It’s not only Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) that fans want to see in the MCU again, despite the tragic events in Avengers: Endgame. Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson) also died during the movie, and Captain America (Chris Evans) retired at the end of the film. RDJ’s return often comes up in rumors and leaks, especially considering that the multiverse can make it happen. But Chris Evans’s return to the MCU is also a recurring topic. And it so happens that the actor addressed the speculation in recent interviews.
Before we get into it, you should know that some MCU Phase 4 spoilers follow below.
Marvel’s new Captain America
Before the Endgame premiere, Evan’s Steve Rogers was on a short list of MCU superheroes that Marvel would kill or retire at the movie’s end. Ultimately, Marvel chose Nat and Tony Stark to die in the film. Their sacrifices helped the Avengers beat Thanos (Josh Brolin) once and for all.
Endgame also told the seemingly final story of Steve Rogers acting as Captain America in the MCU. The hero decided to retire to a different universe and marry the love of his life, Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell).
Then the MCU Phase 4 told us that Steve Rogers isn’t dead. Chris Evans did not cameo in any of the MCU movies or TV shows that Marvel released in the past two years. But, Steve Rogers came up, especially in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier. That’s where we learned that Cap is a source of speculation on the planet. The world doesn’t know where he is.
We also saw Steve Rogers references in Far From Home, Hawkeye, and Ms. Marvel. But, again, there were no cameos, and Chris Evans kept saying in interviews that a return to the role is unlikely. Even Loki made us rethink Cap’s retirement.
After all, we have a new Captain America, Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson, who will appear in the franchise’s fourth installment.
Will Chris Evans ever return to the MCU?
The Steve Rogers topic will come up consistently in interviews with Chris Evans, especially considering rumors that Marvel might want the actor to return to the MCU for specific stories. And considering that Evans’s Lightyear is playing in theaters, the actor was on press tour duty in the past few weeks.
That’s where he talked about a return to the MCU. And he actually addressed two different roles that he could play. Fans will remember that Chris Evans played Johnny Storm many years before getting the Captain America role. He was a Fantastic Four member in a version of the story that preceded the MCU.
Chris Evans’s reply to a possible Captain America return
The actor spoke to ComicBook about playing Cap again in the MCU.
“That seems to be something people would like to see,” Chris Evans said while addressing a popular conversation among MCU fans who want to see how Cap returned the Infinity Stones at the end of Endgame. But the actor isn’t quite ready for a return to the MCU.
“I don’t want to disappoint anybody, but it’s tough to… It was such a good run, and I’m so happy with it,” Evans said. “It’s so precious to me. It would have to be perfect. It just would be scary to rattle something that is, again, so, so dear to me. That role means so much to me. So, to revisit it, it would be a tall order.”
That said, we’re not looking at a definitive “No” as it seemed to be in previous interviews.
What about Fantastic Four?
But now that the multiverse is bridging the MCU, Sony’s Spider-Man universe, and the Fox universe of Marvel stories, the Fantastic Four, including Chris Evans’s Johnny Storm, are part of this massive interconnected universe. And Evans might be more excited about returning to the Fantastic Four universe than Captain America.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness gave us a look at Marvel’s first Fantastic Four member. Mister Fantastic (John Krasinski) appeared briefly in the movie, only to die at the hands of a Wanda (Elizabeth Olsen) variant. That’s not to say that Krasinski will play Reed Richards in the MCU’s primary reality.
However, while Marvel will tell a brand new Fantastic Four story, the multiverse would technically allow it to revisit the other universes where Fantastic Four exist. And Chris Evans appears to be more excited about a return to his version of Johnny Storm than Cap.
He said so in a different interview during the Lightyear press tour, adding that nobody reached out to him to reprise his Fantastic Four role.
“I would love it,” Evans said. “That would actually be an easier sell to me than coming back as Cap.”
“Cap is so precious to me,” he continued, “and I almost don’t want to disrupt what a beautiful experience that was. But Johnny Storm, I feel like he didn’t really get his day. That was before Marvel really found its footing. So I loved that role, and, you know, who knows…” he concluded.
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