Captain America: Brave New World Just Set Up The Perfect Adamantium Upgrade For 1 Key MCU Villain 7 Years After Marvel Avoided It
Captain America: Brave New World's story just set up the perfect adamantium upgrade for one MCU hero 7 years after their on-screen story carefully dodged around the material. As one of the last movies in the MCU timeline before Avengers: Doomsday, Captain America: Brave New World holds a spot in the film slate that is equal parts crucial and tricky to handle. This ultimately means the story has to hold up to being a movie that furthers the overarching Multiverse Saga and manages to also be its own story that shows off Sam Wilson in his film debut in the Captain America mantle.
While audiences have been divided on the release - evidenced by its very different 49% Tomatometer and 79% Popcornmeter Captain America: Brave New World Rotten Tomatoes scores - the movie does take care to make some big moves that are sure to pay off for upcoming MCU movies and shows. One such crucial call is the film's decision to finally introduce adamantium into the MCU, which is something that's sure to help with plenty of Marvel character debuts, but is also timed perfectly to let one villain get a comic upgrade almost a decade after it was first avoided.
Daredevil Set Up Bullseye's Origin Story, But Removed The Adamantium From It
After Daredevil introduced its own Bullseye via Benjamin Poindexter's debut in Daredevil season 3, episode 2, audiences were naturally curious about how his transformation would unfold and formally transform him into the comic villain - or indeed, if it fully would, since the Netflix show took a more grounded approach with things. Season 3 built up this story by having Benjamin eventually decide to don a version of Daredevil's costume and moonlight as the vigilante, making him out to be a serial killer in efforts to falsely clear Kingpin's name.
Though this story seemed like it might circumvent much of the traditional Bullseye backstory - other than his incredible aim and history with baseball leading into a career that weaponized his skills for more violent means - the ending of Daredevil season 3 closed by giving the character a missing part of his story that would make him closer to the comic villain. With Poindexter having his spine shattered in his final fight against Kingpin, the last viewers see of him is surgery being done on the character in order to repair his shattered bones.
This has direct parallels to Marvel comics, wherein Bullseye is paralyzed by a massive fall after a fight with Daredevil, leading to his bones being laced with adamantium to allow him to operate as an assassin once more. Interestingly, however, Daredevil made sure to avoid the adamantium aspect of this part of Bullseye's story, with one of the surgeons working on him explicitly stating they're using another Marvel metal known as cogmium in the surgery - though the new changes to Daredevil and the MCU mean this could be subject to change going forward.
The MCU Introducing Adamantium To Its World Changes What's Possible For Bullseye
Captain America: Brave New World officially introduced adamantium to the MCU, revealing that the transformed body of the Celestial that has been jutting out of the Earth since the ending of Eternals is in fact made of the material, and is already the subject of some considerable geopolitical tensions as a result. Not only does this set up a fascinating political storyline for the MCU to explore as it goes forward, it also opens the gateways for several characters whose stories integrally involve adamantium, most crucially setting the stage for a potential MCU Wolverine.
Daredevil's initial decision to avoid incorporating adamantium into Bullseye's story made sense for the show, as it had largely veered away from getting too intertwined with too much of the wider Marvel lore - something that was par for the course, given the series only became an official and definite part of the MCU timeline in more recent years. With the Netflix Marvel shows also trying to keep themselves as grounded as possible for the most part, randomly bringing in the larger-than-life metal associated with Wolverine might have also understandably seemed like a step too far for the story.
However, now Daredevil and Kingpin have cropped up in a range of MCU releases - and now adamantium is also an official part of the MCU landscape - it stands to reason that Bullseye's teased Daredevil: Born Again story can be tweaked to align with his adamantium-enhanced comic counterpart. While the timeline for Daredevil: Born Again means this isn't a totally straightforward process, it does open up a series of possibilities for the sequel series.
How The MCU Could Retcon Bullseye's Daredevil Season 3 Ending
While Bullseye is last shown with the bullseye logo appearing in his eyes as his surgery proceeds to implant cogmium into his body, this part of Benjamin Poindexter's story could easily be tweaked, as the procedure is only partially underway when the character is last shown. The initial surgery could either be unsuccessful - resulting in even more experimental treatment - or successful, but not the end of Poindexter's efforts to hone himself into a killing machine.
The Daredevil: Born Again teasers for the show have provided early looks at Poindexter that show him seeming recovered from his injuries, meaning the show will at some point have to address how Bullseye is back - and may end up relying on the cogmium explanation this early into adamantium's story. However, if Bullseye's focus is still on his hatred for Daredevil and Kingpin, it would make sense he'd find himself with some powerful allies, who could be willing to make him a first candidate in any experiments with the recently-acquired adamantium set to take place that could further reinforce him.
Daredevil: Born Again season 1 is set to run for 9 episodes, and debuts on March 4, 2025.
With Daredevil: Born Again confirmed for multiple seasons, there's plenty of time to tie Bullseye's Daredevil season 3 ending to his comic upgrade, especially since this would continue making adamantium a big deal after Captain America: Brave New World, and make the Marvel villain more threatening. Indeed, since it's been reported that Bullseye may only be in three episodes of season 1, there's reason to hope the MCU are looking to save him as a focal threat for a day in the future where he may be even more powerful thanks to the introduction of adamantium into the universe.
Captain America: Brave New World
- Release Date
- February 14, 2025
- Runtime
- 118 minutes
- Director
- Julius Onah
- Writers
- Dalan Musson, Malcolm Spellman
Cast
Sam Wilson / Captain America
Thaddeus 'Thunderbolt' Ross / Red Hulk
- Franchise(s)
- Captain America, Marvel Cinematic Universe
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