#marvel you cannot make me hate john walker in the mcu

[calisverse]

𝐖𝐘𝐀𝐓𝐓 𝐑𝐔𝐒𝐒𝐄𝐋𝐋 𝐀𝐒 𝐉𝐎𝐇𝐍 𝐖𝐀𝐋𝐊𝐄𝐑 / 𝐔𝐒 𝐀𝐆𝐄𝐍𝐓

Thunderbolts* (2025)

[meggtheegg]

Femininity and Guilt in the MCU

So I started going on a rant in the tags of a post and realized, hey, you can make your own posts on here, so this is a little stream-of-consciousness-y, but here it is.

For a while, it's been tough to pinpoint where my discomfort with the state of the MCU and its fandom comes from. On the surface, it's improved pretty dramatically from its early days, in terms of representation. The Avengers lineup has gone from a bunch of white dudes and one obligatory sexy white woman to an imperfect, but certainly more diverse cast.

And yet...its approach to some of these characters feels really bizarre, to me. And maybe moreso, the response of the fanbase, at large, can be completely baffling.

I saw a TikTok a while back where the person was talking about men (obligatory not all men, but enough to be concerning disclaimer) only being able to like/root for female characters that they could see becoming victimized/sexualized. That's why a common refrain after Captain Marvel came out was "I don't hate her because she's a woman; I like Black Widow/Wanda Maximoff/Gamora/etc." Because those characters were written for the male gaze and shown to be weaker than the men around them in at least one notable way. (ie. Nat being physically overpowered at least once per movie/Wanda messing up in Lagos and losing in the airport fight/Gamora being the "capable" one but also being an explicit victim of Thanos, in more ways than one.)

It stands out as very notable, to me, that most of the guys whose argument was "I can't hate women; I really like Wanda" suddenly switched to "Idk, I just think she'd be more interesting as a villain," the second she was described as the strongest Avenger/more powerful than the Sorcerer Supreme. Not because her character arc in any way points towards villainy (quite the opposite--she is constantly rejecting villainy, at great personal cost) but because her being a villain means that, structurally and story-wise, Dr. Strange has to overpower and defeat her. She cannot be more powerful than him, and if she is, she must be evil and taken down, at all costs. She must ultimately lose, to him.

All this to say that perception of villainhood and victimhood in female characters seems entirely determined by men's ability to overpower them. Captain Marvel is cocky and arrogant and has the skills to back it up, so she's an arrogant bitch. Tony Stark is cocky and arrogant and has the skills to back it up, so he's awesome.

On the flipside of that coin, you have male characters who are not, under any circumstance, allowed to be victims. Bucky Barnes is consistently shown to have been stripped of all agency and humanity, made entirely helpless and unable to make any of his own decisions or disobey any order. And yet, in canon and in the fandom, he is almost always blamed for the actions he was forced to take. Because a man cannot be a victim, to that degree. He can be beaten down and broken and turned into a shell of who he was, sure, but only if he can be blamed for it and have jokes made at his expense (looking at you, fat Thor.)

The version of the Black Widow programming that was used on Yelena is canonically based on the Winter Soldier program, developed with information stolen directly from HYDRA. But Yelena is a woman, so she is a victim. She did nothing wrong. (Which is true. An accurate description of the situation.) Bucky, though, is a man, and a man must be guilty for his actions, so even someone as good and kind as Sam Wilson will constantly crack jokes about him "killing everyone he's ever met," and pretty explicit implications of assault are, at best, brushed over, and at worst, treated as humorous. Because it's so funny to see a man offer another man up to a woman, with promises that he'll be forced to do "anything she wants."

Similarly, male violence can be forgiven, if it's a response to intense negative emotions. Lemar Hoskins can be sacrificed for the sake of John Walker's manpain, and the brutal murder that prompted can immediately be forgiven with one (1) semi-heroic decision, and some quirky banter to show that he's a good guy, now. Tony Stark can repeatedly try to kill Steve and Bucky over his parents' deaths, and that can just be brushed off, especially because he explicitly states that the anger is over his mom. Never mind that she hasn't been mentioned/discussed/given any agency or meaning up to this point. She's a woman who died at the hands of a man who can't have also been a victim because he's a man, so yeah, murder seems pretty justified. It's seen as noble when those things are forgiven, yes (ie. T'Challa not letting Zemo kill himself or Peter sparing Norman Osborn), but if they're not, it's not really a problem, either.

In the MCU, men are allowed to do terrible things because they can't handle negative emotions, in the same way women are immediately (again, rightfully) forgiven for doing terrible things due to any sort of inherent victimhood, on her part. Because that fits into the MCU's view of masculinity and femininity. Men aren't meant to handle emotions well, and women are meant to be overpowered.

Flip that around, though, and you've got Bucky Barnes and Wanda Maximoff, a man who was made a victim and a woman who was overwhelmed with emotion, and both are treated as unforgivable. Because women are supposed to be able to take any and all tragedy on the chin, and men are supposed to be unvictimizable.

When Peter Parker lost everything and everyone, fanboys rejoiced that they finally fixed his character! Because he cannot he a true hero without immense loss and suffering! He cannot prove himself to be responsible or a hero if he has any loved ones or connections! Girl stuff like companionship and emotional support only weakens a man's true capacity for heroism. But when Wanda loses everything and comes into her own identity as a result, she's clearly unstable and must be put down, because she accidentally did some bad stuff in her grief, and she's too powerful to victimize if she lets her emotions get the best of her. So, nevermind that she's consistently chosen to sacrifice her own happiness for the sake of doing what's right, the exact same way that Peter does. That can't be a show of goodness or strength, because once a powerful woman starts having visible feelings and doesn't handle them with absolute grace and stability, it must be a slippery slope to monsterhood. With great power comes great responsibility, unless you're a woman, in which case great power is an inherent threat that must be destroyed, as soon as possible.

It seems, in the MCU, there is nothing more virtuous than a man handling emotion as a woman is supposed to, and nothing more shameful than a man being victimized. Likewise, there is nothing more shameful than a woman handling emotion as a man does, and nothing more virtuous or necessary than brutal victimization. And as much as I love this franchise and these characters, that attitude just...leaves kind of an awful taste, in my mouth.

[spearcast]

I saw you rb some Marvel stuff and I thought I'd ask how you feel about TFATWS!!!! And idk if you've watched Wendyviz or not, so if you have how you feel about that too. (Also a bit of a throwback but I hope Rose Rogers is doing well and I would pay money to see her kick J-Walker's ass!!!)

omg thank you!! yeah i haven’t really been into the mcu as of late bc of....... *gestures vaguely* everything. i haven’t seen w/viz and i’m not really planning on watching it ever bc of all of the, y’know... whitewashing and antisemitism and anti-romani sentiment and stuff. i even really hesitated watching tfatws bc i just cannot for the life of me trust the mcu to do things anymore but! honestly i’m enjoying the show so far! i would kill and die for sam wilson and mackie and stan’s chemistry is really fantastic, sharon carter finally getting some of the characterization she deserves, i find karli incredibly captivating despite them already doing the “but what if both extremes super evil?” bit. i respect john walker’s actor for making him literally so hate-able and daniel bruhl for playing zemo so well (even though i think it’s WACK that they’re rewriting baron zemo to be not hydra and just a general antagonist and i can’t get over that and never will, it’s incredibly fucked but i would be lying if bruhl wasn’t doing a good job) 

i’ve also had the GVS-verse on the mind and rose rogers in particular since the show AND because i think rose would 100% be behind sam and supporting her closest uncle and his family. she respects bucky and treats him as family also don’t get me wrong but i’ve wanted to write rose and sam interacting because i think they’d just be a very wholesome duo- especially since i’ve also been doing plot lines about how she’s coming to terms with her having the x-gene and all of the mutant stuff and how lonely and isolated she’s gotten in-universe and interacting with sam while also having someone she can truly trust and put her reputation and skill behind. she trusts him just as much (if not possibly more) than steve at this point in-universe and ALSO she would HAPPILY fistfight john walker without hesitation (: 

ADDITION: lamar deserved better. he absolutely fucking did.

thank you again for the ask, anon!!!!