So, What The Heck Is Adamantium? Captain America: Brave New World Makes Wolverine’s Metal MCU Canon.

FINALLY, SOMEBODY REMEMBERED that there’s a god sticking out of the ocean. Eternals might be a lesser MCU movie, but its conclusion—in which the Celestial Tiamut begins to hatch from the Earth—should have had larger ramifications in the rest of the Universe. Despite the fact that Tiamut’s hand and head remain sticking out from the water at the end of Eternals, no one has mentioned it again.

No one, that is, until President Thaddeus Ross (Harrison Ford) gives a press conference in the first act of Captain America: Brave New World. In a signature Harrison Ford growl, Ross tells the assembled leaders of the world about a proposed treaty, one that will keep the various nations from fighting over Tiamut’s remains, now dubbed “Celestial Island.”

Of course, it’s not Celestial Island that truly matters. Rather, it is the metal that the Island contains, a super substance called Adamantium. Ross describes Adamantium as the strongest and most versatile metal in the world, even more valuable than Vibranium, the metal that makes Black Panther’s Wakanda such a magical place.

While that might sound like a lot of politician bluster, especially when other attendees to the conference start griping about Wakanda’s isolation politics, every comic reader knows that Ross tells the truth. Adamantium is perhaps the most coveted element in the Marvel Universe, one at the center of many secret government projects. That includes Weapon Plus, the program that created the X-Man known as—that’s right—Wolverine.

What is the history of Adamantium in Marvel Comics?

Chronologically speaking, the first character to use Adamantium in the Marvel Universe was not Wolverine, but someone much more dangerous. In 1969’s Avengers #66, written by Roy Thomas and penciled by Barry Windsor-Smith, the evil robot Ultron seeks Adamantium for his latest body. Ultron’s quest sends Earth’s Mightiest Heroes on the lookout for mad scientist Myron MacLain, who knows the secret to Adamantium. Even after that issue, Adamantium popped up every now and again in Hulk and Defenders comics, not getting paired with Wolverine until the Canucklehead joined up with other mutants in 1975’s Giant-Size X-Men #1.

The fact that Adamantium has a secret that can be hidden or revealed indicates the first big difference between the Marvel Universe and MCU versions of the metal. In the MCU, Adamantium comes from mining Celestial Island. In the Marvel Universe, Adamantium is an alloy, one that can only be concocted through a complex formula known to very few people, mostly lunatics like MacLain.

Lunatic though he may be, MacLain and other experts caught the attention of Weapon Plus, a government program designed to recreate the Super Soldier process that turned scrawny Steve Rogers into Captain America. Labelling Captain America “Weapon I,” MacLain and others experimented with various soldiers and methods.

In Weapon Plus’s tenth iteration, called Weapon X, MacLain’s successors returned to Adamantium after they found a perfect test subject, a mutant soldier who served in the Canadian black ops division called Department K. Thanks to his healing factor, this mutant could withstand the process of having Adamantium bonded to his skeleton. Even better, the process left his mind in shambles, making him more pliable to do his handler’s bidding. His memory wiped, the mutant only had the name Logan to go with. But his handlers gave him a different, more apt name: Wolverine.

Over the years, more of Weapon X’s test subjects have been revealed. The program gave Wolverine’s arch-enemy Sabertooth Adamantium claws at the ends of his fingers. Deadpool gained his Adamantium katanas from Weapon X, and the mutant Cyber bonded with Adamantium armor. Overseas, the Russian agent Omega Red was outfitted with Adamantium tendrils and Lady Deathstrike from Japan gained Adamantium bones.

In short, Adamantium is the metal of choice for governments who want their own supersoldiers.

Adamantium in the MCU

Obviously, the two movie characters most associated with Adamantium are Deadpool and Wolverine. While those two did make their MCU debut in last year’s Deadpool & Wolverine, the movie also treated them as visitors to the mainline universe on Earth-616. By the end of the movie, Wade and Logan and other characters from the Fox Universe live on their own Earth in their own universe, far from the main Marvel Earth.

But there’s no way that Marvel will leave Wolverine off the screen forever, and Captain America: Brave New World paves the way for the next incarnation of Logan. The fact that Adamantium is already the subject of international debate fits with Wolverine’s standard origin. At some point, someone in the Ross administration or some other branch of the U.S. government will start using Adamantium samples to create their own supersoldier, especially important with Sam Wilson refusing to toe the company line, which will inevitably lead to the founding of Weapon Plus, and then Wolverine.

However, the fact that Adamantium debuts in Brave New World also suggests that it will have significance beyond the MCU Wolverine. In particular, Brave New World goes to pains to contrast Adamantium with Vibranium, which Black Panther posited as the most important element in the universe. Sam Wilson’s Captain America costume features Vibranium augments, and his shield is made of the metal as well.

However, it’s no spoiler to say that Sam’s battle with the Red Hulk has an adverse effect on his Captain America duds. It wouldn’t be much of a surprise to see Sam get an Adamantium upgrade for his next costume, and possibly his shield as well.

Furthermore, Ross’s chief opponent in the Celestial Island negotiations is Japanese Prime Minister Ozaki (Takehiro Hira), suggesting that Lady Deathstrike or the C-list Daredevil villain Lord Dark Wind, a criminal mastermind with a Cobra Commander-like hood, aren’t far away.

Adamantium, the Metal of the Future

Whatever Marvel’s actual plans for Adamantium may be, the metal’s inclusion in Brave New World is a good thing for the franchise as a whole. It shows that the MCU is willing to introduce some of the wackier concepts from the comics, which only helps to further build out the world.

Apropos of its name, Brave New World establishes a Marvel Earth unlike our own, a place where the body of a dying god creates an all-new island in the Indian Ocean and governments have access to metals greater than anything that exists in real life. Adamantium helps make the MCU stronger and more resilient, the type of place we visit for amazing fantasies and fantastic stories—even if that means forgetting about giant hands for a few months.