(not putting this under the cut because i want people to read it, but warning for MAJOR ENDGAME spoilers)
i’m doing my best to stay away from endgame discourse, but boy oh boy, the fact that fandom (especially the st0ny and the stu///cky fandons) has taken steve’s ending not as “oh, the writers gave this character an ending i do not enjoy” but as “this character sucks and is horrible/evil/a psycho” is… both the least surprising and most frustrating thing i’ve experienced in fandom.
because i just… i don’t know. how much more steve has to do? he stands there and takes it as tony snaps at him (and look tony’s been through A LOT at this point, i’m not gonna be upset at him for lashing out in such a situation, god knows the poor man needed it; but, yes, while he was saying a bunch of stuff that’s fair, he also said a ton of completely unfair things, such as acting as if ultron was a great idea and acting as if steve wasn’t there for him because he didn’t want to, and not because, you know, TONY DIDN’T CALL HIM); then, after they fail to retrieve the stones, he tries to move on, dedicates his life to helping others. he’s doing terribly in those five years - the team is all scattered around, he mostly can’t talk to anyone except nat (who’s also in a terrible emotional state), he lost all his closest friends in the world and his instinct is still to help, to sit down and listen to other people’s problems and tell them he’s proud of them when they’re making small progress. when scott comes back, he goes to tony once, understands his refusal and doesn’t push it - later, when tony comes back, steve even asks if he’s sure about giving him the shield, gives him one more change to back out and close off to him if he wants to.
then later in the movie tony asks him if he trusts him, steve says yes. he doesn’t get to see his best friend’s body or even grieve her properly - he just sits down and cries in silence, suffers in silence (as he’s done through his entire life), and then stands up ready to keep going, because he must.
then during the final battle he wields mjolnir - thor screams “i knew it” which proves to us steve could have done it all along and just choose to not lift at the party in aou because he knew it would hurt thor’s feelings - he fights thanos with all he has, his shield is destroyed, and then when his friends come back he gets to say “avengers assemble” one time and fight, again, with all he has.
then he gets the task of going back with the infinity stones. and i’m not a fan of that ending, i’m really not, but the movie goes OUT OF ITS WAY to explain that he can’t change the future, he’s creating an entirely new timeline, he can’t stop the bucky we know from being tortured or the shield we know from getting infiltrated by hydra or anything of the sort. he knows that to his friends he’ll only be gone for five seconds, he knows they won’t miss him or need him in the meantime, so he gives himself this one thing and chooses to live a happy life with the woman he loves.
and like. you don’t need to love this ending! i don’t! there are plotholes and many questionably things about it and it’s totally fine to be upset at them and point them out. i’m just left wondering why every time other characters do things fandom doesn’t agree with, the blame is on the writing; but when steve does it, the blame is on him, and fandom hurries to tear him down and bash him as much as they can for failing to be the version they carefully crafted of him through fanfiction and shitty meta (the version that’s nothing but a caregiver to hold bucky or tony and tell them how great they are and how much he failed them).
and it’s just GLARING to me how every character gets to receive a little bit of empathy, a moment of reflection to think about their struggles and their own feelings, but somehow steve doesn’t, and everything he does must always be interpreted in the worst light possible and discussed as such.
i don’t agree with the way the directors choose to finish steve’s arc, but they took a comic character that a lot of people didn’t know/care about and crafted this amazing character that became such a beloved icon for an entire generation. chris evans starred this movies and consolidated himself as one of the best superheroes’ performances of all time, on par with reeves’ superman. and instead of being grateful, or, god, even being bitter while affording him the slightest bit of respect, fandom tears him down for every. single. little. reason. and again, i get why people are angry, i get why people are upset, but the way people decide to direct this anger to bash this character and all he represents is just so incredibly telling and so upsetting.
tl;dr: steve rogers was a gift to the mcu, but, boy, the mcu fandom does not deserve steve rogers.
