But, hey, did you know that Steve could have picked up that ol' hammer any dang time he wanted to, from
Age Of Ultron up to its destruction in
Ragnarok? The Russos would like you to, apparently, making clear in the interview a point that the movie itself leaves happily ambiguous: Captain America has always been worthy in their minds; he's just chosen not to pick up Mjolnir in the past because it would have made Thor feel bad. (And robbed the franchise of a big damn heroic moment several years down the line, of course.)
To be fair, the Russos didn't write
Avengers: Age Of Ultron, where the famous hammer-lifting scene—in which it moves just a smidge when Steve "tries" to lift it—takes place, so the only true answer to the question is presumably floating around in Joss Whedon's head. Still, they've been stewards of the character—and through him, the wider MCU—since
Captain America: The Winter Soldier, so it's not like you can easily contradict them when they say Cap was sandbagging and
chose not to haul the hammer around for years. Which is a bummer, both because it's a less narratively interesting choice—isn't it cooler if Steve achieved worthiness over the course of
Civil War and its complicated, grief-filled aftermath, rather than just inherently possessing it?—and because it deprives fans of the chance to argue about when he became worthy, or what, exactly, Thor means when he yells, "I knew it!" in the aftermath of the big reveal. (You might not have caught that line, though, because again: big screaming point.)
