'Infinity War': Captain America's New Shield Might Connect Old Canon
Somebody get that man a shield.” With those words, Black Panther all but assured that Captain America would get some sort of replacement shield in the upcoming Avengers: Infinity War, after leaving his iconic round shield behind at the end of Civil War. Photos of an action figure from the highly anticipated Marvel movie might’ve given fans our first look at the new shield, which appears to be a fusion of Cap’s original shield and newfangled technology.
The toy first appeared in a store in Australia, and a few fans who spotted the early action figures snapped photos, which you can see here. The line of 6” figures includes movie versions of Captain America, Iron Man, Spider-Man, and Proxima Midnight, along with figures for the comic characters Taskmaster, Songbird, and King Cobra. Each toy also comes with part of a larger Thanos figure, and lucky Captain America is boxed with Thanos’s severed head. He’s also got a new shield, a metallic accessory with no stars or stripes.
The shield is mostly triangular in shape, which puts it in line with the first shield Captain America wielded in both in the comics and in the MCU iteration, where it was originally a prop for his U.S.O. show. However, the toy shield has a smaller, vestigial shield of sorts coming off of the bottom. It’s cluttered any busy-looking, but there’s likely an in-universe explanation for it, assuming it’s not just a toy-exclusive piece of plastic.
Cap’s iconic, round shield was made out of vibranium, the unbreakable metal that’s the secret to Wakanda’s success. When Howard Stark made the shield for Cap in World War II, he called it “the rarest metal on Earth.”
“What you’re holding there, that’s all we’ve got,” Howard Stark continued, explaining what a big deal it was that the United States was entrusting its whole supply to Captain America.
He wasn’t wrong, except you know who has a lot more vibranium? Wakanda, the most technologically advanced civilization on Earth. That just so happens to be where Captain America is hiding out.
The new shield calls back to Cap’s original look, minus the stats and stripes, but it’s evolved since then, with additional parts and, presumably, features, as befitting Wakanda’s role in its creation.
So, now the only real question: Is that shield strong enough to keep Cap from dying?
