History Recap / TheFalconAndTheWinterSoldierEpisode2TheStarSpangledMan

** "He's a ''sorcerer''."

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: Given the obvious fan suspicion/immediate-and-undying-hatred of the new Captain America, the show went out of its way to portray him as nervous about his forthcoming interview and give him a Hispanic wife and Black best friend. In other words, ''not'' a secret Nazi who's been dreaming of this day.

** A member of the Flag-Smashers gives up his chance to leave with the others to slow down the Power Broker's men.

* GodzillaThreshold: Bucky decides to visit Zemo for information on HYDRA, as that's the likely source of the serum that has empowered the Flag-Smashers.

* PintSizedPowerhouse: Karli Morgenthau looks like a regular young woman but beats the crap out of the two Avengers, the new Captain America, and his sidekick.
* PlotMandatedFriendshipFailure: This episode shows how Sam and Bucky are starting to undergo this.

* RetiredBadass: Isaiah Bradley is an elderly Black man... and former super-soldier. And he still has his super strength.

* RhetoricalQuestionBlunder: Of a sort. When Bucky asks John Walker if he ever [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger jumped on top of a grenade]], Walker replies yes, he did, four times, but he did it with his reinforced helmet. Doubles as ComicallyMissingThePoint (of a very dry comedy variety) as the question was about being willing to sacrifice himself, not his reflexes in stopping grenades with his helmet, exasperating Bucky and Sam and further highlighting that Walker's similarities to Steve are only skin deep.

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Bucky immediately orders the Jeep to pull over and continues walking to the airport after hearing Hoskins’s code name is Battlestar. Sam follows a few seconds later when Walker makes the mistake of saying [[InnocentlyInsensitive it would be easier if he had Cap’s wingman on his side.]]

* SlasherSmile: Karli gives a huge one to Bucky before punting him out of the cargo truck.

* TraumaCongaLine: Sam gets put through quite the emotional wringer this episode. First, he meets with Walker, the man they immediately gave Steve's shield and title to, who turns out to be kind of obliviously insufferable. Then, he discovers that the legacy of Captain America that he feels Steve blindly burdened him with was built on the suffering of black men just like himself, including discovering that all this time there was a black man who was successfully given Super Serum and fought valiantly for his country only to be jailed, tortured, and experimented on for decades. Immediately after that, he's thrown out onto the street, where a racist cop nearly arrests him in the middle of his anger at never having been told about this. On top of that, he's forced to sit in a therapy session only for a fight to break out with Bucky, who blames Sam for letting the shield get away, unable to understand his justified motives for giving the shield away, and making him so angry that he tells Bucky he hopes to never see him again after the mission is over. All in all, quite a horrible day.

* VillainousUnderdog: The Flag-Smashers are former civilians going up against military operatives (with two being bonafide Avengers). They still leave them in the dust.

* WeAreStrugglingTogether: Sam and Bucky's attempts to work together resulting in this.

** All of us are familiar with the capabilities of both Sam and Bucky (since their [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier MCU debut]]), while John Walker is established in the first minutes of the episode to be at least physically and politically capable of performing the role of the government-sponsored Captain America. That said, all of them come away empty-handed in their encounter with the Flag-Smashers--who avoid MookChivalry and exploited their numbers to overwhelm and neutralize whatever experience advantage they had. Bucky gets the worst of it and is the first to be taken out of the fight, despite being the only one of the four who should be a match for a super soldier, mostly because they gang up on him.

* YouShallNotPass: While the Flag-Smashers prepare to flee Munich by plane, one of them, implied to be a relative of Karli's, stays behind to draw fire from an ambush as the plane takes off.

* AllAmericanFace: John Walker, the new Captain America, is not just a decorated soldier and war hero, but also has a Hispanic wife and BlackBestFriend, reflecting a more culturally inclusive America. He's also loyal to the U.S. government's orders rather than his own conscience, something that is very different from his predecessor.

* ArbitrarySkepticism: Sam's idea of the big three threats that superheroes face consist of androids, aliens and wizards. Bucky vehemently denies the existence of the latter, despite not only fighting alongside magic users like Doctor Strange, but even acknowledging him by name.

* AtrociousAlias: When Lemar reveals that his codename is 'Battlestar', Bucky demands that the Jeep they're riding in to stop so he can get out and walk the rest of the way to the airport.
* BadassNormal: Despite his tremendous physical abilities, John Walker mentions he doesn't have any super strength. His best friend and partner Lemar Hoskins/Battlestar is likely this as well.

* BigDamnHeroes: Just when Sam and Bucky are about to get their teeth kicked in by the Flag-Smashers, the new Captain America and his sidekick Battlestar arrive to bail them out. Ultimately subverted as they get their asses kicked as well.

* ButtMonkey: In this episode, Bucky Barnes, the famed and dreaded former Winter Soldier who terrorized the world for over 70 years, gets his ass handed to him by a bunch of randos with super strength, constantly mocked by the closest thing he has to a friend, and at one point gets arrested for missing his court-mandated therapy session.

** A new rendition of [[Film/CaptainAmericatheFirstAvenger "Star Spangled Man"]] is played by the marching band during Walker's interview. Though given that the song was an in-universe propaganda piece it was most likely an [[Main/InvokedTrope invoked trope]] to appeal to the public's nostalgia.
** The whole public event and pageantry unveiling Walker as the new Captain America also invokes Steve's USO shows, and Walker is even shown practicing and stumbling over his lines, much like Steve did when he first started out.
** Bucky jumps from the plane without taking a parachute just like Cap from ''Film/CaptainAmericaTheWinterSoldier'' though Bucky's landing isn't as graceful.

* TheChainsOfCommanding: Somewhat. In his private moment with his wife and Hoskins, John Walker suggests him being made Captain America was way out of his expectations (albeit something [[HeroWorshipper he also dreamt of becoming similar to]]). He also seems to be very eager to make a very good impression to the public of it too. That said, the subtext of the conversations suggests it's also beginning to get to him.

** Isaiah Bradley never seemed to have served as Captain America in the MCU, just a super soldier sent against the Winter Soldier.

** A brief shot of the surveillance footage of Zemo shows that his cell number is 2187 -- the same cell that Princess Leia was held in during ''Film/ANewHope'', and the same identification number as Finn's in ''Film/TheForceAwakens''.

* FiveSecondForeshadowing: Isaiah says he defeated the Winter Soldier and took half of his metal arm. No mention is made of anyone else helping him. A moment later, we find out how he did that, when he reveals his SuperStrength and the fact that he's a SuperSoldier.
* {{Foil}}: Isaiah Bradley is a tragic version of Steve Rogers. He was a super soldier and war hero in the '50s who battled HYDRA but was imprisoned for 30 years (a twisted version of Steve being frozen in ice for decades) to be tested upon, before being released to build a family and live out his old age in relative peace, albeit in [[WretchedHive a run-down portion of Baltimore]]. He's also very similar to Bucky, who was himself a super soldier imprisoned against his will and experimented upon.

* GilliganCut: Bucky tells Sam that he's coming with him to Munich. Sam tells him "No, you're not" but then the scene cuts to Bucky sitting with Sam on the plane.

* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: At the start of The Winter Soldier’s career, when he was just starting to make his legendary reputation and at his physical prime as the “fist of Hydra,” a lone American operative was sent to deal with him in the Korean War... and walked away after tearing his cybernetic arm off. But because he was black and the result of secret Super Soldier experimentation, the world never heard the legend of Isaiah Bradley, who was imprisoned and experimented on afterwards. Sam, understandably, is pissed.
* HeroOfAnotherStory: Isaiah Bradley alludes to a time in the 1950s when he was sent to fight the Winter Soldier in Goyang-si, South Korea, and tore off half of Bucky's mechanical arm. Bucky also mentions that Isaiah was a threat to HYDRA on par with Steve Rogers, implying the man was a very prolific super soldier.
* HeroicSacrifice: Well, heroic from the viewpoint of the Flag-Smashers. One of Karli's friends remains behind to hold off an attack squad sent by someone called the Power Broker. He's killed in the process, but buys the group enough time to escape.
* HitAndRunTactics: The Flag-Smashers' MO seems to be this: conduct operations and sow chaos to achieve a particular objective, then make themselves scarce. Taking into account that they seem to be former civilians who simply got their hands on SuperSerum, it makes sense for them to employ such guerilla-style operations.

* LowClearance: Sam attempts to use this on a Flag-Smasher when the trucks approach an overhanging road sign by flying up over it, but she just punches straight through it.
* MoodWhiplash: The therapy session, which starts off with Bucky and Sam's VitriolicBestBuds routine, takes a darker turn when they call each other out over the latter's decision to give up Steve's shield and agree to part ways after dealing with the Flag-Smashers.

** The kid assumes Sam's superhero name is "Black Falcon", because he's black and the Falcon. Sam corrects him, saying he's just Falcon, and notes that the kid isn't called "Black Kid", alluding to the fact that Falcon was the first black comic-book hero to not have "Black" in his title.

** Two scenes first featured in the trailer, Sam and Bucky going down a countryside road and their shared therapy session with Dr. Raynor, are shown in this episode. What aren't present are the scenes' lines at the end of each trailer scene ("God, I hate you" and "I mean, how old ''are'' you?" respectively). Also, the scene where Bucky yells after Sam in the plane after Sam jumps out, asking him what his plan is that was showed during the Official Trailer is not present during the episode.

* NoodleIncident: Bucky (as the Winter Soldier) and Isaiah had a violent altercation in a bar in Goyang in 1951 during the UsefulNotes/KoreanWar. No specifics are given, but Isaiah strongly implies that he won the fight, and notes that he tore off half of Bucky's metal arm.

* PintSizedPowerhouse: Karli Morgenthau looks like a regular young woman, but beats the crap out of the two Avengers, the new Captain America, and his sidekick.
* PlotMandatedFriendshipFailure: This episode show how Sam and Bucky are starting to undergo this.

** Somewhat lampshaded by the episode being titled "The Star-Spangled Man".
** John Walker reveals his desire is to live up to Steve's legacy while maintaining his individuality.

* {{Profiling}}: {{Zigzagged|Trope}}: After leaving Isaiah Bradley's house and having a shouting bout, Sam and Bucky were stopped by police who are clearly ready to take Sam (a black man) into custody for assaulting Bucky (a white man). Bucky only prevents it by invoking YouHaveNoIdeaWhoYoureDealingWith, with the police [[MuggingTheMonster embarrased to realize they've tried to arrest Avengers]]. ''Then'', a call comes in and they are forced to arrest Bucky instead--[[SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome because he skipped out on his court-mandated therapy]].
* PropagandaHero: Like Steve when he first started out, John Walker being christened the new Captain America is largely a PR campaign to help against the Flag-Smashers, right down to having the same propaganda theme song. Unlike Steve, however, Walker is also a combat asset and participates in missions, whereas Steve had to violate orders and stage a risky solo rescue mission to earn that privilege.
* RememberTheNewGuy: Isaiah Bradley, a retired super soldier and successor to Steve Rogers, has been an operative since at least the 1950s, but has never showed up until now. This is justified by the fact that Isaiah was a covert asset whose existence was never revealed to the public, he quite clearly wants to be left alone and has no desire to correct the record, and Bucky never told Steve (probably because he knew it would break Steve's heart and possibly send him on a rampage against the U.S. Government).
* ReplacementScrappy: [[invoked]] Openly acknowledged by John Walker himself: while public sentiment seems to be so far on his side, he nonetheless admits to Sam and Bucky that trying to replace/one up Steve's legacy is a pointless exercise--he just wants to make it work, and he thinks he could do a better job with Steve's actual comrades on his side. Sam and Bucky don't like him very much anyway, and take particular offense to being treated as mere 'wingmen'/'legitimizers'.
* RetiredBadass: Isaiah Bradley is an elderly Black man... and former super soldier. And he still has his super strength.

* RhetoricalQuestionBlunder: Of a sort. When Bucky asks John Walker if he ever [[Film/CaptainAmericaTheFirstAvenger jumped on top of a grenade]], Walker replies yes, he did, four times, but he did it with his reinforced helmet. Doubles as ComicallyMissingThePoint (of a very dry comedy variety) as the question was about being willing to sacrifice himself not his reflexes in stopping grenades with his helmet, exasperating Bucky and Sam and further highlighting that Walker's similarities to Steve are only skin deep.
* RulesLawyer: Ultimately, John Walker's attitude to his role as Captain America is to be 'the perfect soldier', which means respecting and enforcing U.S. government guidelines over him and other Sokovia Accords-covered peoples. This means, then, that he will choose to obey orders instead of seeing things Sam's and Bucky's way. They part [[{{Understatement}} not on good terms]] by the end of the episode. Needless to say, this was not the philosophy of Steve Rogers, who always chose Good over Lawfulness.
* RunningGag: All throughout the episode jokes are made about Bucky's perpetual DeathGlare expression.
* ScrewTheRulesIHaveConnections: [[PlayingWithATrope Played with]]: Bucky's arrest for skipping mandated therapy was overturned/bailed for by John Walker, who seems pretty insistent in getting into Sam and Bucky's graces. That said, Dr. Raynor still insisted that for it to stick, she has to process Sam and Bucky immediately.

* SecretKeeper: Bucky knew about Isaiah Bradley being a former super soldier, but never told anyone, not even Steve, because he felt Isaiah had suffered enough and deserved to be left alone in peace.

* ThisIsGonnaSuck: When Bucky is informed that the plane is too low for a parachute but too high to just jump, he grits his teeth and jumps out anyway. He uses his vibranium arm to slow his descent as he falls screaming through the trees, and he lands flat on his face at just under terminal velocity.

* TraumaCongaLine: Sam gets put through quite the emotional wringer this episode. First he meets with Walker, the man they immediately gave Steve's shield and title to, who turns out to be kind of obliviously insufferable. Then, he discovers that the legacy of Captain America that he feels Steve blindly burdened him with was built on the suffering of black men just like himself, including discovering that all this time there was a black man who was successfully given Super Serum and fought valiantly for his country only to be jailed, tortured, and experimented on for decades. Immediately after that he's thrown out onto the street where he's nearly arrested by a racist cop in the middle of his anger at never having been told about this. On top of that, he's forced to sit in a therapy session only for a fight to break out with Bucky who blames Sam for letting the shield get away, unable to understand his justified motives for giving the shield away, and making him so angry that he tells Bucky he hopes to never see him again after the mission is over. All in all, quite a horrible day.
* UngratefulBastard: Justified. John Walker and Battlestar seem friendly and polite to the openly hostile Sam and Bucky, coming to their rescue when the Flag-Smashers are beating them, offering them a ride when they had to walk 20 miles to the airport, and bailing Bucky out of jail. Yet their hostility is warranted because Walker only helps them when it benefits himself. After the failed rescue, he tries to recruit them as his "wingmen" to shore up his credibility, and when he bails Bucky out of jail, he does so because Bucky is an "asset" and cancels Bucky's much-needed therapy. He drops the friendly veneer as soon as Sam and Bucky make it clear they have no interest in working with him.
* VillainousUnderdog: The Flag-Smashers are former civilians going up against military operatives (with two of those being bona-fide Avengers). They still leave them in the dust.

* WeAreStrugglingTogether: Sam and Bucky's attempts to work together result in this.
* WhamLine: The Flag-Smashers mention the Power Broker, who in the comics was the man that John Walker and Lemar Hoskins went to buy Super Soldier serum from back when John became the Super-Patriot. This explains where the Flag-Smashers got the serum.

* WoundedGazelleGambit: Karli pretends to be a hostage captured by the Flag-Smashers in order to get the drop on Bucky.
* WreckedWeapon: Redwing, unfortunately, gets smashed in half by Karli. [[AndThereWasMuchRejoicing Bucky practically celebrates its “death”.]]

* YourTerroristsAreOurFreedomFighters: The Flag-Smashers, despite their unsavory image with the U.S. government, seem to have enough grassroots clout that they have families taking the risk of giving them shelter. Their conversations also imply that they represent [[FantasticRacism a growing social rift]] between the people who were [[Film/AvengersInfinityWar Snapped]] and [[Film/AvengersEndgame the people who were left behind]].

* UngratefulBastard: [[JustifiedTrope Justified]]. John Walker and Battlestar seem friendly and polite to the openly hostile Sam and Bucky, coming to their rescue when the Flag-Smashers are beating them, offering them a ride when they had to walk 20 miles to the airport, and bailing Bucky out of jail. Yet their hostility is warranted because Walker only helps them when it benefits himself. After the failed rescue, he tries to recruit them as his "wingmen" to shore up his credibility, and when he bails Bucky out of jail, he does so because Bucky is an "asset" and cancels Bucky's much-needed therapy. He drops the friendly veneer as soon as Sam and Bucky make it clear they have no interest in working with him.

* HitAndRunTactics: The Flag-Smashers' MO seems to be this: conduct operations and sow chaos to achieve a particular objective, then make themselves scarce. Taking into account that they seem to be former civilians who simply got their hands on SuperSerum, [[JustifiedTrope it makes sense for them to employ such guerilla-style operations]].

* TraumaCongaLine: Sam gets put through quite the emotional wringer this episode. First he meets with Walker, the man they immediately replaced him with, who turns out to be kind of an insufferable asshole. Then, he discovers that the legacy of Captain America that he feels Steve blindly burdened him with was built on the suffering of black men just like himself, including discovering that all this time there was a black man who was successfully given Super Serum and fought valiantly for his country only to be jailed, tortured, and experimented on for decades. Immediately after that he's thrown out onto the street where he's nearly arrested by a racist cop in the middle of his anger at never having been told about this. On top of that, he's forced to sit in on a therapy session only for a fight to break out with Bucky who blames Sam for letting the shield get away, unable to understand his justified motives for giving the shield away, and making him so angry that he tells Bucky he hopes to never see him again after the mission is over. All in all, quite a horrible day.

* TeethClenchedTeamwork: Sam and Bucky may hate working with each other, constantly needling each other and trading barbs back and forth, but that is nothing compared to the contempt they feel towards working with John Walker.

* OlderThanTheyLook: An understated one, but extrapolated from his period of active duty during the Korean War, Isaiah Bradley, at his youngest, would have to be in his late 80s, and yet looks and acts like a man 20 years his junior (for the record, [[Creator/CarlLumbly his actor]] was 69 years old at the time). Probably has to do with the super soldier serum he received.

** During Sam and Bucky's confrontation with the cops, it looks like Sam is the one about to be arrested or possibly killed due to the officer's profiling. But the scene actually ends with ''Bucky'' being arrested (due to missing his court-mandated therapy session).

** During Sam and Bucky's confrontation with the cops, it looks like Sam is the one about to be arrested due to the officer's racism. But the scene actually ends with ''Bucky'' being arrested (due to missing his court-mandated therapy session).

* TheGreatestStoryNeverTold: At the start of The Winter Soldier’s career, when he was just starting to make his legendary reputation and at his physical prime as the “fist of Hydra,” a lone American operative was sent to deal with him in the Korean War... and walked away after tearing his cybernetic arm off. But because he was black, the world never heard the legend of Isaiah Bradley, who was imprisoned and experimented on afterwards. Sam, understandably, is pissed.

* EnemyMine: Downplayed as they aren't enemies (yet), but Sam and Bucky are united in their disgust for John Walker and Lemar Hoskins.

* TheChainsOfCommanding: Somewhat. In his private moment with his significant other and Hoskins, John Walker suggests him being made Captain America was way out of his expectations (albeit something [[HeroWorshipper he also dreamt of becoming similar to]]). He also seems to be very eager to make a very good impression to the public of it too. That said, the subtext of the conversations suggests it's also beginning to get to him.

* CaptainEthnic: Sam gets mistakenly called Black Falcon by a Baltimore kid who assumes it's his name because he's black and the Falcon. Sam gets one over by asking if he's Black Kid.

* TokenWhite: The celebration in honor of John Walker as the new Captain America takes place at his old high school in Custer's Grove, Georgia. If the performers are any indication, John was one of the very few white kids at the school.

* BaitAndSwitch: Isaiah makes a comment about how Bucky and "his people" treated him during the Korean War. When he and Sam leave Isaiah's home, Sam assumes Isaiah meant white people; Bucky knows he meant his superiors in HYDRA.

* TraumaCongaLine: Sam gets put through quite the emotional wringer this episode. First he meets with Walker, the man they immediately replaced him with, who turns out to be kind of an insufferable asshole. Then, he discovers that the legacy of Captain America that he feels Steve blindly burdened him, with was built on the suffering of black men just like himself, including discovering that all this time there was a black man who was successfully given Super Serum and fought valiantly for his country only to be jailed, tortured, and experimented on for decades. Immediately after that he's thrown out onto the street where he's nearly arrested by a racist cop in the middle of his anger at never having been told about this. On top of that, he's forced to sit in on a therapy session only for a fight to break out with Bucky who blames Sam for letting the shield get away, unable to understand his justified motives for giving the shield away, and making him so angry that he tells Bucky he hopes to never see him again after the mission is over. All in all, quite a horrible day.

* WreckedWeapon: Redwing, unfortunately, gets easily smashed in half by Karli.

* TokenWhite: The celebration in honor of John Walker as the new Captain America takes place at his old high school in Georgia. If the performers are any indication, John was one of the very few white kids at the school.

* AllAmericanFace: John Walker, the new Captain America, is not just a decorated soldier and war hero, but also has a black wife and BlackBestFriend, reflecting a more culturally inclusive America. He's also loyal to the U.S. government's orders rather than his own conscience, something that is very different from his predecessor.

* ArbitrarySkepticism: Sam's idea of the big three threats that superheroes face consist of androids, aliens and wizards. Bucky vehemently denies the existence of the latter, despite not only fighting alongside magic users like Doctor Strange, but even acknowledging him by name.

* BaitAndSwitch: Isaiah makes a comment about how Bucky and "his people" treated him during the Korean War. When he and Sam leave Isaiah's home, the conversation suggests Isaiah's comment was about race; it turns out he actually meant Bucky's people being his superiors in HYDRA.

* TokenWhite: The celebration in honor of John Walker as the new Captain America takes place at his old high school in Georgia. It's implied that he was one of the very few white kids at the school.

* EstablishingCharacterMoment: Given the obvious fan suspicion/immediate-and-undying-hatred of the new Captain America, the show went out of its way to portray him as nervous about his forthcoming interview and give him a black wife and black best friend. In other words, ''not'' a secret nazi who's been dreaming of this day.