With a Wonder Man TV show coming soon to Disney+ and persistent rumors of Captain Britain entering the MCU, comic fans are rightly anxious that the movies nail what has long made these heroes so compelling in the comics. However, unlike usual fan concern, the worry isn’t that the movies won’t do Simon Williams and Brian Braddock justice as heroes, but that they’ll look too heroic on the big screen.
The original Captain Britain is Brian Braddock, a wealthy British scientist who is granted a combination of technological and supernatural powers after a motorcycle crash, becoming the guardian of magic and a member of the multiversal Captain Britain Corps. A brilliant scientist, Brian has very little in common with Simon Williams, an actor whose life went off the tracks after he embezzled funds at the insistence of his criminal brother.
Captain Britain and Wonder Man are two of Marvel’s most powerful heroes. Wonder Man is composed of ionic energy which makes him immensely powerful and near-indestructible, while Brian possessed confidence-based powers as Captain Britain that allowed him to do anything he believed himself capable of (the Captain Britain mantle has since passed to Brian’s sister Betsy in the comics.) However, despite their Superman-style powers, both Wonder Man and Captain Britain are compelling because they’re not cut out to be superheroes. Despite the genuine desire to help and protect others and many heroic victories on their scorecards, Wonder Man and Captain Britain are both men who never really wanted superpowers, and who are essentially ‘performing’ who they believe they’re expected to be.
Captain Britain & Wonder Man Are ‘Bad’ Superheroes
Both heroes accepted their powers in dire straits – Brian to survive, and Simon to avoid prison – and wouldn’t actually chosen to be costumed adventurers. Both also long for their former lives, with Captain Britain covering the personality of a scientist with macho bluster and Wonder Man parlaying his superhero fame into the acting work he actually wants. Captain Britain’s role in Chris Claremont and Alan Davis’ iconic Excalibur run paints him as a boastful oaf caught up in a relationship with a younger heroine whose powers mean she’s literally shaped into what those around her want her to be (a relationship future writers depicted at face value as a good match.) Meanwhile, Wonder Man has served with distinction alongside the Avengers, but has always been overshadowed by his ‘brother’ Vision (who was based on his brainwaves) and has faced major disgraces, such as being branded a legendary coward in the future of the original Guardians of the Galaxy, attacking the Avengers when his ionic form became unbalanced, and being blackmailed into compliance during Civil War.
Simon & Brian Are More Interesting as Failures
This tension of reluctant ‘heroes’ attempting to bluff their way through Avengers-level threats makes Wonder Man and Brian Braddock’s Captain Britain tragic, comedic, and often relatable. Even Marvel’s most reluctant heroes usually end up embracing their costumed destiny, but that’s not the case for Simon and Brian, whose best stories engage with the idea that it would genuinely have been better if someone else had been granted their powers. This also leads to some radical ideas that wouldn’t work with other heroes, such as Wonder Man’s recent attempts to become the first pacifist superhero, talking villains into surrender since no-one can actually kill him.
Most superheroes begin their comic lives feeling like frauds but then grow into their heroism, but there’s something special about Wonder Man and Captain Britain perpetually struggling to reach this point. Hopefully, the MCU will capture this aspect of Wonder Man and Captain Britain when they eventually hit the big and small screen.
