Captain America: Brave New World Disney+ Streaming Success

2 weeks ago 9

Jordan Iacobucci has been an avid reader and movie fan since childhood. Jordan is known among his friends as the Marvel and Star Wars nerd, and even wrote a thirty-page college dissertation about Spider-Man! He has been a staff writer at both Screen Rant and CBR, where he enjoys sharing his love for pop culture with the world.

Almost a year after disappointing at the box office, Captain America: Brave New World is quietly dominating the streaming charts. The Marvel Cinematic Universe film started a rocky year for the franchise, but it may not be as big a disappointment as some critics claimed.

Captain America: Brave New World is proving extremely popular worldwide. According to data from FlixPatrol, the Captain America sequel is currently one of the most-streamed movies around the world. In the United States, Brave New World is exclusively available on Disney+, where it is the platform's thirteenth most-streamed film of the year (after spending much of 2025 in the Top 10). In other territories, the film is just as popular, remaining on Google TV's Top 10 list for twenty-seven days and counting, as of this writing.

Captain America: Brave New World puts Anthony Mackie's Sam Wilson in the spotlight as he takes over the mantle of Captain America from his predecessor, Steve Rogers. Sam must contend with multiple antagonistic forces, including that of President Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, played by Harrison Ford in his MCU debut. Sam goes head-to-head with the president when the villainous plot of the Leader (Tim Blake Nelson) turns Ross into the savage Red Hulk, leading to a rampage through Washington, D.C.

The fourth Captain America film was met with middling reviews and ultimately underwhelmed at the box office. Brave New World was Marvel's lowest-rated movie of 2025, though it managed to beat out Thunderbolts* at the box office with a worldwide haul of $415 mllion. The Fantastic Four: First Steps outclassed both films with a worldwide total of $521 million.

Captain America: Brave New World Is Extremely Underrated

Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson in Captain America Brave New World

Captain America: Brave New World was eviscerated by critics upon its release earlier this year. The film holds a disappointing 46% approval rating from critics on Rotten Tomatoes. This makes it only the third MCU film to be designated "Rotten" after Eternals and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania. However, critics are far too hard on the Captain America sequel.

Brave New World has many flaws, from a plot stitched together as the result of various rewrites to sometimes middling visual effects. However, the film is far better than most critics give it credit for. At its core is an incredibly strong performance from Anthony Mackie, playing a character who must learn to balance his responsibility to his country and what he knows to be right. Above all else, the film proves that Sam Wilson is a worthy successor to Steve Rogers and generates hype for his continued legacy as Captain America.

Fans clearly have a higher opinion of Brave New World than critics. On Rotten Tomatoes, audiences award the film a 75% approval rating, a 29-point improvement over the critics'. The movie's continued success on streaming almost a year after its release also proves that Brave New World has resonated with Marvel fans despite its poor reviews.

This should be encouraging for Marvel Studios as it continues a troubling trend of more mixed reviews and lower box office numbers. While the MCU still desperately needs to win back audiences, the situation may not be as dire as the widely accepted narrative would lead people to believe. Captain America: Brave New World is by no means an utter failure for Marvel, even if some detractors would say otherwise. Especially with knowledge of the film's troubled production, it is amazing that Brave New World is as entertaining as it is.

Looking back on Captain America 4 several years from now, the world may have a kinder opinion of the film than upon its release. If Marvel can find a way to adequately tie its events to those of Avengers: Doomsday, the film may even see yet another surge in popularity that would threaten to rewrite its status as a failure for the MCU.

Captain America: Brave New World is streaming on Disney+.