After a lackluster opening, Captain America: Brave New World has managed to obtain one victory: it’s not the lowest-grossing film led by the namesake hero. The new movie has managed to overtake The First Avenger, both globally and in the US, though earnings still aren’t huge.
At time of writing, latest figures put Brave New World’s global box office at $370.8 million dollars, with $176.5 million of that coming from the United States. This means the MCU sequel has just edged out the first Captain America film from 2011, which took in $370.6 million worldwide.
This puts Brave New World third in terms of Captain America movies ranked by box office. Although it would be easy to brush this off as another franchise disappointment, broader context tells a different story about what’s going in the MCU right now.
Steve Rogers is gone and Sam is the new Cap, facing different villains and having to help reshape and re-organize whatever’s coming next for the Avengers Initiative. The film comes from a position not dissimilar to The First Avenger in 2011, building audience interest and laying the foundation of a longer overall story. Director Julius Onah and star Anthony Mackie were in the unenviable position of following a beloved cornerstone of the franchise.
Phase 5 has seen the MCU on relatively shaky ground cinematically, garnering two outright bombs in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania and The Marvels amid the supreme successes of Guardians of the Galaxy 3 and Deadpool and Wolverine. Captain America 4 now sits somewhere in the middle, getting closer to a purported break even point of $425 million, but far from the billion-dollar-grossing heights of the Merc with a Mouth.
Much like in Phase 1, the emphasis is on introducing characters, growing our affection for them, and getting things moving. The Fantastic Four: First Steps and Thunderbolts* will both be doing plenty more of that, bringing us steadily toward Avengers: Doomsday.
You can still find Captain America: Brave New World in theaters. Our guide on all the upcoming Marvel movies and shows will tell you what else to keep an eye out for.