Everybody who enjoys comic book movies loves Robert Downey, Jr.’s Tony Stark, right?
He’s witty and charisma just drips off him – plus, if somebody describes themselves as a “genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist”, they deserve your admiration. That being said, he’s being presented as the antagonist in Captain America: Civil War, which could result in some fans’ opinions of the character changing dramatically.
Stark will oppose the titular hero, leading the pro-legislation team into battle, and fighting to bring Bucky Barnes to justice, while also attempting to comply with an initiative called the “Sokovia Accords” (a set of rules that the governments of the world are trying to enforce on superheroes, prompting them to register as such, in order for them to carry out their supervillain-ass-kicking endeavours in a controlled manner) whose rules Cap won’t be too keen on.
While the movie’s concept is loosely based on the classic Civil War comic book arc, it certainly won’t follow its script anywhere near to the letter. With that in mind, knowing what to expect from even established characters is tough. It’s even trickier in Tony Stark’s case, because he’s been the flagship hero of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to date and this will be a completely new role for him.
We have our predictions, however – especially given that the first trailer finally dropped last week and set a tone of sorts – and they’re very intriguing (some of them might surprise you)…
More PTSD
After the Battle of New York in the Avengers movies – in which he fought against aliens and was forced to dump a nuclear missile into a space portal - Tony Stark was revealed to be suffering from “post-traumatic stress disorder” in Iron Man 3. He couldn’t sleep and he kept having panic attacks – though he seemed to be fine in his next appearance in Avengers: Age of Ultron.
However, after he inadvertently created a homicidal robot in the aforementioned movie, he’ll probably experience some similar PTSD occurrences in Captain America: Civil War.
This could end up partially contributing to his irrational willingness to fight against his former ally Captain America and will certainly be further triggered by seeing his best friend James “Rhodey” Rhodes badly injured (which is something we saw will occur from the trailer).
Why He’ll Side With The Accords
Most fans are expecting Tony Stark to be a figurehead in both the creation and implementation of the Sokovia Accords because of his guilt. His battles in the Marvel Cinematic Universe to date have destroyed cities and resulted in a lot of civilian casualties – and it was his meddling with forces that he didn’t fully understand that resulted in the creation of the homicidal robot Ultron. However, it appears he’ll actually have nothing to do with implementing the Accords and he won’t be complying with them out of guilt or morality.
In order to present such a beloved character as “the bad guy”, Tony Stark will only be endorsing the Accords to save his own skin. He might make himself believe that he agrees with them, but there’ll be an ulterior motive. Government authority figures will threaten Stark with a jail sentence for his part in creating Ultron, unless he follows their rules. It will give audiences a legitimate reason to side with the titular Captain America and to (probably only temporarily) dislike Stark.
He’ll Be Working With Baron Zemo
One of the aforementioned government authority figures, who will be enforcing the Sokovia Accords, will be the villainous Baron Zemo. Posing as a legitimate politician with the world’s best interests supposedly at heart, Zemo will likely be a surviving member of HYDRA and his master plan will be to split the Avengers, in order to carry out whatever evil deeds he wishes to carry out without any superhero opposition.
Of course, Tony Stark won’t know this, but the fact is that he will be acting in accordance with a full-on villain in Captain America: Civil War – which could be the only sure-fire way to make him appear remotely villain-esque, given the fact that he’s been the flagship hero of the Marvel Cinematic Universe to date.
He’ll be taking orders from Zemo, effectively being his puppet (Zemo will also be framing Bucky Barnes to make it look like he’s still evil, augmenting Stark’s hatred for him) – and it could well be the realisation of this that ensures Stark reconciles with Captain America before the movie’s climax.
He’ll Attempt To Convince Cap To Join Him First
As Iron Man, Tony Stark has been a “shoot first, ask questions later” kind of guy, but this movie will force a change in him in that respect.
The titular war won’t just happen instantaneously – Stark and Captain America won’t just fight as soon as they disagree with each other over the Sokovia Accords and Bucky Barnes – Stark will attempt to pull Cap over to the dark side as a means of avoiding the inevitable battle (which, of course, won’t work – thanks in no small part to Stark’s mission to bring Bucky down).
While this might look like it’s attempting to show Stark’s reasonable and compassionate side, he won’t be doing it for selfless reasons – it’s something he will have been encouraged to do by Baron Zemo and other antagonistic individuals, who will have known in advance that Captain America would turn Stark down – and Captain America rejecting Stark’s offer will only make him angrier and more determined to beat the super soldier and his team down.
He’ll Be In Peter Parker’s Only Scene
Spider-Man makes his highly-anticipated debut in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in Captain America: Civil War. After years of being tied up his own Sony movie franchises, the Webbed Wonder finally gets to mingle with his comic book allies on the big screen. Tom Holland will take on the role of the character – also known as Peter Parker – but it’s completely unknown to what extent he’ll appear in the 2016 movie.
However, it’s more than likely that he’ll simply appear out of costume in a scene with Tony Stark (at least in the main body of the movie – he might have a mid or post-credits scene as Spider-Man). Stark will be sponsoring a group of innovative local youths – one of which will be Parker.
Tom Holland’s character will likely be sitting in a class in which Stark is giving a talk, with Stark perhaps singling him out for praise due to his achievements in science classes – and that will probably be it. The likelihood of him seeing any action in this movie is slim but, if he does, it will definitely be alongside Stark rather than against him.
He’ll Head To Wakanda
In addition to Spider-Man making his Marvel Cinematic Universe debut in Captain America: Civil War, Black Panther will be doing the same. It’s already known that he will be fighting alongside Tony Stark, but it’s not yet known exactly how that will come to be (it’s fairly obvious that the fact Bucky Barnes killed King T’Chaka – Black Panther’s father - will serve as a motive, but how he meets Tony Stark isn’t yet confirmed).
The likelihood is that Tony Stark will head to his home country of Wakanda to recruit him for assistance. They have the aforementioned fact that the Winter Soldier killed their parents in common, so that will help, but the scene will also serve another purpose.
Avengers: Age of Ultron suggested that Stark had dealings with Ulysses Klaue in the country, and Stark being back there will ensure his dirty history of business dealings will be dug up – and that will only help to reinforce his depiction as an antagonist in the movie.
His Pursuit of Bucky Will Trigger The Battle
As already touched upon in this article, it will be revealed that Bucky Barnes AKA the Winter Soldier killed Tony Stark’s parents, when he was under the control of HYDRA, and Tony Stark will be extremely pissed about that. Stark loved his mother, though he was never particularly close to his father during his life, but in Iron Man 2 he received a heartfelt posthumous message from him that belatedly made him feel closer to him.
He’ll want revenge for their deaths and, in spite of the fact that it really wasn’t Bucky’s fault (he was mind-controlled, after all), Stark will want him to pay. The fight seen in the trailer in which Captain America and Bucky Barnes are fighting Iron Man will be the culmination of an initial one-on-one born out of Stark’s hunt for the latter. Cap will likely save Bucky’s life, just prior to Stark landing what would have been the fatal blow.
This fight will set the tone for the entire movie.
He’ll Only Just Survive The Whole Thing
Tony Stark isn’t going to die in this movie – and neither is Captain America, for that matter. It’s already as good as confirmed that Robert Downey, Jr. will appear in the untitled 2017 Spider-Man reboot movie, and Iron Man will undoubtedly spearhead the assault on Thanos in the Avengers: Infinity War movies, so he’ll certainly make it out alive here – but only just.
By the time he and Cap come to the realisation that they’re being played (by Baron Zemo, of course, and possibly by Martin Freeman’s character), they’ll both be on the verge of killing each other. That realisation will come just in the nick of time and both men will be horrified by their actions – with Stark being particularly distraught, given his association with Baron Zemo – as the killing blow from both men will only be seconds away from being landed.
He’ll Officially Break The Avengers Up
With Tony Stark and his allies willing to comply with the Sokovia Accords in the Civil War movie, Captain America and his team will be considered renegades. It will be Stark’s team who will officially be considered to be the Avengers and, therefore, it will be Stark who is considered to be the Avengers’ leader (remember, it was Cap who was officially in charge of the team previously).
However, after the previous events in New York, Sokovia and indeed the battle that will take place in Captain America: Civil War, Stark will come to the decision that the Avengers are doing more harm than good, and he will officially disband them. This will set the stage for them to reform in glorious fashion when Thanos threatens the entire universe in the Avengers: Infinity War movies in 2018 and 2019 respectively.
The Audience Will Be On His Side
In spite of how this movie will try to present Tony Stark, the fact is that audiences are likely to end up siding with him anyway. Robert Downey, Jr.’s character is flat-out more popular than Chris Evans’ Captain America – and one movie isn’t going to change that seven years into the franchise.
Regardless of the fact that Bucky Barnes was brainwashed at the time, he has killed hundreds of people and that means Cap is essentially siding with a murderer – that’s not the kind of thing that gets audiences on side. Moreover, the trailer has already got fans feeling sorry for poor Tony – his “so was I” line in response to Cap saying Bucky is his friend was heartbreaking – so it’s very unlikely that he will come across as the villain, as the people behind this movie intended.
What do you think? Will these predictions come true? Do you have any of your own intriguing predictions about Tony Stark’s role in Captain America: Civil War? Have your say below!
