Daniel Bruhl, who received high critical praise for his role as Formula 1 race car driver Niki Lauda in Ron Howard’s Rush, has been cast by Marvel Studios in Captain America: Civil War.
The studio is tight-lipped about his role, but Variety is stating that their sources are telling them that Bruhl “is not the main villain in Captain America: Civil War but could potentially be the top menace in Marvel’s Doctor Strange.”
If so, that raises some interesting questions about Civil War. Specifically, what character can Bruhl be playing? While not a diehard Marvel zombie, I do have about three-and-a-half decades worth of reading their books but I am at a loss as to what character, particularly a villain, could appear in both a Captain America and a Doctor Strange film. That’s not to say that I doubt the report that Bruhl will appear in both movies. I think that Marvel withholding the name of the character he will be playing suggests that, if the Variety report is accurate, the character may be more associated with Doctor Strange and would stand out as part of a Captain America movie if revealed too soon. And with Doctor Strange being released some six months after Captain America: Civil War in 2016 it could be that Bruhl’s
We already know that Robert Downey Jr’s Tony Stark/Iron Man will be appearing in the film and he will be taking and adversarial role against Chris Evan’s Steve Rogers/Captain America and that superhero Black Panther (Chadwick Boseman) would be making his Marvel Cinematic Universe premier before headlining his own film in 2017. And writers/directors Joe and Anthony Russo have indicated that the film would continue the story begun in this past spring’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier. With the addition of Bruhl in his unnamed role, Civil War is starting to look like a packed movie, with a lot on its plate to accomplish.
But I don’t think that this is going to be quite the Civil War movie that some comics fans may be hoping for. While the movie side of Marvel has looked to the comics for inspiration, more often than note the films have not been fairly literal or faithful translations of those stories, so I am not expecting it to be anything close to the 2006-2007 miniseries event.
For his part, in their press release, studio president Kevin Feige stated –
With Daniel’s ability to deliver intense, nuanced performances, we knew we had found yet another great actor to share the screen with some of our biggest heroes.
Captain America: Civil War is set to start production early next year for a May 6, 2016 release.
