Captain America: Anthony Mackie Reveals How Long He Plans To Play the Marvel Hero

The Falcon and the Winter Soldier saw Sam Wilson, played by Anthony Mackie, become the new Captain America. But like his predecessor, Mackie doesn’t plan on playing Captain America forever. Chris Evans played Captain America through seven films, three of them Captain America headliners and four of them Avengers team-ups. After taking up the shield in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier‘s finale, Mackie will reprise the role in the fourth Captain America movie. After that? “I definitely don’t want to be a 55 year old Captain America,” the 42-year-old actor told Variety, “so I’ve got a solid six to eight [years] in me.”

Mackie also commented on the importance of Sam’s monologue in the final episode of The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, where he speaks directly to world leaders in front of the public eye. For Mackie, that scene helped define what his Captain America is all about.

“This is the moment where he becomes Captain America, so what’s his Captain America going to stand for?” Mackie said. “Because he was a soldier, he was a caretaker of soldiers, a counselor, he’s not the guy who’s going to bust his way through problems.

“The humanitarian side of him was something that I feel is his superpower, his ability to have empathy and sympathy for those around him is your superpower. So that monologue was about him showing that if one of us is mistreated, we’re all to blame. And that’s the overall theme of the the new Captain America, not that not Black Cap, or Cap for the people, he’s Captain America for all.”

Mackie further discussed the impact of visible Black heroes on young people of color. “A friend of mine is a teacher down in Homestead, Florida, and she works with special needs kids,” Mackie said. He then explained that the teacher discovered one of her students doing pull-ups on the monkey bars. “She’s like, ‘What are you doing? You’re gonna hurt yourself.’ And the kid tells her, ‘Well, Captain America looks like me now, so I need to get in shape, if he needs my help.’ And I thought that was the coolest thing. For this kid to see a six-hour series and get enough strength within himself to think that he needs to be prepared and ready, that made all of the work that we had to do to put it together worthwhile for me.”

What do you think? Let us know in the comments. The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is streaming now on Disney+.