Sam Wilson enters a brave new world as Captain America, but is his first solo movie worth the watch?
Captain America: Brave New World reminded me that Marvel Studios still has a long way to go to recapture their former glory. The audience wants something new and something memorable, unfortunately this movie doesn’t deliver on that.
It’s not a bad movie and that’s why I gave it three out of five stars. The movie serves its purpose, but it had so much more potential. I wanted to walk out feeling excited about the MCU, like I did after Deadpool & Wolverine, but I didn’t. I did get a little excited when they first mentioned Adamantium (minor spoiler).
Now let’s break down my three star rating, starting with the bad. Brave New World suffered multiple reshoots. It feels like they were trying to hard to put the pieces together from all the reshoots.. It’s kind of like the Frankenstein’s Monster of MCU movies.
This also adds to some pacing and editing issues. The movie has a slow build, which could’ve been great if the ending wasn’t obvious. They tried to capture the suspense of Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but it failed. The movie does try to carry the weight of a similar political thriller, but crumbles under it.
The editing also takes away from some of the action scenes, it just doesn’t flow as well as Captain America: Civil War. And I know I shouldn’t compare it to the other Captain America movies, but the movie obliviously took inspiration for it.
The movie also has some horrendous special effects. Some seem unfinished and in other scenes it just feels like they didn’t try. There’s one scene where it seems like Anthony Mackie was called in to do a promo in front of a green screen, and somehow it made its way into the film (You’ll know what I’m talking about when you see it).
Now onto the positives – this movie is entertaining. And what more can you expect from an MCU movie than for it to be entertaining. Even though the film lacks some of the humour from the previous movies, it does have some funny moments.
The movie is carried by exceptional performances from Anthony Mackie and Harrison Ford. Mackie turned Sam Wilson into a character you just want to root for, while Ford turned Thunderbolt Ross into a character you just hate to love or love to hate.
Ford steals the show, his take on the Red Hulk is fantastic. I know I criticised the CGI, but Red Hulk actually looks really cool. You can see it’s Harrison Ford. The supporting cast is amazing. Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas, Carl Lumbly and Tim Blake Nelson rock. I wish we got more of Giancarlo Esposito’s Sidewinder.
One other good thing is, this movie finally delivers on plot points and credit scenes Marvel set up more than 15 years ago. It finally ties up some loose ends from the Incredible Hulk and The Eternals. So yeah, the good slightly outweighs the bad and that’s why this movie deserves three starts. It’s a good watch and a good popcorn flick. I can’t wait for more Captain America, Falcon and Red Hulk in the future.
