Captain America: Brave New World Review - Oh Captain My Captain

Walt Whitman’s poem about Abraham Lincoln represents Captain America better cause Cap believes Blacks and whites “should have the same rights.”

Black Superheroes are real I tell you! They’re REAL! (Gets carried off by thought police)

Let's not kid ourselves. I am a Marvel Comics stan. I've been reading these adventures since I was 5 years old and my favorite cover is Captain America #1 where Cap punches Adolf Hitler in the face. This cover came out in 1940 before the U.S. joined World War II.

Chef’s Kiss…

On the flip side, a character I've had a problem with has been The Falcon, a.k.a. Captain America's Black sidekick or partner as he was later called. In the 1969 comics, Sam Wilson was a person with a hunting falcon who went to an island "in the tropics" to work for a group that turned out to be nazis. He stuck around to organize a revolution with the natives, met Captain America who hates nazis, and became the Falcon until that origin was retconned (a change made by a future writer) in 1975. This retcon ACTUALLY had the Red Skull using the reality-warping powers of a cosmic artifact to turn Sam "Snap" Wilson from a street hustler into Captain America's perfect partner, The Falcon. It's all... kinda dumb when you think about it. Not quite as dumb as what they did to the 50s version of Captain America. I'll let you check that out on your own.

While I didn't discover racism until I was 14, something about The Falcon never sat well with me. Even though writers like Priest made him look like a complete badass, I scoffed at it. I asked the television “Why?” when he was on the 99 cartoon Avengers: United We Stand. To me, Falcon was an early Black superhero, created by a white supremacist and completely spawned by whiteness. Whether Sam Wilson was a hustler or a social worker didn’t matter. Even as a child, I did not care for this character.

So when the film Captain America and the Winter Soldier came out and Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) was re-introduced, he was very much his own man. I liked that. Even though he's constantly getting passed on the track by lonely Super Soldier, Steve Rogers (Chris Evans), I appreciated that change. Sam has his own history and later had a show made about it along with the Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan). You get to see Falcon as himself, mixing it up with Steve Rogers' best friend from World War II, Bucky Barnes.

Falcon and the Winter Soldier was a great, complicated show that was big on challenging politics. Superhero things like "Why can't I kill people?" and real-life things like "Why can't I kill billionaires and other elites? (1212)" The beginning and ending of this jaunt were a bit weird depending on what side you're on. For instance, why would a man accept the shield from the original Captain America only to put it in the Smithsonian Museum, only to have the American government give it to U.S. Agent (Wyatt Russell). Also, why would beautiful Black Captain America end all those rivalries with a silly speech? To be fair, chronic optimism and impressive speeches are Captain America’s greatest superpower which is probably why Steve chose Sam Wilson as his replacement. Sam’s not juiced up with Super Soldier Serum like Steve or the enemies Sam makes along the way, but he was given the shield. After saving the world a couple of times, Steve Rogers retires and has his first slow dance with Peggy Carter (Haley Atwell). Awwwwww. That's the ultimate Valentine's Day miracle!

That’s interesting, but should I see Captain America: Brave New World?

Damn, Cap… you looking smoove.

Captain America: Brave New World allows me to continue with one of my favorite hobbies, gobbling up all the Marvel-based connective tissue. Nom nom nom I say. Nom nom freakin nom. One of the best elements of this movie is how many question marks of the MCU it answers. If you're like me and have seen 100% of Marvel Movies going all the way back to Blade (1997), you should absolutely go see this movie. It connects over 16 years of Marvel movie history and will be fun and interesting for you. I might go see it in the theater again.

On the flip side, if you don't like "Marvel Movies," choke on all that juicy connective tissue, and have never hung around for after-credits scenes, Captain America: Brave New World could have two effects on you. This film could make you want study up to learn all the interesting things that happened, or it will make you angry and you will think it's stupid. This is probably why this film was released in February rather than as a summer blockbuster like Thunderbolts or Fantastic Four: First Steps.

Ultimately, this doesn't matter. My opinion is that this movie is great. Great fights, an interesting plot, a murderous bad guy that hired the more murderous Sidewinder (Giancarlo Esposito). Black Captain America has Wakandan Black Panther tech and throws the shield even better than O.G. Cap. Also, Sam does a variety of things Steve has never done, like… fly. Steve Rogers is like original recipe Superman; he can leap, but he can’t fly. Not only can Captain America fly, he can also use his wings to cut the wing off a plane and that’s not even all they do.

I love the explanations Captain America: Brave New World gives me. I'm excited to see more Marvel films after watching this. This kind of thing is very fun for someone like me. The major difference between Marvel Comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe is that, in the movies, things change. Things change because they have to. People get old, superheroes die, retire, or exit roles for a variety of reasons. The center cannot hold as plans constantly change. The fact that Marvel is still making movies that work together in this way is a feat. It's never been done at this scale. And for me, it's never been more fun to watch.

Some of you will skip Captain America: Brave New World while some of you will love it. Some folks will be racist about it for silly reasons, while most of us will happily check it out. I'd tell you to keep nazi-based opinions off the internet and let people enjoy the film, but you wouldn't listen to me anyway. So fly my little doves. Fly behind the shield that has entertained us for over 80 years. Fly into a theater and watch a hero's hero do what heroes do... suffer horrible loss to make sure others don't have to.

Fly Captain America, fly!