'You get chills': Chris Evans reflects on 8 years of playing Captain America, wrapping 'Endgame'

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Chris Evans admits he felt "a little apprehension" when initially taking on the mantle of Steve Rogers, aka Captain America.

Eight years and seven movies later (not to mention a few cameos), that sentiment is hard to believe, given how instrumental Evans has been to the fabric of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Of course, it wasn't his first go-round bringing a famed comic book character to life, with two financially viable but critically panned Fantastic Four movies under his belt.

Playing Cap, though, is a story arc in the 37-year-old actor's career that very likely comes to a close with this weekend's release of Avengers: Endgame. We won't use this space to spoil the events of the epic sequel, but judging from Marvel president Kevin Feige's comments that the MCU's 22nd entry would mark "a definitive end" to the storylines that began 2008's Iron Man and Evans's own farewell note on Twitter, the writing appears to be on the wall for this version of the star-spangled superhero.

"This is kind of the culmination of a really long journey for a lot of people, so yeah, it’s emotional," Evans told Yahoo Entertainment at Los Angeles press day for the Joe and Anthony Russo-directed Endgame (watch above).

"My last day filming I was the only [actor] on set. Obviously we had the Russos and Feige but still just hearing someone say, ‘All right that’s a picture wrap on it.’ You’re just like, ‘Whew.' [Evans grabs his chest.] You get chills. It’s a big thing."

Evans says his growth as an actor the past eight years very much mirrors the growth of Steve Rogers, first introduced as a scrawny WWII army recruit in Captain America: The First Avenger (2011), then super-sized, cryogenically frozen and forced to adjust to modern times and take on Loki (2012's The Avengers), S.H.I.E.L.D. (2014's Captain America: The Winter Soldier), Ultron (2015's Avengers: Age of Ultron), Iron Man (2016's Captain America: Civil War) and Thanos (2018's Avengers: Infinity War and 2019's Endgame).

"There was a bit of a parallel between myself and the character in ways. I think [Cap] has — not a reluctance — but feels a little bit out of place at times, and has to kind of adapt a little bit," Evans told us.

Thus that initial apprehension.

"But there’s been such a wonderful community of people that made me feel really welcome and safe and over time it now feels like home," he said. "And in a lot of ways that’s what I think Cap grows into… finding his place."

Avengers: Endgame is now in theaters. Get tickets (or at least what’s left of them) on Fandango.

Watch the cast react to surviving Infinity War:

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