#that face#he FAILED his mission#not to kill the captain#he’s practically gonna ace that one#but the inbound one that he’s had in him since the day he first met the scrawny kid in brooklyn#protect steve rogers#you ARE my mission#he failed to protect steve rogers#and something inside of him#despite the lack of humanity in him#knows this#so he lets go and falls after steve#protect steve. (via goodbyebucky)
Tag: meta
get a load of this non-standard sidearm configuration – two small-capacity derringer pistols, both strapped at the winter soldier’s (most likely) dominant side:
- top is a COP .357 Derringer pistol, chambered for four .357 Magnum cartridges – it’s a heavy, huge size for a Derringer, but it’s a solid choice for a defensive weapon, often chosen as a back-up piece for law enforcement because of its powerful cartridge
- bottom looks to be an Intratec TEC-38 two-shot polymer-framed pistol, housing .38 Special cartridges – guns this size, this small of a capacity, don’t serve much purpose in distance or combat. they’re meant for close-range (contact-range/point-blank) defensive use, or as a last resort.
given this set-up, these two weapons are the winter soldier’s penultimate and final outs. the COP .357 can get off four shots, enough to take out four attackers if he’s not already disabled or trapped, but he doesn’t appear to be packing anything to reload and both these weapons are a different caliber than his other sidearms.
that 2-shot pistol, that’s the Winter Soldier’s cyanide capsule. that’s his way out – one .38 to the hollow of his jaw is his nuclear option, the one that he probably doesn’t even know is there, the one that’s simmering just below the surface of the mission that’s forced into his mind.
the winter soldier doesn’t lose; but if he did, if he could, if he was –
all assets are disposable.
So, I finally managed to read Bucky’s biography as presented at the Captain America Smithsonian exhibit.
And yes, the “Captured by Hydra, Barnes endured long periods of isolation, depravation and torture“ part certainly got to me, but what really caught my interest was: ”An excellent athlete who also excelled in the classroom”.
Bucky wasn’t all looks and brawn, he was also a good student. He basically had it all, was probably the most popular guy at school, and still chose small sickly Steve Rogers as his best friend.
#no one can tell me that he doesn’t enjoy or relish the mission – not so much the killing part which is the end goal – but the overall proces #the stalking; the finding; the honing; the strategy; calculating his trajectories and picking his weapons and following and executing #the orders to an t; and GIVING orders himself to the men who’d put a bullet in his brain if he so much as twitched #out of protocol; being able to give orders in the first place and being able to decide what gets done next #there’s a level of autonomy he gets running a mission than he gets anywhere else; and it’s only on a mission #that it looks like he really knows what’s going on – every other time he’s a child waiting for a hiding #the winter soldier is not a spy and the winter soldier is not an undercover agent; the winter soldier isn’t an AGENT as in #he has no agency; he probably doesn’t know how to keep himself alive for an extended amount of time without an extraction team #he’s a gun that you just point and shoot; but he’s still a person under that and even if he doesn’t understand it – #he’d relish the agency. he’d relish the momentary freedom he gets no matter how meaningless and small it is
I just realized through a conversation with Ashley that the reasons most people disliked (or still dislike) Skye are the reasons I fell in love with her instantly. It’s also why she is an exceptionally ground breaking character in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.
Skye is not easily defined by her job. She doesn’t have a singular passion or lens through which she looks at the world. She’s young and learning and soaking everything around her in, trying to figure out where her home is and who she is as a person. Skye is Skye first and hacker second.
I feel like every other female (except for Darcy) in the Marvel verse fills a very defined role of ‘bad ass field operative’, ‘science geek’, or ‘administration’. Hell, the majority of them had to go through multiple films (and some are still waiting) to get any definition outside of their profession or role as a love interest at all. Natasha didn’t get it until Avengers (though IMO they only touched on it there and really gave it definition in Winter Soldier), Pepper didn’t really get fleshed out until Iron Man 3 and Maria Hill is still a complete unknown on a personal level.
Agents of SHIELD and Skye were SUCH a fantastic move in the right direction for Marvel in terms of starting out a female character as more than a profession or love interest. Skye was a character that was ill defined in terms of life goals and who she was. We met Skye when she was just beginning her journey. She was our protagonist and as she discovered who she was, we were along for the ride. Basically she was every male protagonist ever. And yet people hated her. And people called her a Mary Sue. And I am not saying there were no problems with the writing or presentation of the character. I know the beginning was a little uneven. But where I saw a diamond in the rough with Skye, most people dismissed her.
The sad fact is, if she was a male character I have no doubt she would have been treated completely differently. She still isn’t treated all that well. A big faction of the fandom treats her as a cardboard stand in for furthering Ward’s character FFS, despite all she has done and how much we have seen her fleshed out. Trip came into the show very similar to the way Skye did in terms of having a backstory connected to the plot, and not being defined by one aspect of who he was. But nobody cried Gary Stu. I wonder why that is?
If a female is skilled at more than one thing, if a female doesn’t fit into a very specific box, then she is considered unrealistic. If a female has a huge impact on the plot AND knows how to do something outside that? Incomprehensible. Never mind that I can close my eyes, spin in a circle and bump into 50 male characters who share those same traits with Skye (and Trip) who are deeply beloved.
When it comes down to it, a lot of the issues people had with Skye come down to the fact that for the first time Marvel no longer decided to baby the male audience and slowly introduce a dynamic female character to them. This time, they threw it in their faces and the fact that Skye is currently on a list titled ‘characters who make us want to punch our television screens’ says it all.
Skye isn’t your scientist. She’s not doing your paperwork and she isn’t beating up bad guys while wearing a tight catsuit. She’s us. And that is why you should love her instead of condemning her for being more than her job or a romantic interest.
she is us. and we don’t have to automatically see that as a bad thing.
Wait, is this…? I had never noticed this
realisation of Steve not needing his help anymore
was this really necessary
It’s also Bucky being more than a little upset that they turned his gentle, harmless friend—who Bucky wanted to PROTECT from the horrors of war—into a fighting machine.
was that really necessary
#*whispers*he’s also probably super annoyed and pissed that it took him going through that procedure for people to give a shit about him#coz bucky saw ‘captain america’ all along#that’s probably most of the anger there man
WAS ANY OF THIS NECESSARY
It’s the realization that not only has Steve been turned into a fighting machine, but Bucky was never able to actually save him from that. The artistic punk that got his ass knocked about in back alleys all over Brooklyn and had big visions for America and what it stood for got dragged into the same war that he did. (I’ve accepted the headcanon that others have produced, which is that Bucky got drafted and then told Steve otherwise to protect him.)
Bucky knew long before Steve that the world was shitty and cruel and that Steve was a specimen that needed to be protected, that his particular brand of grounded idealism was something worth keeping alive, and it was worth everything to keep it alive. He went off to the war, secure in the knowledge that whatever he was doing over here, whatever the mess of war that was fucking him over, whatever demons he would have carried back, it would have been worth it to come back home to Steve being as pure as he was before the war. And instead, the war’s dragged the best thing Bucky’s known into the dirt and grime and horror movie and it’s not just putting him through fighting, it’s going to saddle Steve with a slew of demons that he never deserved.
Bucky never deserved to stay pure, and he never tried. He knew what it took and he knew how to scrap and fight and fuck his way through life because that’s all he was meant for and that’s all he was good for. Steve, though? Steve was different. Steve was what he fought for all his life, was what he was fighting for in the war, was what America should have been fighting for. And instead, they sacrificed him.
So what the fuck does Bucky have left to fight for?
FUCK U SONIA I DIDNT NEED THIS
“Tony Stark ‘not recommended’ “
Everyone watching on t.v. everyone in the street and every person on the helicarrier bridge watched Tony fly that nuke through the portal and every single last one of them cheered when he disappeared from view….except Nick Fury.
For someone who wasn’t recommended, Fury calls on Tony a lot. Nick had told Tony about the Avengers Initiative years earlier. It was Tony they sent in to talk to Ross. It’s Tony whom Fury immediately calls for when the carriers engines go down and it’s Tony that Fury calls for when the nuke is fired. And each and every time, Tony responds instantly.
Nick would have been in his early twenties when Tony was born. Shield would definitely have had Howard Stark’s only child under surveillance, especially when Tony presented with a genius intellect and Nick when he joined Shield, would have had access to those files.. It is no coincidence that Shield just up and had a form of an antidote when Tony had palladium poisoning. This was Shield protecting a future asset. So Fury would have watched as Tony grew up. Watched as he lost his parents, as he forged his own path in the business world, been fully briefed on Tony’s kidnapping. There may be exasperation with Tony but there is respect and a certain fondness too. Fury is smirking with a definite ‘oh my god, this boy’ in the donut shop and he steps up and in between Cap and Tony when Cap gets in Tony’s space and tells him to ‘put on the suit’. He knows how Tony will react to a challenge. Fury’s been watching video of Tony since his birth. He knows this man.
When he tells Tony that the nuke has been fired Fury knows, he knows exactly what Tony will do. He knows that he is sending this man, this man he has watched grow from a child, to his certain death.
So while Shield, the WSC, the people of Manhattan and the rest of the country are celebrating, Fury is mourning. This isn’t the first time Fury has ‘lost a soldier’ and Tony isn’t a soldier but Fury knows he has just lost a good man who had the heart, courage and potential to be one of his best assets. A leader in his fledgling team.
He knows you don’t recommend someone to become a hero, it’s something they simply inherently are.
**
*SOB*
It also explains why Fury and Natasha look like they’re doing that Disappointed Parents Who Got Called To The Principal’s Office About Their Kid thing in Iron Man 2.
I want fic where young Nick Fury babysat wee!Tony before Tony got sent off to boarding school. (Or maybe I’ve read it and don’t remember?)
knitting in the dark 