Hopefully by now this isn’t a spoiler for you: Robert Downey Jr. reprises his Iron Man role for Captain America: Civil War for a battle with Chris Evans’s Steve Rogers. This fight will force the rest of the Avengers team to pick sides, pitting friend against friend. But the big question surrounding this film is which side each hero will be taking. Still months before the film’s release, Jeremy Renner could be the first actor to reveal his character’s allegiance.
Just Jared has just posted an image showing Renner entering a hotel in New York City, and while this seems ordinary enough, what makes the incident interesting is that the Hawkeye actor was sporting a black baseball cap with the words "Team Captain America" embedded on the front. If this means what we think it means, this could be confirmation that the arrow-slinging hero will be siding with the red, white and blue Avenger in the new film. But could we all be reading too much into this? This might just be a little something special made for everyone who worked on the movie… but then again maybe not.
Here’s what we know about the arrow-slinging Avenger: He’s a former S.H.I.E.L.D. agent who worked closely with Samuel L. Jackson’s Nick Fury and Scarlet Johansson’s Black Widow. Through the events of The Avengers, he realized that the universe isn’t as small as he might’ve once thought. Through the events of Avengers: Age of Ultron, he realized that there are way more "enhanced" individuals like Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver who could very well be hiding in plain sight and just waiting to reveal themselves. We also know that he recognizes the importance of staying off of the government’s radar, as Fury helped keep his home, wife and children secret from S.H.I.E.L.D. At the end of the Age of Ultron, he seemingly hung up his bow and arrows to spend time with him outside of the government’s reach. Based on that information, it would make sense for him to side with Cap, at least for a portion of the film.
Civil War will see the new lineup of Avengers involved with an international incident, but this time it prompts the governments of the world to unite in order to pass harsher restrictions on the superhumans of the world. While Tony Stark will end up siding with the government to enforce this law, Rogers will take the opposition, going on the run with those heroes choosing to side with him. Renner’s Clint Barton doesn’t want the government interfering with his own life any more than it already has, and siding with Cap could be a way for him to further protect everything he built outside of harm’s reach.
Captain America: Civil War doesn’t hit theaters until May 6, 2016, and we’ll no doubt learn a great deal more between now and then. But for now, this photo of Renner is an interesting morsel to chew on.
