#anti russos

[german-garbage]

Nothing more cringe than killing off tony stark just to bring his actor back as another character.

[lucianalight]

WHAT DO YOU MEAN THAT RDJ IS GOING TO PLAY DOOM!?!?!? IF HE COULD COME BACK FOR THE FRANCHISE WHY DID YOU KILL TONY THEN? AND WHY RUSSOS ARE COMING BACK? UGHHH

[captainwidowspring]

An excerpt from my Captain America music paper, for I just made a seriously disgusting discovery:

"The other appearance of the breaking-up-of-the-Avengers theme is during the Siberia fight, where it is played twice. The first time it plays is when Friday tells Tony, “You can’t beat [Steve] hand to hand,” and it continues as Tony tells Friday to analyze his fight pattern and she does it, up until Friday says, “Countermeasures ready,” and Tony grabs Steve’s shield. The second time it plays is shortly after Steve disables Tony’s suit, and shortly before Steve, exhausted and injured, slides off Tony’s suit and onto the ground; this plays until Steve helps Bucky off the ground and starts to walk away with him. Now, as the previous use of the Avengers-breakup theme helps show that Civil War was more of an Avengers movie than a Cap movie, this use actually happens to show how the film is more of an Iron Man movie than either of those other two. For considering that the theme was obviously meant to have the most impact after Steve broke the arc reactor, the fact that it first shows up a little before then is quite notable: and when exactly it shows up is very revealing. It first appears when Tony does not exactly have the upper hand (though Steve is doing no damage despite pummeling Tony’s suit), but then it stops when Friday allows Tony to get the upper hand over Steve and seriously hurt him, and then it resumes again when Steve is able to thwart Tony and disable his suit.

Such use of the music that symbolizes the Avengers team splintering seems to be the movie implying that if Tony had won the fight, whatever fracture the Avengers were experiencing would be less severe, but it is solidified now that Steve won the fight. Now, this is very much not true, as the entire Siberia fight was literally Tony trying to kill Bucky because he was upset, while Bucky tried to avoid this and Steve defended Bucky: and while Tony did some really despicable things throughout the movie, successfully killing Bucky and/or Steve while he was having a temper tantrum is something he would never be able to come back from. But considering the lengths the movie went to to try to make it seem like Tony was justified in doing this and not acting monstrously, it is not surprising that these fraudulent efforts extended to the music. And curiously, the Avengers-breakup theme does not play when Tony provokes Steve into dropping the shield, even though that is much more symbolic of the Avengers breaking up than Steve preventing Tony from killing him and Bucky. But that, too, might have painted Tony in a bad light, and the movie avoided such a thing at all costs. Civil War is seriously messed up."

Truly, the more one examines this mockery of a Captain America film, the more it becomes clear just how thoroughly rotten this movie is, and how it is most definitely not Cap 3.

[alwida10]

Sometimes I forget that it was civil war that really set the course for the MCU‘s downfall. And then I see pics like these.

The Russos had a favorite fraction and it shows.

[lokiinmediasideblog]

Sadly it did kill loki to kill abt thor. But can we just see loki caring abt thor with him living for once. I was so excited at the end of ragnarok and iw ruined everything

Not sure what words were meant in the first sentence, but I agree with the rest.

[skipperauroras]

I heard the Russo brothers are working on a Live-Action Hercules inspired by Tiktok or something... and as you know despise the Russo brothers. Disney just keeps getting worse and worse... I swear if they touch Hades and ruin him and do cruel things like they did with Loki, I'm going to throw hands! They better not write Meg wrong, either! Knowing how they did Natasha dirty by killing her off, I still don't forgive them for killing her, either...

[hey-rissyroo]

Absolute 💯 Proof that Steve & Bucky were, are and will forever be True Loves, Best Friends, Soulmates, OTP, Boyfriends, Husbands and Loves of Each Other 's Life! 💖 NOTHING and NO ONE can say otherwise, Dammit!!!!!

[levelofyoureye]

lmao so i was just going through my camera roll and clearing some photos out, when i stumbled across this screenshot i took in january of 2020 and…

i’m in shock. i literally don’t know how i forgot this happened, like i was actually astounded when i found this. NEVER forget when steve rogers’ ending was so horrifically out-of character that SEBASTIAN STAN HIMSELF posted a screenshot to instagram of a tweet dogging on his ending. it’s been years and i still haven’t forgiven marvel. i don’t think i ever will.

[captainwidowspring]

A Thorough Analysis of Civil War's First Trailer

So I was inspired by this post to watch the first Civil War trailer, and I was intrigued, for the trailer seemed to promise a much better movie than what we actually got. Therefore, I decided to compare stuff in that trailer to stuff in the finished movie, and what I found was very revealing. For Civil War, despite the title, is very much not a Captain America movie: and this trailer provides some insights into how it came to be so. It offers multiple insights into what we were robbed of, and how exactly the movie was maliciously turned against Steve and his friends. Indeed, the sheer extent to which the movie has been twisted is truly enraging. This is going to be rather long, so get ready:

The first thing that is shown in the trailer is the scene of Steve, Bucky, and Sam in the warehouse after Bucky wakes up. Steve asks pleadingly, "Buck, do you remember me?" And after Bucky gives his response, Steve is shown with an expression of pure relief and joy and hope. This is in sharp contrast to what we got in the actual movie. In the actual movie, Steve asks almost accusingly, "Which Bucky am I talking to?": and his expression after Bucky's answer is significantly muted. It is clear that the change here was done to both downplay Steve and Bucky's relationship, and try to make Bucky less sympathetic. First of all, Steve went from "Buck" to "Bucky" which while still a nickname is much less familiar. Second of all, the change in question is quite telling. The original question—"Do you remember me?"—is very eager and hopeful, and indicates a clear trust that Bucky is not dangerous. The new question, on the other hand—"Which Bucky am I talking to?"—is much more resigned, and implies that there is a good chance that Bucky is dangerous and not in control of himself.

There is another difference between the two clips that is quite noteworthy. In the trailer, right after Steve says "Buck," there is a pause, and a nicely centered, well-lit shot of Bucky looking attentively at Steve is shown before he continues. In the finished movie, however, Bucky is not shown until Steve finishes his question: and the shot of Bucky is noticeably darker, and he is crammed into the side of the frame, and unlike the trailer his face is turned away from the camera and obscured by his hair. This was clearly done to try to make Bucky seem more dangerous, and prevent the audience from trusting him.

The trailer conversation continues as follows:

Steve: You're a wanted man.

Bucky: I don't do that anymore.

Steve: Well the people who think you did are coming right now. And they're not planning on taking you alive.

Once again, this is in sharp contrast to the conversation in the finished movie:

Sam: Just like that, we're supposed to be cool?

Bucky: What did I do?

Steve: Enough.

Bucky: Oh, God, I knew this would happen. Everything Hydra put inside me is still there. All he had to do was say the godd—n words.

It's clear that the change here was once again to make Bucky less sympathetic. Intriguingly, based on the trailer, it seems like the words might originally have been less of a factor, and Bucky ended up in the warehouse for a different reason. But besides that, the conversation is also much more compassionate. Bucky was given a chance to explicitly say, "I don't do that anymore," confirming that he has thoroughly rejected what Hydra tried to make him into, and Steve's subsequent response—"the people who think you did are coming right now,"—emphasizes Bucky's innocence and the fact that he is being targeted and endangered for something he didn't do. This is not brought up in conversation in the finished movie, however. Bucky is not allowed to bring up the fact that he's not the Winter Soldier anymore, and the fact that he is being wrongfully hunted is ignored as well. Instead Sam immediately asks, "Just like that, we're supposed to be cool?"—as if Bucky had done something wrong when he was literally just mind controlled—and when Steve tells Bucky that he did "Enough," which emphasizes Bucky's guilt rather than his innocence, Bucky responds, "Everything Hydra put inside me is still there," which clearly implies that he has not in fact changed at all from his Winter Soldier days.

But what's really interesting is that dialogue that is very similar to the warehouse conversation actually does appear in the finished movie, just in a different place: in the apartment in Bucharest. Here is that conversation, with Sam's comments removed for clarity:

Steve: You know me?

Bucky: You're Steve. I read about you in a museum.

Steve: I know you're nervous. And you have plenty of reason to be. But you're lying.

Bucky: I wasn't in Vienna. I don't do that anymore.

Steve: Well the people who think you did are coming here now. And they're not planning on taking you alive.

This indicates a substantial reshuffling of scenes, because much of that dialogue was clearly intended to be in the warehouse; we have several clear shots of Steve in the warehouse speaking those lines. Also, Steve's line changes from "coming right now" to "coming here now" which implies that in the first instance, the pursuers didn't know their location, and if they were in the warehouse that would make sense. So this doesn't seem to be just a case of the trailer being intentionally misleading. And, just as with the changes to the warehouse conversation, these changes afforded the movie a chance to downplay Steve and Bucky's relationship and cast doubt on Bucky. For example, Steve's earnest "Buck, do you remember me?" has been changed to just a flat, quick "You know me?" The question has been altered to make it much less personal, and to deemphasize their history. Also, Bucky being allowed to say that he's not the Winter Soldier anymore is now moved to before the events of the warehouse, so that once the words become a factor the movie can continue to insinuate that he's dangerous. In addition, while Steve is still allowed to draw some measure of attention to Bucky's innocence, Bucky immediately responds to the revelation that he's being wrongfully attacked with "That's smart. Good strategy," so that his attackers receive a measure of validation also. It certainly did not seem like he was going to respond thus in the warehouse; if he had, it would have been an abrupt and jarring change of tone. The clear and concerted attempt to slander Bucky, and Steve by proxy for believing in him, is quite heinous.

The next thing that does not appear in the finished movie comes a little bit later. There is a clip where Bucky is shown for a second before a car passes him and then he disappears—the background is clearly Bucharest—and then it cuts to Steve looking out a window in Lagos. Given the discrepancy of location, as well as the fact that Lagos came before Bucharest, this might just have been the trailer being intentionally misleading. After all, following The Winter Soldier many people wanted to see more of Steve and Bucky's relationship, and Marvel knew of this: but since with everything else that went on in Civil War there wasn't much time for that, they might have put some quick extra footage in the trailer to lure people in.

However, it is also equally possible that this was something that actually was supposed to be in the movie but then got cut. After all, based on the warehouse dialogue, some scenes did get reshuffled: and later in the trailer we are shown Steve jumping off a truck to get a boost into the building instead of being lifted up by Wanda, and there are more assailants when he gets in the building, and there does not appear to be any gas. In addition, unlike the second trailer we are not given any hints of Rumlow's explosion, so it's possible that Lagos was not originally meant to be the inciting incident for the Accords, and that it did actually originally come after Steve saw Bucky in Bucharest. And indeed, the footage the trailer gives of Steve looking out that window never appeared in the final film; he is clearly looking out the window quite yearningly, not in the cool and collected manner of someone gathering information for a mission. So either Lagos was a scene that got moved in the reshuffling, or that footage was shot with the sole intention of tricking people into thinking Civil War would feature more of Steve and Bucky's relationship.

The next difference can be seen in a bit of audio. Natasha says, "I know how much Bucky means to you," unlike in the movie where she says, "I know how much Barnes means to you." And this appears to have been a change that was made fairly late in the game: in the movie, Scarlett Johansson pauses briefly before saying "Barnes" indicating that this was not what she was used to saying. Such a change once again intentionally serves to try to distance the audience from Bucky, and make them care about him less. So we're seeing a clear pattern here.

The next change is significantly more alarming. While Natasha is saying, "Stay out of this one. Please," a shot of Steve standing where he went after he found out about Peggy's death is shown. Now, there are two things this could mean: either 1) Marvel knew that people wanted to see more of Steve and Bucky’s relationship in Civil War, but since the end product didn’t have much to offer they put an unrelated scene in the trailer to trick people, or 2) that scene actually was originally intended to be about Bucky, and Peggy’s funeral was something that was added later. It's hard to tell which one it could be. Again, it is possible that this was done with the express intention of tricking people. However, again, it is also possible that this was something that got changed. Steve looks much more clearly upset in the movie than the trailer: and it's entirely possible that Steve's message on the phone was supposed to be something about Bucky, and Peggy's funeral was something that ended up replacing this. After all, it's not like Peggy's funeral had much impact on the plot; its main purpose appeared to be to both remind people that Steve was supposed to have had a romance with Peggy, and to set up his romance with Sharon. (And none of this was hinted at in the trailer.) Stucky shippers have long speculated that the Staron romance in Civil War was fueled by gay panic, and it appears that they might have been right. Whatever the situation was, however, such shenanigans are truly despicable and disgusting.

(Shortly afterwards, in response to an argument Tony made about the Accords, Steve is heard saying "That's not the way I see it," and this is immediately followed by Tony saying "Sometimes I want to punch you in your perfect teeth." I don’t think this was intentional, but such an exchange perfectly sums up how Tony acts for pretty much the entire movie.)

Soon afterward is another interesting change. Footage from the scene in Bucharest where the police in the helicopter shoot at T’Challa and Bucky is shown, but then instead of T’Challa and Bucky, the target appears to be Steve. The clip that is supplied here is clearly from the portion of the movie that includes Bucky meeting Zemo and Bucky's subsequent escape, based on the clothes Steve is wearing, as well as the fact that it looks like Steve is in front of the damaged helicopter. It looks like the helicopter is hanging off the launch pad with the front end sticking up, and there is a bullet hole in the front window. Now, this is quite distinctly not from the finished movie; the helicopter is not pierced by bullets in the film, and it is never seen hanging in such a position. However, more footage from the finished movie is shown immediately afterward; Steve is shown pushing himself up after a bunch of excitement, and the helicopter is behind him on its side. Given this, I'm not sure why the other clip was in there. For even then it doesn’t seem like they were planning on using it, and it is very different from what happens in the movie, with the biggest difference being that Steve and Bucky are alone on the roof. I guess maybe they wanted to make it seem more like Hydra might be involved somehow, because that would make it somewhat more of a sequel to The Winter Soldier than the actual movie was, and a sequel to The Winter Soldier was what people were expecting. So again, either Civil War really was originally going to be more of a Captain America movie, or that footage was shot with the sole intent of deception.

Shortly afterward there is another interesting clip. It is very brief, but there is a shot of Bucky running with a terrified expression on his face, followed by a spray of bullets on the ground, presumably what he is running from. This was seemingly supposed to be part of the Bucharest chase sequence. Once again, however, it does not appear in the finished movie. We are actually given very few shots of Bucky's face throughout the finished chase sequence, and in all but one of these he looks determined rather than afraid. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, but considering all the other Bucky slander the movie ended up having, it does not feel like this was done with good intentions. Bucky is apparently not allowed to feel fear—he can only be determined or startled—because if he was allowed to be afraid, more people in the audience might realize that he has feelings too, that he wasn't having a very good time of it either, and the wrongness of the situation might be emphasized. All of which is stuff Civil War was apparently allergic to, in its quest to treat him like dangerous damaged goods. It seems like once again this was a thing to show Bucky's side of the story that was purposely taken away.

Following this there are two more indications that Lagos might have originally been substantially different. One is the fact that, shortly after Steve’s “We fight,” line is heard, a few clips of Natasha’s scenes in Lagos are shown. This sort of implies that she was going to help him with the aforementioned fight. Again, this might have just been the trailer being misleading: but since there were already several scenes that indicated that Natasha was going to be opposed to Steve for some portion of the movie—Steve asking her, “Are you going to arrest me?”, her line, “you know what’s about to happen, do you really want to punch your way out of this?” and the fact that she was not in Team Cap’s charge—it’s not like the fact that she wasn’t with Steve for a large part of the movie was going to be a surprise. The trick here would just be making people believe that at some point she was going to rejoin Steve and fight with him, instead of turning on Team Iron Man at the last minute and then disappearing from the movie shortly afterward. But if it wasn’t a trick, maybe Lagos actually was originally supposed to come later in the movie, and she was going to be reunited with Steve for that.

The other possible indication is the fact that another bit of deleted footage is shown. Steve is seen running and then an explosion goes off, and based on the background he is in the spot where in the movie he gets blown out of the building by Rumlow: but that does not happen in the trailer, the brunt of the explosion misses him and he is able to keep running. (And him getting blown out of the building is shown in the second trailer.) This is a further implication that Lagos might originally have been different. I guess if it was, the question is whether at the time of the trailer's release they were still intending to use that footage, or if they had already decided not to but showed it anyway.  

The final change is the fact that footage from a deleted scene (that we have access to) shows up in the trailer. Now, bits of deleted scenes being featured in trailers is not unheard of, and the clip itself doesn’t really show much; all it shows is Natasha on top of a storage container watching an explosion. However, comparing that clip with deleted clips from other trailers is quite revealing. In the second Iron Man 2 trailer, for example, two clips from deleted scenes are shown; one from the deleted opening where Pepper kisses Tony’s helmet, and one from the deleted scene where Tony is with Natasha at the party. It is not surprising that these scenes got cut, though, because the ideas these clips’ scenes conveyed were also expressed elsewhere. We got plenty of other Tony and Pepper interactions that showed their dynamic, and the same is the case with Tony and Natasha. However, in the scene the clip in the Civil War trailer is from, Natasha sees how violent the rest of Team Iron Man is being and becomes upset; presumably, seeing this pointless violence is why she later switched sides. But in the movie, no similar indications are given for her change of heart. In the movie it’s framed like she was fully intending to stop Steve, but then realized at the last second that she couldn’t and let him go. So while Iron Man 2 got rid of clips that were fairly redundant, Civil War got rid of a clip that would have supplied valuable information. And the lack of that valuable information appears to be an intentional effort to stifle Team Cap's side of the story, and prevent Team Iron Man from looking bad.

That is all the changes there are, but there is one other thing. One of the last things shown in the trailer is the "He's my friend/So was I," exchange. This is also what is said in the movie: but the fact that the trailer so prominently featured Steve and Bucky's relationship helps highlight just how ridiculous that exchange is. I wonder if that is another reason why Bucky and Steve's relationship was so carefully downplayed.

Now, again, considering that this is just a trailer, it is hard to tell how much of the stuff that was shown was originally supposed to be in the movie, and how much of it was the trailer being purposely misleading. After all, trailers are deceitful all the time, and the second trailer was also cut in deceptive ways. However, unlike the first trailer it does not show anything that is substantially different from the finished movie: so considering the abundance of unused footage in the first trailer, there very well might have been significant changes made after that trailer's release. Indeed, this film was supposed to be a sequel to The Winter Soldier before it became Iron Man 4, so it might have originally been less of a clown show. A sequel to The Winter Soldier is certainly what most people were expecting. It’s just hard to tell whether there had originally been more of an effort to make one, or whether the trailer was just stringing people along.

In conclusion, looking at the differences between the first Civil War trailer and the actual movie is quite revealing. The Russos said in the director's commentary that in making the film, the hardest thing for them to do was "to balance the characters, and constantly recalibrate, through the writing, through the acting, through editorial, to make sure you could walk out of the movie, and really be conflicted,”: and even with the few changes the first trailer gives us insight into, it is clear that this involved arranging things to purposely minimize Steve and Bucky's relationship, curtailing Bucky's role in the movie and making him look as unfavorable as possible, and deleting things that would either make Team Iron Man look bad or make Team Cap more sympathetic. Civil War was billed as a Captain America film, but considering how deliberately the movie was turned against him and his friends, it is quite clear how untrue that is.

Truly, it is exceedingly tragic that the third Captain America movie was turned into the Iron Man 4 mess it ended up being, when it should have been a continuation of everything that was set up in The Winter Soldier. And based on the fact that the first trailer seemed to promise those things, as well as the fact that even the second trailer was cut to make it look like Bucky would have a bigger role and Natasha would reunite with Steve (though Sam was largely left out), the makers of Civil War knew exactly where they were falling short. But unfortunately, they made no efforts to repair such deficiencies, and even now we are still waiting for Cap 3.

[eddiediazismyhusband]

9-1-1 Tweets Part Eight

• other installments under the cut •

(Part One) (Part Two) (Part Three) (Part Four) (Part Five) (Part Six) (Part Seven) (Part Nine) (Part Ten)

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Josh is so wrong about tommy and the pre glee world of it all - man was engaged to Abby in roughly 2015-17/18 Glee finished in 2015. So Tommy came out in the post glee world.

Now he might’ve been aware he was gay and using Abby as a beard during the glee era, and yes he was in the military during don’t ask don’t tell and working under Gerrard after that, but let’s not pretend for any minutes that he was fighting in the trenches of the pre glee world with his fellow queer population. Because he wasn’t, so sorry Josh but I do get to judge tommy - he treated Abby appallingly and while she had a lot of red flags, Tommy has way more and that is not ok.

[swiftiesbuddie]

Josh: Do you see a future with him?

Buck: … yeah

[cherishingstydia]

Gonna manifest some things:

Canon buddie, Ravi main, Karen main, May main, Albert comes back, Chris coming home, buddie roommates, Henren get Mara back, Tommy leaving, Gerrard dies, Josh gets a nice boyfriend.

[captainwidowspring]

This is a very thoughtful bit of work. I like, for example, how you drew attention to the fact that the writers only cared about Sharon as a love interest. This is further emphasized when it is remembered that at one point the intention was to show Steve and Sharon in a relationship together in Infinity War, but make it clear that it was not working out. They literally considered putting Sharon with Steve for the sole purpose of breaking them up, so that they could act like Steve was having issues in the future, and more easily send him back to Peggy. I also like how you mentioned Peggy's mistreatment. I strongly dislike Peggy—she is not a good character, and honestly the ending was believable for her, wanting Steve to herself was not out of place—but it was still wrong of the movie to treat her the way it did, like she was nothing more than an object.

Indeed, I agree with most of this. There are only two things I disagree with. One is the assertion that "Steve went to war with the Avengers out of love for Bucky." Now, there are two issues with that statement. One is just a small flaw in the wording; Steve had multiple Avengers on his side who supported what he was doing, so characterizing the conflict in Civil War as "war with the Avengers" is simply not true. But the other issue is that the main conflict in Civil War was not about Bucky. It was about the Accords, and Steve expressed his problems with them well before Bucky entered the picture. The airport fight was not about Bucky, either; it was about Team Iron Man trying to prevent Team Cap from going to Siberia to stop the other Winter Soldiers. The only major role Bucky played in this was supplying the information about where to go. And while the final fight was about Bucky, the only one attacking him was Tony, and the fight had literally nothing to do with the rest of the movie. Civil War was not about Steve "going to war with the Avengers out of love for Bucky", it was about conflicts caused by the Accords and Tony's problems. Steve and Bucky were just along for the ride.

And there is something else I feel is worth remarking on. You say at the end that "It is neither a joke nor an exaggeration to say that the trajectory of Captain America throughout the MCU was ruined at the very last possible second by the straight agenda." This is very much not true, however. For there was also a straight relationship that Endgame actively sought to smother: Romanogers.

Endgame's ending elicited no great cry of outrage from Romanogers shippers, unlike the Stucky shippers, because Natasha was dead by the time Steve went back to the past, so he wasn't abandoning her the way he was with Bucky (and Sam). But if you think about it, killing off Natasha in the first place made literally no sense. There are multiple reasons why this is so. The most obvious one is the fact that she had a movie slated after Endgame, but there are others. For one thing, it would have made a lot more narrative sense for Clint to sacrifice himself. He killed a lot of people after the Snap happened, after all, so sacrificing himself to bring everyone back would be a nice narrative resolution to this. Indeed, Clint even expressed a desire to sacrifice himself for just that reason. Of course, death is not the only way to atone for such a thing, but it does give him a motivation to sacrifice himself beyond a general desire to revive everyone, and make it a symbolically significant gesture. As it was, Natasha ended up being the one to sacrifice herself simply because she was the better fighter.

But also, nobody had to die. There are plenty of ways that Clint and Natasha could have obtained the Soul Stone without sacrificing themselves, this being just one example. That way, all six of the original Avengers would have been present for the final battle, which would have been the optimal state of things.

Even putting that aside, however, there is something else to consider: Natasha (or Clint) could easily be brought back! The Avengers only needed the soul stone for the reverse snap, after all, and it was returned afterward. By the film's logic, a soul for a soul, returning the soul stone should have revived the soul who bought it. McFeely even said, when trying to explain why Natasha couldn't be brought back, "But that’s the everlasting exchange. You bring her back, you lose the stone." Despite the quote's intended purpose, this indicates that returning the stone would indeed restore the person who sacrificed themselves, in this case Natasha. So there was literally no reason for her to stay dead.

No reason, that is, other than the problems it would present to Steve's ending, for it would cause many. For instance, since Natasha couldn't stay in the past with Steve because they wanted him with Peggy, she would show up on the time machine alone: and then there would be someone for the characters to ask where Steve had gone, and the creative team would then have to answer some uncomfortable questions about what they made Steve do, or else blatantly and obviously dodge them. Also, it would throw into sharper relief how Steve was just randomly abandoning his friends. Bucky and Sam he was able to just ghost, since he didn't have to face them until he was super old, but in order for Natasha to come to the future without him, he would have to directly say to her, "Go, and I'm not coming with you." (Or pretend he was going with her and then just not do it, which would be even worse.) Even if this was not shown, it would be pretty evident that such a thing happened. It would then be a lot harder to pretend that Steve's ending had anything to do with love, and ignore the whole "Steve suddenly just abandoned everyone" aspect. (And in that case, the Romanogers shippers would probably be just as outraged as the Stucky shippers.)

Indeed, considering how adamantly the movie insisted that Natasha was permanently gone, it really seems like the creative team of Endgame killed her off because she was in the way of Steve's reunion with Peggy. This is especially apparent when one considers the multiple concerted slights of Romanogers that occurred throughout the movie. They had that unnecessarily long shot at the beginning of Natasha observing Steve looking at the compass, for example, and then when Steve visited Natasha at the compound later, it was carefully insinuated that he didn't visit often. Also, during the visit he acted like he didn't know her at all, and literally suggested to her face that the work she was doing was not important. And it's definitely not an accident that Bruce mentioned that he failed to revive Natasha right before Steve left, as if she was permanently gone, even though there was absolutely no reason why returning the soul stone should not have brought her back.

If Marvel was simply desperate to put Steve in a straight relationship, they could easily have forced him together with Sharon, or else taken advantage of Romanogers instead of purposely trying to put it down. Steve's ending wasn't ruined by a straight agenda, it was ruined by a specifically Steggy agenda.

And then Steve's ending sucks and is bad.

Steve's ending infuriated a lot of Stucky shippers for obvious reasons. But. Like. Here's the thing: From a filmmaking standpoint, the Stuckies are right. Sending Steve back in time just doesn't work for multiple reasons, both in and out of universe.

This is going to be a longie.

#1 - Time Travel Doesn't Work That Way

The first problem is the in-universe one. This ending is so busted that the directors and writers actually have separate interpretations of what happened, and they're both wrong.

According to the directors, Steve created a parallel timeline where he's lived with his Peggy. He used the time machine to return to this timeline and go to that bench, but only once he was super old for, uh, some reason?

Problem is, according to this movie, you can't do that. You can't make a new timeline without removing an Infinity Gem from it, and also making new timelines is bad, remember? Further, the film gives no indication that Steve time traveled here. He doesn't appear on the Quantum platform. He's not wearing his time suit. He's just chilling on a bench, staring at the horizon.

The reason the film gives no indication for how Steve arrived here is because of the writers' interpretation: Steve arrived in the past of this, the main timeline. Steve himself was Peggy's mystery husband back in Winter Soldier. Old Steve has always been here, waiting for this moment.

That's actually worse than the directors' explanation. The movie has been very clear on the point that you can't directly change the past. Even after they prune the timelines, Loki didn't actually escape in 2012. That never happened. The events of the Time Heist never happened, from a historical perspective.

The internal logic of Steve's jaunt doesn't work out, no matter which way you slice it.

#2 - The Future is Scary and You Should Run Away

The second problem is what it does to Steve as a Man Out of Time. The white-hot core of this character direction is that he is an old man living in a world he doesn't recognize, and having to adapt to changing times. That's something we all have to deal with eventually.

So what is Endgame's final statement on Steve's efforts to fit into society? It's that he can't. Trying to live in this world he doesn't know is a futile gesture. In the end, Steve gives up, sinks his head in the sand, and rejects modernity. He embraces the shallow image of a woman he once loved was attracted to and lives out the rest of his days in a reactionary fantasy world.

I guess there is no value in changing and growing to adapt to the new world around you. What a shitty ending.

#3 - To the End of the Line

And finally... yeah. I'm sorry to tell you this, but the Stucky shippers were right. Not necessarily about Steve and Bucky's relationship being canonically romantic. But about Steve and Bucky's relationship being the driving emotional throughline of the entire Captain America trilogy.

In the end, this ending is the epitome of the problem with the way writers write platonic relationships versus romantic ones. Throughout the trilogy, Bucky is the most valuable and important person in Steve's life.

Steve defied orders and officially joined World War II, venturing deep into enemy territory alone, for Bucky. He was ready to die for this man. He laid down his shield and accepted the Winter Soldier's violence out of love for the man behind his eyes, and that sheer unrelenting loyalty brought him back from the monster he was programmed to be. Steve went to war with the Avengers out of love for Bucky.

And whether you take that love to be romantic or platonic, it doesn't change the fact that this is what drives the films. Not Peggy. Never Peggy. The films occasionally pay some attention to Peggy and Sharon, but they aren't actually interested in using these characters as characters.

(In fact, they're so disinterested in Sharon that she drops off the face of the universe in Infinity War and Endgame. Not even a namedrop. The moment the filmmakers decided to send Steve back to Peggy, Sharon ceased to have any value as a character and was consequently erased. They do not care about these women and their stories. The Carters are just the obligatory love interests.)

Instead, Peggy is merely the symbol of what could have been. She represents the life Steve lost, but is barely treated as a person in her own right. She's just a picture in his wallet that he can pine after. She doesn't move the story along, and his feelings for her rarely amount to more than Steve being sad for a little bit and then continuing along with what he was doing.

And this is how it always is. The best friend is the diehard series-defining relationship that moves mountains and saves the universe. And the girlfriend is just there, getting little focus or development. Steve and Bucky prove their importance to each other again and again, but no attention is paid to why Peggy is important. "She's a woman. He's a man. What more do you need?"

I'm not, personally, a Stucky shipper. But "I'm with you to the end of the line," still meant so much to me. This was the emotional core of the Captain America trilogy, right up there with "I can do this all day." Steve suddenly quitting on the future, quitting on Bucky, and running off to bury his face in Peggy's bosom felt like a betrayal of everything the films have ever told us about these characters. Peggy just wins. Because we need to marry him off somehow if we're going to tie up his journey!

It is neither a joke nor an exaggeration to say that the trajectory of Captain America throughout the MCU was ruined at the very last possible second by the straight agenda.

[justanotherbuggysimp]

Doctor Doom is just going to be a Tony Stark fucking variant like oh my God they really can't stop sucking RDJ's racist old ass washed up taint and it SHOWS, so many great potential actors and a BRAND new villain, my FAVORITE COMIC VILLAIN OF ALL TIME and its just a whitewashed Iron Man fucking variant. I hope the MCU continues to crash and burn, they deserve it.

[singitforthegirls]

Okay, I gotta say a thing and this is just how I see things. 🤷

That 6 month anniversary gift?

Wasn't really a gift for Buck. It was a gift for 🗿, because he's the one who likes basketball. Not Buck. And when Buck didn't get that he was joking about taking Eddie & seemed to be considering it instead of him he had to clarify no, Buck had to take him.

Because he used Buck as an excuse to buy those tickets for a thing he enjoys and not what Buck enjoys too. Because 🗿 doesn't listen and everything is about him. His time/energy is more important than Buck's.

Hell, he's out but still bitter that Abby dated a "himbo half her age" after he dumped her and called her crazy for it. 🫠🙃 Like why do you care what she did?

Yes, people can change & get better. It's possible he's not as openly racist as he used to be, etc. He might be trying to be less of a dbag, but boy, those red flags just keep popping up, huh?

Also tv show and everything is put in there for a reason. Or those writers have some big ass red flags themselves. 👀👀

One thing I don't blame him for? The break-up. I get why he did that. No one wants to get hurt, so he was just trying to protect himself from that. Idk, I think that's a very valid reason. And I def think he suspects Buck has feels for Eddie.

Also I get that Josh was trying to be helpful, but lol, he literally just said he didn't know Tommy so he's making A LOT of assumptions there. And Buck being Buck, missunderstands the assignment.

Plus, the whole fear of abandonment thing.

At least 🗿 nipped that in the bud.