CAPTAIN AMERICA

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Captain America and his beard in Avengers: Infinity War Marvel Studquả táo
The most beautiful moment of Chris Evans’s eight years as Steve sầu Rogers, a.k.a. Captain America, lasted about seven minutes.

That’s a microscopic piece of the time that Evans spent onscreen in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, a franchise whose world was built across 22 movies over 11 years. And three of those movies were solely devoted to Rogers, a puny runt who, with the aid of super soldier serum, turns inlớn the superpowered patriot Captain America. That elixir grants Rogers barn-door shoulders, a chest that seems lượt thích it could stop an oncoming train, biceps that can curl helicopters, and a butt so turgid & round that it threatens to lớn redefine the idea of American exceptionalism. As appealing và character-defining as each of those were, none compare lớn the devastating beauty of what came later: Steve Rogers’s beard, and the glory of seeing it for the first time.

Obscuring Evans’s sharp jaw và poreless skin should be garish, like installing carpet atop mahogany floors. To put a beard on Captain America is to mask the literal face of our country. And it would undoubtedly clash with the rest of Rogers’s all-American style, from his appropriately cut hair lớn his well-fitting, unassuming wardrobe.

But when you see it — without prejudice — the beard makes sense. It deserves lớn be on Captain America’s face. And we want it to lớn be.

The beard made its first appearance in the promotional material for Avengers: Infinity War. In the group poster, Evans is facing khổng lồ our left, looking lượt thích he’s about khổng lồ rush lớn our defense. His facial hair is in for the fight, too, standing majestic và unbroken. In another poster, a bright xanh bolt grazes Evans’s face, making hyên look lượt thích an angel just touched down from a sapphire sun. The beard looks great, even if it’s blown out and bluish.

A poster for Avengers: Infinity War.

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Marvel And in a third poster, featuring Captain America solo, Evans is twisted in a pose that exposes America’s glutes to full effect. But our eyes are again drawn lớn the beard, in profile, beaming proudly, as if the stubble is imbued with indomitable freedom & justice:

Captain America in an Avengers: Infinity War poster. Marvel The beard, lượt thích Cap himself, only appears in Infinity War for six minutes & 45 seconds. Bearded Cap first appears in the shadows, saving his friends Scarlet Witch và Vision from the Carrie Coon-voiced villain Proxima Midnight. The beard is peppered in little spots throughout the movie — when we see Rogers recruiting Rhodey at Avengers HQ, telling the team where they’re going next, etc. — và its final appearance is in the grand battle against Thanos, defending the country known as Wakanda.

Trying khổng lồ pay attention during those seven minutes is especially difficult with the beauty that is Cap’s beard demanding your attention. Even when Cap is throttling Thanos’s hell hounds or taking on Corvus Glaive sầu, it’s impossible lớn pry your eyes away from Rogers’s majestic scruff.

For some, seeing the beard inevitably piques curiosity.

Does Rogers only need mere minutes lớn grow a five sầu o’cloông xã shadow? How long did it take him lớn grow his particular beard? How does he maintain it? If Captain America is everything good about America, then what does America’s beard feel like? What does it smell like? What does it feel like to lớn have America brush against my neck?

That curiosity begets fantasy.

“It would definitely give you beard burn if you made out, but you also wouldn’t care because getting a little roughed up by a grizzlier Cap is exactly the point,” Captain America beard connoisseur, Variety TV critic, & former kftvietnam.com culture writer Caroline Framke told me. “It smells like woodsmoke & pine.”

BuzzFeed declared the beard “the most important part of Infinity War.” Cap’s beard has become so popular with fans (who have flooded sites like Tumblr and Pinterest with art, GIFs, và movie stills), declaring how hot the beard is, how handsome Steve Rogers is, và how the beard’s beauty can make you forget about the world’s ills and the mortal coil, & possibly knock you unconscious.

The facial hair even overshadowed some of Earth’s Mightiest Heroes during the Endgame press tour, when someone asked Evans’s co-stars whether they approved of the beard (the majority preferred bearded Cap).

And, like waking up from a dream kicking, the first time we see Cap in Endgame, he’s in the bathroom abruptly shaving off the beard.

CNET lamented that the beard was Endgame’s “biggest loss.” a bold statement considering the movie is about dealing with the loss of heroes Spider-Man, Blaông chồng Panther, và Doctor Strange — the future bedrock of the Avengers.

So what precisely makes Steve Rogers’s beard as popular as it is — seemingly popular enough to overshadow some of Infinity War’s biggest deaths? At the kết thúc of the day, it’s just human facial hair growing in an eye-pleasing pattern over a handsome human’s jaw. But I found out there’s so much more.

How beards in America explain Captain America’s beard

It’s so beautiful. Marvel There’s so much more lớn beards than just hair growing from unshaven skin.

For taxonomy purposes, a beard consists of swaths of facial hair that slide down from the middle of the earlobe, hugging the chin và cascading lớn the Adam’s táo bị cắn. But culturally, beards symbolize a certain combination of rebellion, chaos, và age. The thought being that men with beards don’t follow the rules set by corporate or mainstream America.

According to lớn men’s magazines & grooming chroniclers like Esquire và the Thành Phố New York Times Style section, beards started becoming popular six or so years ago because of the rebellion they represented at the time.

“Previously a hallmark of certain kinds of lifestyles — say, lumberjaông chồng, biker or hipster — beards have sầu moved past their countercultural roots and inlớn the mainstream, showing up on Hollywood red carpets (Ben Affleck, Brad Pitt và Ryan Gosling have sầu all been photographed with them) &, now, in cubicles across the country,” the Thủ đô New York Times reported in 2013.

Hollywood actors hopped on the trkết thúc first, according lớn the Times; then mainstream culture followed suit. As members of a creative field, actors aren’t supposed to be clinical or robotic or rule-following. They want to be cool, organically rebellious, trendsetting spirits. Ergo, they & their adopted styles, facial hair included, need to lớn get across that idea of rebellion.

By the time dudes across America adopted the scruff, the beard went from being worn by people who were actually off the beaten path — or could at least afford to lớn come off that way — to being worn by men who wanted to lớn be seen that way, all by following a popular trend.

“I think people started putting their toes in the water five sầu or so years ago in the corporate setting with beards, and then got the general go-ahead, so they went nuts,” J. Clark Walker, a barber at Martial Vivot Salon Pour Hommes in New York City, tells me.

By 2014, the New York Times noted that prominent CEOs of companies like Google, Salesforce, và Goldman Sachs had begun sporting beards, a marked change from their previous clean-shaven looks — a C-suite banshee shriek indicating the looming death of everything beards stood for.

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Another nail in the coffin of the beard was the rise of the “achievement beard,” a term used to lớn describe beards worn by men who got to lớn the pinnacle of their respective fields & then effectively retired, like David Letterman, David Beckyêu thích, và Jon Stewart.

If there’s anything that marks the decline of beards as a signal of rebellion or a sign of an outsider, it’s wealthy CEOs of billion-dollar companies & successful celebrities wearing them.

Then there was the rise of the Republican beard late in 2018 and early this year, in which GOPhường lawmakers và figures, including political square Ted Cruz, began growing out beards, some more successfully than others. It was no coincidence that businesses built around razors and shaving accoutrements leveled off by 2018 as well.

Now, it seems that the notion of beards representing any kind of counterculture is dead. Beards are now more of a statement of personal style, a style that wants khổng lồ vaguely thumb its nose at the mainstream, as opposed to being an organic symbol of defiance.

“Big grizzly beards were the rage for a couple years; now the craze has slowed down & people are just maintaining the length that suits them,” Walker said. “No one’s trying lớn shock the world anymore.”

Captain America’s beard works because of Steve sầu Rogers

Look at that majestic beard. Marvel Curiously enough, shocking the world is the reason Rogers’s scruff works.

In the MCU, bearded Rogers is the result of 2016’s Civil War. Rogers, fighting his nature, takes a stvà against the US government & the United Nations, which want to register superheroes because of the damage they could bởi vì if unchecked. Rogers argues that he trusts his own judgment more than that of a government toàn thân, và that heroes, like all civilians, need freedom. Adding lớn this set is the reemergence of Rogers’s best friover Bucky Barnes, who we find out isn’t actually bad but rather the victyên of intense Hydra brainwashing.

Civil War ends with Rogers breaking off with his own team of Avengers, essentially everyone but Tony Stark & James “Rhodey” Rhodes, và going off the grid và on the run. And to get that point across, it means not shaving.

Like the real world, the MCU uses a character’s appearance khổng lồ help inkhung his or her story. Tony Stark’s goatee monstrosity helps get across his haughtiness, as Walker explains, as no regular civilian would have sầu the courage lớn shape their scruff inkhổng lồ something so physically unappealing. And in Endgame, Thor’s unkempt mane and billowy beard are signs of how he’s let everything, including his physical appearance, go in a fit of depression.

For Rogers, not shaving is sacrilege. If having a beard used lớn connote a sense of rebellion, being clean-shaven represents compliance. Rogers follows the rules, leads by example, và is a beacon of hope và goodness. And in order to lớn show that, his haircut and his shave must be precise.

Rogers’s persona & his style — clean-shaven with a military-grade side part — evoke a vintage (think: trắng crewnechồng T-shirts, brown leather jackets, xanh denim), effortless sense of cool. There’s nothing audacious or mythical about hlặng. Steve sầu Rogers is an uncomplicated guy who just follows the rules — until he sees that the rules are broken.

“His entire arc has been about growing up from a scrawny kid into lớn a super soldier, trying to keep his intrinsic curiosity và kindness without leaning too far into naivebổ, & ultimately learning the hard ways of the world,” Framke told me. “There’s something about hyên ổn growing a beard that instantly ages hyên ổn và makes it clear that he isn’t the kid he used lớn be.”

Rogers’s beard only works because of how deeply Marvel has realized and crystallized Rogers as a character both personally & physically.

The beard grounds the character Marvel introduced to us eight years ago, making him more relatable và human. If bearded Rogers is willing khổng lồ defy the government, something he cares deeply about, then what else is he willing khổng lồ defy? Clean-shaven Rogers would shake your parents’ hands, buy you dinner, lend you his jacket, have sầu you trang chính by curfew, and walk you lớn your front door at the kết thúc of the night.

Rays of sunlight or the sheer glow from Cap’s scruff? We cannot be sure. Marvel Bearded Rogers? There’s something that says he might stay out past midnight (Walker notes that Rogers’s longer hair works in unison with the look too).

The power khổng lồ create a lifetime of fantasy is a testament lớn its beauty and grace. But again, it’s fleeting. In Endgame, Rogers’s first minutes onscreen are spent giving himself a shave — the beard is already gone.

Having witnessed half of life on Earth decimated và all of his friends gone, Rogers’s clean shave is his way of going bachồng to lớn being the Captain America the gryên ổn post-snap world needs hyên ổn khổng lồ be: the impossibly hopeful soldier & relentlessly good man. It’s out of duty, & seemingly his and our way of moving forward.