Captain America trilogy next? Anthony Mackie cites “17 Spider-Mans!” to make his case
Anthony Mackie isn’t shy about where he wants Captain America to go next—and his pitch might catch you off guard.
Onstage at New York’s 92nd Street Y for a live taping of Happy Sad Confused, Anthony Mackie didn’t make a polite pitch for more Captain America movies — he broke out the math. With host Josh Horowitz prodding him about what comes after Sam Wilson’s first solo outing, Mackie turned to a very Marvel kind of evidence: Spider- Man headcount. Jamie Dornan, seated beside him after the pair introduced the first episode of their new Apple TV heist series “12 12 12,” let his co-star handle the superhero calculus.
The Spider-Man math
Pressed on how far he wants to take Sam, Mackie argued that every character deserves at least a second film — then escalated to a trilogy case study built on Web-Slinger precedent.
“17 Spider-Mans. All of them had three movies. That’s about 51,”
he said, to big laughs, before bringing it back to Sam’s journey.
“I would enjoy partaking in the idea of two more films just to see that character complete his arc.”
Dornan, for the record, stayed out of the Spider-verse accounting and let Mackie do the lobbying.
Where the Avengers pick up
While he’s game for a full trilogy, Mackie also suggested Sam’s next team-up is coming fast. Speaking to SYFY WIRE over Zoom while promoting Exoplanet — a project produced by The Martian author Andy Weir — he said Avengers: Doomsday picks up just months after Sam officially takes up the shield.
According to Mackie, Sam heads straight into a new expedition and works on getting Earth’s Mightiest Heroes back together. In story time, Captain America: Brave New World wrapped only a few months earlier — meaning the suit is still practically fresh out of the box and there’s not much breathing room between crises.
Here’s what Sam was already dealing with in Brave New World:
- Presidential conspiracies
- An assassination attempt
- An adamantium crisis
- A bruising showdown with Thaddeus Ross in Red Hulk form
That tight timeline also complicates things with Bucky Barnes, who was off running with the Thunderbolts while Sam accepted the shield. There’s no multi-year off-screen reset baked in before they cross paths again.
Trilogy math aside, Mackie’s bottom line for now is timing: Avengers: Doomsday starts only months after the events of Captain America: Brave New World.