Sam grapples with whether he should take Captain America’s shield, and seeks out an old contact for advice as we recap The Falcon and the Winter Soldier episode 5, “Truth.” With John Walker on the run for killing Nico, Bucky and Sam team up to take him down, leading to a massive status quo change for the wannabe Cap. Meanwhile, back in Louisiana, Sam’s sister doesn’t want to sell the family boat. And the Flag-Smashers make their move, thanks to a returning super-villain. We break down all the Falcon and the Winter Soldier Easter eggs and comic book references in the episode, from Julia Louis-Dreyfus’s surprise cameo as Contessa Allegra Valentina de Fontaine, to whether she’s playing Madam Hydra, to John Walker’s new shield and much, much more.
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Full Episode Transcript
Alex: Welcome to MarvelVision, a podcast about Marvel, the MCU, and right now, Falcon and the Winter Soldier. I am Alex.
Justin: And I’m Justin.
Pete: And I am Pete.
Alex: And we are talking about the penultimate episode of Falcon and the Winter Soldier, titled Truth. And we are not going to lie all episode long. Just kidding, that was my first lie.
Justin: Oh man. We are liars. Straight up. Two truths and a lie.
Alex: This is a big episode. I know in particular, I think I’ve been pretty down on the show and I still certainly have my quibbles.
Pete: What?
Alex: Yeah. We’ve discussed this every week, Pete.
Justin: Yes.
Pete: No, but I didn’t think, overall, you thought the show was down. I thought you’ve been enjoying yourself.
Alex: I’m having an all right time watching it, but I think it’s a little all over the place in terms of how things are happening. Let me finish what I’m saying. This episode was the best episode so far.
Justin: Yes, I agree.
Alex: That’s what I was getting towards.
Justin: And let me say, I know this is a tired way of talking about it, it’s like a movie. The series is structured like a movie and it’s coming to the part where everyone’s together. It’s time to fight, and we’re there, and it’s good. My quibbles are, I’m fine with that sort of progression of the narrative, and it just means some episodes are going to be a bit of a bummer. One thing I think is struggling here, the music montages.
Pete: Oh, you watch your mouth. That was hilarious. That was hilarious. Making of a boat music montage. Come on, that was fun.
Justin: I like the montage. The music is weird. There’s something weird about the music.
Pete: Oh, okay. So the music is…
Justin: The montages are great in this show. The music I’m going to say, “What is this.”
Pete: Okay, yeah. I thought that was hilarious.
Alex: You didn’t like Cotton-Eyed Joe? They used Cotton-Eyed Joe when they were building the boat the entire time.
Justin: It felt like a late ’80s movie.
Alex: (singing).
Justin: Stop that.
Alex: (singing).
Justin: Stop that.
Alex: (singing).
Justin: Stop.
Alex: (singing).
Justin: Finish the song.
Pete: Why haven’t you put that in somebody’s head?
Justin: We have a rule on this podcast that when you start Cotton-Eyed Joe, you have to do it to completion. You have to finish it.
Pete: That is the worst, most ear worm of a song that won’t leave your head. I hate that song. Anyways, emotional ep, I got very choked up. I thought this was really touching. You get a little bit of everything here. You get some action, you get some emotion. Love the dual cliffhanger we got. That was great.
Alex: I should have mentioned this earlier, but spoiler warning. Obviously, go watch the episode because we are, of course, other than this section right here at the top, diving right into it. Now brief overview of the plot. We get the end of the big fight from the last episode. John Walker has just killed Nico, one of the Flag Smashers, Bucky and Sam go after him, they break his arm, take away the shield.
Alex: They head to Louisiana, as you do. But first, Sam makes a brief stop with Isaiah Bradley, talks to him about the Super Soldier Program, which is where the title of the episode comes from Truth: Red, White, and Black by Robert Morales and Kyle Baker, which we talked about here on the podcast before. And we get a little bit of a touch of that from the comic book here in the show. But then they ended up rebuilding the boat along with the entire community. Sam starts to realize maybe he does want the shield. Maybe he does want to be Captain America after all. Bucky is wrestling with his own things, including Baron Zemo, who gets arrested by the Dora Milaje and taken to the raft. So we’ll never see him again. Maybe he’s done for, gone forever.
Pete: Till they need some information about Hydra.
Justin: The only [crosstalk 00:03:47] character is leaving for good when they do a very gigantic, slow shot, revealing them in front of a Sokovia in statue. The guy is meaningless.
Alex: Yeah. No imports at all. John Walker gets dishonorably discharged, but gets a new job offer from none other than Julia Louis-Dreyfus.
Justin: JLD, coming in hot.
Pete: Like a boss.
Alex: We’ll definitely talk about that in a minute. And at the end of the episode, John Walker is rebuilding a shield. Definitely his scrap metal shield is going to hold up against everything else, I’m very sure. And the Flag Smasher have recruited Batroc thanks to Sharon Carter, maybe to take down the GRC who was having a meeting in New York City, right near Bryant park. It seems like, which is a very nice part that everyone should go to.
Pete: Very nice area. I mean, if you’re in the area, you should swing by.
Justin: That’s great. As you go great Pret A Manger, right there.
Pete: Oh, wow. Look at you.
Justin: And the sandwiches are ready to eat.
Alex: Yes. That’s my favorite restaurant. So thank you for bringing it up. So that’s the broad overview. There’s obviously a lot more to talk about, but the things that I liked about this episode, I was suckered in right at the beginning. I thought the action sequence, Sam, Bucky, [Fasher 00:05:01], John Walker, are very surprised, was happening in the second to last episode. So soon, relatively speaking, because that seemed like the big thing they were building to, but it was very nicely reminiscent until the Iron Man, Bucky, Cap fight from Civil War. It was intense. It was very… Not very funny to be is the wrong word, but it was funny to be that one time, John Walker decapitated a guy with a shield. And now that is his go-to finishing [crosstalk 00:05:27].
Justin: He tries to do like nine times, it barely get away.
Alex: But it’s terrifying at the same time. What’d you guys think about this opening?
Justin: I thought it was a great fight. Really knocking out Bucky’s arm, I thought was really cool, and really visually well done.
Pete: Also the, you guys don’t want to do this Bucky Gordon. Yeah, we do. That was just all so great. And yeah, I liked it. It was kind of like their finishing move was finally working together. Although I was surprised that Falcon led with his legs instead of the shield, but whatever, he’s getting used to it. So it’s understandable.
Justin: And it was a really good superhero fight. I feel like we’ve gotten a lot of good action sequences, but this is just a great superhero movie level fight. And then we’re really getting into the shield gets a lot of camera time, this episode, especially right here.
Alex: It’s really the shield is like another character.
Pete: Yeah. I mean, Bucky says it’s part of his family.
Justin: He does.
Pete: So yeah. It’s going to get some time.
Alex: Mm-hmm (affirmative).
Justin: Hey shield, finish your dinner. It’s almost bad time.
Alex: I mean, I’ll tell you. I know a lot of people were very effected by the last image of the last episode, with John Walker standing with the bloody shield, which I thought was a very nice image. I wasn’t emotionally [crosstalk 00:06:44].
Justin: Very nice image.
Alex: You always have a problem with the word nice.
Justin: With the well done.
Alex: Well done. Medium rare, it was a medium rare.
Justin: Medium rare. It’s a rare… Well rare, well done issue.
Pete: You’re like, I really like this. This is really spoken.
Alex: I did it. My favorite character is John Walker, and it’s the first time I’ve seen myself on TV.
Pete: Wow.
Justin: You Pete will tell, of anyone I know, you are the most John Walker.
Pete: Oh, wow.
Alex: Absolutely. I mean, look at this chiseled jawline.
Justin: I’ve seen you decapitate so many tweets.
Alex: What I was going to say it is I was emotionally affected by the shield in this episode. I think they did a really good job. Sam seeing the blood on there and just kind of trying to [crosstalk 00:07:27].
Justin: I love that. That’s good, good metaphor, good visual metaphor. The shield is scarred now and he can’t put it back, he can’t wipe it off, he just has to move forward. And I think that sort of speaks to the larger episode. I think that Captain America is marred by John Walker by what they did to Isaiah Bradley. All of that is not the pristine thing that he thought he was getting, that he gave up and put behind the glass case. And now in this episode we see him take it back, and get to the point where he opens a case and looks at some clothes.
Pete: But also the fact that the fake Captain America was yelling, “I am Captain America.” And the actor did such a good job where it felt like he was trying to convince himself as well. You know what you mean? Not only to the other people, which was, I thought a well done to see-
Alex: He’s great. And I do honestly mean he’s great Wyatt Russell, the actor, he is doing such a good job on the show to the point where you realize it’s wrong when you’re feeling it, but you feel for John Walker when you’re watching this episode. He’s obviously the bad guy. He’s obviously the villain, but I know Pete, you feel differently because your world is very black and white. I live in shades of gray though. You can see it from the clothes that I’m wearing right now.
Pete: Fifty Shades of Grey.
Alex: Yes. I live in Fifty Shades of Black.
Justin: But let me say, I agree you Alex, in the scene where he appears in front of the Senate panel, I thought it was done well. When he first gets there, you’re like this, guy’s a bad guy, fuck this guy. But then he really does make the case, and over the course of it, he passes judgment on the senators. And I think he successfully flips it where you’re like, actually they’re dicks too, both sides are wrong here. And I think that again, we’ve talked about that a lot, the gray areas, this episode does a great job of muddying everything, to the point where we’re feeling different things about characters in the beginning and end of this episode.
Pete: Yeah. And I think when you’re making a point, if you can destroy a podium in the process, that really helps prove the point. So I’m glad that they use that kind of power move in [crosstalk 00:09:33].
Alex: Did you want him to break the podium? Because I kind of wanted him to break the podium with his super strength.
Pete: Yeah.
Justin: The podium, actually the original Latin, it means smash box.
Pete: Well then, he’s really getting to the root of it.
Justin: Yeah.
Alex: I didn’t also really like while we’re talking about John Walker, the very clear, very stark contrast between what he is talking about, and how he’s talking about being Captain America versus Isaiah Bradley, because spoiler warning, we’re all white here, but it’s very clear that John Walker has severe white privilege, he’s saying, “I deserve this. I need this.” And that’s the thing that, even if he’s right to go up against the senators and say, “You made me, you built me,” there’s still a level where he is 100% completely wrong at the same time. And he doesn’t deserve that, he was doing his job. It traumatized him. It hurt him. No I’m saying up until then in the army, but he took it too far, and nobody deserves it. That’s kind of the whole point of Captain America, and the Erskine speech about the super soldier serum, making you more of whoever you are versus what Isaiah Bradley is telling Sam, that no Black man should ever be Captain America.
Justin: Yeah. Not in this America, not in America that hasn’t changed.
Alex: Exactly.
Pete: I mean, I want to talk about, as soon as I saw him walking down the street with the case for the shield, which is great to see that it’s still got that suitcase. Yeah. It’s a great case. But just the way that Isaiah was like, “Don’t you open that up and the stars and stripes seem to be nothing around here.” And I was like, oh, that is awesome. The back and forth was so great, so powerful, so moving. It was really, really well acted, well shot performed. It was so fantastic, I couldn’t get enough of it.
Justin: That scene was great, I agree with you Pete, but it’s interesting later, Sarah’s like, “You don’t need to listen to Isaiah Bradley,” and Sam doesn’t. So how do you feel the fact that what Isaiah was saying was, “You can’t be Captain America.” And Sam eventually is like, “I can, and I need to.”
Pete: I’m going to show you. Yeah.
Justin: But that makes… And I love the line that Sarah had, sort of being like, “Don’t listen to him. He doesn’t know.” I thought I was so surprised that they said that, but I was like, oh, of course, it changes the point of view from, this is right, this is wrong, to, no, everyone has a different perspective. And I think that’s a much more mature way to look at all the problems in America, especially with race, that is being grappled with.
Alex: Well, I think what we’re going to get to in the next episode is where Sam got to with the comics, which is, no, he can’t be Steve Rogers, Captain America. That is like you were saying earlier, Justin, that’s the shield in the glass case. And he can’t be Isaiah Bradley who is bitter, and definitely, literally scarred by his experience being very briefly Captain America. He’s going to figure out his own way of doing it. He is a good guy, he wants to do right. He wants to do the right thing, and doing the right thing even though it’s hard, is the essence of Captain American, and is the essence of being a hero and being a superhero. And I think that’s what he starts to realize at the end of the episode. And we’ll probably have it literally set out loud at some point in the last episode.
Pete: But I also really liked this thing of something that it’s still so relevant today. Sam tries to talk about, this is a different time, this is different now. And he’s saying, “No, it’s not,” and there is sort of much truth in that, but what’s nice is Sam is realizing, I can make my own path, I can kind of figure things out as me, not as me trying to be somebody. And I think that’s why he says, “It still doesn’t feel right.” We get that one more time.
Alex: I know I’m repeating myself a little bit here, but again, I think that comes back to what Captain America is. If you look at the iconic Captain America scenes for the MCU alone, him jumping on the grenade, even though that’s going to kill him, at the end of Avengers: Endgame, before the portals open up being like, all right, here’s [Thaddeus 00:13:39]’s army, it doesn’t matter, I’m going to fight anyway. And I think that’s the thing, that’s the essence that Sam is ultimately pulling there.
Pete: That, and you can do things all day.
Alex: Well, [inaudible 00:13:48] you can do things all day, that Isaiah is right. Not much has changed. Things are worse in certain ways, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t keep fighting and trying all the same.
Justin: Right. Yeah. Two things that I thought were sort of total gear change, funny and weird in this beginning bit, Torres coming in, Joaquin coming in, and bringing big standup comedy energy after this crazy fight, he’s like, “Hey, yay, yay.”
Alex: So let’s talk about this. We talked about this offline a little bit between the two podcasts, but we were talking a little bit about how there’s been rumored re shoots on the show. I heard a little bit more about that between the last time we tailored the podcast and this time, and apparently this is weary, because it’s like very secondhand information. But apparently what happened was the original plot here was the Flag Smashers were going to release a virus that would kill off half the population of the earth, to bring it back to blip levels.
Pete: Wow.
Alex: For obvious reasons, they changed that. And a lot of it seems now, if you go back, if you watch the show, you can see that there are things like [Mama Daniel 00:14:59], who they keep talking about as this very important figure who died of, I don’t know, dot, dot, dot question mark.
Alex: She died of the virus in the original version, and that’s why it was a big deal, it got released too quickly or something like that. And that’s why also Sam and Bucky, we’re going after them in the first place, rather than, oh, you guys are viral and maybe robbing a bank or something, instead they were going to kill half the population of the earth. That’s why they’re a big threat. That’s why everybody’s after them. That’s also why they were stealing vaccines in those early episodes is to protect people against the virus. So I bring this up with Joaquin, because apparently Joaquin was a late addition to the show, and it seems like a lot of his purpose is to cover there and kind of cover those re shoots gaps.
Justin: Might I say he sort of yada yadas some information.
Alex: Ooh, these pretzel nuggets of information are making me thirsty.
Justin: So yeah. And I don’t want to say that would have been a better show. I do think it makes the Flag Smashers a totally different kind of threat, and sort of speaks more to a philosophy that there’s a much more hardcore villainess as opposed to being like, I wish people were able to move between borders instead of I want to kill millions [inaudible 00:16:14].
Alex: It also on the other hand though, I think explains a lot of the weird fluctuations in terms of what they’re doing. This episode we’ve seen about what? Maybe five, 10 of them, or something going around. And they seem like a small, tight knit group, except for the first episode of the series, and this episode where they reveal like, “Nope, we have operatives everywhere. We send out an alert in Bryan Park, and literally everybody stands up.” They walk away from the Shake Shack, and they’re on their way.
Pete: Did you see how many goons hanging out in that park? I was like, “Man, the parks are full of just crazy hitman or [crosstalk 00:16:501].
Alex: I’ve seen that happened with Pokémon Go, but never with the Flag Smashers app.
Pete: Oh wow. Okay. Right.
Justin: The line, keep the wings, I thought it was interesting. And I feel like he’s going to get the wings back, and become his own version of Captain America next episode.
Alex: Wait, in Falcon?
Justin: Yeah.
Pete: Yeah.
Alex: No. Well, Joaquin becomes Falcon when Sam becomes Captain America in the comics. So I think that was a no to that.
Justin: Maybe. I don’t know. You may be right. I just feel like…
Pete: That suitcase did look like it had wings in there. It looked like it was just going a [crosstalk 00:17:24].
Justin: Yeah. No, I don’t think the wings are in there. I think maybe eventually when he Wants… You were talking about him identifying as his own version of Captain America, that feels like it may be a winged Captain America.
Pete: Ooh.
Justin: Because there was a wing. Falcon had wings as well.
Alex: Yeah. Falcon has wings, but also Joaquin Falcon has wings. Maybe they’d just both have wings.
Justin: There you go. Red Bull gives you wings. And the only thing is the end of the Walker scene, where Walker’s walking out and the Senator’s like, “Oh, and turn in the shield, turn in your laptop because you’re fired kid. You’re done working at this place.” I thought it was just a funny big middle-management.
Pete: Yeah, that was a weird like, “Hey, and what happened to the shield?”
Alex: Now, let’s talk about this. This is why we’re talking about John Walker again, a little bit. We should talk about JLD coming in there.
Pete: JLD.
Justin: JLD.
Alex: Her character name is, and I’m going to read this off, because I forgot it. It’s very long Contessa Valentina Allegra de Fontaine.
Pete: Why does everybody keep doing that? She did that twice. I was like, who cares? Just say Val.
Alex: That’s the character’s name in the comics. She was a classic shield character, I believe created by Jim Steranko. She was a romantic interest, sometime of Nick Fury. She was on S.H.I.E.L.D, work with him. In more recent comics, she-
Pete: She was on Seinfeld.
Alex: She was on Seinfeld. And then she was on Veep as a little bit of a side note. I don’t know if you guys felt this way. I felt like they paste that out, so people could be that into the Veep beam, like the end of a Veep episode.
Justin: Yeah. I mean, the character to me had the pacing of Veep with the energy of the lawyer she played on Arrested Development, season two, where it was just always talking and just being like, I don’t know what I’m saying. I’m just talking.
Pete: It was great. Just her energy from the jump of her walking in the whole-
Alex: They let her improvise a lot of that dialogue. Right.
Pete: I’m sure you got what you got.
Justin: She’s so good though. It’s hard to tell.
Alex: Yeah. She was great. The other things about her character that I think are important to mention in the comics more recently, she’s been Madam Hydra, that character. So there’s a lot of speculation about is she good, or is she bad? There is a little bit more information about the character though, which is that she was originally supposed to be introduced in Black Widow, because Black Widow would have come out first before Falcon and the Winter Soldier. But obviously those have switched order. So we don’t know whether she’s going to show up there. I’ve also heard a couple of things about her, that apparently she is going to try, whether they keep this or not, going to try to recruit Yelena the new Black Widow in Black Widow. So that’s probably how she would have shown up, and it potentially was going to lead into the Thunderbolts. So her getting John Walker, USA, Jed, getting Baron Zemo probably at the raft, and then Yelena, you’ve got half the team there already. Half the team, right there, I mean.
Justin: I feel like we’re going to get a Spider-Man, was it 2, type reveal where it’s like, all the villains are in the prison cells, and they’re like, “Hey, we should just be mad at everybody together.”
Alex: Wait, are you talking about The Amazing Spider-Man 2?
Justin: Yes.
Alex: Oh, okay. Great movie.
Justin: Yeah. Great. It’s favorite. That’s why I knew the titles so quickly.
Pete: Yeah.
Alex: Yeah. Can I tell you this is a total side note, but something I think about all the time with The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which just such a weird specific thing, but the second trailer for Amazing Spider-Man 2, there’s a line of dialogue, where… Chris Cooper who plays Norman Osborn in those? Says, “We have plans for you Parker.” And then not only did they not continue that series, but also that line was cut out of the movie.
Pete: Oh man.
Alex: I thought about that.
Pete: So battle plans.
Alex: No plans.
Justin: We have no planes for you Parker.
Alex: Yeah. Now I do want to ask you guys a question here about Isaiah Bradley scene, because I don’t know if you guys remember, I assume you do. But when Truth came out, there was a huge flap about having a Black Captain America from comic book fans. I would argue probably racist comic book fans in particular, but I felt like the Isaiah Bradley scene here, just, I got so tensed up while I was watching it, because the dialogue and the tone of it reminded me so much of the conversation there, him talking about people never accepting a Black Captain America, that I immediately flashed back to those conversations when the book originally came out. Did you guys have the same reaction there at all?
Justin: Maybe not direct as direct about the book, but yes, that wasn’t such a tense scene to watch. And I do remember the book. I was less into the controversy of it, because I just was like, oh, this is a great book. And I love the questions that it’s asking, and the sort of position it’s putting Isaiah’s character in the Captain America mythology.
Pete: Yeah. Also reminded me of when Miles Morales happened endorse, again, an uprising of bullshit. So yeah, I think it’s definitely well done and well addressed in this.
Alex: Yeah. I thought it was great. A couple of other things to call out. I’ve seen a couple of people mentioning this online, but I thought this was a really nice parallel. Isaiah tells the story about getting arrested, because he went on a rescue mission behind enemy lines, dressed as Cap. That’s a little bit different than what happens in the comic book, but that Parallels versus Captain America: The First Avenger, where Steve Rogers does the exact same thing, he steals the costume goes behind enemy lines, and he’s made into a hero because of that, which I thought was a nice point.
Pete: Oh, yeah. It’s great.
Alex: Also, what’d you guys think about Bucky flirting with Sarah? You’re shipping that?
Pete: That was really great. I really loved that. Where he was like, “Hey, I’m Bucky.” And it was just this fun where she was like, “Hey.” And then I later Sam like, “No flirting with my sister.” I very much enjoyed that. I thought it was very nice.
Justin: Yeah. It was fun. We get a little bit of the brotherly play with all of that.
Pete: Yeah. The sister back and forth. I completely agree was really, really nice.
Alex: You’re talking about the Bucky and Sam acting like brothers, right?
Justin: Yeah. And just getting after each other in a fun way, the scene later where they’re well, coworkers, peers, eh, friends not really, we’ll just team up again, maybe.
Pete: Yeah.
Alex: Honestly that was the sort of energy I wanted from the second episode of the show, or even the first episode of the show. And Pete don’t get angry at me, but it’s a little frustrating that we’re finally getting at five episodes in, it feels like that’s delayed. They could have started there. And then have them break apart.
Pete: Why are you mad? We’re there now. Okay. You enjoy the journey.
Alex: Because I think there’s different ways of looking at this TV show, and there are parts that I really like, but at the same time, I think structurally things are a little discombobulated. They’re a little all over the place in terms of the arcs of the characters, and they’re not measuring up. So I think we can look at it as a scene basis as an episodic basis, but also as a season long basis.
Pete: Yeah. Well, here you go, do you want to see Zemo dancing or no? If the answer is yes, then you got to wait a little bit before you get the partner action.
Alex: All right. The answer is no.
Pete: Well, you know what, there was a lot of moving parts in this. It was done in a way that was enjoyable enough, where you shouldn’t fucking complain about it. And it’s-
Justin: Wow.
Alex: Don’t complain about things that I think could have been better on our podcast where we dissect episodes of this TV show. Is that what you’re saying?
Pete: I’m having too much fun to hear you being like, “Yeah, it could have been better a little bit.” [inaudible 00:25:09].
Alex: First of all, that’s an amazing impersonation of me. That’s exactly what I said.
Pete: [inaudible 00:25:20].
Alex: Second of all, no further points.
Justin: What did you guys think of the scene with Walker talking to Battlestar’s parents?
Pete: That was rough dude. That was tough because it was like, I’m glad he did it. That really showed a lot of like this guy, isn’t just a douchebag. You know what I mean? He showed a lot of character on his part to do that. But then also he was kind of standoffish and cold a little bit about it, and also fucking lied right to him. And it was part of me that felt like the sister knew this guy is full of shit, but was just being nice around her parents.
Justin: I don’t know why they included that scene. It felt like, does that what motivates Walker to feel like he is right? Because…
Alex: Well, I think so. Yes. That’s how I took it, and that not that I’ve ever lied about anything, but I do think there are these-
Justin: You said at the beginning of this podcast, we were liars and we’ll lie often.
Alex: But I think if you’ve lied, sometimes there’s these lies that you start doubling down on until they kind of become the truth in a certain way for you tying back to the title of the episode. And I think that’s what John Walker is doing there, that he knows he did the wrong thing. But like Pete was mentioning earlier, he keeps saying out loud, “I’m Captain America. I did this, I did the right thing. I do the right things, because I am Captain America.” And to the point that he gets into the scene with Battlestar’s parents, like you’re saying, he’s come off, this is after the hearing. Right? I think.
Justin: Yeah.
Alex: So, it’s after the hearing, he’s already yelled at the senators about that. He comes to the parents and he lies until he starts to believe it as his truth, that he did the right thing, he got the right guy, he has the right, because he’s always in the right.
Pete: And that was also kind of Lemar’s mantra to him. It’s like, you deserve this because you’re the guy who makes the right choices when things are crazy. So all of this is kind of reinstating this kind of thing for him still.
Alex: Yeah. So that’s what I kind of took away from that. I mean, that ties into that mid credit scene where he’s making the shield, clearly he’s making himself.
Pete: Did you think it was weird though, when he was staring at that poster of himself? I thought he was going to turn to camera and be like, “Cap is back.”
Alex: That would have been great.
Pete: Sing little song.
Justin: Yeah. Skip down the street.
Alex: I mean, just to prognosticate a little bit, I think what he’s going to do is, he’s going to come out and his character going forward in the MCU is I’m Captain America and Julia Louis-Dreyfus is going to be like, “You’re USA A agent, shut up.” But he’s clearly unhinged now. The Super soul serum has not reacted well with him, and he has lost control of his own narrative.
Pete: Actually, I think Val is first going to be like, “Oh, you’re a close talker. Get away from me,” and then say that. Right?
Alex: This bit really is starting to share some shrinkage, I would say.
Pete: Oh, come on home.
Alex: Yeah. A couple of other things before we start to wrap up here, we mentioned this earlier, but I really liked actually Zemo going to the Sokovia Memorial, just from an MCU perspective, I thought he’s right. They shouldn’t be visiting Sokovia more often, and helping them repair it. So that was very nice. Also-
Pete: It’s just crazy how woke Zemo is man, it just keeps getting [inaudible 00:28:45]. It’s crazy.
Justin: You love him. He’s the hero to you.
Pete: I don’t know if he is, but he’s got some points.
Alex: You’ve been brainwashed, man.
Justin: You just love everything.
Alex: We touched on this earlier, but Batroc is back and helping out the Flag Smashers, and particularly gunning for Falcon at the end of the episode. And it looks like Sharon got him out of prison based on that conversation, and is paying him. What’s going on there? Is she the Power Broker like people have been suspecting, like we’ve been suspecting?
Justin: Yeah. It’s sort of feels that way. Batroc’s working for her, and is maybe going to flip on [Carly 00:29:24] and her squad.
Alex: Oh, maybe.
Pete: I don’t know what else-
Justin: Why else would she do that?
Alex: I don’t know. They deeply have a lot of explaining to do when it comes to her in the last episode in particular. Go ahead, Pete.
Pete: I was going to say, I don’t really know what a Power Broker is, but she is brokering a of deals with powerful people where there’s going to be some real ramifications. So I feel like maybe she is.
Justin: I think almost exactly what a Power Broker is. You just said, “You’re brokering deals between powerful people.” You nailed it, dude.
Pete: Well,, yeah, I took a stab at it.
Justin: Context, baby. I really liked Sam and the Bucky… We talked a little bit about this, the Bucky and Sam stuff, that’s sort of like, it was bringing this episode to its last couple of scenes. Bucky apologizing, talks about how he was questioning everything, and the line that Sam has for him, “You weren’t amending, you were avenging,” which I thought was cool. And it’s like, now Bucky gets to go deal with his shit.
Pete: Yeah. The kind of pep talk that they give each other before they slowly walk away from each other was very cool, very touching. I thought it was just the right amount of [inaudible 00:30:33]. But I really want to talk about the fun two montages. I mean, not only do you get a training montage, which everybody loves, but then you get a boat montage. I mean, come on. That was just-
Justin: I could take her, leave the boat montage, but this training montage was fucking awesome. I want to spin off series. It’s just shield the training montages. Not always Sam, other characters can pop in to give it a spin, literally. That was so well done, I thought. And I played Ultimate Frisbee when I was in college.
Pete: Oh, [crosstalk 00:31:09] flexing on this.
Justin: I know how hard it is to catch something like that, and it can really hurt our hands.
Pete: Oh, it can yeah.
Alex: This was my one quab. And I know they were never going to do this, but him catching… There is no way Sam’s fingers did not get sliced off when he was trying to catch that shield.
Justin: It doesn’t have a sharp edge, Alex.
Alex: It’s sharp enough to decapitate a man.
Justin: That was increasingly banged onto him and stuff.
Pete: Yeah. Exactly.
Justin: Sure. Yeah.
Alex: I don’t know how this shield works. I don’t get it. I’ve read comics my entire life. And I’m still like, I don’t know [crosstalk 00:31:40].
Justin: It’s great that they did that montage. We got to see it in action because it is very strange that Captain America is like, “Oh, how do I use the shield? I don’t block bullets with it, really. I throw it and bounce it off nine things, do back flips until it comes back to me, and then I catch it.” It’s like, wait, what, that’s your idea of how to use these things? It’s such a [inaudible 00:31:58] stuff.
Pete: Did you not play Ultimate Frisbee? Because that’s how I played Ultimate Frisbee.
Justin: Sure.
Alex: That is 100% Stanley in the obvious being like, “We have to get this issue out. What did she do?” “I don’t know.” Throws the shield.
Justin: Yeah. And it comes back to him, does he have more shields, or does it bounce around and come back?
Alex: Mr. Lee, that’s not how it works. It doesn’t matter. I already printed the pages. I’m selling plastic shoes on the corner of Bryant park.
Pete: I like this idea of, instead of father and son playing catch, it was these two guys playing catch with the shield, and kind of talked it out with their feelings and stuff.
Alex: Who’s the father and who’s the son, Pete?
Pete: Well, yeah. Well I think in different times in their life, they would be different things to each other, but it felt like Sam was getting some fatherly advice from Bucky, and then Bucky was also getting some fatherly-
Justin: I feel like Sam had the dad.
Alex: One other thing that I thought was really fun. I loved the line when Bucky comes in and fixes the pipe, and sat down, and I said, “Why didn’t you use your metal arm?” He says, “Because I’m right handed. I don’t want to immediately think about it. Very funny. Honestly, one of the best jokes of the series so far, just because it was so understated, it was really, well played.
Justin: Understated, and they put some time into it, like the pipe. I was like, what is this pipe bursting? Then I was like, what are we doing here? And it was just for that joke, and I was straight.
Alex: Yeah. Good stuff. All right. Before we wrap up here, let’s talk about what is on our vision board for the final episode of Falcon and the Winter Soldier. Pete, what’s on your vision board?
Pete: All right. Well, we’ve got a boat montage, right? So maybe we’re going to get a truck montage. I don’t know, maybe a plane montage. There’s so many montage possibilities, maybe putting on a outfit montage. I want the last episode to be mostly montages, and then some very emotional stuff.
Justin: Mostly montages. The thing I’m looking forward to… We’ve talked about this a lot. How this series has done a great job of really blurring the lines between what’s right, what’s wrong? Who’s right, who’s wrong? And I’m very curious when you’re coming to an ending of something, you sort of have to choose at least to some degree, who wins and who loses? Where does this story end? Or where does this chapter end anyway? And so I’m curious how they’re going to handle putting all their characters in a position to really resolve this, and what we take away from the series just on these other big ideas that are on the table.
Alex: Yeah. I think that’s a good one in terms of nailing the themes, because that’s the thing that’s been kind of wobbly throughout. So as long as they can settle on something, I think it’ll retroactively justify a lot of the other stuff. For me, this is an easy one that we’re definitely going to see, but Sam and the new Cap costume, it’s very cool in the comics. I’m excited to see how it is on screen. I’m excited to see it. I think it’s what we’ve been waiting for. I was worried it was going to be like the last shot of the last episode, but it seems like we’re going to get a full episode of it, I like that as a cliffhanger. It’s exciting. I think it’ll be fun.
Pete: I really also want to see a Bucky make amends. I really hope we get to see that, we saw the set up. I really want them to work on that.
Alex: Yeah. I hope he kills that guy.
Pete: Oh my gosh.
Alex: That is what making amends is like.
Pete: You’re the worst, man.
Justin: Got it.
Alex: Now you’re with your son.
Pete: Oh my God, you’re the worst.
Justin: Amenders assemble, is what I hope he says.
Pete: Oh my God.
Alex: I’m sure we’re going to have a lot more speculation. After the next episode, there’s going to be ed, credits scenes, galore, things to talk about whether it’s Thunderbolts, or Dark Avengers, or whatever is coming out of this going be very exciting. So please, all of you head back here next week for more talk about Falcon and the Winter Soldier. In the meantime, if you’d like to support us patrion.com/comicbookclub. Also, we do a live show every Tuesday night at 7:00 PM, to Crowdcast and YouTube. Come hang out, we’d love to chat with you about Falcon and the Winter Soldier, iTunes, Android, Spotify, Stitcher, or the app of your choice to subscribe and listen to the show, and MarvelVision pod on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook, comicbookclublive.com for this podcast. And more until next time don’t lose all your Marvels.
Justin: No matter how many time you do that, I never got the frisbee to come back.
Pete: Oh.
