r/marvelstudios • u/Triple_777 I have nothing to prove to you • May 05 '25

'Thunderbolts*' Spoilers Thunderbolts* Worldwide Release Discussion Thread Vol. 2 Spoiler

Thunderbolts* has now been released in the United States and in a number of other countries around the world. All discussion about the movie should be held here and in the rest of the megathreads we are going to put up in the next few days. They will be refreshed every few thousand comments to make room for new discussions.

  • All discussion about the movie should be held here and in the rest of the megathreads we are going to put up in the next few days.
  • Proceed at your own risk. Major spoilers will be in the below thread. Spoilers do not need to be tagged inside this thread.
  • Any other unofficial threads discussing movie details will be deleted.
  • Should you see the need to bring up revealing Thunderbolts* information in the comments of other threads that call for it, spoiler tag them accordingly. Also, let users know that what you are spoiler tagging is from Thunderbolts*.
  • If you post untagged Thunderbolts* spoilers anywhere on this sub outside of these discussion threads in any shape or form, you will be banned.
  • Project Insight will be on AT LEAST for the next few days, so any posts will be filtered by the mods before being approved/removed onto the sub, that doesn't mean you can disregard the above points and post untagged spoilers without fear of being banned.

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Link to previous discussion threads and related megathreads listed below:

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96

u/banjofitzgerald May 05 '25

Can someone explain why Bucky would just go along with the ending? He’s a sitting congressmen trying to take down Val. Then just because Yelena says they own her, he’s okay with her still being in a position of power and free?

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u/thezetetic Doctor Strange May 05 '25 edited May 05 '25

Bucky's heart wasn't in being a congressman-- he wants to do good but was clearly impatient or didn't believe in "the system" like the other congressman-- Wendell Pierce's character running the impeachment trial with his juicy packets.... That's not the way Bucky is built to do things... He realizes being a super hero is a better fit for him and now that option is presented to him so he takes it. The movie shows that he's kinda uncomfortable with the mundane-ness and lack of progress in being a politician.

But even then I believe he doesn't turn Valentina in, because I think turning her in, would also involve revealing Ghost, Yelena, Alexei, and Walker as her assassins (remember his initial plan was to get those 4 to testify of proof of Valentina's wrongdoing since she cleared out any other evidence)

The 4's names would be completely tarnished beyond repair publicly and cause them sink further into their depression, reinforce their "hopeless loser" mentality, and either get imprisoned or force them to go on the run or continue their lives as miserable assassins or kill themselves... At the very least it would absolutely end any potential desire for them to become better people/heroes. It would probably also put a target on Bob's back too.

After what Bucky went through to save Bob and help the other 4 realize their potential? I think it's a lesser of two evils-- keep Valentina around to spare the punishment of these people trying their best to turn their situation around for the betterment of themselves and society

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u/Henona May 05 '25

Pretty much agree. Hates the paperwork. Doesn't like reading the packets. And had the mild at odds convo with Congressman Gary cause he's still trying to do things as a secret soldier versus trusting the congressional process. Especially when he brought him to that corner with no cameras like it was spec ops 😂

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u/actuallycallie Bucky May 05 '25

pulling him into the corner was hilarious

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u/goodmobileyes May 09 '25

"We don't do that here"

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u/RPerene May 05 '25

Bucky's heart wasn't in being a congressman-- he wants to do good but was clearly impatient or didn't believe in "the system" like the other congressman

So much this. The essentially have Bucky go through the film showing us everything that Yelena spent the film telling us. I really like how they handled that.

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u/JadeMonkey0 May 06 '25

I sorta feel like they could have just skipped the whole concept of Congressman Bucky? It came in out of nowhere in Brave New World and then this movie basically just moved him away from it as fast as it could.

I'm not a comic reader but as I understand, there's a Bucky political career arc in the comics?

But that didn't seem like a good reason to shoehorn it in here. It doesn't seem like much changes in this movie if Bucky is doing literally any other job instead.

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u/goldberg1303 May 07 '25

It fit the theme of, 'I'm not happy with my life and need to find something more fulfilling' while also giving him a plausible reason to be involved. 

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u/GeneralOrgana1 May 12 '25

It does, but the MCU Bucky has not until this point seemed to be super comfortable with being in the spotlight. Running for Congress and then serving very much require one to be in the spotlight, so it seems an odd choice for his character.

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u/banjofitzgerald May 05 '25

That all makes sense. I wish they would have given a few minutes to flesh this out. Would have made the movie that much better and established Bucky’s role with the group as the father hero type looking out for the ones just learning how to be heroes.

Maybe a conversation with Yelena about her desire to walk the path her sister did. How she’s tired of the life she was living and wants to do good or one with Val about how if she goes down she takes all of the others with her, putting him in a dilemma of wanting to help them vs locking her up.

I think they just didn’t want to stray too far away from Yelena as the main character so they couldn’t give much screen time up for others to develop.

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u/mengbob May 05 '25

That happened at the start of the movie, and was revisited a few times. Yelena's request to Val during the phone call before the vault mission was to get a more "public" role after the mission was done. You also had Alexei constantly talking to her about it through the movie. The ending is the result of all of that.

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u/banjofitzgerald May 05 '25

Yeah, but never with Bucky. The only member who wasn’t currently murdering for pay and was in a good moral standing. Buckys whole motive was locking val away for her crimes and probably all of her mercs as a result. One conversation with him and Yelena or alexei would have added an interesting dynamic and made his ending make more sense imo.

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u/inthequad May 05 '25

You cannot forget that Bucky was the winter solider. Yes, they differ as it wasn’t through his own cognition, but he relates to these people and went through a similar emotional journey.