"Real Steel's" Anthony Mackie at the event, which featured fashion presentations from Hugo Boss and Fendi.
Jeff Vespa/Getty ImagesMarvel isn’t resting on its laurels after a victory lap at Comic-Con this weekend. The studio moving ahead on casting its latest project Captain America: The Winter Soldier.
Anthony Mackie is in negotiations to star alongside Chris Evans in the sequel to Captain America: The First Avenger that is being directed by Joe and Anthony Russo.
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The film will be released April 4, 2014.
Plot details are being kept under wraps, but the subtitle suggests a respected comic book storyline from the 2000s that resurrected Captain America’s sidekick Bucky as a brainwashed super-assassin known as the Winter Solider.
While Marvel would not comment nor divulge character details, it is believed that Mackie will portray the Falcon, one of mainstream comics’ first black superheroes and perhaps its first American one.
The character, Sam Wilson, is Harlem-based and had many street adventures with Cap in the 1970s comics, when he served as his partner. He derives his powers from a suit that allows him to fly and enhances his strength. He can also telepathically talk to birds. In current comics, Falcon is a key player in many of Cap’s espionage adventures.
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Mackie, who became a hot commodity after his turn in The Hurt Locker, is on the big screen in Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter. He has the Warner Bros. all-star crime movie Gangster Squad coming out this fall, recently completed shooting Michael Bay’s Pain and Gain and is shooting Runner, Runner with Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake.
Mackie is repped by UTA and Inspire Entertainment, who also had no comment.
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