Falcon and Winter Solider: Marvel series to explore “complicated” topics

Last Updated on July 30, 2021

While Marvel Studios' WandaVision presents audiences with something weird and otherworldly, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is said to be taking on a more serious tone. According to composer Henry Jackson, the upcoming series will play more like a psychological drama, in addition to featuring some outrageous superhero action. Jackson recently spoke with FilmSpeak, where he discussed some of the more serious themes fans can expect to be addressed when the show hits Disney+ later this year.

During the interview, Jackman noted to FilmSpeak's Griffin Schiller that The Falcon and the Winter Soldier's episodic format gave the story room to breathe.

“Because of the slightly different format of having six-hourly episodes, that's more real estate…so there's a bit more opportunity to go down the road into psychological-drama and explore backstories because you've got more space to do that in,” Jackman explained.

Jackman also noted that the series will approach a very "untrivial and serious issue" in how people, specifically African-Americans, view the legacy of Captain America as well as the country he's sworn to protect. For quite some time, fans have speculated that Isaiah Bradley will be featured as a part of the series, who in the pages of Marvel Comics was one of three hundred African-Americans forcibly recruited as test subjects to recreate the Super Soldier Serum. As the story goes, Bradley survived the ordeal, as did his comrades Maurice Canfield and Sgt. Luke Evans, the group then became part of a covert black-ops team. In other words, it's possible that Sam Wilson won't be the only African-American to hold Captain America's shield in the show.

"And in this particular series, there's the very much untrivial and serious issue, particularly now more than ever, about what it means to hold that shield and what kind of a person should ultimately be holding that shield and with the history of this country and how African-Americans would feel about being a Captain America or not,” Jackman told FilmSpeak.

While much of this sounds heavy-handed thus far, Jackman wants audiences to know that the show "is still entertaining" while choosing to embrace its more mature content.

“There's weighty issues. It's still entertaining. It's not a deathly serious seminar about the political history of the United States of America, but it definitely touches on less comfortable, important things that give rise to some really quite impressive performances.”

Lastly, Jackman wanted to tease that fans of the show's characters will get to experience them like never before thanks to the new series. He again points to the show's episodic format, and how it allows the characters to relax, if only for a short time. 

“I'm so sad I can't say more, cause I'd love to say who's giving those performances and what that's about, but I really can't say anything about the plot, but it's more to say that with the extra time that you've got in this slightly different format the motivations that people have when they're not in the middle of saving the world and what things mean on a more grounded level have a chance to breathe.”

Marvel Studios' The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will let its first episode fly onto Disney+ on March 19, 2021. Considering that we still have several more episodes of WandaVision left to go, we're going to be riding the Marvel train full-steam for quite some time. All aboard!