The following story contains some spoilers for the Apple TV+ movie Ghosted.
CHRIS EVANS has always seemed like a nice guy. So nice, in fact, that he must have realized that much of the audience for Ghosted, the new action-adventure-romcom on Apple TV+ that he stars in alongside his Knives Out and The Gray Man costar Ana de Armas,likely crosses over with the audience for his past outings in the Marvel Cinematic Universe as Captain America/Steve Rogers.
And so Evans, ever the nice guy, gave that audience something that everyone knows fans of the Marvel Cinematic Universe loves: cameos. Lots and lots of cameos. Ghosted is chock full of ’em, with a couple known Captain America associates, and a couple upcoming MCU entrants, and one whose connection is a bit looser.
Ghosted is a fine movie that will keep you entertained for the just-under-2-hours you’ll spend watching on it, but it’s probably not too hot a take to say that it’s not reinventing any kind of wheel. It’s an action-comedy that will be a fine way to spend a couple hours if you turn your brain off and let the vibes of charismatic movie stars carry you away from the real world for a little bit.
But maybe the memory of the jolts of dopamine you get from these five appearances will stay with you for a bit longer:
Tim Blake Nelson
Fairly early on in the movie, Cole gets his first taste of the world he’s been sucked into via proximity to Sadie when he’s tied up and nearly tortured by an arms dealer (who deals in dangerous insects and animals) named Borislov. Borislov is played by someone with a decent amount of superhero experience: Tim Blake Nelson, who was an early Marvel Cinematic Universe as Dr. Sam Sanders in The Incredible Hulk, a role he’ll be reprising (now as The Leader) in 2024’s Captain America: New World Order. He also played Looking Glass in HBO’s tremendous 2019 Watchmen series.
Anthony Mackie
Anthony Mackie is about as vital to anyone in Evans’ Captain America run, considering he played his loyal friend Sam Wilson/Falcon ever since 2014’s Captain America: The Winter Soldier. Oh, and, you know, Mackie’s Sam is only the current holder of the shield and will be the titular character in Captain America: New World Order. In Ghosted, Mackie plays a bounty hunter named “Grandson of Sam” who attempts to bring in Cole and Sadie for the large bounty that has been placed on the “Taxman’s” head.
John Cho
Grandson of Sam doesn’t make it very long with Cole and Sadie in his custody, though, as he’s quickly taken out by another bounty hunter going by the name “The Leopard,” played by the one and only John Cho. Cho is best known for his roles in Star Trek and the Harold and Kumar films, though his look as The Leopard looks closest to to how he looked in Netflix’s live-action Cowboy Bebop adaptation.
Cho is the only major cameo in Ghosted without some kind of Marvel connection; could that be some kind of hint? He would make a pretty solid Reed Richards—just throwing that one out there.
Sebastian Stan
The Leopard himself doesn’t last too long either, as he’s instead taken out by another bounty hunter who only refers to himself as “God,” sitting chillingly in the backseat of a car. And God is played by Sebastian Stan! Marvel fans were probably happy to see Evans’ longstanding bromance—Stan played Cap’s brainwashed best friend/enemy Bucky Barnes/The Winter Soldier in several MCU appearances and is scheduled to star in next year’s Thunderbolts—on the screen once again. (God is taken out after a few moments by Grandson of Sam, who somehow survived, with a van after only a few moments.)
Ryan Reynolds
In the movie’s final big action set piece, a mysterious, eye-patched figure crawls his way over to Sadie to say hi: her ex, a guy named Jonas, played by past and future Deadpool Ryan Reynolds (who will join the MCU officially with the upcoming Deadpool 3). Reynolds—missing not only an eye but other body parts as well here—is never above a cameo, and they’re frequently fun: he also popped up late in last year’s Bullet Train and 2019’s Hobbs & Shaw.
Evan is the culture editor for Men’s Health, with bylines in The New York Times, MTV News, Brooklyn Magazine, and VICE. He loves weird movies, watches too much TV, and listens to music more often than he doesn’t.
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