#i liked stevepeggy before that i did i promise i did

[80yrscap]

Stevepeggy endgame is Sam Wilson erasure

And I’m Gonna Die Mad About It

Steve does a job for SHIELD and the whole thing stinks. Natasha’s a liar and Rumlow’s an asshole. Nick’s in an arms race with his own paranoid fantasies. Steve can’t trust SHIELD’s methods or mission, and the more questions he asks the more uneasy he feels. He’s thinking about getting out.

But Steve is paralyzed with future shock. SHIELD is the successor to the SSR and the last piece of continuity he has. So he’s looking for an excuse not to quit.

In this mindset, Steve visits Peggy Carter, the person who 2 years ago (and 70 years ago) knew the right thing to say to snap him out of paralyzing despair after Bucky fell. Maybe she’ll be able to do it again?

Not so much.

Steve: For as long as I can remember I just wanted to do what was right. I guess I’m not quite sure what that is anymore.

Peggy Carter: Haha, you're always so dramatic.

If we take her response at face value it sounds like she thinks Steve ought by now to have grown up and put away caring about being a good person. Or maybe she’s just bored with the conversation and wants Steve to shut up. 

But Steve laughs good-naturedly and lays all his cards on the table: Knowing that you helped found SHIELD is half the reason I stay. 

Which brings us to...

Steve finds himself back where it all began. It’s the army base where Dr. Erskine tested Steve’s moral character before giving him the serum, the place where Steve met Peggy Carter for the first time. There, in the sub-basement of an abandoned bunker, where Howard Stark and Peggy Carter’s SHIELD-founder portraits still hold pride of place in the elevator lobby, Steve meets an old enemy. 

Steve: How did you get here?

Arnim Zola: Invited!

Steve last saw Zola 70 years ago (and 2 years ago) in SSR custody. He’s a true HYDRA original, and his capture was bought with Bucky’s life. 

Zola cheerfully provides proof that SHIELD has played host to HYDRA from day one. There’s a photograph of Peggy and Howard in Zola’s computer lab watching him work.

Natasha helpfully points out to Steve: You seem pretty chipper for someone who just found out they died for nothing. 

Actually, it looks like Bucky’s the one who died for nothing...until Steve finds out the truth about that. 

Which brings us to...

Peggy Carter drops out of the movie entirely, and although I kind of wish we got to see some payoff in the form of Steve’s despair and anger at this betrayal (or, and I know this is crazy talk, Sharon Carter’s feelings about it) the movie was pretty damn full of all of those feelings already so I don’t mind that it’s left out.

Peggy’s not important to the story going forward and Steve makes it clear where he stands.

Steve: We’re not salvaging anything. We're taking down SHIELD.

Nick: SHIELD had nothing to do with it.

Steve: You gave me this mission. This is how it ends.

How it ends is with all of SHIELD’s secrets revealed; SHIELD’s former employees scattered into the military-industrial complex; Nick burning down his own house and heading to Europe to burn down HYDRA there; and the promise that HYDRA and SHIELD are two sides of a coin that is no longer currency.  

In conclusion 

Peggy Carter’s heel turn was one of the more jaw-dropping moments in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and it was a great twist.

It also gave Steve the kick in the pants he needed. 

A choice was explicitly set up for Steve in Act I. On your right: Peggy Carter of SHIELD, representing duty and sticking to the familiar and 70-year-old promises. On your left: that cute jogger from the VA, representing quitting your military job and mental health resources and freedom of choice.  

When Peggy Carter and SHIELD turn out to be rotten, it hurts, but Steve is forced to accept that the years he missed changed everything. Organizations and structures and even people that he knew in the past are not now what they were then. Loyalty freely given in 1945 is no longer owed in 2014.

So Steve knocks on Sam Wilson’s door.

But then

Nick immediately rebuilds SHIELD never having come to terms with the fact that he spent the last 20+ years of his life furthering HYDRA’s agenda all while doing his best and thinking it was good work, like god damn, this man needs years of therapy not his old job back

In CACW everyone pretends that Howard Stark’s last words were not “it’s a fair cop”

In CACW everyone pretends that Steve would still take moral advice from Peggy Carter oh my god

The compass comes back you gotta be kidding me Steve chose Sam Wilson

Steve’s entire story arc is reverted

The end