Wynterwolf

Yes, I have been aware of who Ronin was since the set pics leaked of JR in the Ronin get up, however long ago that was. They never named him as Ronin, it was kinda more like an easter egg, and I think for the people who would recognize that's who he was, they would have known him from the outfit even if he had shown up in Peoria. I get trying to rationalize 'canon' to something that feels more narratively appealing. I'm still working on ways that Steve did not abandon his "semi-stable" best friend. It's basically what Fanfic was invented to help with when the text lets you down.

You absolutely can assume that. But they didn't show us that. This is more about what they chose to show us. And he was still a serial killer vigilante, regardless of who he killed. That's also an assumption, not a narrative fact. They also may not have had the resources to go spend time trying to find him while he hopped continents, since it seemed like they had their hands full with what they were already dealing with.

The author’s intent is only one perspective once they choose to release it into the wild. I think you can separate out Joss’s unfortunate dialog and still see how hetero-normative bias still very strongly appears to have played a part in why Nat died instead of Clint (especially when viewed within the context of the choices they made for the rest of the movie). They chose to value Clint's nuclear family over Nat's found-family. Clint is the one who chose to become a serial killer, but in the end, he paid no narrative price for that. Here's another pov on Clint's storyline.

I suspect they are all trying desperately to cling to 'plausible deniability'. 🤣

Plus there will probably be more smaller scale content on the D+ service, so the gap might not feel as long? I don't know...

I love this soooo much!!

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Yes, by all means... lets erase every last smidge of queer reading the text had allowed us, because we don't deserve to keep anything! Wee! Sorry, @festivus I do not mean to take my hurt out on you specifically and I know and understand your position, yours was just last post here. After reading some more commentary, it occurred to me that, at its core, this movie is basically like a GGer’s manifesto (i.e. the 'fans' that hounded Kelly Marie Tran off social media) that we’ve been conditioned to see as the default: Bruce/Hulk: Smart, nerdy guys should be celebrated and idolized. Clint: All Asians and Latinx are criminals and should be hunted down like animals (because we are hard wired in our western brain to recognize them as shorthand for criminal. There were seriously no rogue skinhead Hydra/Nazis brutalizing people and taking advantage of the chaos closer to home? And no I don’t think the argument that ‘maybe he did that before we saw him in Asia’ or ‘it was meant imply he was Ronin from the comic’, is valid because it’s not what they chose to show us and this isn’t the comic. I didn’t even recognize this until I saw a black woman commenting on it, this is why diverse journalism is important) Thor: people with mental health issues are weak and pathetic and should be physically abused and ridiculed until they snap out of it. Natasha: must have the cool girl who hangs out with The Men, to show how cool The Men are, because the cool girl loves and supports them. But all she’s good for is to sacrifice herself so The Men can save the day (so she doesn’t rate a funeral or any acknowledgement because she was just a tool to be used and discarded when she wasn’t useful any more). Steve: Champion of Masculinity who is so het he travels through space and time to be with his idolized one true love and trophy wife, so of course he is worthy (so Peggy wasn’t allowed to speak, since she was a prize not a person, and she would have called Steve on his bullshit and sent him home, like she did in WS). Tony: the rich cis het white dude is always the true hero and martyr of any story. But they spruced it up and disguised it really well under a veneer of performative progressiveness: Minuscule lip service to ‘queer rep’ by having an extra say the words “he” and “him”. Genuinely cool “Girl Power” images, and other incredibly cool iconic imagery sprinkled throughout, that were ultimately just a lot of flash with little substance. Stellar performances hid a lot of this too, I think, particularly with Chris H and ScarJo. But once you scrape off all the glitzy makeup, it’s basically a GGer’s wet dream. And it comes across like a highly calculated and effective con job. Even the time travel inconsistencies and conflicting interviews, whether intentional or not, have helped disguise the myriad issues by giving people a puzzle to gnaw on, so they’re distracted by that instead of spending any time exploring the deeper themes and how they were portrayed. I love the ideal of Disney, I grew up in Disneyland’s backyard, but this is just making me feel… so tired. I worked for a globally known company for almost 20 years, so I know that there are good and bad people that work in any large company, but people there made these decisions. And M&M and the Russos, regardless of how they may personally feel, are complicit in this. But literally no one is going to pay any attention to the (cis het abled white) dude behind the curtain, because he put on a really great show and any legitimate criticism has been successfully reduced to, "You just don't understand Quantum Mechanics" or “Stucky shipper are mad because Steve and Bucky didn’t kiss… heh heh heh”. And since this will probably end up being the highest grossing movie in history, there is absolutely no incentive for anything to change, because it’s always just about money. And I absolutely get that examining these kinds of things can make people feel defensive for enjoying them, but there isn’t anything wrong with enjoying it… it was great fun!!! And there are so few fun things to enjoy right now, but at the same time… [insert Will Smith ‘ta da’ meme]. Alright, I think I’ve finally gotten all this out of my system, I just had to get that off my chest and just… say it out loud somewhere. (And oh look! They’re already using the ambiguity of the ending with Steve and Bucky to plug the F&WS D+ series… “maybe we’ll find out more then.” Yeah, no. I reserve the right to change my mind, but as of this moment, I’ll pass because yeah, I really don't want to see Bucky flirt with a Natasha-lookalike. But I would laugh if they are forced into some sort of action because Steve is coming across so badly in certain factions of fandom over his treatment of Bucky and Peggy)

Which is fine, in theory... unless you're part of the fandom that never get's to experience what it's like to be the 'serviced' part, and you're always left with trying to imagine an ending where it does go a way that would be meaningful to you.

Yeah, I mean at this point I think they might even be purposely contradicting themselves, or giving the 'I don't know' or 'I'm not sure' answer, just so it's impossible to created a coherent narrative, kind of like how they used the time travel in the movie to confuse and complicate the plot so in the end, most people are just going, "Oh, fire bad, tree pretty! I cried when Tony died, but Thor was funny, and oh yay, Steve got a happy ending!”

It get's better: They literally made different movies. This would be hilarious if this wasn't about how a multi-million dollar movie was made, that had a tremendous emotional impact on millions of fans. The lack of care and understanding of consequences is staggering. But hey, it made it's billion+ so no one will care, or in many cases even see, the damage that they caused to multiple marginalized fan groups.

I just... WUT? Tony was closest to Thanos BECAUSE THAT'S WHERE YOU PUT HIM. Why are they talking like they had no control of the situation??? I can't...

... but then Nat wouldn't have been able to do the Noble Sacrifice to get the stone. This whole movie was written backwards, determined outcomes first... then they tried to make some sort of story out of it, sort of. And in the places where they really couldn't... wibbly wobbly timey wimey time!!!!

Hey man, whatever helps people get through the night (replacement!Bucky doesn't work for me, but I definitely understand it). And that's okay, if we saw that it was our Steve dancing... my workaround still works. In my scenario, the Peggy, Steve and Bucky from that timeline lived ployamorously ever after, and OldSteve had another ring on his other hand to signify that. 😉

... and like someone else said, when Steve took the Soul Stone back, he should have gotten a soul in return for giving up the power of the stone! Thanos probably could have even gotten Gamora back, if he'd been willing to give up the stone rather than destroy it to keep anyone from undoing what he did. BUT, it you go with my new happy place theory above, Steve did get Nat when he took the Soul Stone back, but took her with him on whatever the hell he's doing. That's my new theory and I'm clinging to it for dear life! I don't want to hate Steve!!!

BWAHAHAHAHA... another crackpot theory. Apologies if someone else has already mentioned something similar, I've tried to keep up with posts, but I know I've missed stuff. OurSteve, leaves Bucky as we saw, telling him he'll be back. Bucky is.,.. not convinced, and he doesn't like being left behind, but he trust's Steve, so he's not going to argue. But our Steve has some sort of CRAZY PLAN (yeah, I have no idea, but... something Steve-like), he goes back in time and returns the stones (maybe, he might actually be trying to use them also), and then goes off to create another universe for Peggy, not with Peggy. He helps her find her Steve (we didn't see the dude's face, right?... he could have been REALLY YOUNG Steve), he helps them find Bucky, he helps all of them stop Hydra, he kicks Howard's ass and tells him to be a better dad, and he helps them be ready for Thanos. They also figure out tech to jump timelines. So then when we see OldSteve, that's actually the Steve from that universe, not our Steve (but he needs them to think he's our Steve, so they don't look for our Steve). That's why he has the shield, because Howard made another one for their Sam and OldSteve hasn't needed it in a long time. And our Steve is still out there somewhere, intending to come back, but he's still doing... something, and he also wants Sam to be able to be Cap, with Bucky's help, but without Sam having to also deal with Steve's shadow. So that's also why he didn't come back right away. But OurSteve, does intend to come back, that's why he tells Bucky that 'it'll be alright'. HA, yes... I think I can live with that. Also, much better than Kidnapped!Steve.

Yeah, absolutely. And they did end up creating a timeline where the snap likely didn't happen when 2014Thanos was dusted. I'd love to see that timeline!

I think the issue would be that they were initially trying not to create any alternate timeline (which they fucked up royally anyway), based on what the Ancient One told Bruce. So their attempt was based on being able to put everything back the way it was (returning the stones once they used them), and then when everything went FUBAR, I guess Steve figured what the hell, he'd make his own too. (Yikes, yeah still bitter... gotta work on that. 😬)

Yeah, sorry I knew that... I just grabbed it from yours, because it was on the same page. 😉

Part of the issue, though, too is that the only "happy ending" they could conceive for Steve (or apparently anyone) was to "have a wife and kids". There are so many more options for a happy life than just that, and they had to twist the story to an extraordinary extent to give him that. As I said, I am genuinely glad for anyone who got what they wanted/needed out of that. But, in the end, it was... uninspired.

Mine too, but I'm still debating. I knew that what happened here would have a huge impact on how I interact with that series, if at all. I knew they were going to no-homo Steve in some way, I just didn't realize they were going to turn him into a completely different character to do it and I'm not sure I can watch Bucky, having that last scene in my head. I'll probably just wait until it's finished and see what they do, before I decide. But I also feel so badly for Sam, because his huge moment was wrapped up in that travesty (If you enjoyed it, I'm sincerely glad for you. I didn't.). That should have been a so much bigger moment and to be honest, I'm far more excited to watch Mackie in Altered Carbon than I am this.

I kinda wonder how this will affect the Falcon & Winter Soldier series. I'm sure it will be fine and it will do well, but I wonder how much better it might have done (viewer-wise) if we'd gotten a different ending here. This ending is the kind of thing that can make a lot of people leave a fandom, because continuing hurts too much. No way to measure this, obviously (without being able to compare alternate timelines), but I'd be curious...

That was one thing they were specific about, changing the past (killing yourself) doesn't change your present, it just creates an alternate timeline. So there would be a branch in 2014 when 2014Nebula died.

Yeah, I brought up something similar earlier... I had him killing AlternaSteve on the Valkyri and then landing it or using the parachute to take over his life. Very HydraCap. And my thought on the timeline jumping is that OldSteve was from far enough in the future of his alternate timeline that a Stark was able to advance the tech of the time travel GPS enough to be able to jump timelines. I'm thinking Morgan is going to be smarter than her mom and dad put together.

Of course Bucky knew, because they needed him to. He had to serve his sole purpose in the narrative they had pulled out of their ass for this move, ironically ignoring some of their own best work. What Bucky knew was that Steve was abandoning him, because he was too broken.