Why Falcon & The Winter Soldier Is The Next Show After WandaVision
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is set to premiere on Disney+ on March 19, just two weeks after the WandaVision finale, and there’s good reason why it will be the MCU’s next entry. The upcoming miniseries, which stars Anthony Mackie as Sam Wilson/Falcon and Sebastian Stan as Bucky Barnes/Winter Soldier, was initially intended to air as the first Disney+ MCU show of Phase 4. However, due to COVID-19 production delays, WandaVision ended up airing before it.
The various delays and hindrances caused by the coronavirus pandemic forced Disney to reorder their initial Phase 4 release slate, but that doesn’t mean the new order doesn’t have some thinking behind it. After the conclusion of the Infinity Saga in Avengers: Endgame, the MCU got a soft reset. The core story that had been driving the first three phases was over, and in its aftermath, the franchise seems to be taking a more focused, personal approach to its storytelling.
WandaVision is, in many ways, a story about that aftermath. With no Thanos to prepare for or other crisis threatening the lives of billions, Scarlet Witch struggles to return to anything resembling a normal life after all the trauma she’s experienced. SWORD embodies a different side of the Endgame fallout, showing that humanity has grown more fearful in the wake of the Snap. The agency’s experiments on Vision and obsession with superpowered individuals can be seen as direct responses to the first three phases of the MCU.
From what’s been shown so far, it looks like The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will continue that theme of the aftermath. Sam and Bucky have once again become assets for a governing force, responding to the threat of Baron Zemo, whose entire villainous mission is a campaign against superheroes and the collateral damage they cause. Zemo’s extremism and Sam and Bucky’s status as glorified weapons can both be seen as responses to the events of the Infinity Saga, and the theme of super-people being under heightened scrutiny is a direct continuation of the storyline from WandaVision.
Another way The Falcon and the Winter Soldier embodies this idea of the aftermath is in its treatment of Steve Rogers and the Captain America legacy. The series will deal with the cultural impact of Captain America, and how his name and image are carried forward by Sam, Bucky, and the government itself. Just as Spider-Man: Far From Home dealt with the passing of Iron Man and WandaVision deals with Vision’s death, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier will in many ways be a response to the retirement of Captain America.