**Light spoilers for Marvel’s Avengers: Endgame.**
At a talk at AOL Build in New York City, screenwriters Stephen McFeely and Christopher Markus talked about the juggernaut that is Avengers: Endgame and their journey from The Life and Death of Peter Sellers to working on Marvel’s massive finale.
One thing that’s clear when listening to the two talk is that they care about the Marvel Cinematic Universe and know how to write for the characters they’re in charge of. They did give us Captain America: The Winter Soldier, after all. The problem, though, is that they still can’t really talk about Avengers: Endgame. In fact, those of us in attendance were told that Disney sent them emails saying they were to give away no spoilers.
So imagine my shock when Markus brought up the appearance of Jarvis (portrayed by Agent Carter’s James D’arcy) in a time-travel sequence from the film. (He even brought up Howard Stark, which … like, Christopher, what are you doing?) Other than that moment, though, the event was rather spoiler-free. They even answered a question about Steve/Bucky without giving away who is in the film or what happens, which was a pretty incredible feat.
What I loved was discovering that both McFeely and Markus also wrote Captain America: Civil War, a movie that gave me more Stony as well as Steve Rogers literally starting a war for Bucky Barnes while fighting against my son, Peter Parker—the best of all my worlds. These writers are rooted deep within the fabric of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and have managed to end many of the 22-film storylines beautifully with Avengers: Endgame, and I think that, despite some of my problems with the film, it’s amazing to see how they connect back throughout the franchise.
It also helps that they love working with the Russo brothers. They brought up a fun point about working with them, saying it works because there’s a balance. There’s two of the Russos and two of them, making it easy to always find some common ground with one another.
You can see a clip here with the two of them talking about how they enjoy working with the Russo brothers:
Another interesting aspect of the discussion came from a fan bringing up a famous relationship in the MCU, that of Steve Rogers and Bucky Barnes, and asking whether the writers felt Endgame’s conclusion to their story arc was satisfying. While not an official canon ship, Stucky, as the pair is referred to in fandom, has become one of the biggest ships on fanfiction hub Ao3, Tumblr, and beyond. It’s interesting because, within the context of the MCU, they are not a canon ship, but many are angry that Steve and Bucky did not end up together.
They explained that Steve willingly leaves Bucky after an off-screen conversation because they’re both in a much more healthier place. Which yes, I agree. They are. Bucky Barnes went through a lot but he’s finally getting his life back. Look, I said already that I don’t think the MCU Bucky Barnes would want the mantle of Captain America on his shoulder and I think, at the end of the day, he wants Steve to be happy. If that’s with Peggy Carter than so be it.
Are we going to see more work from McFeely and Markus in the MCU? Right now, they say they’re exhausted, but they have their ideas for where these characters could go in the future. So we may see more of them yet!
(image: Jesse Grant/Getty Images for Disney)
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