MCU Star Chris Evans Breaks Silence on Captain America Return

Rumors of the original six Avengers returning to the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) have circulated online following a shocking exposé published by Variety, in which details of the behind-the-scenes drama currently rocking Marvel Studios were made public. More so, in this report, MCU insiders revealed that talks were underway to bring back Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man/Tony Stark and Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow/Natasha Romanoff, among others, though Captain America/Steve Rogers actor Chris Evans might’ve just cast doubt on these rumors once and for all.

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When Marvel’s critically acclaimed Infinity Saga came to an end in 2019 with the Russo Brothers’ Avengers: Endgame, the Disney-owned franchise certainly wasted no time moving on and hit the ground running with an extremely experimental Phase Four that left the fanbase divided.

Although projects like Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021), Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021), and select Disney+ entries, including Loki and WandaVision, were met with widespread praise, there’s no denying that Marvel’s post-Infinity Saga era kicked off to a rocky start. Installments such as Eternals (2021), Thor: Love and Thunder (2022), and the ill-fated She-Hulk: Attorney at Law were almost universally hated by viewers, with the beloved IP failing to recapture much of the same magic that made it one of the most lucrative film franchises of all time in the first place.

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While it’s hard to pinpoint where exactly things started to go wrong for Marvel Studios, many place the blame on its turn to streaming, with the MCU rapidly expanding its Disney+ catalog with less-than-impressive TV installments, including The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Ms. Marvel. While not egregiously bad by any stretch, the nonstop sludge of content led to a noticeable drop in quality, with many beginning to suffer “superhero fatigue” from the overwhelming amount of new titles.

As for the characters themselves, many longtime fans turned away from the MCU after its obvious attempts to “replace” beloved heroes, with Kate Bishop (Haley Steinfeld) taking the reins from Clint Barton (Jeremy Renner) in the Hawkeye miniseries Yelena Belova (Florence Pugh) filling in for her slain sister, Riri Williams (Dominique Thorne) reverse-engineering a version of Tony Stark’s own Iron Man suit, and of course, Sam Wilson (Anthony Mackie), who now wields Steve Rogers’ iconic Captain America shield.

After Steve traveled back in time in the final moments of Avengers: Endgame to live out his life with Peggy Carter (Hayley Atwell), Sam, known as his former superhero alias, Falcon, hesitantly takes over the Captain America moniker throughout The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, with a bit of encouragement from his friend, James “Bucky” Barnes (Sebastian Stan). Now, Mackie is set to make his first outing as the MCU’s new “Star Spangled Man” in Captain America: Brave New World, which arrives in 2025.

Until then, however, Marvel continues to navigate turbulent waters amid a string of box office flops, with The Marvels (2023) expected to lose millions. With the fate of the MCU’s Multiverse Saga seeming increasingly uncertain — made worse by the March arrest of Kang the Conqueror actor Jonathan Majors — sources close to the studio have revealed that Marvel execs are allegedly looking to fall back on familiar faces from the Infinity Saga to help save the franchise from certain doom.

In the same Variety report that delved into some of the major issues surrounding the MCU, one solution that was considered apparently by studio heads involved creating a new Avengers movie with the original cast. This team-up film would, per the article, include the returns of Robert Downey Jr. and Scarlett Johansson’s characters despite their deaths in Endgame.

Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige, however, reportedly hasn’t “committed” to this drastic proposal, though it sounds like the door is still open for their returns in either a standalone project or as part of Avengers: The Kang Dynasty (2026) — if the struggling studio can manage to pay the actors’ famously high salaries.

So, what does Chris Evans think of the chatter surrounding the OG Avengers’ MCU return? Well, according to him, assembling Steve, Natasha, Tony, Clint, Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), and Thor (Chris Hemsworth) might be easier said than done.

Appearing on a recent episode of The View, Evans was asked about the rumors that he’s gearing up to play Captain America again, to which he responded, “You know, I always see those reports too, and it’s news to me,” suggesting that there might not be much of any discussions happening behind the curtain at Marvel HQ after all.

He continued, joking, “I think every couple months, someone says that they’re getting Downey, and Hemsworth, and Scarlett, and everyone’s coming back!” before adding, “No one’s spoken to me about it. And look, I would never say never, but I’m very protective. It’s a very precious role to me, so it would have to be just right.”

This isn’t the first time Evans has addressed speculation of his MCU return, echoing a similar sentiment back in September, saying, “I’ll never say never, just because it was such a wonderful experience. But I’m also very precious with it. It’s something that I am very proud of. And like I said, sometimes I can’t believe it even happened.”

For now, it seems like the door to Evans playing Cap again is firmly closed, though a sliver of hope remains for those hoping to see him reprise the role at some point during the impending Multiverse Saga. Given that the next Avengers movie will see heroes from all different points of the MCU colliding, there’s the off-chance that a version of the same Earth’s Mightiest Heroes we know from Phases One through Three could reunite onscreen. However, this would almost certainly receive backlash from disgruntled fans, many of whom would see this as a lazy cop-out on the studio’s behalf with the sole purpose of filling seats.

Chris Evans has every right to be “protective” over the role that made him a household name, and considering the near-perfect legacy of the Infinity Saga, it might be unwise for Marvel to disrupt that by bringing back the whole crew for future installments. However, based on the Captain America actor’s recent remarks, it sounds like Marvel hasn’t stooped that low — just yet, at least.

Would you like to see the original Avengers team reunite in Phase Six, or would this be a wrong move on Marvel’s part? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

This post is originally appeared on Inside the Magic.