Captain America and Thor’s costumes in the MCU are near-perfect representations of their comic book counterparts. But they are missing a big detail.
One of the greatest strengths of the Marvel Cinematic Universe is how it translates the fantasy world of the comic books into live-action on the big screen. Many of his characters seem to have jumped off a comic book cover page. However, not all of his characters are perfect. In fact, some compromises have been made with some of the more famous Avengers.
Captain America and Thor have arguably two of the silliest costumes to ever grace the pages of a comic book. They both have bold colors and bold, instantly iconic designs. And when it came to bringing both characters to the MCU, Marvel Studios largely stuck to each character’s appearance, except for one key detail. They have lost their little wings.
In the comics, on the sides of Captain America’s cowl and Thor’s helmets are small white wings. They serve no functional purpose for either character and are simply there for aesthetic purposes. But they end up being iconic if small parts of each character’s look. However, the wings are a deliberately omitted design choice from their MCU counterparts.
While the MCU is generally loyal to bringing comic book designs to life, there’s usually a design ethos to justify how these goofy designs can work in a realistic setting. So instead of Captain America’s outfit being a typical superhero costume, it’s more of an army uniform that’s been altered to fit Captain America’s colors. This has generally been the case for all Captain America outfits in the MCU; these are tactical military suits designed to look like Captain America’s USO tour costume. However, the wings are present as a set of 2D recessed patterns on the helmet.
Thor is in a similar but also distinct situation. His costume in the MCU is actually very close to what he wears in the comics; he barely wears his helmet. And when the character wears a helmet, much like Cap, he also doesn’t have the feathered wings on the side. Instead, the wings are depicted as metal plates that are part of the helmet’s design.
It’s strange, to say the least. It’s not like Marvel Studios is bothered by the characters’ quirky looks, but there’s a deliberate attempt to hide from each character’s more overtly silly elements. If any studio could make feather wings work on the big screen, it would be Marvel. It remains a slight shame that he found other ways around those iconic designs instead.
