Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) has a job to do, and he’s going to do it. An Air Force veteran and former paratrooper, Sam is used to following orders. But now he’s Captain America, having inherited the title from Steve Rogers, one of the world’s most beloved heroes. In addition to the resistance he experiences as a Black man representing the country, Sam’s latest mission comes from the newly-elected Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross (Harrison Ford), a former General and Secretary of State with whom he clashed in previous Marvel movies.
With a set-up like this, Captain America: Brave New World was poised to be a superhero blockbuster for the current moment, reflecting the high stakes and political urgency affecting so many of us in our real, day-to-day lives. The end result is less gripping. At its best, Brave New World’s well-crafted fight scenes and fantastical setting propel the movie over its clunky plot. But anyone hoping for Brave New World to engage in any meaningful way with our current political state will be disappointed.
Brave New World’s refusal to engage with political reality is a missed opportunity to stand up and say something relevant about the world we’re now living in, and not just because the story they’re telling involves a doddering U.S. president whose inability to control his impulses nearly destroys the nation’s capital. More than that, it also represents a failure to live up to the character’s established legacy—Captain America has a long, proud history of clashing with his own government and standing up for those who need it, no matter who’s giving the orders.
A History of Resistance
The first time Steve Rogers gave up the mantle of Captain America, he tripped over his own cape. In 1974’s Captain America #180, written by Steve Englehart and penciled by Sal Buscema, Steve Rogers debuts his new superheroic persona Nomad, complete with a deep-V shirt, a Gambit-like head sock, and a flowing yellow cape. The first time Steve tries to save the day, he trips on said cape and falls flat on his face, ending Nomad’s inauspicious debut.
The Nomad arc and its build-up is far from a high point in Captain America comics, but beyond the clunky pacing and ineffective comedy, Englehart is making a salient point. A disillusioned Rogers abandons the Captain America identity after doing battle with the Secret Empire, a cabal of snake-themed villains who launch a misinformation campaign against him. At the climax of the storyline, Rogers discovers that the leader of the Secret Empire is the president of the United States.
The issue never states the president’s name or shows his face, but given that the Secret Empire storyline completed in 1974, amidst the height of the Watergate Scandal, the identity is pretty clear. The Secret Empire is led by Richard Nixon, the notoriously paranoid U.S. president, who would resign from office just a few issues after his defeat in the comics (the two events are, best as I can tell, unrelated).
Thus, Engelhart’s goofy story makes a larger point. Captain America cannot be the country’s hero if that means blindly following the lead of a corrupt government.
A decade later, another storyline would cover similar ground, albeit in a more effective manner. In a 1987 story by writer Mark Gruenwald and penciler Tom Morgan, the U.S. military tries to push Rogers back into active service. Because he does not agree with the actions of the U.S. military, he abandons the Captain America title and takes on the identity of the Captain (not the most creative move).
In response, the American government, under the direction of a charismatic figure called Mr. Smith, gives the Captain America title to an unstable right-wing reactionary named John Walker. As Rogers investigates Walker’s violent actions as Captain America, he discovers the truth: that Mr. Smith is in fact his old Nazi enemy the Red Skull, who has used American conservative extremists to destabilize the country and take control.
When Sam Wilson became Captain America in a 2012 comic, he faced his own challenges with the country. From the very beginning, right-wing online commentators declaimed him as a false Captain America and conservative politicians stood against him. But Sam didn’t give up the Captain America title until a 2017 crossover event titled, appropriately enough, Secret Empire. Written by Nick Spencer and illustrated by a number of artists, Secret Empire involved alternate reality shenanigans that transformed Steve Rogers into a sleeper agent for the fascist organization Hydra. As the Hydra-influenced Rogers led an overthrow of the American government, other heroes launched a rebellion… but not Sam Wilson. Wilson devoted himself to helping refugees escape the U.S. for safer countries. Most Americans gladly supported the fascist Cap, convincing Sam that the country was beyond saving.
As these samples from over the course of decades illustrate, Captain America rarely serves as a jingoistic hero who unquestioningly serves his country. Instead, writers present him as the conscience of the country—a conscience that often has to stand against reactionary forces that call themselves patriots while dismantling democracy.
A Big-Screen Objector
For as openly left-leaning as Captain America comics can get, Marvel movies tend to lean toward the right in some key ways, a function of their attempted centrism. Sure, Captain Marvel can sneak in a message about caring for refugees and Black Panther depicts Western nations looting Africa for resources, but even those films valorize the American military and intelligence systems.
At the same time, even the earlier live-action versions of Captain America have questioned and critiqued the American government. The sepia-toned nostalgia of Captain America: The First Avenger never openly questions the U.S. or any of the Allied forces. But when Doctor Erskine advises Rogers the night before he undergoes the super-soldier treatment, he makes clear that bullies can come from anywhere. In fact, in his estimation, Rogers can be Captain America not because he wants to kill Nazis (i.e., fights for the right military) but because his affinity for the little guy transcends nationalism. It only makes sense, then, that Rogers must stand against his government if it too becomes a bully.
And that’s exactly what happens over the next two Captain America movies. Civil War fumbles its central conceit, framing Rogers as a selfish individualist who eschews public policy to defend his war-crime-committing friend. And yet, Civil War also pits Rogers against his government, namely then-Secretary of State Ross (portrayed in that film by the late William Hurt). The next time we see Rogers, in Avengers: Infinity War, he’s fully left the country and wears a variation of the Nomad costume (sans cape, this time).
Captain America: The Winter Soldier handles the issue much better. Within a more personal plot about Rogers finding his long-lost friend Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan) alive and brainwashed into becoming the Hydra agent the Winter Soldier, The Winter Soldier reveals that S.H.I.E.L.D., the explicitly international but American-focused intelligence agency, has been infiltrated by fascists. Although the movie treats the Hydra infiltration as a big reveal, in fact, S.H.I.E.L.D. and its director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) approve of the plans instituted under Hydra’s secret influence, driving Rogers away from the fold.
But the most prominent example of the MCU’s Captain America standing at odds with his country occurs under Sam Wilson’s tenure, in the Disney+ series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Instead of immediately accepting the Captain America mantle, Sam struggles with the idea of taking up the shield, wondering if he as a Black man even wants to represent a country rife with systemic racism. To help Sam with his dilemma, Bucky introduces him to Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly), one of several Black soldiers forced to act as test subjects as the government tried to recreate the Super Soldier Serum that gave Steve Rogers his powers. Where most of the others died horrible deaths, Bradley lived and was sent on secret missions in Korea. But when he was captured by Hydra, the U.S. abandoned him, disavowing all knowledge of his existence.
Although not as direct as the comics that introduced the character (2003’s Truth: Red, White & Black by Robert Morales and Kyle Baker), the Bradley arc on The Falcon and the Winter Soldier directly condemns real-world American history. The experiments conducted on Bradley mirror the Tuskegee Study, a forty-year-long program in which the U.S. government conducted biomedical experiments on Black citizens while deliberately misinforming about the nature of the research and their treatment.
Wilson eventually reaches a decision, choosing to answer the call and become Captain America in spite of his reservations. But he does so by going directly against what the government wants Captain America to be, the jingoistic warrior they installed when they recruited John Walker (Wyatt Russell) in Sam’s place. Sam becomes Captain America not to simply represent America, but to push it toward a more perfect union.
Captain America’s Continuing Quest for Justice
Isaiah Bradley returns in Captain America: Brave New World, once again portrayed by Lumbly. While Lumbly gives the movie its most potent emotional moments, the movie largely downplays his role. It turns its attention away from Bradley and even from Captain America, focusing instead on Ross as an American president who apparently deserves our sympathies despite his reckless, war-mongering ways.
Brave New World was filmed before the results of the most recent election, and certainly didn’t need yet another reshoot after the fact. And yet, Sam’s insistence upon protecting the current system still seems fully wrong-headed in light of the monstrous actions of the current administration. If ever we needed a Captain America who is willing to stand up to those in power to defend the vulnerable and oppressed, it’s now. In Brave New World, Captain America has to spend so much time taking care of President Ross that the lessons of Isaiah Bradley, who has witnessed and suffered from the consequences of unchecked power and privilege, seem to fall by the wayside.
Almost. Within the cacophony of Brave New World, Bradley’s righteous indictment of American injustice can still be heard. It calls us to remember the lesson taught by better Captain America stories, that Rogers and Wilson are at their most heroic when they defend people from their government, not when defending the powerful. The Captain America we need right now is the one who protects the vulnerable and powerless—not a perfect soldier, but a good man.
