So a post discussing new Thunderbolts promotional arts appeared earlier today in the John Walker tag trying to single out John as the odd man out of this Thunderbolts team, saying how everyone in the team deserves to grow and heal but John deserves to die and never be redeemed because he's not like the others.
I'm here to explain why what you see below is totally wrong and shows a fundamental misunderstanding of John and the Thunderbolts movie.
"this man willingly joined the military"
I don't know if the poster is American or not, but this claim ignores the very important context of how John joined the military and when he joined the military. You see, John is canonically stated to have gone to West Point for college, that is a military academy, which means that during high school when John was underage, he would already have been preparing for his application process, getting letters from his congressman or senator or even the president. The selection process is incredibly stringent. You don't decide to go to West Point and apply on a whim like you do regular colleges. Attending a military academy is a long term commitment because after you graduate, you are automatically put into active duty service as an officer, your contract is signed by you agreeing at 17/18 years old to go to this military college.
Some people may not understand, but America has a hugely active military recruitment system that targets children, especially kids from disadvantaged communities. Military recruiters are literally legally given access to high schools across the country, they're allowed personal contact information of kids, they get to show up at career fairs and other activities to actively recruit children to be soldiers and lie to them about all the good things they will do and the opportunities and benefits they will receive. And THIS IS NORMALIZED in American society. The exploitation of children and turning them into soldiers is NORMALIZED. Even celebrated.
So tell me, in an environment that already normalizes and praises the idea of being a soldier and protecting your country and giving yourself for true heroic service, is it that illogical and surprising that a young underage John would have bought into the idea of service as so many other young kids do? Not to mention we don't even know if his school had a mandatory JROTC (Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps) program that funnels kids straight into military service. Or if the MCU follows John's comics history and his father and his older brother both have served. Either way, John lives in an environment and a country that idealizes soldiers to kids, actively recruits and exploits kids, and heavily showers them in heroic military propaganda. A propaganda that even Steve in the 40s buys into and is eager to serve, and Steve was already an adult in his 20s. Meanwhile John was a young teenager when 9/11 happened, when the country was actively rallying its citizens through lies and getting people to buy into a war to defend freedom and protect our loved ones. If people older than John bought into this, then why is it surprising that a teenager surrounded by all this rhetoric and propaganda would buy into it, thinking that he is doing a good thing to help?
Just because indoctrination is normalized by society doesn't mean it's any less harmful indoctrination. Just because John wasn't kidnapped or forced into being a weapon doesn't mean he wasn't turned into one by the military industrial complex as a teenager. And just because he willingly signed up for something that his at best 18 year old self wouldn't have ever properly been mature enough to fully comprehend, doesn't mean he was not abused by a violent system that doesn't care about him beyond using him as a tool. The same way that violent systems of control used and abused the other members of the Thunderbolts team.
We all understand abuse and exploitation and power imbalance when an 18 year old is dating a 35 year old. When abuse happens in that context, we don't say "well the 18 year old willingly got into that relationship so who cares", so why is this kind of dismissive tone taken with John? If a domestic abuse victim stays in a relationship because of complicated feelings, do we blame the victim? What's happening here with John is a form of victim blaming. A very easy kind of victim blaming because the illusion of choice makes some people, like the above poster, think that John asked for it. So John can't be like the others. Nevermind that John's experiences likely mirrors Alexei's yet this poster never seems to call out Alexei for anything.
Yes, John willingly joined the military, but pretending that there isn't a more nuanced context of why and how he joined is to be ignorant to exploitation and indoctrination beyond just the garden variety kidnapping and forced brainwashing, and the insidious nature of that kind of trauma and exploitation. And it also ignores that John's decision was likely made when he was underage and under the influence of a hugely active military recruitment and exploitation apparatus. The creatives behind the Falcon and the Winter Soldier even once stated that the military was John's only family, which implies that he was a vulnerable and lonely child looking for a home, and the military took advantage of that so that they would ensure John would be loyal and grateful to them. They groomed him to be their weapon, no matter how "willing" he made that decision as a teenager.
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"willingly decided to try to become Captain America"
This comment shows a lack of understanding of how the military works. John didn't ask to be Cap, he didn't even know what the government and military was doing until they showed up one day to give him a new job duty two weeks before they were gonna officially unveil him. There is no willing or unwilling in the military when you're a soldier, you follow your orders. Sure, you can disobey unlawful orders, but guess what, being the next Captain America is not an unlawful order. John didn't get to choose. The military made the decision and it was his job to obey. Because if he didn't obey, he would end up in court martial and in jail. There is no agency in this. You are not an individual, you are property of the US military to do as they wish. And if you don't obey, they will make your life and your loved ones' lives hell.
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"willingly killed people in a way that everyone knows Steve never would have"
What people? John killed one person. One person in the heat of the moment in the middle of grieving his best friend who he just watched be killed right in front of his eyes. If anyone would have understood why John did what he did, it would actually be Steve. Yes John doesn't have Steve's restraint, but let's not act like Steve doesn't know the anger and rage that comes in those moments. And if Bucky had watched Sam be killed, he would have done what John did. In fact, most of the MCU would have done what John did. Tony did. Thor did. Wanda did. Peter Parker and Peter Quill did. Yelena did. Clint did. T'Challa did it twice even after learning the lesson of letting go of revenge. Are all those heroes irredeemable and deserve to die?
Hell, in a post that accuses John of not being like the other Thunderbolts, John does the same thing that Yelena and Ava have both done, wanting to hurt and kill and lash out in pain and revenge. Yelena was going to kill Clint for revenge. Ava literally did not care if her actions would have killed civilians if it got her what she wanted to fix herself, was even ready to threaten Scott's young daughter Cassie. Both of them were no longer under the control of their abusers at that point, yet what makes their chosen rage and lashing out okay and understanding but John's somehow the most evil thing a person has ever done? What makes his pain and loss any less than theirs? In fact, in the Thunderbolts trailer, we watch Yelena just gun down guards left and right, does it make her irredeemable for choosing to still do killing when she no longer has to? Why is all this hypocritical judgment only against John?
And if we even want to address the people John killed in war and how Steve would never, let's just remember that in the Winter Soldier movie, Steve specifically states to Fury that he and the others during the war did somethings that weren't so good, that made them not sleep so well at night, but they thought they were doing it for people to be free. Yes, freedom, the same thing that the US military has been peddling since its conception. So why is it okay when Steve does terrible things in war for freedom, but John is a monster for also doing the same?
John wasn't running about happily wanting to shoot every bad guy. He never had any intentions of hurting anyone, only arresting them, even though the Flag Smashers tried to kill him and Lemar from day one. Even after Karli blew up a building with innocent people still inside it, John wasn't going to kill them but only arrest them. He only killed one Flag Smasher in the heat of the moment because he just saw Lemar die. You know what T'Challa said to Natasha after losing his father and thinking that Bucky did it? He said he would kill Bucky himself, even though Natasha pointed out that there was due process and a task force would arrest Bucky.
Why is it that violent desire for revenge is understood when other MCU heroes/protagonists do it, but John is somehow uniquely evil and not-like-the-others because he lashed out in a very human way? Why is John not allowed his humanity?
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I will be the first to say John is flawed, he is imperfect, he did make mistakes. But he is not this willful evil monster that this poster tries to paint him as. He is someone whom for essentially 20 years has been trained and groomed to be a perfect weapon for a violent and abusive system that he thought of as his only family. And when this system no longer had any uses for him, it threw him out like trash and left him to drown. This poster talks about other Thunderbolts members rebuilding themselves and their sense of identity, yet this is John's struggle too. Who is he if not a soldier?
The showrunner of TFATWS literally stated that John and Bucky were two sides of the same coin of a veteran's story, of what happens when you give everything for a cause that abandons you and doesn't care for you back. Even the writers of this show understood and deliberately wanted to link John and Bucky's mutual struggles as veterans. Yet this poster wants to exclude John, because the illusion of choice made his trauma and indoctrination and grooming less "real" than the others somehow. This isn't trauma olympics. John is a broken and abused and abandoned weapon, just like every member of the Thunderbolts team. And quite frankly I'm sick and tired of people ignoring this reality because their own hate of the character blinds them to nuance and context.
Death is not the only acceptable character arc for John. He can grow to be a better person and learn to stand up against the system that harmed him and many others. And they can and will redeem him, you know why? They already did. Because John already in TFATWS finale chose to walk away from easy revenge so he could save lives. He has already proven that he could be worthy of that shield and title even if he no longer has it. And the Thunderbolts movie is about ALL of this team learning to overcome their past trauma, of learning to love and accept each other, yes even John. He isn't the exception. He is a integral part of this new team and family. And if you think that Thunderbolts is just gonna be a movie that is designed to kick John out and otherize him, then you've missed the point of this story that the cast and director have stated many times in interviews already. Hopefully Thunderbolts will teach you some important lessons about bias and judgment.
The poster of the comments says that they need to still rewatch TFATWS, and I would say to that, yes, yes you do need to rewatch, preferably rewatch with your eyes, ears, brain, and heart open, because you have missed many important contexts and nuances in your desire to only see John as some unforgivable monster.
By the way, Alexei and John are literally characters sharing the same background, Alexei is just as willing of a participant, yet the fact that those comments never once judge Alexei for actively participating in child trafficking and letting the abuse of little girls keep happening, and somehow Alexei still isn't so irredeemable and could be counted among the others who should get to learn to heal and grow is certainly a choice.
Anyways, here is hoping that when Thunderbolts finally releases, people will learn a lesson about John and how wrong some of yall are.
you are a gem for all your analyses <333
