In one of the biggest shocks of the MCU‘s post-Endgame period, Tim Blake Nelson was announced to return as Samuel Sterns – AKA The Leader – in this year’s Captain America: Brave New World. The smart money would have been on him returning for a Hulk movie, but that perhaps would have been too obvious. Instead, Nelson played the not-so-secret villain of the piece who would also go on to herald the events of Avengers: Doomsday. Again, surprise was the name of the game.
And now Nelson has written a novel – his second – on the subject of making superhero movies. He spoke to ComicBook’s Chris Killian to discuss his latest release, Superhero: A Novel, which takes the actor’s own experiences working on major Hollywood productions (and superhero adaptations, of course). Naturally, the question of The Leader’s future came up, given how important (if somewhat unexpected), a role he played in setting in Doom’s arrival. And while he didn’t confirm whether he’d be back in Doomsday, Nelson did express his enthusiasm for a second return to the character:
“I can confirm that if I have my way, they won’t have to wait 16 years.”
Why The MCU Needs To Bring The Leader Back
The most interesting part of Captain America: Brave New World‘s post-credits scene was The Leader’s chilling warning that Earth was going to face a reckoning when the heroes were forced to defend it against “the others.” The explanation in the scene suggests Sterns saw the coming storm “in the probabilities”, and the value of that prophecy should, by rights, see The Leader return as an asset. Even if he’s briefly involved, the Avengers turning to Sam’s enemy to find out more about the excursions on a theoretical level could well make a lot of sense.
Tim Blake Nelson Discusses Making His Novel Into A Movie
Nelson’s experience on set is obviously invaluable to painting a picture inside the machine, as it were, and he has previously revealed that being recast as The Leader during the writing process allowed him to do 2 months of intensive paid research. But what of the chances to bring Superhero: A Novel to the screen, in the vein of Seth Rogen’s The Studio or HBO’s The Franchise?
“If I, or somebody else, figured out how to tell that story where it can only be a movie. I mean, I think form is content and so, when you switch media, you have to find the moviness of the movie… Superhero has to be a novel in its current form, because it’s taking advantage – I hope anyway – of everything a novel can do to explore its subject matter. You get inside the heads of characters, chapter to chapter, with alternating points of view, often surrounding the same events, and you learn what people are thinking in a very reliable way.
In movies and plays, and television shows, you don’t get inside of a character’s head; you only see what they do, and you hear what they say. And that’s often there to mask what’s really going on inside their heads. And so, that’s what makes theater and film and television interesting is watching people disassemble like human beings do. Whereas what I think makes novels really interesting is that you see characters acting in certain ways and saying certain things, but then you also get the benefit of the truth that’s inside their heads. In the movie version, you’d almost kind of want to figure out how to do the opposite.”
Given how eloquently he talks, it’s no surprise that Superhero: A Novel is an engaging read, and having the intelligent actor back in the MCU would be to the benefit of the franchise. For now, we’ll have to wait and see. Superhero is available to buy now from Unnamed Press.
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