With Robert Downey Jr. signing on to do CAPTAIN AMERICA 3, Marvel Studios is planning to bring the Civil War from comics to the screen. Anthony & Joe Russo will return to direct CAPTAIN AMERICA 3, so you know that they’ll do a great job.
The basics of the story is that the government wants to invoke the Superhero Registration Act (SRA) that forces people with abilities to have to reveal themselves to the world. As most people know, Captain America is about preserving people’s freedoms and not forcing people to do things. Most likely, Stark will be pro SRA, and they’ll make some heroes go on the run.
I’m all for a movie or stretch of movies of this magnitude, but there are a few key pieces missing that could create quite the speed bump.
There are some important characters and franchises where Marvel Studios doesn’t have the rights to be in the movie(s). A few must-haves are Spider-Man, Wolverine and Mr. Fantastic. They all are owned by either Sony Pictures or 20th Century Fox. That means they won’t appear unless Marvel Studios can work something out with those studios by either buying the rights or talk them into making the universe bigger.
The other big issue is that the word mutant is not allowed to be used by the Marvel Studios. So like Wolverine, there is no X-Men, Xavier or his school where a majority of the mutants seek shelter during the war.
Don’t get me wrong, if anyone could make it work, Marvel can — but it just worries me. One way to make it happen is to introduce the Inhumans and have Stark pull some B-list heroes into the fold. I’m all for Marvel proving me wrong and hopefully they will.
I have a few major problems with this if this is the road that Marvel’s taking:
1) It’s too soon for Civil War. That MCU’s cast of characters is too small. Unless Marvel acquires Spider-Man, the X-Men and the Fantastic Four (which I doubt they will), they’ll only have the characters of the Avengers, the Guardians of the Galaxy (they probably wouldn’t be earthbound during this), Ant-Man, Doctor Strange and (maybe) the Inhumans. I suppose on a smaller scale, they’d also have characters from Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. and the Netflix series if they wanted to use them, but it still seems too small for me.
2) Keeping to the trend that “it’s too soon,” I don’t believe Iron Man and Captain America have established enough of a friendship yet for anyone to suddenly care that they’re splitting apart.
3) There’s SO many villains in the Marvel Universe. I’d rather see a new one come to life than two heroes fighting each other.
And the big one…
4) I’d hate for Captain America to lose the spotlight in his own film. Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark is insanely popular and considering how much RDJ costs, Marvel wouldn’t under-utilize him if they have him. Meanwhile, Chris Evans is AMAZING as Cap and let’s be honest… other than Guardians and the Avengers… Captain America: The Winter Soldier is the best Marvel film since the first Iron Man.
Like you said, though, Michael, the Russos did such a great job with Cap 2, so I trust that they’ll give us a great third film. At least I hope they do.
Maybe something similar or smaller in scale to the Civil War comic version. The Civil War story line is difficult to do in the big screen. Too many heroes and villains in one movie. The 10 or 12 issue arc will not fit in one movie. It remains to be seen. A 3-movie arc ala The Hobbit or The Lord of the Rings is a possibility.