It’s old news by now that Captain America 3 will be loosely based on the Civil War Story line from Marvel Comics. It has become one of the more highly anticipated non-Avengers movie in the MCU lineup. It is a story line that should see Captain America and his supporters facing off against Iron Man and his supporters. For those that are unfamiliar with the comics story line let me summarize it for you. It starts out with a young superhero group known as The New Warriors. They are superheroes and reality TV stars. On one particular adventure near Stamford, Connecticut, one of the bad guys-Nitro- goes off causing an explosion that destroys miles of the area they are in, killing a bunch of people. Included in that area was a school and 60 kids die. This leads to congress passing the Super Human Registration act, requiring all super humans to register so the government can more closely monitor/control their actions. This also means that their secret identities would become public. At this time, Tony Stark is running SHIELD, and he ends up supporting the act. He believes that someone should be regulating all the super beings and their powers and what they do with them. He is obviously not concerned with his own secret identity (secret identities, with a few exceptions, are not as big a deal in Marvel as they are in DC). Cap opposes the act. He feels like it is taking away the rights of the super powered beings, and even though he has no secret identity, he understands how that is a protection to some of the other heroes. Cap and Iron Man become the de facto leaders of each side and the whole Marvel Universe is split on the issue of super human registration.
Those familiar with this story line in the comics had some idea of how the Civil War movie was going to play out. Obviously, the film was not going to follow the story line exactly, but the broader story could work out. This last week Marvel announced that Captain America: Civil War was beginning principal photography in preparation for its May 2016 release. Along with its announcement that the shooting was beginning, Marvel also announced who was going to be in the film and how the basic story line would play out. You can find all those details here.
If you look at the list, at first glance, it looks like the whole MCU will be in this movie, but there are a few notable names left off the list. Nick Fury, Maria Hill, The Hulk, and Thor are all missing from the list of cast members. Some have called this film “Avengers 2.5,” but it will be a very different Avengers team if these characters will in fact be missing from the film. It looks like Daredevil will also not be making his debut on the big screen with Civil War. Also missing is Spider-Man. The final decision on who will be the MCU’s Spider-Man has not been made, so just because he is not listed here does not mean he won’t be in the film. They are probably waiting to make that announcement separately.
There were also some interesting names on the list. Most intriguing is General Ross. We haven’t seen him since he was hunting after Edward Norton as the Hulk. It’s been a while. What makes his inclusion even more interesting is that Hulk is not on the list. So why is ol’ Thunderbolt going to show up? Maybe we will be seeing a Hulk in the film, he just won’t be green. Martin Freeman is also listed, but not who he is playing. I honestly have no idea who he will be playing in the film. I don’t even know where to begin to guess, but I do wonder if it will be similar to Robert Redford’s character- someone we have never heard of before. Black Panther and Ant-Man are both listed in the film, so it will be interesting to see where they fit in. The other really interesting character is the Winter Soldier. What will his role be in the movie? In any case, it is a very impressive list of characters.
We also get an idea of how the actual story will play out. Instead of the New Warriors being involved in the incident that leads to the Super Human Registration act, it will be the new Avengers team. This makes sense, since we have never seen the New Warriors in the MCU. Plus, from a lot of the rumors we are hearing, the new Avengers will be the primary team in the Infinity War Part 1, so it makes sense to have them working together before that, and this movie is a perfect opportunity to play that out. It will also be interesting to see which of the characters will end up on which side. It will be interesting to see how it all plays out leading into Phase 3, how it will set the phase up and what the after effects will be.
What do you think of the cast and story announced for Civil War? Are you excited to see how it all comes together, or are you afraid it may be too many characters to cram into one movie? Let me know in the comments.
If I remember correctly Tony doesn’t actually run shield until the end of the series. Before that it was Maria hill.
I’m wondering if Ross is going to be there in connection with Abomination. There’s a one-shot called the consultant and it mentions how some people had wanted to put abomination on the original avengers team, so maybe they’ll use him to bring in some of the heroes.
That could be. I would be kind of surprised if they were introducing the Red Hulk at this point.
I am interested in seeing how this goes, yet I feel the storyline is weakened with the exclusion of the X-men. Yet X-men are another franchise not a part of the MCU sigh.
I agree. It won’t be the same without the X-Men or the Fantastic Four or just introducing Spidey. It will be watered down for sure.