Steve’s life in the 21st century is one that, in spite of his almost herculean strength and unwavering heroic demeanor, is defined by loss. After being resuscitated from suspended animation, he joins SHIELD (the organization co-founded by his former lover Peggy Carter) and subsequently becomes a member of the Avengers. Over the course of the Marvel films, Steve remains true to that promise. Because a strong man who has known power all his life may lose respect for that power, but a weak man knows the value of strength … and knows compassion.” The scientist then asks his subject to promise him that, no matter what happens in the wake of the serum, that he will remain who he is at heart “Not a perfect soldier,” Erskine says, “but a good man.”

“The serum amplifies everything that is inside, so good becomes great bad becomes worse,” Erskine explains to Steve when asked why he was chosen on the eve of the serum procedure. Abraham Erskine to train in the Strategic Scientific Reserve and eventually hand-picked to become the test subject for Erskine’s newly perfected Super Soldier Serum. The Steve Rogers of 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger is far from the chiseled portrait of American exceptionalism one would expect from the so-called “First Avenger.” A scrawny orphan kid from Brooklyn who stubbornly persists in his attempts to enlist in the armed forces, Steve is nonetheless chosen by Dr. That reluctance, that humility, is what makes Sam the perfect person to carry the shield of Captain America after Steve, and may in fact be the very quality for which Steve chose him as his successor. But what Captain America has himself established, and what The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is slowly explaining to Marvel fans, is a point that’s quite the contrary. Steve pauses for a beat before replying, “It isn’t.”įor those who expect heroes to heed the call and leap into action, that moment of hesitation could have been seen as a disqualification right off the bat. “ like it’s someone else’s,” he tells Steve, strapping the Shield’s leather grips against his arm, appearing dazed by the sight of it. The encounter is all the more so odd for how Sam himself feels ill-suited for the title.

Which is why the scene in Avengers: Endgame of Steve passing the mantle of Captain America, and his iconic vibranium shield, to Sam may have felt odd for those unfamiliar with the source material of the comics. The humble veteran with an experimental flight suit dropped everything to become Steve Rogers’s right-hand man back in 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier, only for his own story and arc to be situated at the periphery of the film’s action. Who is Sam Wilson? Despite six films worth of screen time in the Marvel universe, the hero known as “The Falcon” has always been something of an afterthought compared to the rest of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes.

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