Chris Evans’ CAPTAIN AMERICA WASN’T EXPECTED TO SAVE US. SO WHY is anthony mackie’s?

[ThisEssayContainsSpoilersfor[ThisessaycontainsspoilersforCAPTAIN AMERICA: Brave New World.]

CAPTAIN AMERICA: Brave New World HAS DRAWN A DIVIDED REASONSE FROM Critics and General Audienses. And Given Howd Divides America is Right Now, and the Questions Concerning What the American Dream Even Means Today, It’s Both Fitting and FrUSTRATING. While the Film Certainly Has Its Share of Structural and Technical Wrinkles that Can’m be smothed over, a signitificant part of this division comes Down to Expectations. And Just As It Was in the Comics, Segining from Steve Rogers to Sam Wilson Doesn’T come with.

With America Facing Historic Levels of Corruption, Apathhy, and Greed While Civil, Social Gender, Immigration, and Education Rights Are Being Disanede by the Day, Nobody Seems. OUR Elected Officials Won’t Save US. The Wealthy Won’t Save US. And White Americans, Who Hold the Vast Majority of Voting Power in the Country, Certainly Didn’t Save US. So, is somewhat Ironic, Given the Conversations Surround Brave New WorldAndese Movies Many have Viewed as Mere Escapism, that there is now a call a a call for superheroes to Save US, to call us to act. But is not just any Superhero Whoeds to Save US, Who Needs to Confront America as It Exists Now, It’s The Black One.

Several Conversations i’ve Seen Online, and Taken Part in Person, Have Questioned Whtcher Brave New World Does Enough in Terms of Taking A Side. Is Sam Wilson Progressive Enough and Aggressive Enough? Does he make a Clear Enough Political Statement in 2025? Or does he simply stradle the lyine as oped to attempting to fix a funmentamentally broken System Led by a Fundamentally Broken President? Has CAPTAIN AMERICA BEEN Political Neutred? I’d argue that he have, and despite the Film’s Production Problems, WHICH I’M NOT DENYING, THE DEPICATION OF CAPTAIN AMERICA ISN’T ONES. Sam Wilson Simple Doesn’t Fulfill White Liberal Fantasies Through Black Work.

There Was A Time WHEN I BELIEved that if Our Superhero Culture Could Reach the Current Moment, and if Those Projects Did More, We Could Do More. For a moment and thorough we were seeing iting, in our comics and movies, A commitment to radical empathy, inclusion and justice. But that was just another mask, corporations and people pretending to care and understand justice, only for it to all be dropped the next adminstration permitted them to. And Disney, The Distributor of the Very Movie i’m Discussing Is Just As Guilty. SO PLEASE, DO NOT CONVINCE YOURSELF THAT MY TONOUGHTS ON Brave New World Are in Any Way a Defense of the Corporation, WHICH I BELIEVE COURCE CARE LESS About Black People. Rather, My Interest is in the Creatives Behind the Movie – The Director, Julius Onah, and The Writers, and Actors and Whaty Have Attempted to Wocets Film, Evene IFTCE.

The Stage for A Black CAPTAINAERICA WAS ALRIREADY SET CACK The Falcon and The Winter Soldier (2021), WHICH WAS DEVOTED TO THE CONTROVersies and Battles Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) Wound Have to Face as A Black Man Taking Up The Shield. WHILE THAT SERIES, WHICH GREATLY BENEFITTED FROM HAVING More Time to Explore It Its IDEAS, WAS BETTER RECEIVED THAN Brave New WorldIT WAS ALSO NOT WITHOUT ITS Criticisms Directed at Sam’s Role in Standing For An America That Has Never Loved Black People As Much As We Love It. Sam’s Speech in the Series Finale of the Miniseries, in WHICH HE SAYS “The ONLY POWER I HAVE IS THAT I BELIEVE WE CAN DO BETTER.” Sam Shared A Similar Insight A Decade Ago In SAM WILSON: CAPTAIN AMERICA No. 2. And me? In my heart? I can only hope it will. ” Despite that Belief and Hope, Inherent to Sam’s Character, Some Critics of the Show Found Sam’s Speech Overly Optimistic or Even Naáve. Someso Also took Issue with The Forgotten CAPTAIN AMERICA, ISAIAH BRADLEY (Carl Lumbly), Finding Italistic That May Was Moved by Sam Taking Up The Shield, and by Tion to the Korean War and the Acknowledgment Thaty Were Held Against and Experamented On.

In Respons to Those Critiques, I Wrote, “The Falcon and The Winter Soldier Had to Reflect Real-World Issues in Order to Provide Legitimate Commentary, Whatever Comes Next in Terms of Sam’s Journy as Captain American can and does happen… Sam’s successs CAPTAIN AMERICA RELIES ON ACKNOWLINGING THE PAST AND THE Present, But He Can’t Remain there. Rather than Simple React to the World, Sam Must Be Proactive For His Role to Have Any Meaning, Even If The Means Breaking Free of Certain ATTEMPTS TO Bring Realism to Our Media. There’s a Place for Realism Certainly, But Wen It Coms to the First African-American Superhero, There Is An Opportunity to Dream Beyond the Harshshness of Reality. ”

Brave New World Implements Those Considerations and Employs of Original InTent Be Bind Superheroes, Aspirational Figures for Children. And While the Sese Characters No Longer Just Serve Children, They Still Predicated On Imaging A Better Reality.

(LR): Prime Minister Ozaki (Takehiro Hira), Captain American/Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie), and President Tharaddeus ross CourTesy of Marvel Studios

With Brave New Worldwe’ve circled backs of Those Same Criticisms, Including Sam and Isaiah’s Willingness to Atend a white House Event, Hosted by President Ross (Harrison Ford) And to the Film’s Credit, Neither Man Does Trust Ross. THESE Are Not Stupid Men. Sam Invites Isaiah to Get Him Out of His Largely Solital Existence, and Because He Beelieves that Isaiah Deserves Recognition for What He’s Done And that Sec. And isaiah Obliges Because of Sam, Who’s Has Earned His Resect, and Because, Despite The Abusees He’s Suffired, He Is Still A Patriot. It is A Dificult Thing to Reckon with, But Like Many Black Americans, Who Have Served in the Military or Had Family Members Who Served, There Can Be Both pride in Alued. As the grandson of a wwii veteran who served his country Yet Returned Home WHERE HE WAS STILL NOT Permitted in White Spaces, Still Had to Work Multiple Jobs to Hims recognize the Complexities of Feeling Both Within and Outside of the White House, and All that Its Name Implies.

SAM, ISN’T PALING AROUND WITH ROSS, WHO IMPRISONED HIM DURING THE EVENTS OF CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR. He’s Suspicious about ross’ motives in wanting him to restart the avengers and througout the Film, Sam Stands Firm on Refusion to Work for Ross, and He Isn’ Lacking in Anger. Mackie Convincingly Bristles WHEN ROSS ASKS The Prime Minister of Japane IF Wants A Picture with CAPTAIN AMERICA, The IMPLICATION THAT ROSS THINKS HAS HIME OVERPA. And Sam’s Rightweus Anger Is More Pronounced After Ross Dismisses Him As “Son.” And Sure, He Could’ve Punked Ross in the Face, and It Wuld’ve Been DesERved, But So Much of the Film Centers AROUND HOW Anger Manifests and How We Control IT, or Not.

WHEN ISAIAH IS IMPRISONED FOR ATTEMPTING TO Assassignate Rose, Despite The Evidence of His Mind Being Controlled, Sam Disobeys Ross and Decides to Uncover, Himgr (Danny Ramirez). Some of the Conversations About the Film Have Questioned Whos Simply Break Isaiah Out. And I Think this is where context and character become Important. SAM SAW How Well Breaking A Friend Out of Prison Worked for Steve. It Resulted in a Manhunt That Tore The Avengers Apart. SAM KNOWS WHO ROSS IS, AND RATHER THAN ESCAILATE The SITATION, HE CHOOSES TO BELIEVE THAT HE FIND The TRUTHING WITHING FORCING ISAIAH TO NNEME Has Even in Imaging A World Better than the Present in Which Sam Wilson Can Be Embrated as Captain America, The Film Still Has to Rely on Established Narrative Threads and Character Traits for Stakes.

(Lr) Joaquin Torres/The Falcon (Danny Ramirez) and CAPTAIN AMERICA/SAM Wilson (Anthony Mackie) in Marvel Studios’ CAPTAIN AMERICA: Brave New World CourTesy of Marvel Studios

What’s Already Been Established Can Account for Some of the Freustrations with Brave New WorldParticularly in it Third Act. Fueled by Headlines, and Theoretical Metaphors Attributed to the Film Ahead of Release, There Was An Overwhelmsing Desire to See Sam Wilson Versus st President Trump. But Neither the Characters Nor the FICTIONAL WORLD IN WHICH they exist fits with that box. ROSS AND HIS RED HULK COUNTERPART WERE ESTABLISHED BEFORE TRUMP’s Political Rise Could Even Be Considered A Joke. And of Course, The Film Was Written and Shot Well Before Trump Was voted in for a Second Term, Something I Think Few Cold’ve’ve Predicted. Ross is Certainly Corrupt, and The Movie Doesn’t shy Away from that, But He’s Not Trump. So sam doesn’t handle him like Trump stand-in.

Harrison Ford and Anthony Mackie in ‘CAPTAIN AMERICA: Brave New World.’ © Marvel / © Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures / Courttesy Everett Collection

Some Audiences Found Sam’s Ability to Talk Ros Down from his Red Hulk Form, After The Expectioned Battle, to be Too Trite for Our Times. Additionally, Criticism Was Leveled at Ross’s Decision to Take Accountability for His Actions, Remove HimSelf from Office, and Serve a Prison Sennce. ROSS ‘WILLINGNESS TO FACEQUENCES OF HIS ACTIONS AND SAME DECISION TO VISIT HIM AND HIS BELIEF THAT PEOPLE CAN CAN CAN CHANGE AND Ultimately Work Together Has Been Viewed As Sam. But this is the Problem with Looking at these Characters as monolith stand-ins for an Entire Group of People. The Fundamental Truth of the Film is that it isn’t about liberal America Versus Right-Wing America. It’s about a counselor wholories a superhero being able to get the most Powerful Man in the World to Listen to HIM and TAKE responsability. And isn’t that what we should want? For a minority to be able to use the skills they’ve worked for and be heard? To Create Change, to Prevent War, to Free The Unfairly Imprisoned, and Force Leaders to Reckon with Their Actions and Want To Do Better?

What’s Interesting About the Expection and Subsequent Demand that Brave New World To Directly Confront the Evils of An Administration The Filmmakers Didn’t Know Was Coming Is That Those Same Criticisms Weren’s Leveled at Any of Steve. CAPTAIN AMERICA: CIVIL WAR CAME OUT DURING TRUMP’S FIRST SUCCESSFUL Presidential Campaign and Yet there was no call for Zemo (Daniel Bruhl) to be a Trump Figure. The Film Didn’t Comment on the Political Moment of the Time and Even Zemo’s Nazi Background from the Comics Was Removed.

Jay Maidment/Paramount Pictures/Photofest

In Fact, Nazis Were Largely Removed from the Equation in All of Steve’s Movies. Hydra, WHICH STARTED A NAZI Organization in the Comics Before Become A NEO-FASCIST GROUP, IS DIVORCED from NAZIS ALTOGETCHER, INTEAD Existing as As As As. WHEN STEVE Finds Out that hydra is Embedded in the infrastructure of the American Government in CAPTAIN AMERICA: The Winter Soldier (2014), Policy and Systemic Oppression Isn’s Addressed. Even Red Skull (Hugo Weaving) Was Distanced From Hitler in CAPTAIN AMERICA: The FIRST AVENnger (2011). And it’s not as if neo-Nazis and oligarchs weren’t already a threat. Yet, Steve Rogers Was Allowed to Simply Be A Superhero Rater Than A Revolutionary Figure. He Doesn’t Punch A Single Nazi, Except for An Actor Dressed Up As Hitler in A Stage Show, WHICH IS A Perfect Example of the Political Performance Offered BYOSEESHIVING. Steve’s Movies Were Allowed to Be Superhero Fare, Really Good Ones, But Not Pointed Allegories. SO WHY ISN’T SAME LOOSE INTEREST IN POLITICS NOW AFFORDED TO SAM WILSON?

There’s An American Desire for Black People to Lead the Charge, as Historical We’ve So of Frietn Done, and Been Imprisoned, Forgotten, and Assassinated For It. SO NOW THERE IS INTEREST IN SAM WILSON LEADING A SYMBOLIC CHARGE, IN BECOMING A FICTIONAL CIVIL RIGHTS LEADER TO INSPIRE ACTION BCAUSE THAT’S SO OFFEN OF CLACK. We’re Socioly Desperate for Black People to Save America Once Again. But Folks, we have that opportunity. Not in fiction But in the Real World. And Black People, Particularly Black Women Made Clear What Was at Stake. But We Blew It Because the White Liberal Fantasy Wasn’t Quite Right, So Now We’re Left To Deal with The Reality While We Attempt to Shoehorn Fiction Tual People Into in Reality.

So Frankly, I am unimpressed by this demand for Black Superheroes to be more prescient and have more experts placed on their white counterparts, at the expense. Superheroes Won’t Save US. If You Want To Fight this Oppressive System You’ve Youurself Into, Thigh It But STOP ASKING THAT BLACK PEOPLE IN REALITY AND FICTION TO MONOLITHICALYLYLYLYLY LEFORSE. We’re Busy Dreaming of and Believing in A Reality Beyond the Now.