Before it landed in theaters, Captain America: Brave New World underwent a variety of changes and tweaks, something a number of big-budget movies have gone through over the years. In addition to a title change, production was paused on the film due to the 2023 actors’ and writers’ strikes, which allowed director Julius Onah to alter the trajectory of the film in a more significant way than other entries in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. With the sequel now out in theaters, Onah has weighed in on some of the tweaks made along the way, which includes addressing the fate of Harrison Ford’s Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross and Red Hulk.
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WARNING: Spoilers below for Captain America: Brave New World
In the movie, Ross takes a pill three times a day that Samuel Sterns (Tim Blake Nelson) claims will keep his heart healthy, only for the film’s conclusion to reveal that the pills were laced with radiation, slowly subjecting Ross to the process that allowed Bruce Banner to become the Hulk. Anthony Mackie’s Sam Wilson bests Red Hulk in combat, resulting in Ross being imprisoned in the Raft, seemingly leaving Red Hulk behind.
As far as whether Onah had ever considered more definitively killing off Red Hulk, the filmmaker confirmed there were some slight tweaks but that nothing came close to being permanent.
“You explore many different iterations of it. There was never a version where he explicitly died, but there were certainly versions of it where maybe the public didn’t know what his fate was after what happens towards the end of the film,” Onah admitted to Variety. “But I think you’re introducing such a massive fan-favorite character, and, as we all know, it’s not very easy for a Hulk to perish.”
[RELATED – Did Captain America: Brave New World Change Red Hulk’s Fate in Reshoots?]
In one of the first teasers for Brave New World and in set photos from the production, there were sequences in which Sam Wilson, Betty Ross (Liv Tyler), and many more attended a funeral. The casket in the sequence is covered in an American flag, so while Onah might not have explicitly stated that this was meant to be a funeral for Ross, his remarks about one potential ending has sparked speculation among fans. If this funeral was seemingly for Ross, it’s possible that another version of the finale ended with Ross being more gravely injured and taken into captivity while the public was led to believe he perished.
Given the nature of the MCU and superhero movies as a whole, it’s hard to ever really consider someone to be definitively dead, but by Brave New World ending with Ross feeling remorse and regret for his actions, he’s offered more closure for his character’s journey.
Captain America: Brave New World is in theaters now.
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