Evans in a role he discarded years ago. For Marvel Studios, all of the pieces for Wilson to become the next Cap were set in place, so there would be no doubt he was going to claim (after Wilson's personal doubts were explored in the D+ series), then make the identity his own for a future in the Marvel movies. That journey was clear to anyone actually watching the films, leaving only those with their ill agenda still arguing that anyone (in-universe) other than Wilson should be Captain America.

I feel like their was good enough reasons to go with Wilson and Bucky so to me it wasn't really a clear cut choice but also it's a choice where their is no wrong choice either. I was fine with either one taking up the mantle. As for the audience then maybe it's not about being rational but emotional. Some people are not into the world building stuff as much as others. For some it is simple as. I like this character so I want to go see a movie with the character in it as the lead. Most of the people going to watch the movies are not nerds like us who get into the stuff in more detail.

I can totally see how many fans would be like. That is not the Captain America I like. Not interested or even the more likely thought of. That looks like a okay movie but not worth going to the movie theater to see. I can just wait a month and watch it on Disney plus. I am afraid that second option is something that lots of movies have to face today. Unless you have something that really appeals to them, many people are content to wait for any movie to come to streaming.

 

[Anwar]

According to Jeff Sneider: Sadie Sink is said to be playing Mayday Parker in Spider-Man Brand New Day,


I don't know if this information is true or not. But the guy gave a lot of information about this Spider-Man movie and DC and it turned out to be false. The guy has become a total "misinformation" person on social media. The worst part is that the sites and magazines he worked for before are now the same, like Variety.

It's a waste having her play that character, the MCU Spidey movies should be about Tom's Spider-Man and not keep falling back to Tobey and Andrews' worlds.

 

[Nerys Myk]

It's a waste having her play that character, the MCU Spidey movies should be about Tom's Spider-Man and not keep falling back to Tobey and Andrews' worlds.

Are we to assume she's the daughter of Tobey or Andrew's Spider-Man?

 

[StarTrek1701]

No. No! You started the 'follow the comic'. There are so many different versions out there, now own up and 1701 up. You can't just say 'my version is correct' and that's it. Either follow up with written words instead of emoji's, or just stay out of this. We require actual conversation, not mindless blablabla.

I'd like to see a mishmash of comic stories during the Clairemont/Lee run back in the 90's.
With those comics costumes brought to life.
Sorta like how Iron Man and The Dark Knight was in 2008.
Happy now?

 

[Mage]

I'd like to see a mishmash of comic stories during the Clairemont/Lee run back in the 90's.
With those comics costumes brought to life.
Sorta like how Iron Man and The Dark Knight was in 2008.
Happy now?

Ecstatic even.

 

[Anwar]

Beh, the majority of 90s X-Men comics actually sucked. I speak as someone who actually was around then and read them. The first three issues where Claremont wanted to wrap up the Magneto storyline and just kill him permanently were good but after that it was just sensationalism.

The less said about every after the mid 90s, the better.

 

[Turtletrekker]

Beh, the majority of 90s X-Men comics actually sucked. I speak as someone who actually was around then and read them. The first three issues where Claremont wanted to wrap up the Magneto storyline and just kill him permanently were good but after that it was just sensationalism.

The less said about every after the mid 90s, the better.

Oh yeah, the qualities of the story dropped precipitously after Claremont's departure. The art was pretty though, and that was all Marvel editors cared about back then.

 

[Set Harth]

Sometimes the art was pretty. Other times it was like "what were you thinking"

 

[Nerys Myk]

Sometimes the art was pretty. Other times it was like "what were you thinking"

Rob Liefeld has entered the chat.

 

[Anwar]

Sometimes the art was pretty. Other times it was like "what were you thinking"

Rob Liefeld has entered the chat.

Liefeld aside, they had this weird wannabe manga Artstyle as well during the late 90s I HATED

 

[DarrenTR1970]

I saw that Robert Downey Jr posted on Instagram, a behind the scenes photo of himself reading Jeremy Renner's autobiography.
What I found interesting, is that he has 'mo-cap' dots on his face, presumably as part of Doom's facial disfigurement.​

 

[Nerys Myk]

I saw that Robert Downey Jr posted on Instagram, a behind the scenes photo of himself reading Jeremy Renner's autobiography.
What I found interesting, is that he has 'mo-cap' dots on his face, presumably as part of Doom's facial disfigurement.​

That was my thought too. Though some think it’s for the Doom mask.

 

[Jayson1]

GOD I hope they give him a real mask. Enough with the CGI helmets and whatnot.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

I liked BNW a lot more than most and I feel it was a bit unfairly maligned. The media is still holding out hope for Thunderbolts while they were much more willing to leave BNW to the social media/internet wolves.

The media holding out hope for Thunderbolts* while leaving BNW to the social media hate-mongers is not a surprise; TB very likely checks boxes a film starring a black male (specifically instead of a White male) bearing the American flag ultimate American superhero" does not, and certainly not to the social media hate-mongers Disney/Marvel Studios bend to.

Granted, the second weekend drop for BNW was catastrophic compared to TB, but still, TB isn't lighting up the box office like a pre-Endgame Marvel release would either. The middling performance also punctures the argument that a Bucky Captain America movie would've been a surefire blockbuster hit. Though the internet knives maybe wouldn't have already been drawn before a Bucky movie came out.

Facts regarding box office mean little to those with a negative agenda about Mackie / Wilson as Captain America; this is among the same group who believed the Bucky character somehow "deserved" the be the next Captain America based not on some comic book story (because they rarely reference any comic story), but a couple of scenes from MCU films where Bucky merely held the shield. To this group, they ignored the logic behind what MCU Dr. Erskine (of all characters) explained what made Rogers the perfect candidate to be Captain America, which Rogers himself saw (one would assume with unique sociopolitical differences) in Wilson alone in Endgame. No, that set of most important traits within the man--the only which qualifies anyone to be Captain America--were and are written off by a vocal part of the MCU fanbase as "woke" and a "DEI" decision.

IOW, "no Bucky-Cap, no Cap".

Like most of their so-called thoughts it--at its core--is utter nonsense, but said nonsense hangs like a weight around the Wilson Cap, and how he--despite Wilson being one of the longest-serving MCU characters (read: consistently exposed to audiences) from the Cap corner of the franchise--is treated (by the agenda-driven zealots) like an eternal sidekick from a non-National/Timely comic from the 1940s--no growth and locked into an secondary, submissive position forever.

Some of the problems with BNW stem from Falcon and Winter Soldier. The series didn't set Wilson up enough to be a standalone character that many felt merited his own movie. Even putting Bucky as the co-lead was a sign, to me, that Disney was shaky on building a series around Wilson. That shakiness was quadrupled in BNW which became a way for them to tie up loose MCU ends more than establish Wilson as a hero in his own right and one that can and should be the heart and soul of the MCU going forward.

I concur with your view of BNW's handling of the lead character. That said, I believe The Falcon and the Winter Soldier series served its purpose of fleshing out who Wilson was and his reasons (with Bradley's as a darkly cautionary mirror) for reaching Rogers' conclusion about who earned the right to carry on as Captain America, so the next film appearance would--or so was the plan--hit the ground running with an established Cap.

Disney has been averse to giving Wilson a love interest. Sharon could've fit the bill in the Falcon series

Agreed; in the series, Sharon made a flirty remark to Wilson (when he and Bucky were taken to her apartment), but not for a second did I believe this would turn into much in the future of either character (Rey and Finn all over again). Even if Wilson discovered her villain status, that would've lent itself to obvious conflicts within the relationship without a total collapse, but again, this was not going to happen under the wings of the allegedly "progressive" Disney/Marvel Studios.

To me, MCU Falcon was intended to be a Black best friend who sprinkled a pinch of pepper on the MCU, but not a lot of thought was given to him getting his own movie or series. Falcon and Winter Soldier was a promising start, but BNW didn't do much to expand on it. In a way, BNW wanted to both sell us on the idea that Wilson is widely embraced as Captain America while at the same time, not, and they were skittish about Wilson spending much time in the movie pondering what him being Captain America really means. There are bits of it in the film, but the focus was on action, jokes, and keeping it light but tight, in the hopes that that wouldn't arouse too much internet anger over Wilson as Captain America and that it would let audiences know that they wouldn't be "preached" to. But audiences still didn't come.

Again, agreed with your view. There were enough social media rants and screams at the last acts of TFATWS the moment Wilson confronted the politicians and his historical fact-based reasoning for taking on the Cap identity (in the scene with Bradley). That was too much reality to the agenda-driven zealots, and none (not meaning you) should ever make the mistake in thinking self-professed White Liberals did not join in the aforementioned ranting. IOW, "why did he have to bring race into it? What does race have to do with..."

A personal enemy, relatively lower stakes to fit the "political thriller" vibe, and more guest spots (where was War Machine, Banner, or She-Hulk?), I think could've helped the movie out.

Well, we know the real world legal reason why the Banner/Hulk character was not going to participate (despite being the most obvious, needed guest-star role, considering the circumstances of BNW), so Marvel Studios had to tap-shuffle-tap around what some audiences were well-aware of. Another blow to the film.

The biggest mistake stemming from Falcon and Winter Soldier was Wilson accepting the shield. I felt he should've said thanks but no thanks. What Rogers wanted wasn't as important as what he wanted, and it would've been nice if Wilson had had an "I am enough" epiphany.

Here, I disagree: Wilson initially rejected the shield, as he had not reached his side of the ideological mountain peak which joined with Rogers'; he needed to look within and learn what he would likely face from the abuse Bradley suffered. For that latter reason, Wilson knew he--more than any other man--had his own history tied to the idea of a Captain America--he was and is the historical and living embodiment of it, thus he finally accepted the shield and role.

A Falcon: Brave New World movie would not have had to live up to the Chris Evans's films, and I'm guessing would've had a lower budget, and then it clearing $400 million worldwide could've been a success or spun that way. Right now, it's fourth on the list of highest earning Black-starring live action superhero films behind Black Panther, Wakanda Forever, and Hancock. Black Adam is fifth. Now, if you throw in the Spider-Verse movies, that still keeps it in the top five:

Here are the Black-led comic book/comic strip/superhero/superpower movies (live and animated that I can think of):

1. Black Panther ($1.35 billion)
2. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever ($859 million)
3. Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse ($690 million)
4. Hancock ($629 million)
5. Captain America: Brave New World ($415 million)
6. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse ($394 million)
7. Black Adam ($393 million)
8. Glass ($247 million)-this movie being Black-led is debatable, but SLJ is on the front of the poster.
9. Blade II ($155 million)
10. Blade Trinity ($132 million)
11. Blade ($131 million)
12. Spawn ($87 million)
13. Catwoman ($82 million)
14. The Meteor Man ($8 million)
15. Blankman ($7.9 million)
16. Sleight ($4 million)
17. Steel ($1.7 million)
18. Friday Foster ($1.5 million)
19. Green Lantern: Beware My Power ($740, 607)
20. Vixen: The Movie ($330, 246)
21. Fast Color ($76,916)

If BNW had just been a Falcon movie it could be cheered as a success and an even bigger breakthrough than it was if it made the same box office.

Thanks for the box office list. If a Falcon movie performed better than a Black Captain America movie, it would add to the truth: that a large part of the movie-going body (innumerable MCU fans included) resent the very idea of a Black American Male representing the idea of America in its superheroic form, and that is a permanent, smoking brand mark on aforementioned audiences and the failings of Dinsey/Marvel Studios.