WARNING: There are spoilers ahead for Thunderbolts* and for Captain America: Brave New World! It’s been a big year for Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan), who dropped in on audiences back in February to reveal he was running for the U.S. Congress, was elected by May, only to leave that job behind and join the New Avengers. Screenwriter Joanna Calo just discussed Bucky’s short-lived political career in an interview with Marvel.com. Calo co-wrote the script for Thunderbolts* along with Eric Pearson, who is credited for writing the story. She said that it wasn’t hard to imagine people voting for Bucky, even in the chaotic world of the MCU.
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“All of these people have spent their lives trying to make the world better, and they’re also trying to come to terms with the bad they have done in the past,” Calo said. ” That is what all of our characters are trying to figure out. I really loved the idea that Bucky is still genuinely trying to figure out how to make the world a better place, but he doesn’t fit in. After the terrible thing happened to him almost a hundred years ago, he really hasn’t fit into life. He’s always been out of time. So, that’s where he finds himself in Congress.”
“People would vote for him!” she went on. “If you saw Bucky Barnes on the ballot, you’d probably vote for him! But he feels like he doesn’t really have the skills, and he feels like it’s not enough. I love that first scene with him where he doesn’t know how to talk to the reporters. He doesn’t have all the moves yet. I thought that was very charming.”
This was Calo’s first time working on the MCU, though her other credits are impressive enough on their own — she wrote on the acclaimed Netflix original series Beef, and is a co-showrunner on Hulu’s The Bear as well. However, it doesn’t appear that Calo or Pearson are responsible for pushing Bucky into politics, as neither of them contributed to the story or script for Captain America: Brave New World. Even then, we have to assume the five writers credited for that movie were taking notes and directions from Marvel Studios producers in order to tie all these stories together.
Bucky’s brief career in congress has been a bit divisive among fans, despite how little it ultimately impacted the action. Bucky has not run for congress in Marvel Comics, and to some, the idea felt a little out of place in the MCU. To others, it felt a little to close to home, as the idea of celebrities and public figures taking a hand in politics is not too foreign in the real world these days.
Bucky’s charm, altruism, and charisma may have served him well in a political campaign, but it’s easy to imagine the issues raised against him as well. His history as a foreign spy might render him ineligible for office, and would certainly create security concerns among voters and colleagues. Some fans simply wished the MCU had put more of these debates on screen rather than cutting the political story short.
Now, it seems like Bucky’s political career is over already, as he is a full-time member of The New Avengers in the Thunderbolts* post-credits scene. The movie is still playing in many theaters now.
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(Photo by Bruce Glikas/Bruce Glikas/FilmMagic)
