Captain America: Brave New World - Official Trailer (2025)

[pukunui]

Thus, I’d argue that it’s likely that the Widow process involves some degree of neurological enhancement - faster reflexes, pain suppression, that sort of thing - that makes its recipients borderline superhuman.

Absolutely! I mean, we've seen Nat fall multiple stories, banging into things on the way down, without breaking any bones. That has to count for something!

 

[trappedslider]

Absolutely! I mean, we've seen Nat fall multiple stories, banging into things on the way down, without breaking any bones. That has to count for something!

Savings on hospital bills

 

[Thomas Shey]

We don’t really know what the Widow process involves - it takes (kidnaps?) girls from a young age from a wide variety of backgrounds and moulds them into obedient efficient assassins. How does that moulding occur and does it involve more than real-world indoctrination and terrorist training?

I suspect given what we've seen, its basically what some people think classic ninja training, especially of kunoichi was like. Which is to say there's a lot going on there, and imprinted early.

But I suspect that matters more as to breadth than depth.

One indicator is that the Red Room also produced someone who was neurologically and cybernetically enhanced to copy combat skills from exceptional individuals, including superhumans. Presumably that technology didn’t come out of nowhere, and clearly the Red Room is already expert at neurological manipulation to control the minds of its graduates. Thus, I’d argue that it’s likely that the Widow process involves some degree of neurological enhancement - faster reflexes, pain suppression, that sort of thing - that makes its recipients borderline superhuman.

There's nothing much to really suggest that, though. The conditioning was absolutely a thing, but note it was still a work-in-progress (that was what Nat's "mother" Melena was involved in) and what Dreykov did to his daughter was treated like it had been cutting edge and experimental (my own hypothesis is it was leftover Hydra experimental technology; but note there's no suggestion that the Red Room graduates had anything like a super-soldier serum, even if that was the case with the version of Nat from the comics).

Basically, my position is that there's no suggestion that Widows are anything but women highly trained and selected from an early age; most other benefits they have, just like Sam, come from various pieces of obvious super-tech like the Stings. This is confused a bit because Nat was apparently a standout even amidst them. But nothing suggests she or the other Widows were superhuman in any fashion beyond the highly-trained super-agent stereotype.

 

[Thomas Shey]

Absolutely! I mean, we've seen Nat fall multiple stories, banging into things on the way down, without breaking any bones. That has to count for something!

So has Clint. That's just a narrative conceit of superhero stories. Look at any extended run of, or set of movies about Batman sometime.

 

[Stalker0]

So has Clint. That's just a narrative conceit of superhero stories. Look at any extended run of, or set of movies about Batman sometime.

My head cannon continues to be, that humans in Earth-616 are all just tougher than humans here. Its why batman can do the crazy stuff he does, its how people can be caught falling at insane velocities and not immediately die, and its how Nat can fall down a 5 story staircase bouncing like a cartoon and not break a single bone.

 

[AnotherGuy]

Trending numbers were decent 80-90million opening weekend. Wonder if this will effect the numbers. Without legs it's around 300ish million all up.

Heard it was a 4-day weekend, not 3-day so not decent...

 

[Zardnaar]

Heard it was a 4-day weekend, not 3-day so not decent...

Think they got 100 domestic 80 international.

Probably means big drop off next week. 60% is typical 70% is bad, 50% or less I great.

If it's close to typical drop off somewhere close to 500-600 million I guess.

Shouldn't bomb unless next week is catastrophic drop.

Disney Calls ‘Captain America: Brave New World’ 4-Day At $100M Opening – Box Office Update

'Captain America: Brave New World' Will Lead 4-day Presidents Box Office with a shot at $100M+ after $40M+ Friday/previews.

deadline.com

192 million.

Good legs might climb higher a'la Elemental.

 

[Clint_L]

That's just rose-colored glasses. The MCU had several missteps before Infinity War. It's just a more convenient narrative to support the fact that "The MCU is dead" now to overlook those. There was also more than a bit of clemency given to the movies in their critical scores and that has worn off.

Every single movie through End Game is fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, which isn't the be all and end all, but is remarkable. If your biggest misstep among 20 films is Dark World or IM2, that is a remarkable accomplishment, and they have the audience reaction scores and constantly growing box office to go with it. That's hardly "rose coloured glasses," that's objective facts.

Here's another fact: that entire run was built around two central character arcs, Steve Rogers and Tony Stark, culminating in each of them changing radically from their first film to that last (the inherently selfish man ultimately sacrifices himself for everyone else, the inherently selfless man finally chooses something for himself over his duty). What's holding the MCU together since then? Some of these films are good, some are bad, but there's no compelling core. Each film is about a threat to the multiverse or something but who cares? We care about characters, not imaginary worlds that are never actually in danger anyway.

 

[chuckdee]

Every single movie through End Game is fresh on Rotten Tomatoes, which isn't the be all and end all, but is remarkable.

Again, they were being reviewed with a different rubric. If those had been released now, they wouldn't have done as well, I'd posit. Just offhand, Dark world, Iron Man 2 nor AOU would be positively viewed. I liked them, but the reviews at the time were not fresh reviews, though they were skewed towards that.

 

[chuckdee]

I agree with the first part of this, but the truth is he does need the gear to do what he's doing; for better or worse, if you're going to be challenging superhumans, some kind of edge is needed. Even Nat and Clint aren't trying to do it with their skills and conventional gear.

But that's the point: anyone can use gear. It doesn't need a superhuman to do that. Rodey isn't a superhuman, Nat wasn't, Clint isn't, and Sam doesn't need to be; he needs to have the personal tools he has, and the external tools he can get.

At the end all of his gear didn't mean anything against the Red Hulk. He fell back on what he started as and what Steve saw in him- his empathy and his ability to be a counselor.