Captain America: Brave New World may be picking up the reigns of the Captain America movie franchise, but it’s also (as its title would imply) a game-changing chapter of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This film is Marvel fans’ first real check-in with the main storyline of the MCU since Avengers: Endgame, and another key bridge between the movies and the Disney+ TV series the MCU launched, with shows like The Falcon and the Winter Soldier setting the stage for this new Captain America movie.
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Below you can find an SPOILER-filled breakdown of everything that happens by the end of Captain America: Brave New World, as well as insights about what happens in the film’s post-credits scene.
Captain America: Brave New World Ending Explained
The plot of Captain America: Brave New World sees Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie) and Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez) in a race against the clock to clear the name of Isaiah Bradley (Carl Lumbly) after the former super-soldier tries to kill President Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross. That investigation led to the discovery that Ross secretly kept scientist Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson) locked up for years, feeding his gamma-enhanced brain and putting to work as a one-man think-tank designed for one task: getting Ross to the Presidency.
However, Ross had a more pressing agenda than geopolitical manipulation: using Sterns’ brain to solve the mystery of his terminal heart illness. Sterns accomplishes that task but also pulls a double-cross: the same gamma-powered pills that “cured” Ross also slowly mutated him over time, seeding him with a Red Hulk persona and power. When Ross wins the presidency, but still doesn’t free Sterns, the mad scientist goes rogue. He manipulates world events to dismantle Ross’s Adamantium treaty with other world nations and destroy the man himself by transforming him into the same kind of gamma monster that Ross transformed Sterns into.
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The final battle of Brave New World sees Sterns leak audio of Ross conspiring with him during a major press event to announce the treaty. Ross loses it and goes full Red Hulk in front of the world, battling Captain America to an eventual standstill. Sam convinces Ross to power down (for the sake of his daughter Betty and the nation), and Ross complies. In the aftermath, Sam and a critically wounded Joaquin decide to rebuild the Avengers outside of government control; Ross ends up resigning from the presidency and serving a sentence in The Raft prison, where he’s finally reunited with Betty (Liv Tyler in her first MCU cameo since The Incredible Hulk). Adamantium is shared amongst the nations of the world, opening the door to an uncertain future – and a new arms race with Vibranium.
Captain America: Brave New World Post-Credits Scene Explained
There is no mid-credits scene, but the post-credits scene for Captain America: Brave New World does serve as a button scene for Avengers: Doomsday and Avengers: Secret Wars.
In the post-credits scene, Sam Wilson visits the secure facility where Samuel Sterns is being held. Sam gloats that he bat Sterns’ calculated odds of Captain America surviving a fight against Red Hulk, but Sterns doesn’t let him have the last laugh. In an ominous speech, Sterns reveals that he’s calculated such wide-scoping probabilities and scenarios to have stumbled upon the idea of the multiverse, and the ‘secret war’ that will soon turn multiple realities of the Marvel Multiverse against one another. Sterns wonders what Captain America – a hero dedicated to shielding the world – will do when protecting his world means killing off other ones.
This speech from The Leader sets up the events of Avengers: Doomsday, which will presumably explore Robert Downy Jr.’s Doctor Doom, his home reality, and (based on Marvel Comics lore) how he survives the multiversal incursions by becoming god-emperor of his own reality built from fragments of others (or the MCU’s “Void” realm, as some theorize). The post-credits scene also clearly sets up Avengers: Secret Wars, which is where the fight for survival between different Marvel Universes (and franchises) will take place.
Captain America: Brave New World is now in theaters.
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