Many of you will be aware that I'm a bit of a nerd when it comes to Marvel films. As you can imagine, my heart was racing as I entered the Ballroom Corinthia, just a stones throw from Embankment Station. I had never been to a press conference of this size so combined with the opportunity to come face to face with some of my movie star heroes and be at a Marvel press event, this was pretty crazy. For those of you not yet familiar with the Captain America films (where have you been?) Civil War is the second sequel and a follow up to Winter Soldier. The plot follows a political interference between the Avengers', causing a rift between former allies, Captain America (Chris Evans) and Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.). Caught up in the feud, the other superheros must pick a side and defend the future of the Avengers and decide the future of Shield.

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Moderated by Edith Bowman, the event kicked off with a brief introduction before welcoming the cast to the platform. In attendance was a whole array of Hollywood’s finest; Robert Downey Jr., Paul Rudd, Chris Evans, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Elizabeth Olsen, Paul Bettany, Jeremy Renner, Emily Van Camp, Daniel Bruhl, directors Anthony and Joe Russo as well as Marvel Studios president and producer, Kevin Feige. It seems, however, that Civil War had always been in the pipeline for Marvel following its comic book publishing back in 2006. Feige felt it was important that the studio hold out long enough that they would be able to do it well and make it a reality. In response to the question asking him when Civil War came about he said –

 “It was before the MCU even existed, in the early days…we were just beginning to dream about our studio and getting financing…it was an amazing comic series and I could remember reading it in the month that it came out and thinking it would probably be impossible but it would be cool someday to do this. It wasn’t until about two years ago, two and a half years ago that we thought now’s the time, we’ve assembled enough players that we could do it now”. 

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Following a few words from the directors, the floor opened up to the audience, all with their own light-hearted curiosities. Captain America not only welcomes back the old cast but also welcomes Chadwick Roseman as Black Panther and sees the initiation of Scott Lang as Ant-man played by Paul Rudd. I managed to pluck up the courage from the third row to ask newbie Avenger Rudd if there was any hazing from his fellow cast masts but he insists that the whole team was very welcoming although it was perhaps “a little intimidating seeing them all in their suits”. However, having not specified which Paul my question was aimed at, this sparked some light teasing from the other members of the cast in which Paul Bettany told myself and Rudd to “get a room” and said "why don't you just marry her". For the record, if the offer is there I would gladly have accepted. After some witty ribbing, the conference steered more towards the underlining political and contextual analysis behind Civil War.

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Civil War sees a divide between the superheroes in a way that we’ve never seen before. Team Captain America is very much about defending their freedom from government whilst Team Ironman believes there has to be rules set in place. However, it seems that, given the choice not all the real life actors would have picked their given side. Actor Chris Evans (who plays Steve Rogers and Captain America) was quick to state that there would a great level of responsibility on the government - “You have to answer to somebody. You couldn’t just let these group of vigilantes sort it themselves. That’s the sad truth. If they’re really were Avengers I’d be Team Ironman for sure”.

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There were, of course, some brazen questions questioning Marvel’s supposed rivalry with DC following the formation of the Justice League on the big screen. Feeling no need to defend the studio, Evans stated “I don’t think anyone up here makes movies based on what other people are doing” with Feige adding “we do because we do it really well” and Downey Jr joked that “…when they get a Bucky when we’ll start talking”.