So what was going on at the end of Ant-Man?

MAJOR SPOILERS FOR ANT-MAN

And here we are again.

Though for once, I'm almost as in the dark as everyone else. I have an idea about what's going and what it means, but the specific details are vague and the actual context is deliberately being kept from us. Still, there's enough here for me to make an educated guess. And if you're looking forward to Civil War, well then you may want to pay attention.


Before we get started, it's important to note that Ant-Man has two post-credits stingers but I'm only going to discuss the second one. The first stinger is exciting, but only has long term ramifications for the Ant-Man team. It's basically just a confirmation of what many fans had already guessed, that Evangeline Lilly's Hope Pym was going to take on her mother's mantle of the Wasp. On that note, Hooray! The Marvel Movieverse has yet another female superhero and Janet van Dyne wasn't fridged like everyone assumed! But yeah, no big secrets or reveals in that one. Still cool, don't get me wrong, but not really what we're here for.

Anyway, onto the real deal. Here's the setup; the camera pans over and we see the Falcon standing next to a sitting man whose left arm looks like it's caught in an exercise machine. We appear to be in a bare garage. Falcon calls Captain America in. Cap walks in and looks down at the sitting man. Cut to a close-up and it's revealed to be Bucky AKA the Winter Soldier with his robotic arm pressed under a vice. He looks mad, like a cornered dog. Falcon walks over to Cap and they have this exchange:

"Falcon: This would've been a lot easier a week ago.

Cap: If we call Tony...

Falcon: He won't believe us. 

Cap: Even if he did...

Falcon: Who knows if the Accords would let him help?

(pause)

Cap: We're on our own.

Falcon: Maybe not. I know a guy."

And black. Now there's a lot in that exchange to get through, but let's recap where everything is Marvel-wise to help us understand it. Firstly, the Winter Soldier. If you remember the film named after him, Buck had gone MIA at the end after surviving the crash of the helicarrier into the Potomac. But he was in no condition to do anything after Cap shattered his decades of brainwashing and he confronted the fact that he was supposed to be dead, as seen in that film's post-credits scene. Age of Ultron established that Falcon had been trying to track Bucky down while Cap and the Avengers were dismantling Hydra, but had been coming up short. Well, looks like he finally succeeded but he & Cap aren't in a good place to deal with it. Back to that in a sec, but from the look Bucky gives Cap here I think his brainwashing still hasn't completely worn off yet.

Secondly, what's going on with Iron Man. Now Tony Stark was more or less retired as an active superhero after Iron Man 3 to the point that he had destroyed most of his suits and was funding the Avengers mostly as a way to stay retired. Indeed, that was the whole point of Ultron before he went tits up. He's still mostly retired but is willing to lend a hand when needed, like in Age of Ultron. But Tony and Cap's relationship was showing some strain in Ultron, where Tony's desire to finally lock down peace rubbed against Cap's stance as the eternal soldier. They seemed to be on good terms at the end, but now...

Civil War in the comics.

So you're probably wondering by now how this stinger will lead us into Civil War. Well, let's start with those "Accords" Falcon mentions. These are probably the MCU's version of the Superhero Registration Act from the comics. The Registration Act was what started the whole storyline, forcing the entire Marvel universe to choose a side between Pro & Anti Registration. I explained this more here. What exactly these Accords are won't be clear until Civil War comes out, but it is clear that they are hampering cooperation between superheroes in some way. Hence why Falcon mentions that even if they could get Iron Man's help, there might not be much he could because of the Accords.

That's only one part of this conversation though. There's a bit more we can infer. Mostly that things are bad for Cap and Falcon. Whatever's going on with Bucky has alienated them from Iron Man (still the guy nominally in charge of the Avengers even if Cap is team leader) and they can't go to the rest of their team for help. Whether that's because of the Accords or because of Iron Man, I don't know. Heck, it could even be because of Baron Zemo for all we know. Point is, Cap & Falcon are separated from the other Avengers which is why Falcon suggests they go to Ant-Man to help them with... whatever.

But who's this Baron Zemo I mentioned? Well, he's a long-time Captain America foe who's going to be played by Inglorious Basterds' Daniel Bruhl in Civil War. In the comics, Zemo was the son of one of Cap's WW2 enemies, also called Baron Zemo, whose face had been accidentally scarred by Cap causing Zemo to swear revenge and wear a purple hood over his face to hide the scar. Zemo is most famous as the founder of the Masters of Evil, basically the evil answer to the Avengers. They were a group of former Avengers villains who teamed up to finally beat the heroes. Could he do something similar in Civil War? Maybe, but I think Zemo might do something even worse. I think he's going to kill Peggy Carter.

Baron Zemo in the comics.

Okay, this is just a complete guess on my part. There is like no evidence yet this could happen but hear me out. One of Baron Zemo's most famous stories is an Avengers tale called Under Siege. In it, he formed the biggest group of Masters of Evil yet and straight up sieged the Avengers' mansion headquarters. A huge fight ensued naturally but there was a twist at the end of the story. It turned out that wrecking the Avengers' house was never Zemo's goal, at least not his main goal. His main goal was to get to Captain America's room in the mansion, since Cap didn't really have a secret identity or a life outside the Avengers, and destroy all of Cap's most precious belongings from the 40s. Irreplaceable things like the last photo Cap had of his mother. Let me repeat that, Zemo raised the biggest army of supervillains ever seen and kicked in the Avengers' front door all so he could burn Captain America's personal affects and deal a massive, emotional wound to his worst enemy. That is some cold, petty villainy my friends.

Now, if we were to port someone that petty and evil over to the Marvel Cinematic Universe it wouldn't nearly be dramatic enough for him to just burn some old photos. No, you'd have him do something much worse to get a reaction out of the fanbase and the audience. So consider the cinematic Captain America. He too is dealing with not having a life outside the Avengers, and is desperate for any connection back to the 40s when his life made sense. And he clearly still has feelings for Peggy Carter, he visits her in her Alzheimer's ward and remember that the Scarlet Witch caused him to hallucinate her in Age of Ultron. Peggy Carter is quite literally the only thing Cap still has left from his time in the 40s. So if you had a cold, petty villain looking to hurt his enemy in the most emotionally devastating way possible, a villain who is the proud descendant of a Nazi at that, would it be too much of a stretch to have that villain murder an Alzheimer's patient? Especially if that Alzheimer's patient is beloved by your fanbase? I wouldn't be afraid to do it if I was Marvel.

But again, just pure speculation on my part. It got you thinking though, didn't it? See you again next summer when we'll find out if I was right.