This is lining up to be a very exciting year for Marvel Studios. An insane barrage of exciting titles will be making their way to theaters, in addition to some incredible shows that will be available with a Disney+ subscription. We will get to see the return of Charlie Cox’s Daredevil, several members of the Black Widow family in Thunderbolts, and the introduction of the MCU Fantastic Four. Before all of that happens, though, Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) is picking up the shield and stepping into some political intrigue for the blockbuster feature Captain America: Brave New World, and critics are weighing in now that the embargo on reviews has lifted.
Our own Eric Eisenberg posted a 2 star review of Julius Onah’s Captain America: Brave New World, and found it “slow and dull.” Eric said he enjoyed Phase 2-type MCU stories that were free of massive crossover hype, but still found Brave New World to be lacking any real surprises. Eisenberg writes in his review:
The full plot doesn’t offer any extra layers into which one can properly sink their teeth. Every story development is incredibly basic, a shallower version of something we’ve seen in a previous MCU film, spoiled in the trailers, or all of the above.
Bilge Ebiri over at Vulture seems to agree that Captain America: Brave New World feels like just another stop on the long and winding Marvel road, calling the latest MCU sequel “more obligatory than exciting.” When writing about the difficulty a Marvel movie now faces to stand out, Ebiri wonders:
It seems hard to remember now, but once upon a time these Marvel movies staged action in fast, funny, creative ways, utilizing cutting-edge visual effects to realize their superheroes’ unique abilities. Nowadays, more often than not, we get dull, derivative drudgery — a symptom perhaps of familiarity (there have been 35 of these movies so far) but also an overwhelming sense of box-checking that’s settled in over the past few years. Is it that they’ve all just done every move, every kick, every punch, every launch to death?
These Marvel movies are supposed to be a good time, however, and in his review for Variety, critic Owen Gleiberman claims that Captain America: Brave New World has enough “straightforward gusto” to entertain an audience. He writes:
Captain America: Brave New World is a reasonably diverting time filler that feels like what it is: a pit stop in the MCU’s rebooting-the-Avengers strategy. What’s old is not new again. But it’s just fun enough again.
Most of the reviews, our own included, do praise the cast. Everyone seems to like Anthony Mackie in the role. Harrison Ford is dialed in to the part of President Thaddeus Ross – a part he took over for the late William Hurt. And the film does a decent job of extending the stories left behind by Eternals, The Incredible Hulk, and the Disney+ series The Falcon and the Winter Soldier.
It just might not be enough. Writing for Roger Ebert, Robert Daniels gives Captain America: Brave New World 1 star and claims:
The entire franchise’s inability to balance substance with pleasure crashes into its inept conclusion. In fact, I’m not sure I’ve hated an ending to a movie more in recent memory than this one. … This movie is anything but brave. It is the most feckless, spineless blockbuster of the last decade, a film in need of burning down the old world before daring to look for the new.
As always, we encourage you to make up your own mind. Captain America: Brave New World opens in theaters beginning on February 13.
