CAPTAIN AMERICA: BRAVE NEW WORLD Director Reveals What the Serpent Society Could Have Been

With Captain America: Brave New World now in theaters, director Julius Onah is shedding light on how the film originally envisioned the Serpent Society before reshoots reshaped their role in the story.

The film, starring Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson/Captain America and Harrison Ford as Thaddeus "Thunderbolt" Ross, went through an evolution during its development, particularly in how it handled its antagonists.

Giancarlo Esposito was eventually cast as Sidewinder, a character known in the comics for leading the Serpent Society, a group of snake-themed villains. While the organization was always part of the film’s DNA, Onah explained that early versions of the story leaned closer to their comic book roots before shifting to something more grounded.

Onah told Variety: “This is another case of the grounded aesthetic and tone of the film. Serpent Society had always been a part of the story since I joined, but as you are probably well aware, in publishing, these characters dress up in snake-like outfits and have snake-like powers.

“Some of them are, you know, so over the top that they can even be a little bit cartoonish. As we were iterating through how to bring them into the MCU, we leaned into versions that were a bit more heightened and also versions that were a bit more grounded.

“We found that the more grounded version, though it didn’t have some of the really fun, cool stuff in publishing, just felt way more authentic to the film.”

Onah emphasized that reshoots, which he described as “additional photography” planned from the outset, played a key role in refining how the Serpent Society would function in the movie. That process ultimately led to Esposito’s casting and a shift in the organization’s depiction.

Onah explained: “You always want to honor publishing. You always want to honor what the fans love, but at the same time, you want to do what’s right for the movie. So I wouldn’t say it was ever what it was in the comics, but it leaned toward that a little bit more.

“As we got further in our process, it was just clear, this wants to sit in a [grounded] tone. I was trying to bring references like The Day of the Jackal and Point Blank, procedural, paranoid, and political thrillers, and having a Serpent Society that felt more grounded would make more sense.

“So we started thinking about private military companies, thinking of this Sidewinder as a leader of a group that could be something of a combination between that and a warlord. That started to become really, really interesting.”

Rather than keeping the Serpent Society as a group of outlandish, snake-themed supervillains, the film reimagines them as a more realistic and dangerous force within the MCU, one that fits within the political thriller tone Onah wanted to achieve.

I think I would’ve much rather had the snake-themed supervillains.