In Captain America: Brave New World's sole post-credits scene, Sam Wilson visits The Leader in The Raft and receives a vague warning about a Multiversal threat and the "others" coming to Earth-616.
Even mainstream media outlets have deemed it Marvel Studios' worst post-credits scene. Meanwhile, the response from fans has been mixed to negative at best (a shame seeing as an Avengers: Doomsday tease should have blown everyone's minds).
Talking to Collider, Captain America: Brave New World director Julius Onah explained that it was always the plan to forego a mid-credits scene in preference of a single Cap-centric final tease.
"It was always the case that what felt organic for this movie was just leaning into a post-credits sequence that could tease what's coming next," the filmmaker said. "We wanted to tease it in a way that didn't become too explicit. This is about introducing Sam as our new Captain America."
"That was the overarching focus of this movie, so to start throwing in too many post-credit sequences just felt like it was going to stray away from that. Even the tease we have is still very Sam-centric," Onah added.
In case it wasn't obvious from The Leader's redesign in the sequence, Onah confirmed it was filmed during Captain America: Brave New World's reshoots. Those took place last year and potentially before the decision was made to cast Robert Downey Jr. as Doctor Doom...explaining why The Leader could have been talking about anyone or anything.
"That was shot during our additional photography," Onah shared. "That's what I mean about all this is planned ahead of time. We didn't know what our post-credit scene was going to be just yet. As you know, there was a massive writers’ strike, so that meant it was pencils down not just on this movie, but pencils down on everything in film and TV. Nothing was happening."
"So, who knew what Thunderbolts was going to look like necessarily? Or the next Avengers was going to look like?" he continued. "So when we got out of that strike, and we were actually able to put pen to paper for Brave New World, and everybody else was able to put pen to paper for their movies."
"That's when you can actually start to have a real conversation as to where things are going and what post-credits sequence is the appropriate one to tease. So, that's how it evolved."
It's hard to believe Marvel Studios couldn't come up with something better than this for Captain America: Brave New World. Then again, without a completed script for Avengers: Doomsday, that might have been easier said than done...a Thunderbolts* tease might have ultimately been for the best.
You can check out a new poster for Captain America: Brave New World in the X post below.
In Captain America: Brave New World, after meeting with newly elected U.S. President Thaddeus Ross, played by Harrison Ford in his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut, Sam Wilson finds himself in the middle of an international incident. He must discover the reason behind a nefarious global plot before the true mastermind has the entire world seeing red.
The movie stars Anthony Mackie, Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas, Xosha Roquemore, Carl Lumbly, with Giancarlo Esposito, Liv Tyler, Tim Blake Nelson, and Harrison Ford. The movie is directed by Julius Onah and produced by Kevin Feige and Nate Moore. Louis D’Esposito and Charles Newirth serve as executive producers.
"Flawed but functional, Captain America: Brave New World's many problems are largely forgotten any time Anthony Mackie and Harrison Ford electrify the screen," we said in our review. "And when Red Hulk shows up, the movie reaches new heights of awesome."
Captain America: Brave New World is now playing in theaters.