10 Star-Spangled Behind-The-Scenes Facts About The Captain America Trilogy
Of the MCU’s three completed solo trilogies – Iron Man, Captain America, and Thor – Cap’s is the one with the most consistent quality. While Iron Man and Thor only ever starred in one really great standalone movie each, there’s something to love about all of Cap’s movies.
The first one is a pulpy World War II adventure that establishes Steve Rogers’ arc, the second one is a visceral spy thriller that challenges his belief system, and the third one is basically an Avengers movie, tearing Earth’s mightiest heroes apart. Anyway, here are 10 Star-Spangled Behind-The-Scenes Facts About The Captain America Trilogy.
10 Chris Evans turned down the role of Steve Rogers three times
The producers had to ask Chris Evans to play Steve Rogers four times before he agreed to do it. He always liked the character, but he worried that the increased exposure and fame that would come from playing the character would be detrimental to his private life.
However, Robert Downey, Jr. convinced him to take the role, saying that if he played Rogers in the MCU, he’d gain the clout to take any role he wanted afterward, and he signed up. It’s a good thing, too, because it’s fair to say that no actor would’ve played Rogers quite as perfectly as Evans did.
9 Hawkeye was supposed to be in The Winter Soldier
In early drafts for Captain America: The Winter Soldier, the writers tried to fit in Hawkeye. The plot was all about S.H.I.E.L.D., and – considering that characters such as Nick Fury, Natasha Romanoff, and Maria Hill were returning – it made sense for Clint Barton to join the team.
Hawkeye would’ve fought Cap and pretended to lose in order to maintain appearances in front of a hovering Helicarrier. However, in the end, the writers decided there were too many characters and they couldn’t find room for Hawkeye where he would be useful. Instead, they wrote a line explaining his absence that got cut from the movie anyway.
8 Chris Evans injured his arm bicep-curling a helicopter
One of the all-time most memorable MCU moments happens midway through Captain America: Civil War when Bucky is escaping his imprisonment on a helicopter and Steve runs out to stop him by bicep-curling the entire helicopter.
Since the script called for closeups and zooms on Chris Evans’ muscles – which Evans would teasingly call “bicep porn” – he had to hold the helicopter in an unnatural way and flex his arms, which led to a minor muscular injury. Robert Downey, Jr. joked that Marvel didn’t care about Evans’ injury, because of how great the shot turned out as a result of it.
7 There were different versions of Cap’s catch-up list for different countries
In Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Steve Rogers keeps a list of things he’s missed from the past 70 years that he needs to look up. Every version includes Star Wars, Star Trek, Nirvana, Thai food, Rocky, Rocky II, and the Trouble Man soundtrack (the last one was suggested by Sam Wilson), but there are also specific versions for different countries.
The U.S. version has I Love Lucy, the Moon landing, the Berlin Wall, Steve Jobs, and disco. The British version has the Beatles, Sean Connery, and Sherlock. The Australian version has AC/DC and Steve Irwin. The Italian version Ferrari and Roberto Benigni. The French version has The Fifth Element and Daft Punk.
6 Originally, Wolverine and Magneto had cameos in The First Avenger
Just like Nick Fury was originally going to name-drop Spider-Man and the X-Men in Iron Man’s post-credits scene, Wolverine and Magneto were supposed to make cameo appearances in Captain America: The First Avenger. Both characters were present during World War II – Wolverine as a soldier and Magneto as a refugee locked in an internment camp – so Marvel planned to have them show up throughout the movie.
However, as you can probably guess, they ran into rights issues, so the cameos were scrapped. Of course, those rights issues have been resolved by the Disney/Fox merger, so we’ll see those characters’ WWII-era exploits soon enough.
5 The Russo brothers used as little CGI as possible
It can be easy these days for big-budget blockbusters to take the easy way out and use CGI effects instead of practical effects. However, as proven by Mad Max: Fury Road, practical effects still look and feel a lot better than CGI.
Fortunately, the Russo brothers are huge believers in practical effects, and according to Anthony Mackie, they used as few CGI shots as possible on Captain America: The Winter Soldier. He explained, “If they could build it, they built it. If we could do it, we did it. They wanted to do as little CGI as possible. That’s why the movie looks so great.”
4 Black Panther initially had a much smaller role in Civil War
Early drafts of the script for Captain America: Civil War had much less Black Panther and much more Spider-Man. The plan was to save Black Panther’s origin story for his then-upcoming solo movie helmed by Ryan Coogler, so T’Challa originally wasn’t even going to appear in his costume in Civil War.
However, negotiations broke down with Sony and it was looking like Marvel might not get permission to use Spider-Man in the movie at all. During this time, the script had to be retooled in case Spidey couldn’t be featured. This led to T’Challa’s role in the movie getting significantly expanded.
3 Stanley Tucci played Dr. Erskine because he wanted to do a German accent
In Captain America: The First Avenger, Stanley Tucci plays Dr. Erskine. He’s the one who created the super soldier serum that gave Steve Rogers his powers and he’s also the one who selected Rogers for the “Captain America” program. He acts as Cap’s standard older mentor figure who dies to spur on his quest, as is required by almost every MCU movie (Yinsen, Wendy Lawson, Zuri, Yondu, the Ancient One etc.).
Apparently, Tucci only took the role of Erskine – one of the most pivotal roles in the movie – because he’d always wanted to do a German accent and that would let him do one.
2 The Wasp was originally featured in Civil War
Early in the development of Captain America: Civil War, the filmmakers considered including Hope van Dyne and showing her transformation into the Wasp. However, since there was so much else going on in the movie, Hope’s role would’ve been pretty much a cameo, and that would’ve been a disservice to one of Marvel’s oldest and most iconic heroes.
So, she didn’t become the Wasp until her appearance in Ant-Man and the Wasp. That movie ended up using the fact that Scott Lang didn’t call Hope to help out in Civil War as an important plot point, so it all worked out.
1 The Russo brothers originally planned a more intimate Captain America 3
When the Russo brothers first signed on to direct Captain America’s third solo movie after nailing his second, they planned a smaller, more intimate movie that would continue the plot threads that they established in The Winter Soldier. However, Kevin Feige suggested that they adapt the “Civil War” storyline from the comics and it quickly blew up into what fans would later dub Avengers 2.5.
A lot of the Russos’ original ideas, like focusing heavily on Steve and Bucky’s complicated relationship and including Baron Zemo as a villain, did make it into the final movie, but it was more epic than originally planned.