To put it mildly, the MCU's Multiverse saga isn't going how Kevin Feige and co. hoped it would. A combination of nobody seeming to know where this shit is going from a worldbuilding standpoint, brand oversaturation primarily fueled by the introduction of the Disney+ shows beginning in 2021 and roughly half of their post-Endgame projects picking up mixed-to-below-average WOM has created a level of audience indifference that would've been difficult to conceive while they were riding high during the bulk of the 2010's.
About the only thing that has delivered great financial results for them of late is heading back to the nostalgia well whenever possible. The sweet, unapologetic embrace of all things from the past powered their star duo of Spider-Man: No Way Home and Deadpool & Wolverine to a staggering worldwide gross of $3.25 billion combined (for reference purposes, the other 9 MCU titles released during the 2020's prior to this year have made a combined total of $5.28 billion). Of course, this money trail has seemingly now offered the panic-stricken powers that be at Disney a road map forward: Fan service and aping beloved titles from their catalog. In the case of the latest MCU title Captain America: Brave New World, it was more of the latter as the film wants to recapture the political/espionage thriller vibes of 2014's Captain America: The Winter Solider for the big screen debut of Anthony Mackie's Cap. While calling Brave New World a success would be giving it more credit than it deserves, it didn't turn out too bad for a familiar recipe that had to be Frankenstein-ed 62 times after the team of chefs tasked with putting it together kept dropping it on the floor after they pulled it out of the oven.
For those who don't know what the stupid quip above is referring to, Brave New World went through quite the tumultuous production process. Principal photography lasted from March 21 to June 30,2023, which overlapped with the Writer's Strike and made Marvel's usual practice of daily script changes impossible for the final 2+ months of the shoot. Naturally, Disney wasn't pleased with the results from the initial shoot and ordered significant reshoots that reworked multiple action sequences and added and scrapped multiple characters/plot threads-which subsequently shifted its release date from July 2024 to the current February 2025 slot. What transpired here may've even been the catalyst for a huge philosophy shift for Marvel as they pushed back the production starts of Thunderbolts*, The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Blade-which remains in flux-in order to tighten up the scripts before production started.
The evidence that Brave New World was being extensively reworked on the fly is all over the screen. Some of the VFX look completely unfinished, there's about 19 characters fighting for screen time in a movie that runs just under 2 hours and above all, the story feels like a completely random grab bag of narrative threads (Avengers teases! Multiple returning characters from the Edward Norton Hulk movie that barely anyone has thought of since 2008! Further examinations of the imposter syndrome that Sam Wilson feels about taking on the Captain America mantle after Steve Rogers that was pretty extensively explored in The Falcon and the Winter Solider!) that got thrown together at the last minute. As underdeveloped and overstuffed as it is, the movie remains relatively watchable throughout. There's an earnest effort from most of the primary cast (Mackie, Danny Ramirez, Harrison Ford, Tim Blake Nelson, Carl Lundly) to sell this as a hugely important film for the future of the MCU, the action sequences outside of a couple bizarrely-edited hand-to-hand fights in the early going are solid enough and despite the desperation of its posturing to be Winter Solider 2.0, it manages to never be boring.
Now, praising Brave New World for being slightly above average is absolutely a ridiculous moral victory that doesn't make me feel better about the future of the MCU in the slightest. However, the blueprint for a full-blown Quantumania-esque disaster is sitting in the haphazardly assembled DNA of this film and it being able to avoid falling into a gaping hot spring of shit by simply showing some base level competency in several key areas is a pleasant surprise. Maybe next time around Mackie can get the proper Captain America showcase he deserves, but for now, everybody involved with this chaotic venture should just be happy that they found a way to clear the comically low bar that was set for it.
Grade: C+
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