What if…, as the Watcher might say, Chris Evans was never cast as Captain America? Given that the beloved star passed on the role twice, this could’ve easily happened, although it no doubt would have reshaped the MCU as we know it.
Even though the studio was single-minded about Evans playing Steve Rogers, that doesn’t mean Marvel threw its back-up Caps under the bus, as numerous actors who were in the running for the role later turned up elsewhere in the franchise. Chris Pratt, for example, originally auditioned for Captain America before later nabbing Star-Lord, and John Krasinski eventually cameod as Mr. Fantastic.
Now another would-be Sentinel of Liberty is finally entering the official MCU in Daredevil: Born Again. And they may have come closer than anyone to swiping Evans’ most famous role from under his nose.
Daredevil‘s Wilson Bethel just missed the bullseye on becoming Captain America
It’s been confirmed that Wilson Bethel is set to reprise the character of Benjamin Poindexter/Bullseye in Daredevil: Born Again. This is wonderful news for DD fans, as he made such a huge impression as the crackshot supervillain in the third season of the Netflix series. With the Defenders Saga recently being made 100% canon, this will mark Bethel’s first official appearance in the MCU and his inaugural role in a Marvel Studios production.
In another universe out there in the multiverse, however, Bethel could’ve been a Marvel fixture this whole time as one of the founding members of the Avengers. Back in 2018, the actor opened up to ComicBook.com that, according to him, he was the runner-up for the lead role in 2011’s Captain America: The First Avenger and for a while it looked a lot like the life-changing gig could’ve been his.
“I mean that was both, probably the single most exciting time of my life and also the single most devastating when it didn’t happen,” Bethel said. “They put me in the Cap suit and did everything. So, I screen tested it at Marvel with a number of other guys. They ended up releasing all the other guys… I was meeting with [director] Joe Johnson to discuss the role and see story boards. So, it was this insane period where during that time I kind of thought that maybe I was going to actually get the role. I actually screen tested again a second time a month later on my birthday.”
You’d think being called back to screen test on your birthday would be a cosmic sign that it was all going to work out, but sadly Bethel recalled that “I think it was like one or two days later that they made the announcement that Chris Evans got the part.” Understandably, the star took the news hard at the time and it was a while before he recovered from the disappointment. “So, to be perfectly honest, that was one of the hardest moments in my professional career,” he admitted. “And it spun me out for a while to be honest with you.”
With the benefit of hindsight, though, Bethel believes things worked out in the end for both himself and Evans and the Marvel universe as a whole. Thanks to playing Bullseye in Daredevil, he managed to achieve his dream of playing — as he described it — “a dude in a suit.”
“But I’m also a firm believer that things happen as they’re supposed to, and obviously, Chris did an incredible job in that role,” Bethel concluded. “And my life, while it hasn’t brought me to lead the Avengers, has been really rich and rewarding in other ways. So, I can’t spend too much time lamenting it. And honestly, just the fact that things have kind of come full circle in a way, and I still get to be a dude in a suit, is pretty exciting.”
Bethel does such an exceptional job of portraying Dex’s dark nature and troubled mental state that it’s hard to imagine him bringing the same moral integrity and warmth to Steve as Evans does, but the actor’s extensive TV career — he’s appeared in the likes of The Young and the Restless, How to Get Away with Murder, and All Rise — proves he has the range to have pulled it off. Nevertheless, as the man himself said, the Sacred Timeline played out as it should’ve done, especially as Bullseye’s Marvel career might just be beginning.
