I love this moment. Like, they’ve been “back together” in their right minds for, what, five minutes? since 1945 and the dynamic is already coming back.
Steve: Come on, man, fuck’s sake, try harder.
Bucky’s face: Shut the FUCK up Rogers, don’t start with me, I was FINE but NO you show up and bring a FIGHT with you WHY AM I NOT SURPRISED.
actually ive decided that infinity war just needs to be 2.5 hours of peter parker trying his best to address various adult superheroes as politely as possible and struggling a lot. attempts range from “your majesty mr panther sir” (accepted with only a small twitch of the lips & shuri giggling a lot) to “starlord”, which earns him 2 hours of riotous mockery from a talking raccoon
When he gets to Bucky his brain just derails complete. “It’s metal arm dude! Oh wait, I can’t call him that, that’s not polite. Aunt May didn’t raise me like that. Winter Soldier? Nah, no. Mr. Winter? Sounds like Jack Frost. Mr. Soldier? No wait that’s dumb. WAIT isn’t Winter Soldier the name HYDRA gave him? Maybe he doesn’t want to be called that. Mr. Red Star? No wait that’s no, bad, no calling the recovering brainwashing victim by communist symbolism plastered on his arm. Bucky? Mr. Bucky? No that sounds like a person nickname Mr. Captain calls him. Mr Barnes? No wait, didn’t we learn in history he was a Sargent? MR Sargent!”
But what actually comes out is “Mr. Winter Soldier Sargent Bucky Mr. Barnes Red Star Man”
Steve and Sam light up like he just gave them ammunition for the next 20 years. Bucky never lives that moment down. They are careful not to do it when Peter’s around for the first 5 years so as to not embarrass the poor child over his mistake.
Bucky gets revenge by telling Peter that Stark is actually pronounced Stank and Tony will be super impressed if he says it that way
I keep thinking about the huge difference between Bucky asking T’Challa, “Where’s the fight?” and Bucky telling Steve he’s “not bad, for the end of the world.”
Talking to T’Challa he’s upset but resigned, he won’t even meet T’Challa’s eyes as he asks a question he doesn’t want an answer to and braces himself for something he wants nothing to do with.
But when he sees Steve his attitude has completely turned around: he’s grinning ear to ear, his tone is light, he even huffs a little laugh.
I think there are two things going on here. First, Bucky’s never happier than when he’s with Steve. He’s genuinely happy when he sees Steve because he’s always happy to see Steve. He loves Steve.
And that’s the second thing going on here.
Because this is Bucky in full-on you look sad when you think he can’t see you mode. What’s going on here is the same thing that’s going on in The First Avenger when Bucky shouts, “Let’s hear it for Captain America!” and grins at Steve and then the second Steve looks away lets his face fall.
T’Challa is right: Bucky is tired of war. Bucky never wanted to go to war the same way Steve did in the first place, and he certainly doesn’t want any part of it now.
But Bucky loves Steve, and Steve is going to be part of this fight. And if Steve is going to be part of it, Bucky’s going to be part of it too — that’s the promise he made on a front porch and the promise he screamed in a burning warehouse seventy-five years and a lifetime ago.
And he can’t have Steve feeling guilty about that.
So he smiles, he laughs, he jokes. He makes sure Steve knows he’s fine, he’s ready, he has no reservations about being part of this fight. He does everything he can to relieve Steve of any burden of guilt.
Because Steve might not need him to protect his body anymore, but Bucky will never stop trying to protect his heart.
The MCU was trying sell a narrative about Bucky wanting a ‘Simple Life’ after being freed of HYDRA, herding his sheep and goats in the rural Wakanda farmlands… but that entire narrative was wiped away when Bucky grinned at the security dome and said “god I love this place”. And it was beautiful.
Because we all know that Wakanda technology is EXACTLY why Bucky wanted to stay in Wakanda. We all know he spent his days hovering around Shuri, just watching her work in the labs because he wanted to see the technology being built. We all know that Bucky lived in a modern apartment in the city and was in awe of all the tiny technological advances. Bucky probably used his sheepherding money to buy Wakandan tech, too – and it was probably tech that did nothing of importance, Bucky just wanted it because it was cool. He probably couldn’t contain his excitement over dumb stuff like kitchen equipment, and Wakandans found him oddly endearing because of that.
This is the boy who spent his last night before being shipped to the Front at a Stark Expo because he needed to see a floating car. A city in Wakanda is everything pre-war Bucky would have dreamed of a Perfect Future.
Usta jak krew o smaku malinowym 