Anthony Mackie Says Jeremy Renner 'Never Looked at Himself as a Victim' After Snowplow Accident (Exclusive)

Anthony Mackie, who stars in the new movie 'Captain America: Brave New World,' opens up about his friend and fellow Avenger

Anthony Mackie is reflecting on fellow Avenger Jeremy Renner’s frightening 2023 snowplow accident.

In an interview with PEOPLE, Mackie, 46 — who first starred with Renner in 2008’s The Hurt Locker before they both joined the Marvel Cinematic Universe — says his friend “never looked at himself as a victim” after he nearly died on New Year’s Day two years ago.

Renner, 54, was hospitalized in critical condition and nearly immobile after being crushed by a seven-ton snowplow at his property near Reno on Jan. 1, 2023. The area near Renner’s mountain vacation home had weathered a blizzard, so the actor hopped into the vehicle to clear the area and tow his car from an icy road.

At one point when he jumped out of the snowplow he got caught underneath. Renner suffered life-threatening blunt chest trauma, resulting in a collapsed lung, a lacerated liver and more than 30 broken bones.

Related: Anthony Mackie Says These Two Actors Send the ‘Smartest’ Memes and Texts in the ‘Lively’ Avengers Group Chat (Exclusive)

“When I got the news, I was really surprised and just hurt that my friend was going through this. So the first thing I thought was, ‘I need to be by his side,’ ” says Captain America: Brave New World star Mackie, who was one of the first to visit Renner in the hospital.

“Once he started getting back up and around, I would get progress reports from either him or his family once a week. And Renner's funny. He's here all broken up and all disheveled, and he is like, ‘Oh, I hate this s---.’ And I'm like, ‘Dude,’ ” continues Mackie.

“It was great to see him keep his spirits and the way he worked through it,” says Mackie. “He's the pure definition of a strong human being. He never let himself get down. He never looked at himself as a victim." 

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“It was really beautiful to see him work through that and become whole again. Now he's a cyborg. He's Cyborg Renner!” jokes Mackie.

Months after the accident, Renner, who needed a metal plate in his face to reconstruct his partially collapsed eye socket, as well as a rod in his leg to stabilize broken bones, joked in an Instagram post that he felt like “the Tin Man."

“I've decided to push through the pain of progress (this damn shattered tibia) and take the new parts for a tiny test drive," he wrote. "The body is miraculous…. Even though I feel like the Tin Man, needing oil for all my new joints (hips, knees, ankles, tibia etc.)."

Captain America: Brave New World is in theaters Feb. 14.

For more on Anthony Mackie, pick up the new issue of PEOPLE.