I saw Marvel’s Captain America: Brave New World and was all-in on Harrison Ford’s Red Hulk — including the monster’s chest hair. I’ll save my thoughts on how good the film was (or perhaps how tedious) for later. But there was one moment that made me chuckle, and then made me think. Don’t worry, this doesn’t spoil anything.
Sam Wilson, played by Anthony Mackie, at one point pulls out his phone to show another character some information (see, no spoils). Captain America’s choice of phone? A Microsoft Surface Duo.
At first I thought this was an odd choice. Sam seems to have all the superhero tech he could want, aside from a super serum (which is in part what makes him so wonderful as Captain America). He’s got Wakanda-ified wings, cool flight googles, Redwing and… a Surface Duo phone. Three of the four of these make perfect sense for Captain America.
Nothing like a little motion blur: here’s Sam holding his Microsoft Surface Duo.
As a phone reviewer for CNET, a Surface Duo cameo was an unexpected delight. I let out a small laugh when I saw it, and judging by the silence in the theater, I’d say no one else enjoyed the mobile phone Easter egg. But was this clever product placement or a prop guy who gave Mackie a cool phone worthy of an Avenger? Or was the Duo’s appearance something else?
The Surface Duo isn’t the first niche phone to get screen time. The Red Hydrogen One phone ended up on Dominic Toretto’s dashboard in F9 and Leonard DiCaprio used the same phone in Don’t Look Up, although neither Leo nor Vin Diesel took advantage of the phone’s 3D lenticular screen. So an out-of-place phone in a movie or TV show isn’t entirely unexpected for me.
But Sam’s phone isn’t a Hydrogen One, it’s a Microsoft Surface Duo that came in 2020 and didn’t sell well. A second version, the Surface Duo 2, came out in 2021, also didn’t sell well and subsequently became the last version. It was hard to tell which model Sam had – I was looking for the Duo 2’s Glance Bar, but there wasn’t a good shot of the phone closed. (Sam would totally use the Glance Bar.)
Microsoft Surface Duo, hands-on with an intriguing double-screened foldable
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The Surface Duo comprises two 5.6-inch screens connected by a pair of stainless steel hinges (one at the top, one at the bottom). It’s genuinely one of the most striking phones ever made. All of this leads to the question: Why does Captain America have a Surface Duo?
This is the part that I couldn’t stop thinking about. There is a fictional galaxy where Sam bought the phone in 2020, and because he is such a meticulous technician when it comes to taking care of his gear, he’s just kept it in perfect condition for five years (or seven years, remember Captain America: Brave New World is set in 2027). Though he’d definitely had to swap out the battery at some point.
Then there’s another scenario where Sam read about how amazing the Surface Duo’s hardware was (despite some major software issues) and bought it just for Microsoft’s brilliant folio design. And just like the way he tinkers around with his EXO-7 Falcon jetpack, I can envision Sam hacking and uploading his own software to run on the Duo and using it ever since.
Watch this: Surface Duo 2: Microsoft’s two-screen wonder gets another shot at premium phone fame
Or this just Sam using the Duo as a burner phone? If that’s the case, this would be a big flex when it comes to burner phones in TV and movies.
I go back to the Red Hydrogen One example, as this might really tell us why the Duo is in a Captain America movie. Years ago I interviewed Adam McKay, the director behind Don’t Look Out, The Big Short and Anchorman. He explained to me that the discontinued Hydrogen One was in Don’t Look Out because a prop guy recommended it. McKay wanted a unique phone and that didn’t look like a standard phone onscreen.
“And then he [the prop guy] comes back with that phone. He goes, ‘This is a whole cellphone that Red cam made. They never released it. Check it out,'” explained McKay. “And I started playing with it. I was like, ‘Why didn’t they release this? This is incredible.’ But apparently it’s technically not consumer-friendly.”
So why does Captain America have a Surface Duo? We may never know. All of this to say, the movie could have been better.
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