With the release of Captain America: Civil War only ten days away, we offer our top five predictions for Marvel’s summer blockbuster.
(Note: While we have avoided early screening spoilers, this article contains heavy spoilers from the comics)
Number Five: Giant Man!
Last year’s sleeper hit Ant-Man took even some of the most optimistic comic-book fans by surprise. Notably smaller (ha!) in scope, the movie felt and operated more like Oceans Eleven, and a suit that can shrink to the size of an insect was the perfect ability for such a caper. However, now that Scott Lang will be fighting alongside Captain America and battling against the mechanical suits of Iron Man and War Machine, his tricks seem far less impressive. Hence, it’s the ideal time to introduce the second evolution of Ant-Man’s powers, what he can make small, he can make big. The thirty foot tall Giant-Man would add needed strength to Team Cap, and it would be a blast to see him lumbering around during the twenty minute IMAX fight scene.
Number Four: The Death of a Major Character
While there are notable changes between the comic story line of Civil War and the cinematic adaption, multiple characters die in the graphic novel conflict. Given the emotional intensity of the story, it makes sense to kill off one of the heroes we’ve grown to love to add consequence to the plot. Here are the odds, as I see them.
2/1: Captain America. The reason why Steve Rogers remains the odds on favorite to bite the bullet is because he actually dies at the end of the Civil War comic run. However, it would be a financial hit for Marvel to kill off one of their most beloved stars, even though he’d certainly find a way back to life to aid in battle against Thanos in Avengers: Infinity Wars. Superheroes are like soap opera stars, no one stays dead for long.
3/1: War Machine. The death of Iron Man’s best friend during the battle between Team Cap and Team Tony would add fuel to an emotional confrontation in the movie’s final act. In the trailers, we’ve already seen Rhodey badly injured, so it’s not too far of a stretch for him to die.
4/1: The Winter Soldier. If Iron Man’s best friend is killed, there could be a leveling of the scales with the death of Steve Roger’s best friend, Bucky Barnes. He obviously plays a crucial role in the movie that separates both sides, so his death could have tremendous emotional weight for the starred and striped, if Steve Rogers does in fact survive until the credits role.
Number Three: The movie’s big mystery is whether The Winter Soldier actually blew up the UN
This is probably the easiest prediction of the batch, because while the synopsis doesn’t explicitly tell us this is the inciting incident of the movie, the pieces are all there. The big mystery will be whether Bucky was mind controlled into performing an act of terror, or if it’s an elaborate set up by Baron Zemo (my guess is option two). We probably won’t find out for sure until the final third of the movie, but it will help add nuance to Cap’s unwavering support to his friend.
Number Two: A nod to the TV Universe
This may be wishful thinking on my part, considering the bad blood rumored between the cinematic and television divisions of the studio, but it’d be great to hear mention about the other heroes popping up in New York (i.e. Daredevil, Jessica Jones, or Luke Cage). Still, since the directors of Infinity Wars have said they want to have over sixty heroes fighting Thanos, it’d make sense to start including some of these smaller characters into their larger universe.
Number One: The Return of The Red Skull
The last we saw of the crimson faced villain, he had been sucked into the cosmic cube called the tesseract. However, we now know it as the infinity space gem, and it’s possible that instead of killing him, it simply teleported him to another planet. Considering how Thanos is obsessed with the infinity stones, how cool would it be for the Red Skull to come back as the herald of the purple faced villain, the big bad of the next two Avengers movies?!
So those are my biggest predictions for Captain America: Civil War, but what about you? Share your speculation in the comments below, and we’ll all find out together May 6th. when Civil War hits theaters!