About a week ago (May 25), actor Giancarlo Esposito revealed he was officially joining the MCU. At the time, he teased it would be a brief appearance in an upcoming project, followed by a series. While the series is still TBD, we know what the project is: Esposito has joined the currently in reshoots Captain America: Brave New World in a mysterious villain role.
Just to take a step back here, yes, Brave New World wrapped up shooting in Spring of 2023. And due to the double WGA/SAG-AFTRA strikes, among other reasons, the movie was heavily delayed until February of 2025. In fact, it was so delayed that McDonald’s leaked the first looks at Harrison Ford’s Red Hulk, and Danny Ramirez’s Falcon suit over a month ago, timed to when the movie was originally scheduled to premiere at the beginning of May.
So given that, is the movie going back for 22 days of reshoots and adding a new villain in Esposito a cause for alarm? Not so, says The Hollywood Reporter! According to them, this is less time than Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness spent, and it’s less expensive than The Marvels reshoots. And I’ll add that reshoots are always part of the Marvel Studios process, though this is perhaps a longer gap between wrapping and reshoots than usual.
Back to Esposito, though, the actor also previously teased that the character he’s playing is one we’d never predict. And given some leaked photos from the set which we won’t link here, but you can find very easily online… He’s definitely not Doctor Doom, Magneto, or any other big bad he’d been previously fancast for. He’s also not Kang, as far as we can tell. Instead, he’s got shades on, and knives strapped to his front like he’s Old Man Blade or something. Given those knives, is he playing the fan-favorite villain, Mr. Knifesy? The classic Captain America villain, who appeared in… Okay, sorry, can’t keep that one up, there’s no Mr. Knifesy in the comics. But there could be!
Some fans have pegged him for Scorpio, or one of the other leaders of The Zodiac — an organization of villains themed around, what else, the Zodiac. Though, given the movie reportedly includes the Serpent Society (or they were cut from the film, unclear) seems like putting a hat on a hat. It would also be a bit of a bummer to throw Esposito in as “random villain character,” even if that will pan out in whatever series he was teasing. And on that point, the only series we know for sure is moving forward at Marvel is Vision, under showrunner Terry Matalas. How Mr. Knifesy might tie into that (or Scorpio, or whatever) is unclear.
Regardless, we’ll know more when Captain America: Brave New World hits theaters in 2086. Just kidding, it’s coming out on February 14, 2025. Hey, maybe Esposito is playing Cupid!
