*THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS*
“Captain America: Brave New World” finally landed in theaters after what felt like 70 years frozen in reshoots and development purgatory. Originally slated for a summer 2024 premiere the film was subject to several reworks and patches and it definitely shows in the final product.
The movie is a total hodgepodge of ideas, none of which are really fleshed out in its just under two hour runtime. “Brave New World”’s biggest issue is that it doesn’t quite seem to know what kind of movie it wants to be. It appears to want to emulate the political and conspiracy thriller elements of films like “Captain America: The Winter Soldier,” but yet it still wants to be a generic comic book film that ends with a big CGI fight and everything. This indecision ultimately leads to the movie feeling more like a tray of half-baked cupcakes rather than a full, finished, and frosted cake.
The first half-baked cupcake comes in the form of the main plot, which revolves around Captain America (Anthony Mackie) having to thwart an assassination/smear plot against President Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford). Seems simple enough right? Wrong.
This plot is a total mess, and the movie never really seems to settle on what the villain’s big evil plan really is. Speaking of which, the main villain of this film is the Leader (Tim Blake Nelson), and he is a mess in more ways than one. His plan is so unfocused and convoluted that it becomes very annoying to see it actually ‘work.’ First he tries to kill Ross, then he wants to ruin his political legacy, then he wants him to turn into a hulk and destroy Washington D.C.
Needless to say he really needs to pick a lane when it comes to his evil scheming. It’s made all the more annoying by the fact that the writers really want you to think he’s super-duper smart and all the things that he wants to happen end up happening cause he’s just that good at mental 4D chess. In reality, it’s just lazy writing.
Another set of half-baked ideas is all of the little side arcs that each character is supposed to have. Cap has to adjust to taking on a new Falcon: Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez), and has concerns about stepping into the role of Captain America after his predecessor left some pretty big shoes to fill. Both of these stories had plenty of potential but only resulted in Cap giving Joaquin a pep-talk about responsibility after he’s injured, and Cap receiving his own talk from a cameo only included to promote another movie.
The movie also really wants to give Ross an arc about growing as a person, moving past his old ways, and mending his relationships, but the payoff is so predictable that even Daredevil could see it coming a mile away, in turn ruining any real emotional impact it could’ve had. There’s also a ton of other side characters, but they’re not really important and add very little to the actual plot.
“Captain America: Brave New World” doesn’t feel like a movie made because the people behind it felt there was a story to tell, it feels like a product designed to fit in with and sell other products. Which is a shame, because all of the actors are really trying. Anthony Mackie absolutely deserved a better true first outing in the Stars and Stripes, and sadly I don’t know how often we’ll get to see him in the lead up to the other projects. Everyone else does a perfectly serviceable job in this movie; nobody really stands out as being great or terrible, except for Harrison Ford. Ford really just turns in the same tired and annoyed “I’m just here to get paid” performance that he’s been turning in for almost a decade at this point.
Hopefully, “Captain America: Brave New World” is not a premonition of the quality of future Marvel projects, because despite being popcorn flicks, these movies are capable of telling powerful and important stories that can reach an incredibly wide audience. When movies like this are released, it feels insulting since it’s clear that studios can take the time to actually create competent and impactful movies, but choose not to. So, let’s hope “Brave New World” is merely a lapse in quality and not the new standard.
