How THAT ‘Captain America: Brave New World’ cameo sets up ‘Thunderbolts*’

Warning: Major spoilers for Captain America: Brave New World to follow.

As the trailers have proven, Captain America: Brave New World spends a lot of time looking backward, bringing together characters, themes, and dangling plot-threads from such disparate MCU properties as The Falcon and the Winter Soldier, The Incredible Hulk, and Eternals. Even so, it has a duty to propel the Multiverse Saga forward at the same time. So, how does it do on that front?

Well, not great, honestly. As perhaps we could’ve predicted, its (lone) post-credits scene paves the way for Avengers: Doomsday — or at least it vaguely gestures somewhere in the right direction. Where Brave New World is perhaps more successful is in setting the stage for the very next Marvel Studios movie, Thunderbolts*, something that’s achieved through the welcome cameo of an old fan-favorite.

Captain America: Brave New World‘s big Thunderbolts* cameo, unpacked

Brave New World isn’t Deadpool & Wolverine, so it’s really not all that interested in cameos. The one that it holds back all the way until its final scene has even been spoiled by the director ahead of time — Liv Tyler’s return as Betty Ross, for the first time since 2008.

The film’s only other cameo is the one that will excite fans more, however, even though it comes earlier in the runtime. At the end of the movie’s second act, Sam Wilson is at his lowest point after the Leader has engineered open hostilities between the U.S. and Japan over the reserve of adamantium discovered in Celestial Island (the calcified god poking out of the ocean from Eternals — come on, keep up!). Although Cap managed to save the day and make peace, it came at a steep personal cost as his sidekick, Joaquin Torres (Danny Ramirez), is left gravely injured.

While Sam is watching over his beaten-up buddy at the hospital, he’s joined by another old friend — none other than Bucky Barnes (Sebastian Stan). Sam confesses to the former Winter Soldier that he regrets not taking the super-soldier serum — offered to him in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier — as the global threat he’s facing feels beyond his means to thwart. Bucky reassures him that Steve Rogers gave him the shield for a reason and that he is more than enough as he is. “Steve gave the people something to believe in,” he says. “You give them something to aspire to.”

Brightening up, Sam teasingly asks if Bucky’s “speech writers” helped him come up with that. Bucky then admits that he’s got a “campaign” to get back to before leaving. Ruth Bat-Seraph (Shira Haas) then enters and notes that there goes “future Congressman James Buchanan Barnes.” Umm, excuse me?

Yes, fans had already worked this out from a close analysis of the trailers (you can see him wearing a congressional lapel pin in certain clips), but it seems Bucky will become a member of Congress in Thunderbolts*. What we’re now left to ponder, then, is how on Earth a former Russian-controlled assassin with more red in his ledger than Black Widow — who murdered countless notable U.S. citizens while under mind control — is now an elected official. Bucky has rarely expressed an interest in talking to people before, let alone getting into politics.

As for how this sows the seeds for Thunderbolts*, Contessa Val (Julia Louis-Dreyfus) likely needs his support in the House to form her Thunderbolts team, which is how he ends up involved with the anti-hero group. No doubt Bucky’s arc in the film will see him re-embrace his nature as a man of action after uncomfortably transforming himself into a man of the people. We’ll find out what’s next for Congressman Barnes once Thunderbolts* thunders into theaters come May 2.