This ending for Steve really only kinda works on the surface level for nostalgias sake.
However, it ignores a lot of character growth and arcs within the previously established canon and the writes backtracking that to make this ending work is lazy writing thb.
1. Steve’s arc: if he focus on Steve’s solo movies, they’re all about growth and moving on from the past. Yes, he was a man out of time but he learned to live with what happened to him and tried to move on. Dated (ignoring the whole Sharon Carter thing for a sec) and actually made friends. As much as the Avengers were never his family, he did find friends in some of them. Particularly Natasha and Sam. Steve himself that the man who went into the ice is not the same man that came out of it. In Winter Soldier when he goes to see Peggy she tells him herself. She lived her life. She was happy. He accepts that. He takes steps to actually find a way to be happy in the 21st century.
2. Peggy’s arc: post CATFA, chronologically, we see her move on and grieve Steve’s death. She starts figuring out life without him in Agent Carter. They had a major spark but there was a war out there and it was just never the right time for them. Both of them ended up accepting it and grieving each other and the what could’ve been of it all.As bittersweet as it is, i’m not sure Steve and Peggy ever had a change at romance. Frankly, i also think that down the line they wouldn’t have worked as well.
3. Timeline issue: so either Steve created a new timeline with his choice to stay back with Peggy or he went back in time and lived out his original timeline and altered a lot of things. If that is the case, would he have appeared back at the lake? If he hasn’t changed anything, then he also would have to have stayed kind of low-key. Cause there’s no way Steve Rogers, aka Captain America, going to protests in the 50s onwards wouldn’t have changed anything or that he wouldn’t have been noticed. Not only is he a six foot beefcake he was also the face of the USO plus there was a comic made about him. Ain’t no way he would have been able to stay under the radar.
3. The Bucky of it all: aside from Stucky, it also doesn’t make sense for Steve to abandon his friends, especially Bucky, when they return after 5 years. Their whole motivation was to get people back. Bucky returns after 5 years of hell, of losing another 5 years of his life because of someone’s evil power moves. The world has changed and is in chaos post snap, post undoing the snap… Bucky, more than ever, needs his support system in order to gain back a sense of normalcy. Yes he has Sam, thank god, but Sam also went through the same thing and they both need to lean on someone. Maybe that someone who grieved them and showed us in 3 of his solo movies that he would do anything for those he is loyal to and loves unconditionally. There’s no way Steve spends years making sure Bucky is okay, going on the run and risking everything just to go and fuck up the timeline because of a situationship he had in the 40s. That’s just not the Steve Rogers we know.
As tempting as it is to want Steve do something for himself, to be selfish for once and actually get some quiet - frankly, he is not the character it would work for.
And if you really need it.. and don’t want to saddle him with any relationship… the idea of Steve sacrificing himself re:gauntlet/stones and the snap - it would’ve been so intriguing to have Steve lose the serum and go back to his pre-serum self. It would be in line with his selfless nature, he’d still have to give the shield to someone because his pre-serum self would not be able to be the Cap he was. And it would force Steve to truly reevaluate his life and find ways to be useful while also living his life. Picket line pre-serum angry chihuahua Steve Rogers in the 21st fighting the good fight because there’s still so much shit to fight for but also finding balance in life. Artist Steve Rogers by day (social and political commentary art), protestor by.. whenever a protest happens.
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